3 Weeks of Excessive Eating in Europe

[nakji]

Can you tell me more about the onion "paper"? What is it? What does it taste like?

[Shelby]

That steak looks SO buttery and delicious *drooling*

[racheld]

Can you tell me more about the onion "paper"? What is it? What does it taste like?

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My first thought was that it would be like one of those little Listerine strips placed on the tongue, but wisping in the most delicate, ethereal essence of a sublime vegetable. There, and then gone, but remembered well.

[nakji]

Yes, I was wondering if it was like one of those new, er, I don't know how to describe it - -flavour sheets? Like, that you could use instead of nori? I'm fascinated by those, I don't know why.

[BryanZ]

Questions: as a food professional, just as people have taken a retrospective interest in breed of Spanish pigs, e.g. Black-footed, and their feeding, acorns etc, for the jamon iberico, would you be interested in speculating+delving later into the beef that you ate: breed, pasture etc?

What made it so good? Britain has several interesting beef breeds, quite different  in meat taste and flavor: Galloway, Red Poll plus the better known ones here in the US, e.g. Red Angus for pasture, Black for feedlot fattening. Even the dual purpose small Dexter breed provides excellent meat.

The US too has built on these breed plus added exotic and surprisisngly excellent beef genetics like the TULI from Zimbabawe, and Ongole/Nellore, originating in India, via Brazil

Japanese Wagyu cattle have lineages  especially reknowned for their meat "flavor", other lineages for other specific organoleptic qualities, e.g. marbling to grade 12.

It woud be fun and educational to learn more about the types of Spanish cattle specially raised for the elite trade.

Also, Spain has some of the best white asparagus, a blanched form of specific types which generally don't make good eating in their green state. That used to be the way things were with classic German varieties for blanching, although dual purpose French varieties exist. Did you have any great experiences with the white asparagus? Thanks.

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I don't know much about the provenance of the beef we ate. I imagine it was very local and not aged for very long given the dark, vibrant red, as opposed to mahogany, color. The other interesting thing was the color of the fat. The yellow tinge suggests an animal not fed on an excess of grain or corn. As you can see the steak was very lean but still very tender. The flavor, however, is what haunts me. Pleasantly chewy flesh with the fat lending unctuousness and a burst of flavor.

I had a nice white asparagus dish in Paris, but we're a few days away from that yet.

Can you tell me more about the onion "paper"? What is it? What does it taste like?

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This paper was a bit thicker than a breath strip--somewhere between that and a thin piece of fruit leather--but of similar texture. Some papers are brittle but this was more waxy and pliable. It lent a nice bit of onion-y sweetness.

Edited July 19, 2008 by BryanZ (log)

[BryanZ]

San Sebastian, Spain - Day 3 cont'd.

So far we'd done the Michelin thing, done the countryside thing, done the pinxo hopping thing. Surely there is much more to eat in the region, but for our last night San Sebastian we chose to visit a very interesting pinxo bar. This wouldn't be a barhopping night; rather, we'd have a full dinner at Alona Berri, an eatery with the traditional bartop food setup but also a few tables with waiter service.

Alona Berri specializes in elaborate pinxos. It's slogan is "Cucina en Miniatura." Roughly, (haute) cuisine in miniature. For €35 plus tax we'd receive several very tasty courses. This meal was surely the best value of the trip, and I highly recommend it for people looking for a haute-ish experience without spending much money at all. The room is far from elegant, but I was so satisfied with the experience, complete with €16 bottle of local white wine. Good stuff.

Bar

This place and Astelana have the most elaborate pre-prepared offerings.

Menu

This tasting of sorts is served in a partitioned off area of about three tables. Reservations are definitely necessary. We were seated next to a British couple and a young Spanish couple on a date. My kind of date place.

First bite

And a big bite it was. Poached quail egg, salmon roe, crispy herbs, other stuff. Uncomfortably large even for my big mouth, but tasty.

