RW – Lure Fishbar
July 30, 2008 § 2 Comments
Lure was the second experience of Restaurant Week 2008 and a true treat. I went with my old tennis teammate Joming and her friend Scott Yang Monday night for dinner to this subterranean seafood restaurant in Soho near Dean and Deluca. Let me first say that the decor inside is amazing – it looks like the inside of a yacht which makes sense. Clean lines, wood panels, leather booths, lots of blue.
For appetizers, Joming ordered the raw bar, I had the shrimp tempura, and Scott got the salmon tartare – a good spread. We were also surprised with two amuse-bouches, crab cakes on a stick and eggs on eggs (caviar topped deviled eggs) and an introduction to the executive chef himself, Josh Capon. A really nice touch if you ask me.
First: my tempura was AMAZING. I’ve never had shrimp that succulent and the outside crust wasn’t soggy at all, which is usually one of my biggest fears. The spicy mayo sauce had quite a lot of zing and reminded me of the sauce that comes with volcano rolls at Fujiyama Mama (a favorite local sushi place in Westfield). My mouth was so darned happy. And the portion wasn’t teeny tiny either which just meant more shrimp for me!
I didn’t get to try the tartare or the rawtasting, but therewas sound approval from both Joming and Scott, so I’m going to go with their statements and say they were both delicious as well.
Main courses: Joming and Scott had the nori crusted tuna and I went with a perfectly cooked and delicate (rare in my books) grilled salmon. My favorite part of this dish though was the lemon gnocchi underneath, which had the perfect smooth texture and a unique twist in taste from the citrus. This is something I want to try making the next time I get in the kitchen. It just added a whole another aspect to your regular gnocchi pasta. Yum.
Dessert started with another treat from the chef – strawberry creampuffs with a sour-cream poppyseed gelato. Joming couldn’t get her spoon away from the gelato, she just kept spooning away little by little (she though she was being subtle) until there was none left. I loved the creampuffs! They weren’t heavy at all and wonderfully buttery/flaky, but the strawberries cut the richness of the pastry.
There was also a lemon meringue bar, which would’ve been too sweet if there weren’t also the tart blueberries on the side. The sake mojito sorbet was…different. It took a bit to get used to the intriguing taste, but I came to like it by the last couple of bites. Very refreshing. Joming had decided to get the chocolate panna cotta, which I liked. Creamy, silky, smooth…a little bit of bitterness that mellowed out. I wanted more though. The cookie and banana in caramel sauce I didn’t care much for.
All in all, a wonderful meal, no doubt enhanced by the additional bites. I’d love to try Lure’s sushi next time and the raw bar since that’s mainly what the restaurant is known for. Given that it’s passed my initial tasting with flying colors, I’m now definitely more willing to shell out (haha! or not) money for a couple of special rolls and oysters. And now, I’m hungry again! Coming up…BARBECUE!
Lure Fishbar
142 Mercer St.
near Prince St.
212.431.7676
RW – Fleur de Sel
July 25, 2008 § 5 Comments
Restaurant Week kicked off Monday, and yesterday, Cathy, Tonia, and I met for lunch at Fleur de Sel in the Flatiron District near Union Square. The restaurant is rather small with amber lighting and what took up most of our attention while we waiting for our food was a weird sculptural bottle holder with a tree growing out of it. When I got back to a computer, I tried researching the significance of the gnarled plant, but no leaves.
Outside
For Restaurant Week, there were two choices for each of the three courses. For the first, all three of us ordered the chicken liver pate with salad, brioche toasts, and a balsamic reduction. As usual with French cuisine, the portions were small and such a tease. But it was the BEST pate I’ve had. It was so smooth, so creamy, so well-seasoned that I wished they gave us more brioche – light and crisp with a buttery sweetness – because the two paired beautifully. In the end we ended up smearing the extra on slices of the regular country bread they doled out for us throughout the course of the meal.
For the main course, there was pan seared cod with lobster emulsion and lamb shank crepe with baby carrots and turnips served au jus (what I had). The crepe was extremely thin and delicate and there was no skimping on the lamb which was extremely tender. I kept clanging my fork and knife against the plate because I was so eager to eat it all. I tried a bit of Cathy’s cod and it was so light that it broke apart almost immediately after you even slightly prodded it.
