Posts Tagged ‘James Beard Award Nominee’

Niche: St. Louis, MO

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Posted 17 Jan 2011 — by S.E.
Category Fine Dining, Full Service

 

I first took notice of Chef Gerard Craft of Niche Restaurant in St. Louis, when he won a “Best New Chef 2008” award from Food & Wine Magazine. As a committed culinary trend spotter and tracker of professional chefs, I pay particular attention to the up-and-coming culinary set since they are often the source of inspired innovation. To see the future, one must keep an eye on young talent. After tracking chef Craft for a few months I came to realize, based on an extensive number of food-related hits on Google, that St. Louis had an incredible food scene relative to the city’s size. With several food oriented publications including St. Louis Magazine and Sauce Magazine (my favorite), the culinary arts in St. Louis are well publicized. Tracking Craft was easy.

Thirty one year old Craft, a Burlington, Vermont native, opened Niche in August of 2006 to rave reviews. According to Inc. Magazine, which included Craft in an article titled “Cool, Determined, and Under 30”, the restaurant was generating upwards of $2.6M in gross sales as late as 2008. In January of 2009 Craft was nominated for a James Beard Award (Best Chef Midwest) and picked up another nomination in the same category in 2010. In September of 2010 Craft shocked St. Louis when he announced that he planned to move Niche and replace it with a new Italian restaurant concept called Porano. Niche would move into the small Sidney Street space next door to the restaurant currently occupied by Taste, Craft’s smaller casual concept dedicated to small plates, great cocktails and fantastic desserts. The announcement coincided with Niche taking the top spot for food in St. Louis scoring a 28 in the Zagat Guide.

The word within the professional chef community around St. Louis was that Craft had taken a hard hit due to the economy and was seeking to reset the restaurant as a casual Italian eatery and make up for lost revenue through lower prices and higher volume. St. Louis is and has always been a town with a penchant toward Italian restaurants and Craft was seeking to find some stability by tapping the demand. When he announced the change at Niche, St. Louis gasped. Then, according to some insiders, the community resisted changes to its favorite restaurant and bastion of the culinary arts.

On January 4, 2011 the St. Louis Riverfront Times announced that Craft had changed course and will keep Niche where it is and the way it is rather than proceed with such dramatic changes. In the process he will move and sell Taste and regroup operationally and emotionally. What a challenging year for such a talented professional and his team. It is clear that in small markets like St. Louis, economic ripples have a serious impact of fine dining restaurants and young professional chefs like Craft. Like many locals, I am glad that Craft is keeping Niche the way it is. Niche is excellent and competes at a level equal to any top destination restaurant in the country. I know this first-hand from spending time on Sidney Street in St. Louis and eating at Niche.

When I arrive for dinner it is dark out and Niche is lit up. The restaurant is located on the ground level of a two story brick building with a large glass storefront and black awning with “Niche” printed on it. At night, the entry and large plate-glass windows glow from interior lighting revealing the hustle and bustle of a busy restaurant inside. It looks inviting and bright on a dark cold night.

Other chefs in the area are complimentary when I mention I am visiting Niche; they genuinely like Chef Craft. There seems to be a high level of respect for the restaurant itself too and for what Chef Craft is doing locally. His regional and national press has helped the reputation of St. Louis as a whole and it appears that he is the center of the culinary community in the city.

Tonight I am dining with a group including another professional chef and folks at the table are excited to sample the fare. Chef Craft infuses just enough modernist culinary techniques to make his food interesting and innovative.  My amuse-bouche is a wonderful egg custard with “caviar” of the sodium alginate and calcium chloride type. The opener is well executed and delicious. I also sample a fresh made agnolotti (light, toothsome), sweetbreads (a real highlight and perfectly done), tuna crudo (nice), a spicy jalapeno sorbet palate cleanser (outstanding, something I will copy), poached seabass, scallops with pork belly (outstanding, I will copy this too), and two desserts that were very good but not as innovative as the other items we had.

