Manresa: A celebratory farm-to-table dinner feast

Manresa in Los Gatos is by far the most amazing farm-to-table restaurants I have been to. We had Manresa on our list of restaurants to go to for quite some time. A few months back we managed to get a reservation to celebrate our wedding anniversary by trying out Chef David Kinch’s tasting menu. Manresa and Chef Kinch are famous for using fresh, local, and seasonal ingredients and converting them to dishes that explode with flavor and leave you asking for more. Manresa gets its produce from Love Apple Farms near Santa Cruz.

Expectations were sky-high ever since I found out that Manresa had made it to the list of World’s 50 Best Restaurants in 2012. We were seated promptly upon arrival. The ambiance makes you feel warm, cozy and welcoming. We were served warm freshly baked bread soon after we were seated. As usual, I opted for the vegetarian tasting menu, but when our server found out that my hubster (M) does not eat red meat, but is fine with other forms of meat, they offered to create a pescatarian menu for him. We’ve been to quite a few fancy places, but no restaurant had offered such an option to us earlier. It was a first and M was delighted to get a chance to try out his first pescatarian tasting menu. I have to state that the staff at Manresa make it a point to make your experience personable and pleasant.

Amuse Bouche was black olive madeleine and roasted bell pepper jello cube. I liked how it was served on a slab of stone. Following the amuse bouche we were served garden beignets with crispy kale. The garden beignets were made with goat cheese and the kale leaves went well with that. Next on the table was chilled lavender lemonade with mint – super refreshing. I slowly sipped on it feeling like a child trying to save her favorite part of the meal so that it wouldn’t get over fast. But I knew there were plenty more of such plates coming up

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M was served smoked salmon with wasabi and green apple while I was served braised chestnut with avocado paste. The chestnut dish was my favorite of the entire meal. Next on the list were nantucket Bay Scallops in brown butter with chestnuts and a dish made out of green tomatoes. They used a specific name for it, but I forgot since I was busy relishing the chestnuts from my earlier course . All I remember is that it was tangy and had crispy bites to cut off the tangy-ness. Next pescatarian item on the list were clams with sesame seeds and shiitake mushrooms while the vegetarian item on the list was sunchoke soup with yolk. The soup was my second favorite item on the menu. The flavors blended extremely well with each other.

Our next course was the super famous “Into the garden salad”. I felt like there were 20+ ingredients all from Manresa’s kitchen garden in this dish. I was overwhelmed by the amazing concept of the dish. After the salad, M was served North American fluke sashimi with chamomile while I was served a pumpkin dish with porcini mushroom and garlic emulsion. Next entree was a dish with smoked persimmon, cilantro and yogurt. I love persimmons but this was my least favorite dish of the meal. For our final savory entree, we had a plate of scallop and cod with potatoes for the hubby and a plate of cripy potatoes, foamy emulsions and nasturtium leaves. I did not know we nasturtium leaves are to be eaten. I have them in my patio garden and was surprised to see them on a plate and to find out that they are edible!

Our first dessert course was fromage blanc with strawberry sorbet and toasted pumpkin seeds. Rich, creamy and delicious. For our second dessert course, we had a parfait with almonds, pear sorbet and poached pear pieces. Our final dessert course was a chocolate madeleine with a cube of strawberry jelly served on a stone slab. I loved the fact that the first course (amuse bouche) and last course (final dessert course) of the menu were identical in looks but very different in taste – Creative and classy!

Post our remarkable celebratory meal, we were a given a pumpkin brioche for next day’s breakfast. I was expecting a goodie for breakfast next day since this is a tradition at most Michelin-star restaurants. When we were leaving through the door, they offered us fleur de sel caramels. I just took one but they saw me hesitating and told me that they were going to be closed for the next couple of days for Thanksgiving so we should take as many as we wanted. When I tasted the caramel candy the next day, I felt I should have taken many more of those . The meal at Manresa has been one of the best meals I have had this year and I guess the Chef deserves a big big thank you for making our day even more special and memorable. I would surely like to go back for another meal at Manresa

 

Plumed Horse – A dining experience at San Jose’s finest

Have you ever been asked the question of whether you eat to live or live to eat? I seldom think about this and I can’t decide for sure. The brain wants to choose eating to live while the taste buds definitely want me to opt for living to eat. But let’s keep the brain aside for now and talk about food. This post is for all those who live to eat! I’d like to share reviews of my dining experience at the Plumed Horse, one of Saratoga’s finest restaurants.

Recently for my birthday, the hubster took to me to the Plumed Horse in Saratoga. Thanks to M for the sweet surprise, and for topping it off with good food and even more wonderful memories . The ambiance of the restaurant is very elegant and sophisticated. When you step in and walk towards the dining room, you know that you are in for a great fine dining experience. Decor is sleek and upscale. The restaurant is huge compared to few of the other fine dining spots I have been to around the bay area. Plumed Horse serves modern Californian cuisine and chef Peter Armellino manages to bring innovation to the dishes served.

