Dining Month 2015: Swank & Swine
We had a group of 6 for this one, so we got to try pretty much everything.
Overall, this - while good - was probably my least-liked of the dining month places I've hit this year. It's still good, and with the right choice of dishes, it could be very good, but I didn't have those dishes.
Appetizers
* Nettle soup with Dungeness crab: This would have been great, except it tasted like crab, and I don't like crab. But if you don't mind it, go to.
* Salad of farm winter greens with aged Gouda and mandarin orange vinaigrette: Seemed a pretty standard salad with bitter greens
* Millennium Farms beet salad with sorrel, smoked chèvre and chive vinaigrette: I love beets. Yummy, but I am easy to please and I know it - put some beets and goat cheese on a plate and I'm content.
* Salad of baby gem lettuce, boquerones, Parmigiano-Reggiano, Pugliese croutons with roasted garlic lemon dressing: No one had this, so I don't know.
Entree:
* Carlton Farms pork tenderloin with corona bean cassoulet, house sausage and hedgehog mushrooms: I'm pretty hit or miss on pork, in general, and as such don't generally order it. This was the winning dish by a MILE. It was great.
* Mary’s Farm half chicken with roasted apples, celery root, and chicken jus: Runner up entree. Juicy and surprisingly sweet (I think it must have been cooked in apple cider or something).
* Cavatelli pasta with local mushrooms, radicchio, citrus zest and mascarpone: Too strong on the lemon, and too bitter. There wasn't much besides sour and bitter in this dish, and it seemed out or proportion. And, while I am learning to not mind mushrooms, the mushrooms here were big and very present and mushroomy, and had soaked up a lot of the sauce, which was just sour and bitter. Not great. Mom ate my leftovers.
* Herb-crusted ling cod with Penn Cove mussels and fennel nage: Fish was good, but I'm not a mussels fan, and the shellfish flavor in this was too strong for me.
Desserts:
* Chocolate tart with pecans, caramel and malted ice cream: Crust was too thick. Tart was big (I could only eat half), and had caramel inside with chocolate ganache on top, with seasalt. Good, but not great.
* Apple tarte tatin warm salted caramel • cinnamon ice cream: Cinnamon ice cream was great, tart came with a touch of gold leaf, but the tart itself wasn't as apple-y as I wanted.
* Flourless chocolate cake with cherry anglaise and vanilla ice cream: Very like other dishes you've had.
* Burnside bourbon butterscotch custard with black pepper shortbread: The hands down winner. Fantastic - rich, creamy, bourbon-y.
Others:
I had a cocktail with coconut milk, kaluah, vodka, and cinnamon, which was pretty good - a little sweet, but not cloying.
Winners: Beet Salad or Nettle Soup (Depending on how you feel about crab), Pork loin, Bourbon butterscotch pudding.
Overall, this - while good - was probably my least-liked of the dining month places I've hit this year. It's still good, and with the right choice of dishes, it could be very good, but I didn't have those dishes.
Appetizers
* Nettle soup with Dungeness crab: This would have been great, except it tasted like crab, and I don't like crab. But if you don't mind it, go to.
* Salad of farm winter greens with aged Gouda and mandarin orange vinaigrette: Seemed a pretty standard salad with bitter greens
* Millennium Farms beet salad with sorrel, smoked chèvre and chive vinaigrette: I love beets. Yummy, but I am easy to please and I know it - put some beets and goat cheese on a plate and I'm content.
* Salad of baby gem lettuce, boquerones, Parmigiano-Reggiano, Pugliese croutons with roasted garlic lemon dressing: No one had this, so I don't know.
Entree:
* Carlton Farms pork tenderloin with corona bean cassoulet, house sausage and hedgehog mushrooms: I'm pretty hit or miss on pork, in general, and as such don't generally order it. This was the winning dish by a MILE. It was great.
* Mary’s Farm half chicken with roasted apples, celery root, and chicken jus: Runner up entree. Juicy and surprisingly sweet (I think it must have been cooked in apple cider or something).
* Cavatelli pasta with local mushrooms, radicchio, citrus zest and mascarpone: Too strong on the lemon, and too bitter. There wasn't much besides sour and bitter in this dish, and it seemed out or proportion. And, while I am learning to not mind mushrooms, the mushrooms here were big and very present and mushroomy, and had soaked up a lot of the sauce, which was just sour and bitter. Not great. Mom ate my leftovers.
* Herb-crusted ling cod with Penn Cove mussels and fennel nage: Fish was good, but I'm not a mussels fan, and the shellfish flavor in this was too strong for me.
Desserts:
* Chocolate tart with pecans, caramel and malted ice cream: Crust was too thick. Tart was big (I could only eat half), and had caramel inside with chocolate ganache on top, with seasalt. Good, but not great.
* Apple tarte tatin warm salted caramel • cinnamon ice cream: Cinnamon ice cream was great, tart came with a touch of gold leaf, but the tart itself wasn't as apple-y as I wanted.
* Flourless chocolate cake with cherry anglaise and vanilla ice cream: Very like other dishes you've had.
* Burnside bourbon butterscotch custard with black pepper shortbread: The hands down winner. Fantastic - rich, creamy, bourbon-y.
Others:
I had a cocktail with coconut milk, kaluah, vodka, and cinnamon, which was pretty good - a little sweet, but not cloying.
Winners: Beet Salad or Nettle Soup (Depending on how you feel about crab), Pork loin, Bourbon butterscotch pudding.