Craft’s front of the house team offered a seamless dining experience from the moment we walked in the door until they handed us our coats and fetched our car. Service was professional, efficient, and comfortable but not intrusive. I love a quiet dining room where the service crew waltzes through the space during a rush. This was the case at Niche; the food was outstanding as was the service.

Time will tell whether Craft’s decision to bend to local pressure and keep Niche unchanged was a good choice. If the same customers that pressured Craft to preserve one of the best restaurants in St. Louis respond by supporting the restaurant with their business, things will work out just fine. The restaurant has the chops to meet the demands of the local community. The future of Niche rests with more with that community than with Craft himself. In the meantime, Craft should continue to be cool and determined, talent always yields good things!

Egg Custard with “Caviar”

 

Agnolotti with Dried Cherries

 

Seared Sweet Breads with Napa Cabbage

 

Tuna Crudo on Crostini

 

Spicy Jalapeno Sorbet

 

Poached Seabass

 

Scallops with Roasted Pork Belly, Cauliflower Florets and Cauliflower Puree

 

Chocolate Cake with Malted Ice Cream

 

Semolina Cake, Pear Terrine, Vanilla Ice Cream

 

Niche Restaurant

1831 Sidney St.

St. Louis, MO 63104

314.773.7755

 

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No. 9 Park ~ Boston

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Posted 24 Oct 2010 — by S.E.
Category Fine Dining, Full Service

Chef Barbara Lynch is setting Boston on fire. For the past thirteen years she’s been steadily opening restaurants while pushing the envelope on culinary creativity and service in a city with a history of embracing strong female chefs. Her restaurants (9 as of this writing) are bold, creative, and of clear intent. Although she’s generated tremendous press for her latest venture, Menton, and newer ventures like Drink (best creative cocktails in Boston),  B&G Oysters (best fresh oysters and martinis in Boston), and The Butcher Shop (best burger in the city, hands down), my favorite  Barbara Lynch outlet is good old No. 9 Park. No. 9 Park is a gem. It has old world charm with a contemporary twist and several long-standing menu items that draw me in each time I am in the neighborhood.

No. 9 Park steadily offers several signature menu items.  Lynch’s prune stuffed Gnocchi with foie gras is such a dish and it’s the main reason I love stop over as a “walk-in” and sit at the bar or one of the café tables for a snack. If you arrive right at 5:30 p.m., a table is usually available without reservation and within minutes hot Gnocchi and steaming foie gras can be yours.  With its deep stained wood floors, antique chandeliers, and cushioned seating by the bay window, the bar is incredibly relaxing and comfortable. Designed by Cheryl and Jeffry Katz of C&J Katz Design, the space draws on its colonial surroundings while remaining sleek and refined. In some ways, the interior of No. 9 Park reminds me of what the original Olives in Charlestown was like back in the day. Warm and inviting, refined, packed, loud, comfortable and mouthwatering.

Prune Stuffed Gnocchi with Foie Gras

In the culinary world, there are lineages, both regionally and nationally. Lynch can trace her pedigree back to Todd English when he was cooking at Michela Larson’s Michela’s in Cambridge.  I had a friend that worked at Michela’s at the time and she was a colleague of Lynch’s. Both were running fast and hard in the midst of an emerging Boston restaurant scene. Even then it was clear that Lynch was her own woman with a future ahead. It wasn’t long before Todd took off to open Olives and the rest is history as far as Todd is concerned. Barbara Lynch followed English to Olives and then over to Figs. When I eat the Gnocchi with foie gras I taste an echo of the tremendous, super rich, deeply flavorful, hearty and rustic foods that English used to serve and sense a bit of English’s genetic code in what Lynch is doing. The evolution of a chef and the lineage he or she draws from results in subtle similarities in menu items and techniques between the master and apprentice.  I see this as complimentary to both parties. Don’t get me wrong, Barbara Lynch owns the dining scene in Boston in a way that Todd English never has.  The apprentice is now the master cooking with some similarities.

