joanmlau

Tried it with a few dining partners early this evening a bit before the major rush of diners entered. Got there early enough to sit outside for a few drinks, on a night that was perfect for sitting outside. Somehow, between those two tall buildings, it was cool enough to be quite enjoyable. The four of us had dinner, more or less family style, focusing on small bites, medium bites, (skipping bites and grilled) sides, and dessert. Menu descriptions are ~4 words long per item, sometimes less...hence it was hard to tell what you were getting. Small bites: Cold corn soup was very creamy without being thick (it wasn't cream that thickened it) with many kernels of crisp sweet corn. Had a foam layer of some other flavor. Lots of mouthfeel. Came with amuse bouche type prawns, which were marinated in a light lemony-tart dressing, also served cold. Tuna tartare served on watermelon slices. Tuna seemed "torn" instead of "cut" resulting in funny shaped pieces, but was fresh, light, and not mushy. Medium bites: Salmon gravlax with blue potatoes. Salmon was very smoked, very oily (good!), drizzled with dill(?) oil and a dollop of tamarind sauce. The potatoes were firm and slightly sweet, not starchy at all. Lobster dumplings. In a spicy soupbase not quite a consomme, small wonton wrapped lobster dumplings. This was the one thing I was not a fan of, as the spice was a little strong for the dumplings and overwhelmed the filling. Cod cakes. Winner of the night. cakes the size of mid size sea scallops (slightly larger than the individually wrapped reece cups). Crispy on top, lots of cod, almost to a crab cake consistency. There was an artichoke sauce that went on top, light, subtle, lightly sweet and rather addictive. Sides: sauteed long beans in a bright golden sweet/spicy sauce. almost a bit too sweet, but punctuated by a slight amount of heat, from the pepper. very crispy. fries. not your mickey D fry. came with a barbecue dipping sauce. each fry was covered in a nut/coarse breadcrumb mix, then fried. could still taste the potato, between the very crisp bites. green curry noodle. second best dish of the night. a mix between spice and a thai basil/ curry sauce, thin rice noodles well tossed in the sauce, with steamed baby bok choy. I liked the light heat and the sauce. Bok choy was great, and not bitter. Dessert: Donut. the smallest ones you've ever seen, and for $6. Not light, like krispy kreme, but heavy yeast, like yum yum donuts, generously coated in sugar, still warm. Filled with cream cheese and black pepper. Pepper is very very subtle. Come with a supersweet raspberry dipping sauce. Note: takes extra time to make these as they are made to order. We ordered this immediately, then took our time picking our second dessert. Brownie sandwich with banana parfait and almond flavored rice milk. The brownie was what brownies should be...dense, chocolately, and chewy, not cakey at all. The banana parfait was good, but I would have preferred the brownie and parfait separate, not made into a sandwich, as it was hard to manage on the plate. Final thoughts: The seats were hard to sit on, making a long dinner difficult (if you go, get the soft comfy booths). Service was a bit spotty (I took silverware from an unused adjoining table when I couldn't get our own silver, though food was at our table). However, the food was a lot of fun, I like the flavor combinations, I like the little plates, and despite the presence of some foam on my food (ala vernon morales) I think it worked well. Django, in my opinion, is still the best at food pairings and flavor combinations, but this was tons of fun, and we enjoyed seeing all the things that came to our table. Also, after seeing some of the grilled items at others' tables, I was very glad to have skipped that part of the menu (who knows it may have been good). Portions are small but were satisfactory to me. We'd go back.

Alison's is reviewed this week by Laban in the Inky. David: perhaps a revisit is warranted, or was Laban right on? http://ae.philly.com/entertainment/ui/phil...&reviewId=13647

Lisa: The waitstaff was very informative; it was that I was very forgetful, or was too excited to see what was in front of me to listen well. The waitstaff, in fact, came back, and I sometimes asked again what we had, but sometimes just enjoyed it without figuring out all the intricasies.