Dessert was the perfect end to an excellent meal. There was an assortment of sorbets with a sugary meringue at the bottom and a blueberry crumbcake with sorbet that was surprisingly light. The flavors of each of the sorbets were incredibly distinct – I hate when all you taste is sugar and nothing else when it comes to ice cream/frozen yogurt/etc. The only thing I regretted overall that the three courses were over so quickly.
The prix fixe for lunch is only 5 dollars more than the Restaurant Week price at 29 dollars. Considering the quality and presentation of the food that Cyril Renaud is creating from the kitchen, that’s still a heck of a deal. Plus, the menus change in tandem with the season and availability of ingredients so you’re not always going to see the same choices. Highly recommend it – if you can, try the pate! It was my favorite part of the meal.
Fleur de Sel
5 E. 20th St nr. 5th Avenue
212.460.9100
Warning! Long post: Dylan’s, Papillon, La Maison du Chocolat, and Bo Ky
July 15, 2008 § 20 Comments
Saturday, July 12th, was my second youngest sister’s birthday. Laura turned 15, and two days before, my youngest sister, Jackie, turned 10. What way to celebrate other than a whole day out in New York City? And I mean a whole day.
We first visited the Brooklyn Museum to see the Murakami exhibit for ourselves – Murakami is probably best known for his
art on Kanye West‘s last album and the cherry-covered Louis Vuitton bags. The exhibition as a whole was pretty eye-popping and funky and a bit freaky, something I’m glad we’d seen before it’s closing the next day.
Here’s an example of Murakami’s SUPERFLAT art. See the flowers below the actual canvas? Well, entire walls were covered in those psychedelic happy flowers. Let’s just say I was a bit dizzy by the end.
SUPERFLAT
From Brooklyn, we took the 4 all the way up to 59 and Lex where Laura and Jackie went gaga over the treats at Dylan’s Candy Bar. They’ve just finished renovations, and now the lower level is exclusively for candy while the upper level is a full-out ice cream, frothy drink cafe.
Afterwards, we walked down to 5th where Laura wanted to see the cubed Apple store (there were droves of people waiting in line for the new iphone so we didn’t actually go inside) and amused ourselves in the Ugly Doll section of FAO Schwarz. Other stops included the Disney store (Jackie went beserk when she saw the Jonas Brothers window display), Henri Bendel, and Takashimaya, until we finally decided at 2:00 PM that it was time to eat and randomly chose Papillon.
Papillon was a mediocre “bistro” with the usual French dishes such as French Onion Soup, foie gras pate with greens, etc. Since it was brunch time, we also got brioche French toast (my favorite of the dishes), and a disappointing burger that lacked tenderness, salinityand flavor. I could’ve been eating a chew toy. Well, I guess you win some, you lose some.
Dishes at Papillon
Walked around a bit more until we got to Rockefeller Plaza, where I dragged the two kiddies to La Maison du Chocolat to FINALLY try one (well, three) of their famous macarons.
Is there anything more delicious? These really are the best macarons I’ve had in NYC – the almond meringues on each had the desired crispiness at the initial bite, yet the insides were soft and slightly chewy and went well with the healthy dose of the filling (Financier macarons don’t have enough and that bothers me a bit). My personal favorite was the chocolate and tea. There was a hint of raspberry that lightened the richness of the chocolate, perfect complements to one another. The coffee was delicious, and the caramel a bit too rich and sweet for me, but it was just plain wonderful to finally eat even a single one.
Macarons!
We ended our day out by shopping in Soho. I stopped at Vosges Haut Chocolat to pick up a couple chocolate bars and we looked around the MoMA store to see if there were any interesting gadgets on sale (usually it’s way too pricey for us). But most importantly, we had to eat noodles for dinner. It’s a Chinese tradition to eat noodles on your birthday because the food symbolizes long life, and we went to our family favorite – Bo Ky.
Just simple, duck and mushroom noodle soup at an unbelievably low price. Flavorful broth with condiments on the side that you can add to your heart’s delight, tender duck, and a helping of Chinese broccoli and mushrooms. Comfort food at its finest and a wonderful meal at the end of a very long and jam-packed day. We went home quite happy.
Soy sauce chicken noodle soup
So there you have it, another long day in the best city in the world. I’m biased it’s true, but after this post, how can you not think it so?
Notes on Food 