A delicious meal

[alonewiththemoon]

Sunday night we went to Craigie on Main, just outside of Central Square, and had the six course chef's whim.  I don't think I've ever been in a restaurant with so many waitstaff who were nevertheless so unobtrusive.  Your every need is anticipated.  A server accompanied us from the bar to our table just to carry my drink, and when M asked where the washrooms were, he was walked to them instead of having them pointed out.  We felt very country mouse in some ways but one does quickly become accustomed to that level of service.

Over the course of two hours, I ate:

• smoked sablefish with caviar and fennel vinaigrette, with little I think radish sprouts
  
• tempura cod cheeks with spicy mayonnaise.  Ordinarily I do not like mayonnaise at all but this bore little to no resemblance to the stuff that comes in jars
• seared tuna with fennel sauce and some kind of greens that I am forgetting
• macomber turnip puree/soup--this was to die for
• Chilean sea bass with chinese broccoli and a carrot au jus.  The fish was of course delicious, even if Chilean sea bass is one of those fish one ought not to eat, iirc, but the carrot au jus was a revelation.  I like carrots well enough, but this was the Platonic ideal template of carrot against which all taste of carrot must be measured.
• apple and pear crisp with prune cognac ice cream.  I make a pretty mean crisp myself so while the crisp was delicious, it did not blow me away.  The prune and cognac ice cream, otoh--wow.  If you had told me before Sunday that I would swoon over prune flavored anything I would have been highly skeptical, but I did indeed swoon over this!

I also had a cocktail called Northern Lights, which had St. Germain, scotch, grapefruit juice and Bitterman's tiki bitters.  It was a very well crafted drink but a little sweet for my palate--the bar menu mentioned douglas fir in the description of the drink so I was expecting something more assertive.  It was good though.  I had a pinot noir whose name I never caught with dinner; the waiter asked what wine I would like, to which I replied, well, since I'm getting chef's whim, I don't know what food I'm getting, so you pick.  It was a good choice, whatever it was.  I was too full for an after dinner drink, though I had some Fernet Branca at home later :-)  M had more or less the same food choices as I did, except that his turnip dish had squid stuffed with lobster and shrimp in it where mine had brussel sprouts (which I will take over lobster and shrimp any day), and he had a plate o' meat in place of my sea bass, hanger steak, marrow, tongue and maybe other stuff.  He liked it, but liked my sea bass better.  And then he had a sweet grits thing for dessert.  I liked it better than my crisp but not as much as my ice cream.

All in all, it was a highly memorable meal.  It is not the kind of splurge we can make at all often, but it was well worth the money for both the meal and the pampering.  Perhaps during the year we can go back for the bar menu and drinks...
 
On a side note, I'm inspired to try cooking with fennel now, as it appears I like it quite a bit.  Must look at recipes...
 

Comments

[silentq.livejournal.com]

Oh, you can ask for a pescetarian chef's whim tasting? :) I would go back to the Bar at Craigie on Main. I seem to remember trying a drink called the Alaska there, but it could have been Northern Lights...

[alonewiththemoon]

Yes--the website says meat or vegetarian only, but M didn't know that when he called, and told them that I ate fish, so that's what I got. I can't imagine they'd have much issue with it in general, since a number of the carnivore dishes were fish anyway.

[kambriel.livejournal.com]

That's very cool they offer a vegetarian version of chef's whim... I was thinking that would have held me back from being able to enjoy that kind of culinary adventure!

And it's funny to see someone else calling themselves country mouse. I kept saying that this weekend while we were in NYC :)

[alonewiththemoon]

I'm sure the vegetarian menu would have been delicious, I wouldn't have minded that one bit.

Country mouse wasn't quite the right term for us, as we are city mice. We felt like a different subspecies for sure though. City rats among the pedigreed hamsters, maybe ;-)

[kambriel.livejournal.com]

For me, "country mouse" came up when I was on the subway in a big crushed velvet skirt with a hoop skirt underneath and a wide-brimmed hat and a top with leg-o-mutton sleeves. I felt like Holly Hobby gone goth ;)

[beafarhana.livejournal.com]

Fennel is YUMMY!!!

[alonewiththemoon]

I agree! But what do you do with it?

[beafarhana.livejournal.com]

I usually roast them in quarters, along with other vegetables. Or make fennel soup. But I like them raw in salad too.

[pamelasbelly.livejournal.com]

I like making salads with fennel and calimyrna figs, nice accents of sharp cheese and drizzled with good quality olive oil (maybe add balsamic if you are in need of a vinegar component). The fennel and the figs really compliment each other - found this by experimenting. I use the fennel raw but you could try braising it for a warm salad if you like and add whatever salad filers you like (leafy greens, salty olives, etc) - although tomatoes and carrots don't seem to mesh well with the fennel/fig combo. Also grilled fennel simply brushed with olive oil is amazing by itself as well. You don't need to do much with fennel since it has such a bold unique taste - braise it, grill it or eat raw.

Anyway, I'm super hungry now!!!

[xenoglaux]

Craige St. Bistro was one of my very favourite places to go, I can only imagine how wonderful it must be now that they have space!

[edrie.livejournal.com]

OMG OMG OMG!!! I HEART that place - we know the chef and he is SO NICE. We've been so many times and every single time I am blown away!!!

I am so happy you got to go there

Let's go for drinks some night (or drink since it's $)