Restaurant « (y)our food choices™

America Eats!

We love Jose Andres’ PBS cooking show, Made in Spain. It was a big inspiration for our trip last year to Spain. Jose and his food are amazing. Jose Andres is a product of Spain’s El Bulli, the once leader in molecular gastronomical cooking, and a master of all things Spanish nouveau. Jose’s approach to food captures the imagination and we’ve been hankering for a seat at one of his many tables since first seeing his program.

Our recent trip to Washington D.C. gave us the opportunity to try Jose’s interpretation of a number of classic American dishes at the former spot of his Café Atlantico. Currently flying the banner of America Eats Tavern, the effort is a partnership of Andres’ ThinkFoodGroup and The Foundation for the National Archives. Opened on the 4^th of July 2011, the effort will run a full year, closing on the 4^th of July 2012. We recommend you get there sooner than later!

Day One, Lunch: Hush puppies, root beer & ginger ale, Waldorf salad, and Maine lobster roll with housemade potato chips.

We liked the menu so much, we ate at America Eats Tavern twice over a long weekend. In round one, we kicked things off with Hush Puppies with homemade sorghum butter. Sorghum is generically sweet – sweeter than molasses and less minerally. The staple grain is refined to produce sweet syrup. We live in California and grew up in the Mountain West and we don’t know from sorghum, so this was an interesting treat.

A damn good crab cake.

Waldorf Salad, adapted from Oscar Tschirky’s 1893 creation, followed and while tasty, we thought it would have been better made with crisper, sweeter apples and celery, or at least celery leaves, instead of just an “essence” of celery. Sometimes the whole molecular cooking thing needs to be pared back a bit. This is one of those cases.

Chesapeake Crab Cakes were close to perfection with their toasty crust and pure crabmeat composition. We’re used to Dungeness crab in San Francisco but we thoroughly enjoyed the blue crab from the East Coast. The cake wasn’t gloopy with mayonnaise, it was just meat with a little seasoning. The way it should be. We shared a single generously portioned cake, but the glutton in each of us could have downed a whole one. They were very good.

And that Maine Lobster Roll! Let’s just say that while rich and satisfying, we could have eaten another and not felt bad about it. Thank goodness for Mr. Rockefeller’s mistake in eating a bowl of soup relegated to the status of servant fair. What was once a food considered “demeaning,” lobster has become one of the great oceanic delicacies and we couldn’t be happier about it. Served with housemade potato chips, this was a dish that will haunt us for years to come.

We washed all the savory stuff down with housemade ginger beer and Abita Root Beer from Louisiana. The meal ended with Pecan Pie, a tribute to George Washington’s love of the nut, and coffee with chicory a la Café du Monde (New Orleans).

Jelly donuts?

We returned for Sunday brunch to continue the trip through the restaurant’s Americana-inspired menu. This time, we started with Homemade Donuts with Blackberry Jam. Light and not overly sweet, these donuts paired nicely with the tart jam.

Next we dove into Vermicelli Prepared Like Pudding, an early American take on mac n’ cheese. We loved this surprising dish for its garlicy, buttery richness and the absence of soupy cream sauce. The accompanying intensely flavored mushrooms burst with big flavor. We were glad for the modest portion.

If you haven’t eaten grits, you must. The Shrimp ‘N’ Anson Mills Grits with a Fried Egg pays homage to 1607 Jamestown. The grits, milled from heirloom corn, is a reminder of early Native American contributions to the colonists’ subsistence. These grits are creamy and not too sweet, setting a nice neutral palette for the fresh briny shrimp and smoky bacon. And that egg. It was poached alright – poached in olive oil. The result was nothing short of delicious with the crispy fried egg on the outside, creamy yolk on the inside!

Brunch: Shrimp and grits, oyster po'boy, and vermicelli prepared like pudding.

In keeping with the prior visit’s classic sandwich theme, we jumped at the chance to order the Oyster Po’Boy. The sandwich came filled with lightly battered, crispy on the outside, creamy on the inside oysters on a roll. Served with a little mayo, a tomato slice and a bit of lettuce, this New Orleans original was delicious. The oysters were fresh and sweet. The nicely seasoned batter held the mollusks together without overwhelming the delicate oyster meat.