Ocotopus salad, gazpacho, local olive oil

Better than I imagined it would be. Sometimes cold seafood salads just taste like their dressing and are rubbery. Not the case here. Loved the soup too, very rich yet refreshing. High quality olive oil was liberally applied to bread.

Shrimp beggar's purse

Tasty but rather simple. Perhaps the weakest dish of the meal.

Hake with tomato vinaigrette

This was actually one of the best fish dishes of the entire trip. The hake was perfectly cooked and tender. The vinaigrette was spot on with salt and acid. Really, really good.

Championship pinxos

One with squid, another with eel, I believe. These were the most modern of the offerings on the menu.

Duo of foie gras

What's not to like?

Roasted pig

Tasty but not as tender as I would've liked.

Sea urchin custard

I added this an extra course because I wanted to try it. It was yummy.

French toast

I can't recommend this place enough. Our server was a young woman who made up for her lack of polish with enthusiasm. She seemed genuinely happy that we were enjoying our meal so much. This is the kind of place that I'd definitely eat at even if I had to pay the bill. Affordable, fun, and delicious.

[BryanZ]

Bryan, you mention that the beef at Etxebarri is very different from American grain/corn-fed beef--how does it compare to a good grass-finished steak?

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I will admit I've had more experience with grain-fed American and Japanese beef at the high end. I've had a couple decent grass-fed steaks from local farmers and the likes of Whole Foods but nothing I would describe as truly special. I'm sure "special" grass-fed beef exists in this country--Craftsteak would probably be a good place to try to find it--but this was much better than anything similar I've had in the States.

[anthonybishopric]

Dude, this is the sickness. Visually, the "slightly burnt" veal is so cool.

I can't recommend this place enough.

I want that french toast. And what, are we on day 3 ONLY? Cripes.

[FauxPas]

After a brief rest--and thorough check and re-check of our directions--we headed off to Akelare to catch the sunset over the Bay of Biscay. 

[ .... ]

... solid martini in a straw.

Bryan, can you tell me a bit more about that martini? Is there something frozen in the straws, by any chance?

I am very much enjoying this blog. And I went back and read the earlier one, which was also fabulous reading. Thank you for all the photos!

[petite tête de chou]

Lovely stuff, sir. Please continue to have fun, eat well and show us how the beautiful and young live.

[nakji]

QUOTE(nakji @ Jul 19 2008, 09:31 AM)

Can you tell me more about the onion "paper"? What is it? What does it taste like?

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This paper was a bit thicker than a breath strip--somewhere between that and a thin piece of fruit leather--but of similar texture. Some papers are brittle but this was more waxy and pliable. It lent a nice bit of onion-y sweetness.

Thank you. I thought it might be a little chewy. Everything looks beautiful, and I applaud your attempt to photograph discreetly in what must be challenging conditions. Some things defy easy description - I can clearly see the difference in the two "ash" dishes, which would have been very hard for you to relate easily without photos.

Is it me, or have a lot of your desserts involved french toast? Do you happen to like it a lot, or is it enjoying a moment in Spain?

[BryanZ]

Provence, France - Day 4

Up at the crack of dawn we took a train from San Sebastian to Hendaye, on the France-Spain border. From there it was off to Marseilles where we picked up another car and drove to Arles. It was a long day of traveling. The logistics of this trip were EXTREMELY challenging, especially given financial constraints, thus necessitating all the time required to plan it.

Welcome to Arles in the south of France. Certainly beautiful country and so full of history.

Taken from the terrace of our hotel in Arles. We spent one night here at Hotel Le Calendal.

Roman colliseum

They now hold events--humane, and the occasional inhumane, bullfights--here now.

Our first meal in the South of France, besides a couple sandwiches on the train, was at Atelier de Jean Luc Rabanel. Rabanel was the first chef to win a star at an all-organic restaurant. He now has turned his attention to more modern cooking and has garnered a star for his efforts. There is no menu here so my recollection is a little hazy. Dinner here is €75 per person; lunch is €45, I think.

