Early Easter Dinner

Before I got into any of the many issues at August Grocery, I should have mentioned my early Easter Dinner Day.  As is tradition of the last three years, I make a rack of lamb with a rosemary plum sauce each easter.  This year, I was going to my uncles house to eat ham on actual Easter, so I had to adjust my plans to keep the tradition alive.

This time, we were going to head out to Cuvee Cellars after, so I invited Vu out to come and eat with us.  As per usual, the lamb was amazing.  I think I finally got the fat crisping part down because that was better than usual.  Vu ended up eating the plum sauce like it was ice cream after he finished his lamb.

Here is the recipe and a picture.

Ingredients
1 rack of lamb, frenched
2 plums, pitted and cut into halves
2 plums, peeled and diced
1/2 cup of red wine plus 3 tbsp of red wine
3 tbsp sugar
3 tbsp butter
2 sprigs rosemary
1/2 cup veal stock (you could also use chicken)
kosher salt
pepper

1.  Preheat oven to 350.
2.  Put the plum halves in an oven poof pan with the sugar, three tbsp of red wine, two tbsp butter, and one sprig of rosemary.  Cover the pan with foil and put it in the oven for 30 minutes.  When plums are done take them out one at a time, remove the skin (it should come off easily) cut each half in half (so you have quarters) and put them back in the pan and toss with the sauce.
3.  While plums are roasting, put 1/2 a cup of red wine, the veal stock, and 1 diced plum into a pan.  Simmer over medium heat for about 20 minutes.
4.  Put plum halves, and the red wine-plum mixture into a blender, and blend on high until smooth.  I like to thicken it with a bit of Ultra-Tex 3, but as that is not a very common kitchen thing, you could probably add a little flour if you want it thickened, or even make a little roux in a pan and pour the plum sauce into the roux.
5.  Heat a frying pan over medium heat and put the last tbsp of butter in it.  Put the last diced plum, the leaves from the last sprig of rosemary, and a pinch of salt and pepper into the pan.  Stir frequently for 3 minutes until plums are cooked through.
6.  Increase heat in oven to 450.  Lightly sprinkle the lamb with salt and pepper.
7.  In a large saute pan, heat some olive oil over high heat until it begins to smoke.  Put lam, fat side down into the oil.  Brown for 2-3 minutes and then flip to brown the other side.  Transfer the lamb to a baking sheet, fat side up.
8.  Put the lamb in the oven for 15-18 minutes until it is medium rare.  Take out and wrap tightly with foil for 5 minutes before slicing.

Home Alone

Last Saturday, I skillfully avoided going to something called "Saddle Up."  Saddle Up, at least the impression I had, involved a variety of hillbillies, hilljacks, other such hill people, every jackass in a frat from miles around who finally found an excuse to wear both flanel and a cowboy hat without being mercilessly ridiculed, and a mechanical bull.  Needless to say, I was not going to go to Saddle Up.

Instead, I bought myself a New York Strip Steak from August Grocery Store (1500 W. Diversey, http://www.augustgrocerystore.com/).  I was kind of excited about August Grocery since I read that they are friendly people who teach cooking classes.  I could assuredly have gone to a closer meat shop, but I wanted to get the feel for August Grocery since I was interested in taking a cooking class there.

When I walked in, I saw the fresh produce on the table immediately in front of me, some pre-prepared food on the shelves on both the right and left, and a small meat counter directly ahead of me (the fish counter was a little farther back).  However, I didn't notice any customers, so I figured I would have a good chance to talk to the workers to see how this place works (and pick up some steaks).  I approached the meat counter to examine the wares.  I think I came in too close to closing time to get a good impression of their full product offering, but what they did have looked very fresh with good marbling.  I decided what I wanted and looked up at the workers to signal that I was ready to make my choice.  Strangely, they did not respond.  I stood there, semi-baffled, that I had apparently worn my invisibility cloak that day without realizing it.  What?  You say invisibility cloaks don't exist?  That's right, these people must have just been unhelpful (since they clearly had no other customers).  I stood there slack-jawed (maybe I did belong at Saddle Up) at their apparent lack of attention.  Eventually after 7-8 minutes of me staring intensely at them, someone approached and got me my steak.  As you could probably guess, I didn't bother asking them about cooking classes or anything else since I was pretty sure that I wasn't going to ever come back.  I walked my steak over to the cashier and she rung me up for a total of $63.  I questioned this absurd price, and she simply repeated that it was $63.  I think she sensed from the dumbfounded look on my face that something was amiss (and the fact that I only bought a little steak).  Eventually she corrected the price to what it should have been.  August Grocery, I will not be returing to you.  I'm also not going to tell you about the typo on your website, so take that!

I returned home with my steak, and since I was going to be home alone, I could make anything that I wanted.  The possibilities were boundless.  Since I never get to eat bernaise sauce normally, I decided that I was going to make that.  I haven't made bernaise sauce since Christmas 2008, so I was excited t do it again.  Bernaise is one of the most satisfying sauces to make since it requires just the right touch (even over a double boiler) to make it perfect.  If you do it too long, the eggs scramble and its ruined, if you do it for too short, its too liquidy and not good.

I made it as well as I ever had, so I was very pleased with myself.  I should have used juice from actual lemons though, instead of ReaLemon, but it was late and I was tired so I didn't want to go to Jewel to get a lemon.  The consistency was perfect, but it was fake sour, so it wasn't quite where it should have been.  Anyway, here's how I did it.