Even though we started the brunch with donuts, we also opted for dessert. This time, the kitchen’s take on Erma Rombauer’s (of Joy of Cooking fame) Pineapple Upside Down Cake. The pineapple puree-topped cake was accompanied by vanilla bean flecked Chantilly cream and Bachelor’s Button petals. The dish was both delicious and beautiful. This is a must try!

The beverage offerings include nearly forgotten shrubs, squashes, phosphates and lactarts. Think vinegar and fruit juice with sparkling water, maybe some milk (lactart). These drinks are dry and clean and slight on sweetness. They provide a nice alternative to beer and wine as their subtle flavors tend not to compete with the flavors of the dishes they’re paired with.

There's always room for desert. Pineapple upside down cake and pecan pie.

On both our visits to the restaurant we sat upstairs, surrounded by restored vintage posters and a James Beard saying. “I don’t like gourmet cooking or “this” cooking or “that” cooking. I like good cooking.” Jose Andres’ American rendition of classic favorites represents good cooking, but it would also be considered fancy cooking, sadly, in our day and age when portions are huge and fast food is abundant. “Typical” American food is now a far cry from what it once was. We’re grateful to Jose Andres for bringing back good American cooking and reminding us that American food is much more than a cheap hamburger and fries. If anyone needs a refresher on how great American cooking once was, and still can be, just sit back and enjoy this Spanish-American’s spin on vintage American cuisine. Viva Jose!

We chose not to photograph inside the restaurant. Enjoy the pics of the grounds.

Day three in Yountville started with a modest breakfast in the hotel. In anticipation for our big dinner at The French Laundry, we enjoyed a relatively light lunch at Hurley’s, dining on olive oil poached tuna niçoise and Crab Louis salads. Both hit the spot without being over filling. We thought it best to go into dinner without hunger headaches and the salads were a refreshing departure from the big meals of earlier restaurant visits. After a long walk around the small town of Yountville and a trip to the sauna and steam room at the Spa Villagio, we were ready to sit and eat for the next three hours. Our meal at The French Laundry would soon be a memory and we wanted it to be perfect.

Reservations were set for 8:45. Arriving a few minutes early, the host seated us in the front room while our table was being prepared. The French Laundry is a model of service, as you should expect, and they work very hard to make sure every guest feels as though they should be there. As it turned out, we waited with a certain celebrity couple (Nicole Richie and Joel Madden –Happy Anniversary!) who did a very good job of keeping a low profile thanks to the discretion of the host. [We’re assuming TMZ is no longer interested in something that happened over a month ago, with no pictures.]

The French Laundry's garden with a view of the Napa Valley hills.

The restaurant is divided into three small dining rooms, one downstairs and two upstairs. We were seated upstairs with four other tables, variously populated with couples and groups, most celebrating some sort of special occasion. We were seated at a large round table next to one another with a view of the other guests giving us an opportunity to “see how it’s done” for those who were seated earlier.

The wine list is 112 pages long and is presented at the table in iPad form, open and ready for your review. We love to drink wine, but we don’t love wine as much as the people who composed the remarkable list. The sommelier patiently helped us reduce our choices to a couple of light reds, each in the $100 range. We selected a delightful French burgundy that we nursed throughout the meal. It was just enough and nicely suited to the evening’s menu.

The first bites, or amuse bouches, arrive in the form of small, warm, cheesy, one-bite gougère. The gougères are quickly followed by the now ubiquitous Salmon Tartar Cornets – bite-sized dollops of fresh, minced wild salmon atop a light, crisp cone filled with red onion seasoned crème fraîche. The “dish” is gone in two delicious bites. That’s OK, because the meal is just beginning and the real starter was just a few minutes away.