Interestingly enough we did not see a single foam in all of Spain. Rabanel would more than make up for this...

Tempura carrots

Started off the meal.

Sardine salad, almond cookie, onion ice cream

A very interesting first course. I would've liked it more without the cookie. The ice cream, however, worked well, adding more creaminess and allium notes.

Tomato gazpacho with a tuna salad on a breadstick

This was very good. Refreshing, extremely tomato-y, and the bread worked better in this application.

A reinvention of sushi (or something like that)

Lightly seared tuna wrapped around green beans with a mustard-wasabi sauce. Served with a tomato sorbet. My biggest complaint about this meal was there was a lot of repetition in techniques and ingredients. This dish begins to show that.

Yogurt, baby leek, onion foam, rabbit liver

Wow, that's foamy. An interesting, if not entirely cohesive, dish. I get what the kitchen was trying to do, combine something rich and gamy with something acidic and bracing, but it wasn't a complete success for me. Good idea though, could just use a bit of refinement.

Fried artichoke, crispy jamon Iberico, tomato bread wrapped in jamon Iberico

Spanish ham makes everything good.

Raviolo of mushrooms in tomato pasta served in broth with herbs

I would've like a bit cleaner flavors here. This was a nice vegetarian dish, but needed to taste more purely of mushroom or tomato.

Lightly cooked salmon, potato puree, enoki mushrooms, sesame foam

I really liked this dish a lot. The foam here was very tasty and effective at conveying the essence of sesame.

Palate cleanser of lemon cream with herb

This was very assertive and kind of strange.

Fish served in lemongrass broth with chanterelles

This was tasty but a bit too brothy. I don't recall what the fish was.

Lamb, chocolate-coffee sauce

Nice meat course, especially the sticky sauce the garnished the plate. The garlic confit and beans were also nice.

Lemon meringue pie and "virtual" beer of tropical fruit

Two nice layered desserts.

Sichuan peppercorn ice cream, red pepper chip, stewed strawberries with fresh cheese

I liked this idea a lot but the execution of the ice cream fell way short. It was way icy, as if there was not nearly enough fat in the base to make it creamy. The berry component was satisfying in a simple way.

Anise liqueur spherication, chocolate-pistachio cookie, olive syrup

A bad experience with absinthe that still haunts me to this day prevented me from enjoying the s'fer. The rest of the dessert was fine, if a bit dry. As a general rule, I'm just not that into baked goods.

Lemon dessert

Nice way to finish the meal. It was quite hot in the open-air restaurant, so this was appreciated.

All in all, this was a very solid meal. I really, really enjoyed the salmon and the lamb dishes. Other dishes felt a bit repetitive or derivative but were still generally tasty. With that said, I actively didn't like the s'fer and the lemon crema. The meal represents a fair value, given the number of dishes served. This wasn't among the best meals of the trip, but I appreciate what Rabanel is doing here.

Edited July 20, 2008 by BryanZ (log)

[BryanZ]

Bryan, can you tell me a bit more about that martini? Is there something frozen in the straws, by any chance?

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It was gelatinzed gin and vermouth, layered in the straw. You suck it up and let the two combine in your mouth. Again, I like a traditional martini more, but this was nice twist.

Is it me, or have a lot of your desserts involved french toast? Do you happen to like it a lot, or is it enjoying a moment in Spain?

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Definitely having a moment. We found the repetition somewhat bizarre too as it's not exactly a seasonal item or anything.

Edited July 20, 2008 by BryanZ (log)

[Chufi]

Lemon meringue pie and "virtual" beer of tropical fruit

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Interesting how everything was served, 3 items on one platter, did you take the glasses/ little plates from the large plate or did the server do that for you? Is this something you've seen before, as consistently as this throughout the meal?