Ingredients
1 tspn fresh tarragon leaves
1 tspn white wine vinegar
1 shallot, finely diced
black pepper
3 egg yolks
1.5 egg shells full of water
4 tbsp butter, melted
lemon juice
kosher salt

1.  Bring the water of a double boiler to a boil and put the top pot on it.  You can use a saucepan with sloped sides if you want, but you really need to be careful about scrambling the eggs if you do it without a double boiler.

2.  Put the shallots, tarragon leaves, vinegar, and  a few grinds of black pepper in the pot.  Gently stir around until the vinegar has mostly evaporated.

3.  Put in the eggs and the water (for each egg you use, you should take half of the egg shell, fill it with water, and pour it in).  Whisk constantly until it thickens up to the consistency of mayonnaise about 4-5 minutes)

4.  Remove from heat and whisk in the butter.  Season to taste with lemon juice and kosher salt.  You should serve this sauce relatively quickly so that it does not "break." 

5.  Cook the steak however you prefer and spoon some of the sauce on top.  I'm a pretty big fan of bernaise sauce, so I heap it on heavily, but you can do whatever you want.

Day Three

On the final day of my self-proclaimed Dining Out Week, we visited Avenues in the Peninsula Hotel.  Avenues is located at 108 East Superior and its website is http://www.peninsula.com/Chicago/en/Dining/default.aspx#/Chicago/en/Dining/Avenues/. 

I always suspected something was wrong with Avenues, even though I had no real basis for that suspicion.  Maybe it was because Graham Elliot Bowles was the chef there (and I do have a problem with that) or maybe its because it was in a hotel.  Whatever the reason, whenever we were deciding what restaurants we want to eat at, Avenues very seldom makes an appearance in that conversation.  I even had a vision of getting in an argument with the head waiter tonight about how bad everything was.  However, it was Dining Out Week, and I have eaten at every other multi-course style restaurant in Chicago, so this was the final frontier and I had to go.

We walked in and got semi-lost walking around the Peninsula (so if you are keeping track, that's 3 for 3 on getting lost during Dining Out Week).  Eventually one of the hotel people pointed us in the right direction and we arrived a few minutes before our reservation.

From the outside of the restaurant, Avenues looked kind of interesting.  There was a long granite bar on the left that overlooked the kitchen, so you could watch the chefs in action if you had one of those seats.  Along the far wall directly in front of us was a windowed wall facing out at the Water Tower.  The room probably had about 18 tables total, so it was relatively small.

We sat down and were nearly instantly ambushed by our waitress Amy (who was very good) with the champagne cart.  She explained the three choices of champagne, and we ended up picking a Schramsburg Blanc de Blanc sparkling wine (which I've always wanted to try).  I was not particularly a fan of the champagne cart coming at me as I did feel like they were pressuring us into buying it.  I would have gotten champagne either way, but I wasn't a fan of having it forced on me (sort of like health insu...ok again, I'll just stop there).  The champagne was very good and had a strong taste of green apples.  It went very nicely with our first three courses.  Next, the sommelier, Aaron, came over and discussed the wine list with us.  I was kind of disappointed that they did not have a wine pairing to go with the meal, but he recommended a Gaja Chardonnay and a Chateau Beaucastel Chateaunauf-du-Pape in half bottle format.  This actually ended up being less than I expected to spend on wine, which is always a nice surprise.

So after getting all the wine choices settled, our first course came out.  It was, as is common in many of these restaurants, a caviar course.  This one; however, was a bit deconstructed and had all of the traditional elements, but in a one bite format served on a spoon.  It had caviar, lemon, oyster, and crumbled brioche to mimic the usual toast points.  This was one of the better caviar courses I have ever had, perhaps just behind the French Laundry's Oysters and Pearls.  The caviar was nice and salty, and the toast and oyster was just a bit sweet.  The Schramsburg wine was a nice complement with its sweet green apple taste.  A very auspicious start that almost immediately broke down my skepticism of Avenues.

After the caviar course, we moved on to the real start of the dinner - what the menu described as King Crag, cucumber, golden wild char roe, and something called kalamansi.  This was interesting because it a two-level course.  It was served in a cup.  On the bottom was a cold cucumber juice with some chilled king crab.  On the rim was a sugar tuile (like a piece of glass made from sugar) that had some piles of roe, orange, and some sort of white sauce (maybe that was the kalamansi).  The waiter, Colin, who looked like he purchased my friend Mike Warren's body on Ebay then jumped in a time machine and went forward ten years, explained that we should break the tuile with the spoon, let the sugar and flavors mix with the cucumber, and then eat it all with the spoon.  All I could think about was how much like Spring this dish tasted since it was so light and colorful.  It was like eating a salad only if salad was good.  The cucumber absolutely popped with vibrance and flavor, and the sugar enhanced the sweetness of the crab.  Finally, the roe added a bit of saltiness to the mix and the few mint leaves added an interesting element of complexity.  As much as I liked the caviar course, this was even better.  Here is a picture from the top and from the side of the cup, so you can see how it was arranged. 