Chef Thomas Keller is known for many things, but the one thing diners at both The French Laundry and Per Se, in Manhattan, have come to expect is his glorious “Oysters and Pearls.” Small, beautiful white covered porcelain bowls arrive warm, filled with delicate Island Creek Oysters swimming in a rich pool of “Sabayon” of pearl tapioca, topped with a remarkably large dollop of white sturgeon caviar. We’d heard about this dish from friends who have dined before at the FL, but we had no idea what to expect. While now “common” to FL and Per Se diners, nothing about this dish says “average” or “pedestrian.” Every bite was as good as the last.

Up next, an interesting Salad of Roasted Hawaiian Hearts of Palm with Petite Radish, Cilantro and Citrus “Vierge.” This precious portion stood out not for the flavor of the hearts of palm (simple, but not memorable), but for the fascinating use of citrus in the vinaigrette. We suspect the kitchen used finger limes to produce the capsules of fresh fruit that popped delicately with each bite.

We supplemented the “salad” course with the Moulard Duck “Foie Gras en Terrine” served with Cippolini Onions, Oregon Huckleberry and Celery Branch. The restaurant is known for its flawless execution, evidenced by the mid-course swap out of warm brioche toast. On cue, our server deftly removed the half-eaten portion of toast and set a new, warm piece of toast down to accompany the remainder of the terrine. We were impressed!

A beautiful head of cabbage.

The fish course consisted of Sauteed Fillet of Gulf Coast Red Snapper with Jingle Bell Peppers, young Fennel, Niçoise Olive, Arugula and Noilly Prat dry vermouth (adding vermouth to sauce is a tip we learned from Julia Childs). The fish, tender and oceanic, paired beautifully with the subtle Noilly Prat. Here again, the sauce was the standout.

Sweet Butter-Poached Maine Lobster “Fricassée” came next with Hobbs’ Bacon, Red Wine-Braised Cabbage, Chestnuts, Tokyo Turnips and “Beurre Rouge.” Lobster, once a peasant food and used as fertilizer, is now king of the seafood chain. The smokiness of the bacon played nicely with the crustacean. We could have eaten more, but then, more was to come.

Our next course stands out as one of the evening’s greatest successes: Georges Bank Sea Scollop with Sunchokes, Piedmont Hazelnuts, Fig Compote, Red Ribbon Sorrel and Guinness-Chocolate Sauce. That’s right, Guinness and chocolate in a sauce with scallop. We get the affinity between the two, but with shellfish? Seriously?!? This one blew us away. The scallop was grand! Seared to a perfect crust, tender and barely cooked at its center, this was a scallop to remember. Swiping a bite through the sauce added complexity without overwhelming the sweet, briny morsel. Our first thought was that we wanted more sauce. However, that might have overwhelmed the scallop and then we would have ended up with a chocolate dipped scallop. Less is definitely more with the sauce for this dish!

The friendly chicken.

Next up, a glorious Four Story Hill Farm “Poularde” with Baby Beet, Tardivo Radicchio, Walnuts, Watercress and “Sauce Périgourdine.” Sophie, one of our charming servers, assured us that this chicken didn’t come from the FL hen house nestled among the garden greens across the street from the restaurant. Good thing too, because Jason had a bonding experience with one of the curious hens the day before and we couldn’t bear the thought of noshing on one of those lovely ladies. The meat was savory and richly satisfying, balanced by the bitter radicchio and spicy cress.

What came next will be remembered as one of the evening’s biggest surprises. “Tripe a la Provençale” in a sauce of San Marzano Tomatoes, Capers, Black Kale and “Pain de Campagne” arrived with our curiosity piqued. Steve learned that Thomas Keller is particularly fond of this “scrap” meat when he read Grant Achatz’ (Alinea chef and former sous chef with the FL) book life, on the line, so we were excited to see it on this tasting menu. Tiny pieces of extraordinarily tender tripe stewed in a simple tomato sauce couldn’t have been more spectacular. We’ve only shared tripe once or twice before at one of SF’s taco trucks, just to say we tried it. And now that we have a taste for it again, we’ll be certain to give tripe another try, maybe at a taco truck, fine restaurant, or maybe even at home (a future blog post in the making).