Today, Barbara Lynch operates nine different restaurant concepts and employs over 200 people. She serves as CEO of Barbara Lynch Gruppo and has a fantastic track record adding new concepts to her portfolio. It was only 13 years ago that Lynch opened her first restaurant! She probably has another new concept in development at this very moment.  As far as I can tell, there is no other female chef in the country with such a high quality restaurant portfolio or the accolades that Lynch has earned over the years. These are the thoughts that fill my head as I take my first bite of Gnocchi, steaming slab of foie gras attached.  You have to try this dish. Go to No. 9 Park and take a seat at the bar. Order a glass of champagne and a plate of the Gnocchi to get you started, and soak in the room. This may be the very dish that launched an empire and it is one that will warm your soul.

Charcuterie Plate

Composed Salad

Black Olive Clafoutis

Chocolate Cremeaux

 

No. 9 Park

9 Park St.

Boston, MA 02108

617-742-9991 

 

 

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Rasika ~ Washington, D.C. Indian Fine Dining

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Posted 12 Oct 2010 — by S.E.
Category Fine Dining

Last month during one of my trips to Washington D.C., I made a point to trek over to Rasika at 633 D. St., NW in Penn quarter on for a meal. Being a fan and follower of great Indian food, I had been meaning to eat at Rasika for months but never had the time. This trip the timing worked so I made a reservation with high anticipation. What excites me most about Rasika is that it’s pushing the limit on Indian fine dining in America and earning rave reviews along the way including one of the highest scores for food in Washington D.C. by Zagat. Rasika also has talent in the kitchen. Executive chef Vikram Sunderam, one of the few Indian chefs to be nominated for a James Beard award (best chef Mid-Atlantic 2010), has a refined yet authentic touch when creating menu items and produces food as elegant as the stunning décor and service at Rasika. This is a serious Indian restaurant with a serious, talented, professional Indian chef.

Sunderam was hired away from the Bombay Brasserie in London by Rasika owner Ashok Bajaj. With Sunderam at the helm, Bajaj opened Rasika in 2006 to compliment his collection of restaurants in the Washington D.C. metro area. It’s telling that Bajaj had to recruit talent from London when opening Rasika. There’s no one else in America pushing the limits on Indian food the way Bajaj is at Rasika and, other than from India itself, London is the only place with an Indian culinary community mature enough to provide Rasika with this level of back-of-the-house talent. Reflecting on the restaurant décor, website, food, service and style, it is clear that Ashok Bajaj is a man of vision.

Bajaj’s first restaurant, Bombay Club, opened in 1989 and is now a Washington institution. After arriving in Washington in 1988, having completed stints with the Taj hotel group in India and London, Bajaj scraped together the resources to open Bombay Club with a partner and, sans partner, has added another restaurant to his empire every 2-4 years since. While dining at Rasika Bajaj stopped over to my table to say hello. He’s a distinguished looking, well dressed gentleman with great presence. He departed my table after a minute or two and I watched him walk away. As he walked he shifted his head from one side to the other, eyes darting around the restaurant to each table. Bajaj has the intuitive ability to “sense” when a restaurant is running well that all great restaurant owners have and his vision drives the progressive Indian fusion cuisine Rasika is known for.

Rasika represents the steady evolution of Indian cuisine in the U.S. Twenty years ago it wasn’t uncommon to find one or two good Indian restaurants in major cities but the cuisine was less prevalent in suburban areas and the food was tame compared to Indian food in the U.S. today. Even Bajaj agrees that the American dining public is shifting toward a wider acceptance of Indian cuisine. Perhaps we are headed into an era where Indian flavors and cooking techniques will become as common in America as Latin and Mediterranean flavors have been in recent years. If this happens, we will have Sunderam and Bajaj to thank, in part, for showing us the way.

My meal at Rasika was served family style for a table of seven. The photos below reflect this (FYI).  