The next course was the Faroe Island Salmon Belly with apple milk that Colin poured over it (they really like pouring stuff onto plates) and whipped chloropyll.  It also had what I think was snail roe on it.  When I asked about that element, they described it as earthy almost "like playing in a playground."  I guess that makes sense, so I let it go.   This course was positively delicious.  The fish was so delightfully fatty and just a touch chilled (after being lightly poached).  The apple milk was very interesting if for nothing else than it was apple milk.  The champagne with its apple-y goodness was nearly perfect for this dish.  The whipped chlorophyll had a strong fennel taste, so I wasn't a huge fan of that, but if you like fennel, then you will probably like it a bit better.

After having three solid courses, I was waiting for the meal to take a turn for the worse (otherwise I would have eaten here already, right?).  I was positive I was not going to like something soon.  The next course was described as Japanese Pumpkin, duck confit, finger limes, and miner's lettuce.  I'm pretty sure they changed this course after they printed the menu because it ended up being some sort of squash soup that they poured over the duck confit with a strip of dark chocolate.  Every single element on its own was absolutely ambrosial (word of the day!), but together they were; somehow, even better.  The duck was incredibly flavorful and the soup must have been made with some sort of meat stock that accentuated the duck perfectly.  The chocolate added a nice hint of bitter and sweetness to the mix.  This was the best course thus far, and I figured that if they hadn't let me down by now, they probably were not going to at all.  This was also where they broke out the Gaja Chardonnay.  It was big and oaky, and as the sommelier described, "a white wine that wishes it was a red."  He was right.  It amply stood up to all of the strong flavors contained in this duck dish.  I think we could have probably gotten away with a nice pinot noir here too, but I'm glad that we went the white wine route since this was such a Spring-y menu.

The next course can only be described as Alice in Wonderland on a plate.  It was beets with strawberries, black garlic, and red sorrel.  On this plate, there were 4 different types of beets: red, golden, candy stripe, and one other that I don't remember.  There were random smudges of fermented black garlic puree all over the plate and different preparations of beets strewn throughout.  On the front right, there was a golden beet ice cream atop the candy stripe beets.  There was a roasted golden beet and a roasted red beet on the plate along with some fresh strawberries, dried strawberries, some fruit jellies, and some extruded beets.  There was an unbelievable amount going on with this course.  I don't often eat beets, but I greatly enjoyed this course and all of its craziness.  I feel like if I liked beets more, this would have been even more tremendous.

The next course on the menu was the one I was most worried about since I've never had a gnocchi that I have enjoyed.  Every version I have had has been a soggy mess that felt like eating a sponge, so I have given up totally on the whole idea of gnocchi.  There were 5 seared gnocchi in a bowl with some herbs that they poured proscuitto broth over.  While the gnocchi was seared and had a decent crust on it, I thought it still tasted a bit spongy even though the proscuitto broth was excellent tasting.  This is also where we switched to red wine.

Following the first course that I really didn't care for came in unquestionably the best course of the night, the Ohmi Gyu (a waygu beef from Japan) with black truffles, pistachios, roasted potatoes, and white truffle.  The meat was cooked sous vide to a perfect medium-rare and then seared to give it a crunchy crust.  The white truffle was cooked into a creme caramel and the black truffle was shaved and placed around the plate.  The combination of the meat and the white truffle creme caramel was one of the best things that I have ever eaten (and I've eaten many many great things).  The red wine was not overly assertive, so this dish could have probably used something a bit stronger like a cabernet, but it was smooth and juicy and played nicely off of the extremely savory elements on the plate.  I could have eaten just this and gone home, and I would have been happy.  I would go back to Avenues just to eat this.  They also served us a waffle instead of bread, which was interesting.

They brought us out a palate cleanser to transition to dessert, and it was gross.  It was like eating carrot baby food (even served in a jar).  I'm just going to move on from here since it was pretty bad and everything else was so good.

With that excellent course behind us, we moved into the two dessert courses.  The first was Rasberry, thai black pepper, marscarpone, and African blue basil.  The raspberry was a puree that was frozen into a log with some frozen framboise.  Again, this dish exploded with Spring flavor, and I always like the idea of basil with berries.  I probably should have ordered a dessert wine for dessert, but at this point I had already formulated a wild plan about drinking wine at Charlie Trotter's after Avenues (luckily that didn't come about).

Finally, we ended with a dark chocolate mousse with saffron, honey, and bergamot tea.  The chocolate was extremely dense and rich.  I love chocolate and it was too rich for me to eat.  The saffron and honey added some interesting floral notes to it, and the tea seemed to be imperceptible.  Overall, I think I liked the raspberry dessert better, but this was excellent too.  We finished off, as usual with some chocolate truffles of different varieties.

Overall, Avenues was amazing.  I'm kind of disappointed with myself that I didn't go as soon as Chef Bowles went to his new and not good restaurant.  The chef even came over to talk to us at the end of the meal, and he couldn't have been nicer.  The service was awesome and we even ended up talking to Time Machine Mike Warren and Amy about Das Boot.  I'd highly recommend it to anyone who wants a great meal.

Day Two

On Day Two of Dining Out Week, we went to the wonderful, incomparable Charlie Trotter's.  Charlie Trotter's is located at 816 West Armitage and its website is http://www.charlietrotters.com/.

