Graham Elliot, one of Chicago's up and coming is a locale I have wanted to try for months. A little on Elliot (head Chef at the restaurant) is as follows: A three time James Beard nominee, he is the youngest four star chef in America. In 2004, he was granted Food & Wine's Best New Chef. With his father in the Navy, he has lived in various cities throughout the world which speaks to his eclectic cooking, flavors and personality.
It's a cute little restaurant on Huron St. Upon entering, they've got a simmering pot of potpourri made with herbs and spices, as well as black and white photos of various raw vegetables adorning the walls. When you walk into the dining room, you immediately spy that food here, is indeed considered art.
The menu is broken up into five delectable sections: Cold, hot, land, sea, sweet. The first two indicate appetizers, the second two comprise the entrees, and the last is pretty self explanatory. We sat down and were ushered in to our gourmet experience with a hearty basket of garlic/parmesean popcorn. Anyone who knows Andrew and I should know about our love of popcorn, and this was light and fluffy (not too buttery), and a perfect savory beginning to whet our appetites for what was to come. (Incidentally, we had two baskets)
Appetizer #1: Off the "Cold" section: Shaved Asparagus Salad
Parmesan Cloud. Poached Egg. Bacon Powder. Tarragon Sabayon.
Starting off with this dish, my eyes were captivated, while my palate was somewhat dissapointed. If the dish were as good as it looked, the meal would have been a home run. However, I have discovered that while Elliot truly does treat food like art, his focus is on the presentation and plating, and a little less on the innovation of food.
*Parmesan Cloud=foam with a slight hint of parmesan flavoring. *Poached Egg=Poached Egg.
*Bacon Powder= high class bacon bits.
*Tarragon Sabayon= mayo with tarragon and mustard.
=One expensive (but much finer looking) Cobb salad.
Appetizer #2: Off the "Hot" section: Fricassee of escargot
Puff pastry. Mushroom ragout. Roasted garlic. Parsley bubbles.
This dish was more of success, though I would attribute that to the ingredients themselves, as well as the perfectly cooked escargot and puff pastry. Garlic and butter are the quintessential ingredients to any well cooked snail. Snail in and of itself has a rubbery, virtually tasteless texture/flavor, and thus the rich buttery-ness you derive from garlic and butter round out the exotic treat. I would never think to add a parsley flavor, although the thought works to combine mushrooms into a somewhat earthy flavored-fare. The puff pastry is what contributes to the "buttery-ness" of the dish (trust me, it definitely had enough), and the texture of the dish in its entirety was equally satisfying. You had chewy, flaky, airy and tender all hit your tongue at precisely the same time to make this concoction come together.
Entree #1: From the "Sea" portion of the menu: Sauteed Alaskan Halibut
Israeli couscous. Smoked Eggplant. Caramalized fennel. Tomato Marmalade.
The fish was cooked perfectly. Moist, tender, flaky, falling off your fork kind-of-perfection. I loved every bit of it. The other stuff, not so much. Andrew and I discovered that we weren't big fennel fans. This 'licorice' flavored root vegetable is what I called an "acquired taste", and if you don't like the black rope-type candy they sell in stores, chances are you probably won't like fennel. The couscous added an interesting mini-pearl/rice texture and was a good complement to the fish, but the smoked eggplant and tomato marmalade seemed like bitter messes. There was too much going on and the dish reminded me of Andrew from Top Chef who could never reign in his focus to one core message.
Entree #2: From the "land" section of the menu: Berkshire pork with a Root-Beer BBQ glaze, Baked beans and a salad de provence.
This man sure does know how to prepare his starring role of any plate. The pork was expertly tender, moist and juicy- and my thoughts echo those as the dish above. The acoutrements are not entirely necessary (the Rootbeer caught our attention), the baked beans did not, and overall there was too much going on for us to hit the singular pinnacle of this dish. While we may be simplistic in nature, that's where my palate lies. Clean, simplistic, fresh, yet innovative. The bbq sauce had a hint of rootbeer (could have done with more, I thought) and the beans were an unecessary addition to bring the dish back down to its roots to an old fashioned, midwestern picnic.
The true highlight of the dinner was when Andrew surprised me with a requested tour of the kitchen, and a meet and greet with the Chef. I hadn't known much about the chef, but true to his description, his nature was bubbly, energetic, and upbeat. He gave us a tour of the kitchen (they prepare each one of the dishes in a siloed environment true to the layout of the menu (Hot, cold, Land, Sea, Sweet), and they've got all sorts of ingredients that are preserved, pickled (root beer and poprocks for example). We chatted to him about his favorite dishes (the appetizers- as we had suspected), and thanked him for a great experience (which it truly was).
Incidentally, for those of you who hadn't heard, Elliot was featured on Top Chef last week (June 10th) and while he placed second in his heat and missed out on making the finals with our favorite Hubert Keller, he showed his true colors with ingenious plating, a great sense of humor (alongside good friend Wylie Dufresne), and a keen sense of innovation (they had to make a gourmet meal out of things found in a vending machine).
His menu is ever changing, and in fact- back in the kitchen he had just announced the new dishes that would make their debut the following night. From previous menu-lookups, I had been excited for his foie with pop rocks, his "twinkie croutons", or his Pabst glazed pearl onions...but alas, those will have to wait for their reincarnation. At least we got a signed menu!
http://www.grahamelliot.com/
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