Chili Garlic Scallops $12 Ginger, lemon juice, poha

Barbeque Shrimp ($12) Fresh mint chutney

Entrée (l-r) Bhindi Amchoor (sliced okra with dry mango powder), Dal Makhani (lentils, tomato, garlic, fenugreek), Chicken Tikka Masala, Basmati rice

Rasika Bread Basket $8 Assorted Naan/Roti

Gulab Jamun ($8) & Apple Jalebi Beignet with Cardamom Ice Cream ($8)

Rasika 633 D St. NW

Washington, DC 20004-2904

 202-637-1222

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Restaurant Charlie Post Mortem

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Posted 02 May 2010 — by S.E.
Category Fine Dining, Food Alert Trends

On March 19th Charlie Trotter closed Restaurant Charlie and Bar Charlie at the Palazzo Hotel in Las Vegas when restaurant traffic, like a Las Vegas rain, dried to dust. Restaurant Charlie was closed at the top if its game because there wasn’t enough traffic to sustain ongoing operations. Another great restaurant killed by a bad economy! The 120 seat restaurant, including a wonderful kitchen table perched on a private balcony above the hot line, and 18 seat Kaiseki bar was nothing short of spectacular and, more important, employed some really nice and talented people. Although seeing Charlie struggle makes me sad (he’s a great guy), the effect this closure had on people like Chef Vanessa Garcia and Kaiseki Chef Hiro Nagahara is even sadder. Restaurant Charlie was just starting to gain momentum when it closed.

Hagar and Trotter

I would never have been to Restaurant Charlie if it wasn’t for Trotter himself. When I bumped into Charlie Trotter at the Venetian late last year, he was chatting with rocker Sammy Hagar. Charlie was as energized as ever with a big smile on his face and asked if I had eaten at Restaurant Charlie yet. I hadn’t and my response was disappointing to him. Hagar rolled his eyes. Wrong answer I guess. Trotter paused for a moment, asked if I was willing to endure a quick 5 course Kaiseki, (I was), and within 10 minutes I was on my way across the casino floor to the restaurant.

Chef Hiro

Alone and feeling a bit off guard, I sat at the end of the Kaiseki bar which was half full. After a minute or two my waitress stopped over and introduced herself (her name was Penny). I told Penny to guide me through the five course menu with wines. She smiled and departed to key in my order. A few minutes later Kaiseki chef Hiro Nagahara approached me and said hello. Hiro and I spent the next two hours chatting about his background, his love of Japanese cooking, global food, blending the traditional with the modern and the wonderful freedom he has to be creative at Bar Charlie.

Although I have more I could write about the way Nagahara waltzes his way through the kitchen while conversing with customers, I will save that story for another entry. Instead, I offer you the photos below with a feeling of loss that Restaurant Charlie is gone along with an enduring sense of privilege that I got to eat there before it closed. Keep your eye’s peeled for Chefs Vanessa Garcia and Hiro Nagahara in the coming months, both  have bright futures. In particular, watch for Garcia. Fresh from receiving one Michelin star in 2009, and nominated for best new chef for 2010 by The James Beard Foundation, it will be interesting to see where she winds up.

 Five Course Kaiseki Menu

1st Course

Hirame, Black Grapes & Celery

Champagne Paul Goerg Blanc de Blanc Brut, France

 

2nd Course

Spanish Blue Fin Tuna, Umeboshi & Seawater

The Southeast Cocktail

3rd Course

Tasmanian Ocean Trout, Cauliflower & Tapioca

2007 Riesling Kabinett “Maximin Brunhauser Herrenberg” von Schubert, Mosel, Germany

 

Pork Belly

4th Course

Kurobuta Pork Belly, Herbed Cream & Baby Carrots

2007 Ken Wright “Abbot Claim” Pinot Noir, Yamhill-Carlton District

 

5th Course

Simple Coconut and Passionfruit Sorbet

6th Course

Black Plum with Red Shiso & Charred Cinnamon Ice Cream

2006 Hauth Kerpen “Wehlener Sonnenuhr” Riesling Beerenauslese, Mosel German

 

Friandise

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