As I mentioned before, Charlie Trotter's holds a special place in my heart since it was the first place that I ever experienced a multi-course tasting menu.  I went there for my 22nd birthday, but, due to a long period of unforeseen joblessness and wanting to try other places, I haven't been back since.  However, once again, Chef Trotter blazes a new path in my life.  I am pleased and honored to write about Charlie Trotter's as my first post about a multi-course tasting menu.  As at Vie, I used my phone to take picutres as not to interrupt the other customers, so I apologize for the picture quality.  Just note that everything had extremely vibrant colors and you will be on the right path.

After getting distracted while driving to Charlie Trotter's, I got a little lost on the mean streets of Lincoln Park.  Apparently Armitage switches directions at some point, which made locating it a bit difficult.  After almost getting T-boned by a bus, we made it to the restaurant unscathed.  We walked into the beautiful townhouse on Armitage and began preparing for what was assuredly going to be an amazing meal.

I had checked the menu online earlier in the day, so I had prepared myself for that progression.  However, apparently, at some point, they had completely changed the menu.  Though I knew it was going to be good no matter what, I needed to get my bearings straight again with this new menu.  As per usual, we opted for the Grand Menu with the accompanying wine pairings.

Without messing around with too much of an intro (since this will probably be a long post), I'll just dive right in.  Our waiter/sommelier, Ryan, brought us the first course which was served in a bento box presentation.  I liked Ryan right away even though he was wearing a bow tie, so I decided to regale him with tons of crazy stories.  This ended up paying off for us in the end, which I will get to later.  In the box at the top of the picture was a fluke sashimi with an orange and onion marmalade (no, Pipes, not Swordfish Meatloaf), on the right of the picture was a Firefly Squid with Sisho, and to the left was an Effingham Oyster with watermelon granite and smoked fish roe.  Of these three elements, I thought the fluke was the best.  Raw fish with a simple fruit based sauce is always a nice way to start off these meals since it is nice and light and would probably get lost if it was served later in the meal.  My second favorite was the oyster.  It was ever so creamy and briney and the watermelon granite and roe added a sweet and smoky taste, respectively.  Lastly, and perhaps most interestingly, was the firefly squid.  I think if I had been prepared for the taste, I would have liked them more (not that I didn't like them), but they did that thing where it pops when you bite into it, which was more than a little disconcerting.  All said, this was a solid first course even if I wasn't totally sold on the squid.  It was served, of course, with a champagne.  Not just any champagne though, it was a Chartogne-Taileet "Sainte-Anne" Brut.  While it says "Brut," it certainly was not as dry as most brut champagnes that I have had.  I love starting meals with champagne, even if it is not quite the quality of champagne that we had here.  This one paired particularly well with the oyster element since 1) oysters and champagne is a classic combination and 2) the sweetness of the champagne went nearly perfectly with the roe and watermelon.  I asked Ryan if there was a better way to pour champagne whereby it didn't foam up so much, he told me that the foam depended on the temperature and glass, but in essence, there was no way to stop it from foaming way up.

The next course was a grilled blue prawn with Manila clams, lemon, and salsify.  While the prawn was grilled to absolute perfection and the manila clam was good, I didn't particularly like the sauce that went with it.  Michelle, on the other hand, really liked this dish, even commenting at one point, "I really like this even though it has eyes!"  I concur.  This was served with a 2002 Riesling "Cuvee Fredrick Emile" Trimabach.  I expected, as I always do with rieslings, for it to be extremely sweet.  However, this riesling had very little sweetness to it, to the point that, if I hadn't seen the bottle, I would have sworn he poured us a chardonnay.  In any event, I'm glad it was not so cloyingly sweet because that wouldn't have gone well with the course.  As it stood, the gentle sweetness was amazing with the grilled prawn (which apparently had fallen over on the plate).  Ryan, you have done it again.  Good work!

The grilled prawn was followed up by a Diver Sea Scallop with Preserved Shallots, Fingerling Potatoes, and Parsley foam.  I have wanted to try a Charlie Trotter scallop ever since I read his chapter on scallops in the first cookbook I ever purchased.  This definitely didn't disappoint.  The scallop was huge, nearly the size of a small beef filet.  It had the best crust on a scallop that I have ever seen.  The scallop was so sweet and perfectly salty.  I love scallops to begin with and this only raised my idea of what a scallop could be.  This was served with a Godello, which is a grape from northern Spain.  I had never heard of it before even though I was in northern Spain last summer.  I also found out that Mugaritz, the restaurant I ate at in Spain, had burned down.  I think this is where I really hooked Ryan on talking to us.  I also told Ryan about Cuvee Cellars, and he seemed interested.  He even gave me his direct e-mail, so I'll have to send him some more information about it.  He also is going to teach a wine class, which I hope to attend.  Anyway, the Godello, I think, was served too cold to begin with and I didn't know what to think.  When it warmed up a bit, it ws probably my favorite white wine of the night.  It had some interesting tropical notes and was just a little bit sweet.  This was my favorite of the seafood courses.