We decided to opt for the tasting menu since none of us is a heavy eater and we love to be surprised by the chef’s creativity. Our server also suggested that would be the best bet for vegetarians. Before food was served, we were offered gourmet bread. I always look forward to the amuse bouche. Amuse Bouche at Plumed Horse was Australian truffles with oil cheese over a cracker. Feed me a good truffle dish and I am sold

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After relishing the amuse bouche, we were served basil bread and roasted garlic bread. For some reason, the impression that I have from a lot of “good” places is that you have to chew so hard on the bread that you feel like you are eating rocks. The side of bread at Plumed Horse was so soft that it almost melted in the mouth. Our first course was Portobello mushroom with truffle oil and cheese. I have to admit that this was my least favorite dish. Since the first course was just ordinary, I was skeptical about the entire meal, but what a ride it was for the taste buds after that first course. The salad course was a grilled local peach with smoked almond, goat milk yogurt, fricassee salad. I was hoping to not eat a beet salad and the chef surprised us with the peach salad. Our third course was corn bisque with corn flan. Now for those of you who don’t know me that well, I cherish almost anything and everything that is made out of corn. For me there has never been a bad tasting corn dish EVER! After some delishhhh salad and soup, our next course was mushroom risotto with truffles. This was the tastiest savory dish of the entire meal. Our final dish was lentil cakes with zucchini roles and mini peppers. This was the chef’s most innovative dish because the heat of the peppers blended really well with the lentil cakes. And the peppers were extremely tasty.

After finishing the savory round of dishes, our server asked whether we wanted to opt for a cheese tasting before moving on to the desserts. Both M and I are light eaters, so we decided to skip the cheese tasting because we wanted to save some room for dessert.

Course 2: Local Peach Salad with goat milk yogurt and fricasse salad

We knew it was going to be desserts galore as soon as our server placed 3 spoons on the table. The first dessert course was raspberry sorbet with tapioca. It was very refreshing. The next dish to be served was toasted coconut semifreddo vanilla salt with strawberry soup and micro basil. This was the yummiest dessert I have eaten in a long long time. It had a lot of flavor to it. After that was a familiar peanut butter jello combo with white chocolate mousse and marshmallow fluff crispy. I could eat those crispies all day long . We have tried enough of chef’s tasting menus to know that it never ends at the final course. Next to celebrate, there was a toast, and then some chocolate macaroons and then a strawberry ice cream popsicle dipped in dark chocolate and coated with nuts. Wowwww!!! This is one of the finest Michelin stars we have been to so far. I highly recommend it for a special someone!

Who doesn’t love being pampered! A day when I was supporting the motto of “Live to eat”. Indulgence at one more bay area’s finest restaurants and I am all smiles This place is definitely worthy to make a special occasion memorable.

 

Aziza: Moroccan food with a zing!

Aziza had been on my list of “to try out” restaurants for quite sometime now for 2 reasons.
Reason 1: Long time ago, I was yelping for good Moroccan restaurants in San Francisco and had read delightful reviews about 2 of them – El Mansour and Aziza.
Reason 2: It’s a Michelin one-star restaurant and once in a while we love to try out tasting menus at such places!

We went to El Mansour last year and absolutely loved it, but Aziza had not made the cut then. However a few months back, I was surprised to get a gift card to Aziza from my beloved sister We had not found a good time to put that to use until recently. Last minute reservations are always tough, but we managed to get a Sunday night spot at Aziza last weekend. Located in the Richmond district of San Francisco, this restaurant features Moroccan and Mediterranean food. Upon our arrival at the restaurant, we were cordially greeted and seated. The decor of the restaurant is ordinary but the ambiance is quite nice. I would have liked to have a little more light on the table though.

After looking at the menu, we asked if they were offering the vegetarian tasting menu. Unfortunately, they were in the process of updating their regular tasting menu, but they said they could do a 5 course tasting with a few items from the À la carte menu. I liked it because that way we got to taste a few of the chefs signature creations along with a couple of his on-the-fly creations. To our surprise, we got to taste 10 different dishes since both me and M (my husband) had separate menu items. I have never experienced this at another restaurant (at least for a vegetarian menu) so that was definitely a thumbs up

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I am going to do the post slightly differently since reviewing 10 dishes and stating that each of them were extremely tasty would be quite monotonous. Instead I’ll just mention the absolute highlights of the dish and a rating on a scale of 5.