[BryanZ]

This is a small restaurant with only a couple of servers. While this style of service wouldn't fly in a more traditional setting, it worked here. All the dishes and plates were small so serving on a long platter generally made sense. I think all the dishes were presented in this way where we'd pick them up once delivered and explained.

[Simon_S]

I'm recently back from San Seb and a group of us ate in Akelare, having pretty much the same menus that you enjoyed. I've been trying to find pictures and now here they are in all their glory.

Can't wait for the next installment. I'm loving this!

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So, Simon, what was your assessment?

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Very similar to your own. The weakest dish, IMO, was the rouget with fusilli, which did nothing for me, really. I enjoyed the creativity, though, and there were some genuine wow moments along the way, plus the sense of fun translated itself to the staff and to the whole experience, which was great.

The only thing I would disagree with is your comment about the foie being similar to Wylie's. In flavour terms at least, I far and away preferred the Akelare version.

In our group there was a mix of hardened foodies and relative novices, and we all of us enjoyed it, which may or may not have been the case in some of the other restaurants (I'm thinking Mugaritz here). In any case, I can't wait to get back with Hazel so we can do San Sebastian properly.

Did you make it to Gandarias for pintxos? We spent a ridiculous amount of time there, to the detriment of other experiences. Still, it ticked a lot of boxes! Having returned I realise that we missed an awful lot of places, mainly due to the fact that we were there on a stag rather than a foodie trip. Hence my comment about getting back there with Hazel.

Can I just make a brief comment about beef?

I live in a land where "grass-fed beef" is just called "beef" and beef finished on grain pretty much doesn't exist. Over time, I've started to suspect that what I look for in a steak is different to what a person more familiar with US steak looks for. Is there a cultural difference here, do you think? Is a steak that's normal to me chewier and gamier than normal to you? My experience of US steak is insufficient to take this thought any further, but what little I've had seemed blander in flavour but juicier in texture. That's not a criticism, by the way, merely an observation that, for the money we paid for prime, I found it very disappointing within my own terms of reference. I've seen US-based people disappointed with Euro steaks for other reasons, hence my question.

Anyway, sorry for the aside. I'm loving the thread, carry on.

[BryanZ]

I think it's definitely a cultural difference based largely on what you're into. Many Americans often find European steak too lean and chewy. Europeans, as you've noted, often find American beef bland. Then there's Argentinian beef. And Japanese.

It's fascinating how cultural differences manifest themselves not just in cuisine but in the very raw products we produce. Fruits and vegetables are another obvious example. In most of the US, the produce kind of sucks. With that said, there are even regional variations in this country. A blueberry grown in Maine is radically different than one grown here in New Jersey. Magnify that to a global scale--you have Japanese melons that go through MRIs and sell for hundreds of dollars--and you've got a striking amount of variation in something (supposedly) so pure and simple.

[BryanZ]

Simon, I'm curious to hear what you thought of Mugaritz, too, then.

[Simon_S]

Simon, I'm curious to hear what you thought of Mugaritz, too, then.

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Sorry, should have been clearer on that one: we didn't go to Mugaritz, and Akelare was our only blowout meal. When planning the trip, it was a very difficult decision which of the "majors" to go for. Certainly, if I'd been choosing just for myself I would have leaned towards Mugartiz, mainly based on comments on the forum, but the more I read the more I thought that it might be a bit much for those in the group not so experienced in the cutting edge stuff. In hindsight, I'm happy with the choice we made, but I still want to get back and try some of the others. I think a long weekend early next year might be in order. It would be rude not to, since it's only a couple of hours flight away.

[BryanZ]

Provence, France - Day 5

We spent the morning in Arles sightseeing and just walking around. It's very cute but a little bit sedate for my tastes. I like big cities or the countryside, in between doesn't quite impress me as much. We stopped for lunch at a pretty typical restaurant just off the touristy Place du Forum called Le 16 and had what I might call a Provençal (I figured out how to make the funny C on my first try; I'm so proud) meal.