On to the meat courses!  The course that I was most excited about at the outset was the Honey Glazed Duck with Spring Garlic, Lavender, and Thyme.  That dish was now upon us, and it ended up being undoubtedly the most complex course of the evening.  I expected it to be more of a whole piece of duck breast, but it ended up being sliced into thin strips, but that is really no big deal and probably made me not wolf it down so quickly.  Anyway, it was served in a bowl with something like a honey stock and also glazed with honey.  the garlic was whipped into a thyme cream, and the lavender was made into jellies.  It all went together so perfectly even though the ingredients are quite disparate sounding.  Again, I wish I could cook duck as good as some of these restaurants do it, but in any event, I'll thoroughly enjoy such perfectly cooked duck.  It was served with a Nemea from Greece from vines that Homer (not Simpson) wrote about, so they are pretty old.  It had an oddly strong alcohol smell too it, but either it dissapated with time or it somehow melted back into the wine because it was incredibly smooth with almost no alcohol taste to it.  If it were super-alcohol-y, it would have been terrible with the duck, but the smoothness ended up making it light enough to go with the duck.  Also, I've never had a Grecian wine before.  Ryan informed me that many Grecian wines are absolutely terrible, so you need to be pretty careful to find a good one.  This was a good one.

At some point around now, Michelle put on an acting performance for the ages.  She was rubbing her shoulders, shivering, she tried building a small fire using the candle, and she huddled around it for warmth.  The attentive staff noticed her not-so-subtle clues and brought her out a pashmina (pretty much a shawl).  I was pretty sure that Michelle was going to try to sneak off with it.

Anyway, the next course was the course that Michelle was most looking forward to, Salt-Crusted Veal Loin with Toasted Brioche, Burnt Oak, Creme Fraiche, and Veal Sweetbreads.  The veal, like the duck, was cut into thin slices.  I'm not really sure where the burnt oak was, but the creme fraiche was gelled into a cake-like thing and topped with brioche.  Again, the veal was nicely salted and savory.  Creme fraiche is generally pretty sour, but whatever they did to it (baking or gelling) took away much of the sharpness and transformed it into something almost savory.  The veal was served with a 2008 Jaffurs "Thompson Vineyard" Petite Syrah from Santa Barbara.  I was a bit concerned because syrahs are generally pretty wound up in general, and the fact that this was a 2008 made me figure that this would be even more tannic.  In 2009 went to a Pax Syrah tasting, and the 2004s were still so tannic that they were nearly undrinkable, so I figured this would be like that.  However, apparently this one did not start with such strong tannins, so it was beautifully smooth to go along with the delicate veal.  It had a bit of smokiness as many syrahs do that went nicely with the grilled meat.  This was probably my favorite wine of the night.

I thought we were moving on to the desserts now since that is what the menu instructed, but instead, Ryan brought out another meat course.  I asked him if this one was on the menu (knowing it wasn't) and Ryan told me "the Chef likes your style."  Well, that certainly is a feather in my cap.  You know what, Chef Trotter, I like your style too.  Maybe we can hang out some time....  Sorry, and back from fantasy land. 

The surprise meat course was a Cypress Wood Roasted Bison Tenderloin with Boudin Noir sauce and Huckleberries and Miatake Mushrooms.  The plate in itself was absolutely stunning with streaks of the sauce across the plate, swirled around the meat.  The meat itself was cooked on a skewer with petrified cypress wood (which burns at something like 2000 degrees).  The wood made it taste like it was cooked around a campfire, which was awesome.  The sauce was creamy and delicious, and the huckleberries added some explosions of tartness to round it out.  Had this surprise course not come out, the duck would have been my favorite, but as it stood, the bison took the top spot for the evening.  It was served with a 1999 Rioja "Reserva II" Roda made from Tempranillo.  This wine was awesome too, though I still think I enjoyed the syrah more.  Since it was 11 years old now, it was awesomely smooth and fruity.  It had a little pepper flavor that many Spanish wines have.  Overall, I loved this dish and its accompanying wine.  The picture makes it look like its a little bit of a mess, but I assure you that it made sense in person.

Ok, finally, we were on dessert...or so we thought.  Ryan came up and asked us if he could interest us in some cheese (another perk of talking to him).  I said that I would eat pretty much anything, but as a cheese hater, Michelle said she would only eat cheddar.  I thought he was going to laugh and bring her a bag of shredded Kraft cheese, but he retreated to the kitchen assuring us that he would come up with something.  Minutes later, he emerged from the kitchen with a plate and a bowl in hand.  The bowl was full of a 15 year aged Cabot Cheddar from Vermont for Michelle and on the plate was an unpasturized cow's milk cheese served with Goji berry.  Her cheddar was amazing.  Apparently when cheddar ages it loses its color and gets more sharp and forms crystals on the inside.  Hers was extremely sharp and nutty and a bit salty.  If everyone had cheddar that good, we would never think about eating shredded Kraft cheese.  Mine was similarly delightful.  The cheese was more creamy than sharp, in contrast to Michelle's.  The goji berry sauce was kind of meaty and strange, but good.  I'll definitely have to keep my eye open for these to see what I can do with it (Ryan told me Whole Foods has it sometimes).  Michelle's was served with an apple-pear brandy, but it was way too strong for her to drink.  Of course, I ended up drinking it because I don't care.  I ended up getting a lightly botrytised Chenin Blanc which was positively delicious and tasted almost riesling-like in its sweetness.

Ok, so seriously, now it's time for dessert.  For my first dessert, they brought me a Grapefruit Sorbet with Compressed Celery and Creamed Olive Oil.  This ended up being mostly a palate cleanser for the actual desserts.  I love grapefruit, so this was right up my alley.  I don't really know where the compressed celery was, but overall it was tasty for a palate cleanser.  Michelle ended up with a lemon sorbet with a black sesame sauce, which was also nice.