Well, we ate at striped bass, the 4 course tasting menu at 5pm on a Saturday. Atmosphere: excellent, and low din (though we were there early -- left around 7:30). Grand space, and my only beef -- the wicker-style chairs has a slight edge to the front where the back of the legs touch it, making short people whose feet don't touch the ground very well feel a bit uncomfortable. We moved, and solved the problem. The waitstaff was very attentive, practically bordering on the overzealous, but never crossing that line...I'll just say they are enthusiastic about ensuring that your meal lives up to expectations. Drink: a bit of Alsacian (I think?) champagne, complements of Katie (thanks Katie) and quite unexpected. It was very sweet (of Katie, not the champagne) and we were very happy to try it. Amuse bouche #1: fresh corn, two clumps of fresh lobster in a bowl. Crab bisque was poured at the table, into the bowl, resulting in a nicely presented soup. The bisque was thick, nicely so, not too creamy and definitely not too salty. There was an earthy depth to it (ground coriander?). We sopped it up. Amuse bouche #2: tuna tartare, golf-ball sized, with lightly choppen onion mixed in. A few dollops of cream-like mustard and extra-virgin olive oil (we think it was -- very bright green), with a bit of bruschetta on the side. The sauce was a great touch. Tuna very fresh, dense, and nicely complemented with onion. Presentation again on par with food. Course #1: Seared hamachi. Likely seasoned with sea salt (?) and ground pepper, then deftly seared. Sliced extraordinarily thin, topped with a stripe of ginger/garlic sauce. I wrapped each thin piece of fish around the bit of ginger, and munched away. Again, excellent presentation on a funky shaped glass plate, accompanied by a radish salad and some thin teeny green veggies (salted veggies, looked like toothpick thin asparagus. Anyone know what this was?) I wasn't a fan of the sides, but the fish was well prepared. I hate fish that is over seared or not seared at a high enough temp to give a good distinctive edge. Course #2: seared sea scallop. It sat on a tiny bed of cubed potatoes and was surrounded by a moat of celery root puree (I'm guessing again). Presentation top notch. one of the best scallops I've had -- not too chewy, cooked just the right amount of time. Maybe even slightly sweet, but my memory may be failing me. Course #3: striped bass and foie gras. I'm not a foie gras fan, but the edges of it, where it was crispy, was good. Left the rest on the plate. Striped bass was a round steak, cooked through on both sides. Tasty, but less interesting than everything before this. Intermezzo: passionfruit sorbet. Small ball, placed on a tiny cookie, held in place with a dollop of chocolate. After the foie gras, we needed a palate cleanser, and this hit the spot. Course #4: dessert. A densely packed shortbread (?) cookie, with a hockey puck shaped mousse on top. The mousse transitioned from very pink on top (strawberry) to white on bottom. Surrounded by a moat of strawberry colored cream, with islands of chopped strawberry interspered within. It wasn't as soft as mousse, since it was a bit springy, but it was delicious. Not overly sweet, which is my main complaint with desserts in general, and not too heavy. Perfect for a hot summer day. Overall: great meal, well balanced food. We ranked it among our best meals (django, Studiokitchen) and better than many (salt). Though less daring than Studiokitchen (after all, they are cooking for many more people at a sitting) it was as nicely prepared and presented as anything else we've had. We'd go again if the quality stayed at the same level as our experience. Price ended up around $100 per person, without the alcohol, but including tax/tip. In all, a fine experience.

I wrote earlier about our poor opening day experience. Since then, we've gone back, on a normal day. Fantastic this time around. Also, we saw that Wegman's was selling *copper river* salmon -- orange-red, beautiful. We grilled it at home -- incredible. $16.99/lb. The samples were plentiful, the choices were abundant, and we had an entirely pleasant experience. My teaching point for the day -- 2000 other gawkers will definitely ruin a food experience.

Katie: I tried to email you privately to no avail, so I'm forced to post here... We've got dinner reservations at Striped Bass Saturday evening; it'll be my first time (gasp) dining there. I've been fretting over two questions: 1) tasting menu or regular menu? and 2) dinner or brunch? Both questions assume I only make it there one time, as obviously I'd do something different my second time. I wanted to know what you think. Thanks!

We had 9:30 reservations recently, and were seated at 10:00 (we were told of the delay), the last of the evening. We closed the place around 11:45. Granted that we have only our solitary experience there, and Holly makes a WONDERFUL suggestion to preorder, but we had no trouble getting any of our 4 entrees, 3 appetizers, 1 soup, the cheese plate, and 2 desserts. The good thing about being there late is that it quiets down quite a bit and you don't have to talk so loudly to your own dinner party. We never felt rushed, even though they began to re-set the other tables for the next day, and in fact, they were quite friendly after all their work was done and we had the chance to engage them in a bit of conversation about the restaurant. And since 9:45 is close to my bedtime, I pestered them every 5 days for the three weeks prior to our reservations and every other day the week of our reservations (and to be truly annoying, twice the day of our reservation) to see if I could move our time up to ANY time that Saturday besides 9:30. By the end, their comments were, "oh hi again, Joan. No, sorry, we still don't have openings any earlier, but I promise we'll call you."They told me at the time I made my reservation that they would put me on a waiting list, but I wasn't entirely sure. When I finally arrived at the restaurant I was quite apologetic about my behaviour, though there seemed no need to be...they were very understanding and nice about it.

We went to Wegmans on opening day. Somewhat disappointing though fun nonetheless. Obviously, very very crowded -- we had to wait just to snag a cart. We took one picture of the inside, then were told that pictures were not allowed. There were some food samples, but I thought that there should have been abundantly more, and it seemed like the sample servers were not even cognizant of the throngs of people who were waiting for samples. Others around me made similar comments. Asked about the quality of the apples, and a worker went on to describe the apples in glorifying detail, but never offered to cut one in half. Prices of Wegman branded products were quite good, and there were some specials (like Coca Cola), to entice the crowd to buy. Overall selection, of course, was better than your average grocery store, but each individual ethnic section did not have a better selection than the independent ethnic stores I frequent (I shop at the Korean market, East Indian, and Chinatown grocers). Produce was similarly priced to other mainstream grocers, but definitely more than our favorite produce spot (the Korean market at 611 and Cheltenham). One interesting item in the produce section: the $499 (no decimal) per pound black truffles, in the mushroom section, locked in a clear case. Excellent fish selection.

Well, not exactly countryside. She's now in Blue Bell (near where the old Ikea store used to be): 721 Skippack Pike; 215-641-2660 Michael Klein reported this in Table Talk http://www.philly.com/mld/philly/entertain...ein/5489546.htm