[CHI] Alinea – Grant Achatz – Reviews & Discussion (Part 3)

[avant-garde]

Moscato Rosa, dark chocolate, and citrus go very well together.

That has got to be the most beautiful color I've ever seen in a beverage. If it tasted half as good as it looks, I bet your head blew right off. WOW!!!

[edsel]

That has got to be the most beautiful color I've ever seen in a beverage.  If it tasted half as good as it looks, I bet your head blew right off.  WOW!!!

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If the wine served to biskuit was the same one we enjoyed, it was gorgeous. The one we had was Abbazia di Novacella Praepositus Moscato Rosa. It was served with the final two dishes (the chocolate and the pumpkin/burning-leaves). There were two moscatos served at the end of our meal. The first was light and honeyed (I think I recall honeysuckle qualities, but my mind's a blur at this point...), and the rosa was intense. Rose and berry fragrance, and a jammy, dense sweetness. The wine pairings overall were brilliant, but ending the meal with two contrasting moscatos was delightful.

[biskuit]

If the wine served to biskuit was the same one we enjoyed, it was gorgeous. The one we had was Abbazia di Novacella Praepositus Moscato Rosa.

Yes, same moscato! The wine pairings were almost all exceptionally good. My favorite was the lamb with the Clarendon Hills Hickinbotham Grenache, which is a raspberry bomb.

[docsconz]

I had the great pleasure to experience Alinea's newest menu last week.  Chef Achatz was in the house, intense as ever, after a couple weeks off for treatment.  It's been said that 'half of cooking is thinking about cooking' and it was abundantly clear that chef Achatz had had some time to 'think about cooking' during his absence from the restaurant.  The meal we enjoyed was the most tightly composed progression I've experienced in my many trips to Alinea.  The delicious courses delighted our senses, evoked unforeseen emotions and captured the essence of the season masterfully.

What follows are some images I captured at our meal, with a few comments . . .

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Ron, those are some of the finest photos I have ever seen taken at Alinea, which has had its share of fine photos taken there. The meal looks absolutely outstanding and has me salivating for a long overdue return visit. I think the tagliatelle with the white truffles are a nod to Chef Achatz' days at TFL. Great to see Chef Achatz staying at the top of his game and more.

BTW, Edsel, your photos were none too shabby either!

[logicalmind]

I have to ask.....What kind of reactions do you get when you take these (I assume flash) photos in the restaurant. The night I was there I wanted to take pictures but the tables around me were filled with people who gave us an unhappy look when we had our waiter take a picture of my wife and I. After those looks I felt it was best not to take anymore photos. I guess I chickened out.

[ronnie_suburban]

I have to ask.....What kind of reactions do you get when you take these (I assume flash) photos in the restaurant. The night I was there I wanted to take pictures but the tables around me were filled with people who gave us an unhappy look when we had our waiter take a picture of my wife and I. After those looks I felt it was best not to take anymore photos. I guess I chickened out.

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No flash . . . ever.

=R=

[A Soldier in the Trenches]

R.S.

Could you go into a bit more detail about the key lime centerpiece?

Maybe it was explained further up the line, but what is the vessel that it is presented in and how is it utilized?

Is it one of Mr. Kastner's inventions?

I get a turn later this week, and that makes me excited.

[docsconz]

I have to ask.....What kind of reactions do you get when you take these (I assume flash) photos in the restaurant. The night I was there I wanted to take pictures but the tables around me were filled with people who gave us an unhappy look when we had our waiter take a picture of my wife and I. After those looks I felt it was best not to take anymore photos. I guess I chickened out.

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No flash . . . ever.

=R=

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Ditto. The trick is to use a high ISO and have lens stabilization. If the lighting is really low, it can be adjusted on the computer. Sometimes that can result in a grainy photo, but the only thing that absolutely doesn't work is a blurry shot.

[edsel]

R.S.

Could you go into a bit more detail about the key lime centerpiece?

Maybe it was explained further up the line, but what is the vessel that it is presented in and how is it utilized?

Is it one of Mr. Kastner's inventions?

I get a turn later this week, and that makes me excited.

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We had the same centerpiece a few weeks ago. It's a key lime that's trapped in a flexible plastic tube that's been shrunk around it. I suppose it might be a heat-shrink material, or maybe they just wedge the lime in there by force. At the end of the tour the lime is squeezed as part of the presentation of one of the desserts.

I have a slightly bleary photo of the centerpiece on Flickr.

Enjoy your tour, and report back!