For the next course, I got a Warm Date Pudding with Yogurt and Pecans.  This, simply, may have been the best dessert I've ever had.  The date pudding was almost more like shredded dates than a pudding, but they were flavored with something, and it was amazing.  The yogurt added a hint of tartness to cut through the sweet, caramel-y dates.  It was simple but pretty much perfect.  Michelle on the other hand got some sort of honey cream dessert with a tuile and clementine oranges.  She said it tasted too licorice-y even though it didn't have any licorice in it.  Being so nice, I traded her since I still thought hers was pretty good and she, of course, really enjoyed mine.  These were served with a 2000 Felsina "Borardenga" Vin Santo Chianti.  I don't particularly recall this wine which leads me to believe it wasn't terribly special. 

Our final course was a dessert version utilizing Indian flavors.  I had a gingersnap ice cream with a chocolate coffee sauce and a coffee tuile.  I was a little skeptical about the flavors of India in dessert form, but the ginger, coffee, and chocolate all went together in an oddly satisfying way.  Michelle had a Milk Chocolate-Praline Semifreddo with Pistachios and Mint.  The milk chocolate was almost like a mousse and pistachios are always delicious.  Hers was definitely better even though I really enjoyed mine.  Both were served with a Bodegas Dios Bacos "Cream" Sherry Jerez.  Michelle hates sherry, so like all things she doesn't like, I ended up drinking it.  This was probably the best sherry I have had.  It was nutty as is classic of sherry, but it wasn't terribly alcohol-y like some sherries can tend to be.  It was also a bit sweeter than some of the dry sherries that I have had.  I thought it went better with the Indian dessert than the chocolate one.  Yet another perk of talking to Ryan so much was that he brought the pastry chef, Chris Gomez, out to talk to us about the desserts.  He was a pretty cool guy, even though he was kind of coy about how to make the date pudding.  Apparently we can get it at Trotters To Go, so perhaps I will pick some up and try to reverse engineer it out.

So, that was the end of our dinner, but certainly not the end of our adventure for I had requested a tour of their wine cellar.  I was simply stunned by their cellar, and I would have slept in it if they let me.  I got to touch a bottle of 1870 Lafite-Rothschild that cost $35,000.  I promised Ryan that one day I would return to buy it, he seemed pleased.  I also saw that they had Scarecrow wine, which I am semi-obsessed with and my have ordered if I had known it as there.  I'll have to look into it next time! 

Once again, Charlie Trotter, you are a trailblazer in my culinary life, so I'm glad to have you on-board as undoubtedly the longest post I've put up on here.

Day One

On the first night of Dining Out Week, we drove out to Vie in Western Springs to eat their Chef's Week Menu.  Vie is located at 4471 Lawn Avenue in Western Springs, and its website is http://www.vierestaurant.com/.

After a slight mishap in finding the place and a detour to two pet stores looking for a new wheel for Chipotle the chinchilla, we finally got there.  Upon walking in, I noticed the long, black granite bar to the right, which looked pretty sweet.  As we proceeded past that, there was an elevated dining section to our left that had about 3-4 tables in it.  We snaked through the restaurant to get to our table.  It was at this point I noticed that I thought something was a little bit off about the design.  Some of the tables were on wheels and looked like they should have been in some corporate board room, and others were normal restaurant tables with tablecloths.  Further, some of the tables had "spotlight" lights hanging over them.  Normally I would have paid this no mind, but no more than 4 feet away from these lights were other old-fashioned crystal lights hanging on the walls.  The whole thing seemed very odd to me.  Then again, I wasn't going to an interior decorating convention, so none of this really matters at all.

They brought us our menus, and to my delight, they had added an option for each course (except dessert) to choose from.  I looked at the menu online earlier in the day, and it only showed one option for each of the three courses, so I was a little concerned about being locked into one path of choices, which to me feels a bit like communism (and despite what your presid.... ok, I'll stop there).  Anyway, for completeness and to satiate one of my many quirks (I hate ordering the same thing as anyone else), we each ordered different dishes.  We also opted for the wine pairing to go along with it.

Before we got to our first courses; however, they brought us out a little amuse that I of course forgot to take a picture of.  It was a grilled shrimp with avocado and some sort of lemon sauce on it.  The shrimp was beautifully grilled but not overdone, and it had a lovely smoky taste to it.  The avocado rounded it out with its vegetal creaminess, and the lemon sauce cut through it all to make it a delightful single bite.

For my actual first course, I ordered the  proscuitto with caramel apple jam and spanish olive oil.  The dish came out with two thinly sliced strips of proscuitto in a pool of olive oil covered (and I do mean covered) in a mache salad.  As I pushed some of the salad to the side and began eating one of the strips, I became curious as to where the caramel apple jam was located.  I figured they must have forgotten it, but the proscuitto was very tasty and delightfully salty that I paid it no mind.  When I unveiled the second strip of proscuitto from its salad jungle, I found the jam, and lots of it.  I couldn't figure out whether they did that on purpose or not.  I finished eating the jammed up strip and then realized that I would have liked it if there wasn't such a thick slathering of jam on the proscuitto.  That leads me to believe it was a mistake to only put jam on one slice, but who knows.  They served this with a Vino Espumosa from Spain, which I very much enjoyed.  It was not as dry as many champagnes and could even be described as a little bit juicy.  The bubbles served as a nice contrast to the fattiness of the meat and olive oil.  Also, I apologize for the quality of these pictures.  I felt it would be rude and kind of weird to take big flash pictures with a real camera in a nice place like Vie, so I used my phone instead.