Tasting Menu 1
Soup: Onion soup with mini mushrooms, watercress and pickled radish (3/5). The dish was quite tasty, but I don’t think it was Moroccan.
Salad: Beet salad with cucumbers, spiced peanuts and crème fraiche (3/5). I have had better beet salad’s elsewhere and again I could not find the Moroccan element. May be the spiced peanuts?
Appetizer: Goat cheese, sweet tomato jam, ciabatta toast (4/5). Sweet tomato jammmmm. The taste still lingers in my mouth.
Entree: Green farro with himalayan truffle, carrot, tempura mushrooms (5/5). This was the highlight of my meal. Making like mushrooms and leave me wanting for more is quite difficult and that’s exactly what happened. The farro was nothing like I’ve had before. Very unique.
Dessert: Sponge cake with lemon ice cream, mint cream, caramel, blood orange (5/5). Totally sold on the mint cream. Mint tea is considered to be a Moroccan specialty, but to make a mint cream for dessert! Kudos to the chef since the flavors on the whole plate were amazingly good.

Tasting Menu 2
Soup: Lentil soup with medjool dates, celery, parsley: (5/5) Very Moroccan! Although this was M’s menu, I obviously managed a few spoonfuls . Loved the sourness of the dates.
Salad: Fennel salad with pomelo, sumac (3.5/5). I think it had boiled shallots too. For some reason, I think this was a dish you would not remember at the end of the meal. But it was decent!
Appetizer: Plate full of spreads: chickpea, yogurt-dill, piquillo-almond with pita flatbread (4/5)
Entree: Brassicas with couscous, almonds and baby cauliflowers topped with foam (3.5/5). I tasted this dish after the farro and so I think it was hard to beat it. The farro was my favorite plate out of the 10 dishes, so I did not bother tasting the couscous too much.
Dessert: A delicious ice-cream with mousse and some crispy treats (4.5/5). (M forgot the name! too bad). For that matter, he had so much to eat, he did not even remember the rest of the dessert plate so we had no notes to jot down!!

Green farro with carrots and tempura mushrooms: My favorite dish of the meal

I always look forward to the complimentary dishes that come after the meal is done. It is like you are so stuffed with food, that you can’t even have an extra spoonful, but you are still looking forward to taste all the different minis on that last plate after dessert. So, to finish off your delicious meal, compliments from the chef included a plate of dark chocolate truffles, lemon meringue and a sweet chilli jelly (I forget the name). And to top that, granola packets for breakfast next day What more can you ask for. Some of the dishes on the menu are quite original and I recommend Aziza for that uniqueness! If you don’t want to spend on the entire tasting menu, the restaurant is a good place to visit for their regular menu too. Finally, a big thank you to my sister for a great gift.

 

La Folie

French food yet again!!! I might have erased my starting line at least 10-12 times before coming up with this one, because the more I eat it, the more and more I like it. So, we visited La Folie recently for our anniversary celebration and I realized that whenever I tend to pick a restaurant for fine dining for a special occasion, I tend to select menus that serve French food as opposed to others. So, here’s my take on yet another french food dining experience. La Folie is small and intimate place in the Russian Hill area of San Francisco. I had heard amazing reviews about chef and owner Roland Passot’s creations so we decided to try out his vegetarian tasting menu at La Folie.

The decor of the place is nice. Rust colored drapes and mirrors surround the small space. Its quite modern, though not one of the best I have seen. I am going to jump straight to describing the food, because this meal was one of the best meals I have eaten at a restaurant.

Soon after we were seated, we were served Amuse Bouche. It was carrot cream with olive oil infused caviar and a citrus sauce. The dish tasted as great as it looked. After that was another complimentary dish from the chef. Poached egg with cauliflower cream topped with a crispy potato chip. The dish was served in a broken brown egg shell. This dish was an absolute delight. Kudos to the chef for coming up with this dish. The Michelin one-star was beginning to live up to its expectations.

After two surprises, our actual four course meal started. The first course was a mushroom soup with marsh-mellow, crispy mushrooms, sweet potato pieces. The marsh-mellow melted when the soup was served and it went well with the other flavors.

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The second course was a heirloom beet salad with sherry viniagrette and smoked cheese. There were tiny beet roots (different colored) placed on diced beet. Well plated, but I did not like the cheese and may be the vinaigrette was a bit over-powering. Our main course was a wild mushroom risotto with mushroom foam and broth, sprinkled with white and black truffles. The white truffles were super delicious and complimented the risotto perfectly.

The portions at La Folie are huge so make sure you go with an appetite. I was already stuffed before our last and final course. Our server brought us a refresher drink before dessert. I believe it was to clear out the taste buds. It was pear and apple juice with pomegranate and pear pieces.

For our final course we had three different dessert plates: Ginger creme brûlée with blackberry ice cream and sugar short bread topped with raspberries and black berries, Chocolate ganache with chocolate fondant decorated with nuts, and Apple pudding with apple fritter and bourbon ice cream. Show stoppers were the ginger creme brûlée, dark chocolate ganache and the bourbon ice-cream.

And so our four course meal was already a seven course one, there was more……a mini dessert plate with maple syrup jelly, French madeleines, chocolate cannoli and two layered chocolate truffles. We could not finish it but the maple jello was my favorite out of all the 4 mini desserts.

I highly recommend this place for its vegetarian tasting menu. Go with an appetite and you won’t be disappointed. Food at La Folie was one of the best meals we have ever had!!!