Elysian Fields Farm “Cote D’Agneau,” Chanterelle Mushrooms, Nantes Carrot, Roasted Mizuna and Madras Curry shocked us not only because of its delicate flavor, but also because of the scale of the portion. This was a large lamb chop and the kitchen didn’t skimp on a thing. The meat was unusually “mild” and the fat … well, we could have eaten more and it took some restraint to resist the temptation to gnaw on the bone when all was said and done.

We’re now starting to get that over sated feeling, as I’m sure you, the reader are too. This is not a good thing because we still have cheese and dessert to come and we want, or rather NEED, to enjoy it. The cheese course consisted of a warm bowl of Andante Dairy “Nocturnes” served with Yukon Gold Potato, Flowering Quince and Burgundy Truffles. A ripe, sheep’s milk cheese, the Nocturnes represents some of the best local cheese making to be found. The standout of this dish was the potato. Cut to the tiniest dice, the crunchy toasty bits were packed with earthy flavor. They paired nicely with the rich cheese and the sweet quince. We confess, this composed cheese dish had more than enough flavor to satisfy any happy glutton.

The rest of the flock.

A palate cleanser of Sour Cherry Sorbet, Coconut “Petit Beurre” and Vanilla Soda took the edge off the rich, ripe cheese course. How were we ever going to get through two desserts and all the other lovely sweets we knew were coming at the conclusion of the meal?

First dessert consisted of Alpaco “Mousse Au Chocolat,” Spice Pudding, “Panna Cotta,” Fuyu Persimmon and Almond “Glacée.” Whoa! The marvel of this dish was the cylinder of panna cotta lying on its side, holding its shape as it gleamed and sparkled in the light of the dining room. How did they do that? Our guess, from watching way too many cooking shows, molecular gastronomy. Silky and cool, this one reminded us just how satisfying panna cotta can be.

We also selected the “Pommes Anna” served with Funnel Cake, “Pruneaux d’Agen,” Rum “Anglaise” and Salted Caramel Ice Cream. This was a beautiful dessert. The apple was sliced ever so thin, stacked into a multi-layer round and cooked to tender perfection. The funnel cake was a delicate, playful companion to the sweet apple. Salted caramel ice cream, now available everywhere (even homemade in our freezer), added just the right amount of richness, though we were finally at our limit and barely finished.

Some lovely blueberries that will one day be on the menu.

The menu complete, we sipped the last of our wine and savored the recent memory of the fifteen or so things we’d just eaten. Our server returned to the table with a “special treat” of coconut cake – a congratulatory gesture from the kitchen to say Happy Anniversary (19 years! We met when we were in preschool.). We know the staff is prepared to help lots of diners celebrate special occasions given the likelihood that many of the guests on any given evening have made this special pilgrimage to honor an important occasion. Nevertheless, we felt personally recognized by a group of professionals who care deeply about the service they provide.

Next came the restaurant’s signature “Frozen Capuccino,” a creamy mousse of coffee topped with whipped cream. That’s right, more cream … and chocolate … and sugar. And then a tray of house made chocolate truffles, each with its own uniquely flavored ganache filling. Oh, and a bowl of crunchy, chocolate covered macadamia nuts. No lie. We tasted a couple of nuts and promptly threw in the towel. Not another bite. Any more and we would be miserable beyond redemption. A cup of coffee was all that we could muster at this point in the evening. We asked our server to box up the truffles and the rest of the nuts.

Our goodie bag and a few extras from Bouchon bakery.

Before leaving, we were presented with a bag that contained our boxed up goodies as well as a couple of bags of short bread cookies. A copy of the evening’s menu is delivered along with the bill and the night finally comes to an end. It was about 11:30 when our server invited us to join him in the kitchen to take a look. We gathered our things and headed downstairs where we waited for another group to complete their kitchen tour before heading in. We were most fortunate to get some one-on-one time with Executive Sous Chef Philip Tessier who graciously congratulated us on our anniversary and answered our questions about the kitchen. This was a memorable end to an unforgettable evening.

Stuffed to the gills, we made our way back to the hotel in a cold light rain. Yountville was quiet and sparkling. Our food holiday was now complete and our bellies were full. Three days of total indulgence now behind us, it was time to return to the real world. Damn!