Michelle ordered the burrata, tomato jam, and basil pesto crostini as her first course.  It was like a glorified version of bruschetta except with much more cheese and, again, a mountain of greens on top.  For most people, the cheese would be fine, but Michelle hates most cheese for reasons that elude me (that's why we can never be European), so, needless to say, she was not thrilled with this dish.  I tried a bite of this just to see what a normal, cheese-loving person would think about it, and I too was not thrilled.  I guess it wasn't just the cheese that throws people off.  While the bread was very good, everything else was kind of mushy.  I don't really like bruschetta for this very reason, so it does not terribly surprise me that I didn't care for this dish.  They served this with a 2007 Domaine Hippolyte Reverdy which is a rose from Sancerre.  I did not like this wine when I tried it, but I also tried it out of context with the dish it was intended to be served with, so perhaps it was decent with the food.  Michelle did have it with the food, and she says it was only "mediocre."  I laughed when they refilled her glass.

For my main course, I ordered the pan-fried whitefish with braised potatoes and a meyer lemon vinaigrette.  I thought I had pulled a fast one on Michelle since she just ordered a plain old Chicken Milanese, so I was grinning like a Cheshire Cat.  This dish came out, and again, it had a dump-truck full of salad on top.  I don't understand the need to put a giant pile of salad on every dish, but since I can just push it to the side, I don't really care that much.  I'm generally not a big fan of fish skin, but the skin on this white fish was fantastically crisped and not slimy at all (like when I make it).  The fish was nice and moist and the sauce added a nice smoky lemony taste to it.  The potatoes may have been my favorite part of the dish.  They had some strange (but good) vanilla taste going on which married nicely with the lemon sauce.  I really liked this fish, and I wished that I had just a few more bites.  I guess that is the hallmark of a successful course.  They served a 2007 Hoopla Chardonnay with this.  I believe it was lightly oaked, and the creaminess of the wine really rounded off the sharpness of the lemon sauce.  Vie, you found another winner here.

With my glorious fish dish came Michelle's plain old Chicken Milanese (with polenta, garlic, and, of course, a whirlwind of salad).  They had brought out the wines before the course was served, and I did not like her 2008 Quattro Mani Montepulciano very much at all (continuing my string of disliking Italian wine).  I was watching her as she took her first bite, and her mouth absolutely dropped when she bit into it.  She started pointing at it and wildly gesticulating toward the plate.  Was it possible that her dish was better than mine?  Note that I have a scary ability to nearly always pick the best thing on the menu.  I had to find out for myself.  As I reached over the table to snag a bite sized  portion of it, her eyes narrowed, and I think she tried to stab me with her fork.  This alone confirmed to me that this was going to be really good.  I took the chicken and bit in, and it was like a garlic explosion with amazingly crisp, flavorful breading and some sort of tart sauce (possibly a vinaigrette) to round the whole thing off.  It was positively amazing.  I tried her wine again to see whether it went with the food, and, reminiscent of Sixteen, the wine, while not that good standing alone, was truly spectacular with the food.  This is probably the hardest part of pairing wines, I would imagine.  Risking my life, I even managed to steal another piece off of her plate.  She got me this time, even though my dish was really good too.

After the stunningly good main dishes we had, we ended, as per usual, with dessert.  Dessert today was warm gooey butter cake, tahitian vanilla ice cream, brittled peanuts, and chocolate sauce.  Gooey and butter and cake all in the same sentence?  I was totally sold just from the description.  The actual course did not disappoint my justifiably high expectations.  The best way to describe it would be "The Best Chocolate Chip Cookie in the World."  The cake was so gooey (I mean that in the best way possible) that it was like eating a cookie fresh out of the oven.  The butter flavor was amazing, and you all know how much I love butter.  Michelle was convinced that the vanilla ice cream was like the milk in "milk and cookies."  I get hungry just thinking about this, and it may have ruined other cookies for me forever.

Overall, I would definitely recommend Vie to anyone who wants to eat somewhere amazing, particularly in the western suburbs where there is a dearth of good an innovative places to eat.  Even though I really didn't understand the salad pile thing, I figure that is a minor blemish on an otherwise stellar dinner.  I was going to try to talk them into giving me the recipe for the Chicken Milanese, but I figured I would try my hand at it a few times before throwing in the towel and calling them.  I also may have to ask them about the warm gooey butter cake.

Redemption!

I desperately wanted to go somewhere for spring break this year to get away from this awful semester. What did I want to do on my break? If you answered "go somewhere crazy to eat," you are correct, of course.

The only question left was where to go. Being a big dreamer, I decided I wanted to try to tackle the current king of the mountain, Per Se in New York. The biggest impediment (or so I thought) in my plan was the 2 month requirement for reservations. Undaunted, I called Per Se and ended up on a waiting list. Surprisingly, they called back about 3 days later with a dinner reservation for me. Sure it wasn't until 10pm, but I'm very European like that, so I took it.

I began checking flights and hotels, but for some reason everything was so absurdly expensive, even by New York standards, that the trip was beginning to look unrealistic. Yes, even more unrealistic than flying across the country to eat at a restaurant.