My mother and sister had big salads for about €12 each.

Lyonnais and one with mixed seafood

Nice and crisp for a hot day. As might be expected, I liked the one with the poached egg and lardons.

I had the three-course menu for about €22 or so. It was simple, but tasty food.

Telines, aka "You've got to be kidding me"

When I saw "baby clams" on the English menu, surely this was the starter to get. When the mass of shell and clam meat arrived I was seriously floored. I think I'd heard of these before but had never seen them. What you see here is at least a pound of the smallest clams you've ever seen. There were hundreds of them. I feel like if one person was eating these it'd take at least 30 minutes to pick through them all. Thankfully, I had nimble help.

Sea bream

Cooked in local olive oil and served with vegetables and red rice. Fresh but a bit undersalted.

Profiteroles

A fine rendition.

After lunch we drove to Les Baux, a town located in and on the white rock cliffs. This place truly felt Provençal, bathed in sunlight and lined with vines and olive trees.

Vines and olive trees in the valley, surrounded by little mountains

We stayed at La Riboto de Taven, a charming property in the valley. The proprietors are very kind people who clearly have a lot of pride in their small inn.

Our grotto room

Instead of staying in the farmhouse/main building we were put in this grotto room, literally carved into the cliffs. The space used to be an olive mill in the 16th century, keeping with the culinary nature of this trip. This was very, very cool. In the main farmhouse is a well-regarded restaurant presided over by the owner's brother. He won a star when he cooked in the UK but has since decided to return to his native France and cook simpler cuisine.

And now, the creepiest wine tasting ever.

Located right above the valley is a nice parking lot that overlooks both the old town and the valley below; it's a popular photo/painting spot. Very pretty. Coincidentally enough, we also saw a small fleet of heavily disguised new BMW 7-Series sedans out for testing. A cool but non-food-related aside. Anywho, the owner of this parking lot is a winery located in the old quarry caves just a hundred yards back.

The entrance

The chances of being abducted and dragged into the caves at this point stand at about 50/50.

Rounding the bend

There's no going back now.

The, umm, main hall

The pictures don't convey how truly creepy this place was. We could hear the bats from deep within the cave. This would be a great place to shoot a horror film like the The Caves Have Eyes or something of the sort.

Tasting bar

I was hoping the wine would be amazing given the totally strange location and all. Unfortunately, it wasn't. We still felt obligated to buy a bottle because we had tasted. Thankfully it was like €7. We didn't even end up drinking it before we had to hop on a plane, but I think it was worth it for the experience.

Edited July 20, 2008 by BryanZ (log)

[Shelby]

The grotto room is killer!

[Abra]

Wow, you were so close to my house and didn't even stop by for a foam-free snack. I would have given you something for no R&G certificates!

I've been thinking about your chorizo comment. Was it pata negra pork? I have some pata negra chorizo in the fridge right now that has an awesome nutty mellowness that I think is entirely due to the breed and the acorns they're raised on.

I know it's not your intention, but you've spared me a trip to Rabanel's domain. The food looks a little too tricked out to me, like it's way more form than substance.

I think it's kind of weird to serve tellines as a starter for one. The only way I've had them is a a big bowl in the center of the table where a group of people drink wine, talk, and pop one or two into their mouths every so often until the bowl is empty. They're more exercise than nourishment.

I hope the next thing you're going to say is that you had dinner at La Cabro D'Or!

Edited July 20, 2008 by Abra (log)

[BryanZ]

Something like that. Our meal that evening would be dining al fresco at Oustau de Baumaniere.

[judiu]

Bryan, this is a wonderful trip you're sharing with us! Thanks

[weinoo]

Provence, France - Day 5

Telines, aka "You've got to be kidding me"

What you see here is at least a pound of the smallest clams you've ever seen.  There were hundreds of them. 

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I've had clams like this in Venice - totally wild to get a plate with so many clams on it. And, iirc, they were quite delicious .