The flights were $350 each, the hotel would have been about $400, and then dinner would have been $800. Add in meals and other stuff, and we are rolling in at like $2500 when the only thing I care about was Per Se. To twist a Justice Antonin Scalia quote around a bit, "I love to eat, but I'm not a nut." However, if I was quoting Justice Clarence Thomas, I would be going on this trip, but I'm no Justice Clarence Thomas. As such, I sadly cancelled the reservation.

Not one to stay down in the dumps too long, I quickly formulated a new plan. I still wanted to eat out somewhere crazy, and Charlie Trotter's immediately came to mind. Trotter's holds a special place in my heart since it was the first multi-course dinner I ever had, but I haven't been back in nearly four years. I also have been hearing good things about Avenues in the Peninsula Hotel, so that was on my list as well.

I was having a very hard time deciding which to choose when I temporarily lost my mind and said to myself, "hey Brian, you were about 4 seconds away from dropping $2500 for one dinner, why don't you go to both restaurants for less than half of that on back to back days?" great idea, Brian, let's do that! What's that you say? It's Chef's Week too and you can go to Vie in Western Springs? Sure, pile it on.

That little thought process is what spawned what can only be described as Dining Out Week. I'm going to Vie tonight, Trotter's on tomorrow, and Avenues on Saturday. I look forward to writing these blog posts, and hopefully I can avoid buying some 1857 Chateau D'Yquem at Trotter's, though I often lose control of myself in situations like that.

A Standing Reservation

I have to say, I really enjoy having Bri over for dinner.  It's like having a dinner party, only every night.  I realized that I always cook too much food, so I decided that from now on, I was just going to send her the menu and a time.  After that, it's up to her if she shows up.

I went to Jewel with absolutely no idea what I was going to cook.  As I was walking around, I noticed that they had "Buy 1, Get 1 Free" whole chickens.  I decided to jump all over that offer and picked up 2 chickens.  Having an idea of what I wanted to eat, I sent Bri the following text "Whole roast chicken, lemon-thyme sauce, 9:15."  Nearly instantly, she responded, "I'm there."

The recipe for roast chicken could not possibly be more simple, and thus, it's outstanding for a weeknight meal.

I began getting the chicken ready for the dinner when Bri texted to tell me she would be over in 5 minutes.  I quickly prepared for her arrival.  Also, I finally successfully trussed a chicken (Thomas Keller would be so proud).

Bri got here just as I was putting the chicken in the oven.  She, as per usual, told me several disgusting stories about being a nurse.  After avoiding puking, she mentioned we should get hammered.  I thought about it, and it was Wednesday, so I readily agreed.

We headed out to In Fine Spirits on Clark Street to pick up some wine (more on this later) while the chicken was in the oven.  When we got there; however, they were closing even though it was only 8:58.  Disheartened but not deterred, we went down the block to the liquor/wine store on Foster and Clark.  We ended up getting a Ridge Zinfandel, a Rombauer Chardonnay, and a Cider.  While at the store, Bri repeatedly insisted that the chicken would not be cooked, but I thought it would be.

We got home right as the oven went off (ostensibly perfect timing!).  I began making the sauce and slicing the chicken when I realized that Bri was right...the chicken was not fully cooked.  I popped it back in the oven for another 10 minutes to finish.

Meanwhile, Michelle opened up the bottle of Ridge Zinfandel.  To my utter shock, Bri started drinking it.  While she was a bit off-put by the room temperature of the wine, she was actually enjoying red wine for what I think was the first time ever.  So for those of you keeping track, she's flown from the grossest sweet Rieslings to some pretty decent Chardonnay to liking some Zinfandel.  By next week she is going to be telling me things like "I detect a faint wafting of asparagus in this wine."  It's like she jumped into the food/wine world in fast forward.  I love it.

Anyway, back to the food.  This was definitely the best roast chicken I've ever made.  The skin was perfectly crisped, and after the additional cooking, the meat was perfectly moist and delicious.  Michelle agreed with me that it was the best one that I have made, and Bri even went so far as to say it was her favorite chicken ever.  I also made a spinach with butter which Bri also ate (she's quite the adventurous eater now).  I thought it was pretty good, but definitely not the best spinach I've ever made.  I think the only thing I would change would be to put the chicken in a cast iron pan instead of a stainless steel one.  The problem there was that my cast iron pan was too small to fit the chicken.  Anyway, here is the recipe.

Roast Chicken with Lemon-Thyme Sauce (serves 3)
1 6 lb whole chicken
kosher salt
pepper
1 tbsp butter
1/2 tspn thyme
1/4 lemon, juiced

1.  Preheat the oven to 450
2.  Pat the chicken dry with paper towels, including in the cavity.
3.  Truss the chicken (look it up, this can be important).
4.  Liberally sprinkle the chicken with the salt and pepper.
5.  Put it in the oven for about 45 minutes (or until the meat thermometer reaches 155).
6.  Take the chicken out of the oven and baste it for about a minute with the pan drippings.  Reserve the pan drippings.
7.  Remove the chicken from the pan and put it on a cutting board.  Cover tightly with foil while you make the sauce.
8.  Put the butter, thyme, and lemon juice in the pan and stir until melted together.  If you need to, put the pan over medium-low heat.
9.  Slice the chicken and serve with the pan sauce.