[ronnie_suburban]

We had the same centerpiece a few weeks ago. It's a key lime that's trapped in a flexible plastic tube that's been shrunk around it. I suppose it might be a heat-shrink material, or maybe they just wedge the lime in there by force. At the end of the tour the lime is squeezed as part of the presentation of one of the desserts.

I have a slightly bleary photo of the centerpiece on Flickr.

Enjoy your tour, and report back!

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Good description, Edsel. Just to elaborate, the limes are placed in the tubes and pierced with a retractable blade. From there, the juice is actually squeezed out of them, using lobster crackers, while the limes remain in the tubes. Once squeezed, the limes, tubes and tools are removed from the table.

Soldier, I hope you enjoy your upcoming Tour.

=R=

[ronnie_suburban]

I have to ask.....What kind of reactions do you get when you take these (I assume flash) photos in the restaurant. The night I was there I wanted to take pictures but the tables around me were filled with people who gave us an unhappy look when we had our waiter take a picture of my wife and I. After those looks I felt it was best not to take anymore photos. I guess I chickened out.

←

No flash . . . ever.

=R=

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Ditto. The trick is to use a high ISO and have lens stabilization. If the lighting is really low, it can be adjusted on the computer. Sometimes that can result in a grainy photo, but the only thing that absolutely doesn't work is a blurry shot.

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As much as I love taking pictures in restaurants -- especially Alinea -- I'd hate to be the source of anyone's discomfort, via the use of flash. Given the choice between using flash or taking no pictures, the camera would just stay in the bag.

=R=

[docsconz]

I have to ask.....What kind of reactions do you get when you take these (I assume flash) photos in the restaurant. The night I was there I wanted to take pictures but the tables around me were filled with people who gave us an unhappy look when we had our waiter take a picture of my wife and I. After those looks I felt it was best not to take anymore photos. I guess I chickened out.

←

No flash . . . ever.

=R=

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Ditto. The trick is to use a high ISO and have lens stabilization. If the lighting is really low, it can be adjusted on the computer. Sometimes that can result in a grainy photo, but the only thing that absolutely doesn't work is a blurry shot.

←

As much as I love taking pictures in restaurants -- especially Alinea -- I'd hate to be the source of anyone's discomfort, via the use of flash. Given the choice between using flash or taking no pictures, the camera would just stay in the bag.

=R=

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Agreed. While I have used a flash in restaurants including Alinea in the past it has been awhile since I have done so and I no longer do unless circumstances make it reasonable and necessary. I actually prefer the results without flash other than in extremely low light situations. Generally the lighting at Alinea is good enough that it is rarely a problem.

[Chris Amirault]

On November 8, I had the great fortune of joining three other eGullet Society volunteers for the Tour at Alinea. The courses we had are reflected in the fall tours detailed so well by Biskuit, edsel, and Ron. We didn't take any photographs, and I don't want to bore by going course by course as others have more skillfully done before me. So, instead, a few notes.

I've had some fine meals in my life. Some of them were executed with precision and finesse; some of them were soulful; some of them were sophisticated explorations of taste & texture that changed the way I thought about certain ingredients; some of them were a ton of fun.

It's really strange to say that the Tour at Alinea wasn't merely the best meal I've ever had. The meal trumps all other meals I've had in each and every category. It's so much better than anything else I've ever had that, well, it's taken me three weeks to figure out how to begin talking about it.

The entire arch of the five-hour meal is literally overwhelming. Take, for starters, the remarkable "wine" pairings. I put wine in quotation marks because the trout course is paired with Masumi "Arabashin" Junmai Ginjo Namazake from Nagano Prefecture, a palate-altering sake that follows the pretty good champagne cocktail that kicks off the evening. That sake transformed the trout; the trout transformed the sake: going back and forth from one to the other built to a level of intensity that most meals -- hell, most experiences -- never even approach.

And this was course two of twenty four, most of which reached this peak of interplay between food and drink. The meal fills you with awe.

The service team was impeccable. Let's face it: selling some of the kitchen's dictatorial edicts can be tough, particularly for a table of wiseacres eager to know why we can't reverse the order of sniffing and eating or where exactly the polenta came from. But despite our hanky-panky, the team was friendly, coordinated, precise, and ridiculously well informed about everything. Even the folks pedaling shtick had truly interesting shtick. Our mohawked sommelier was channeling Orson Welles, a 19th century carnival barker, and Randall Grahm with great panache; by the end of the night, I wanted to slap the guy on the back and buy him a boilermaker.

The kitchen's skill is breathtaking, and each plate exhibits the skill in a dozen ways. Take the burnt bread puree, one element in the sweetbreads course. As a guy who orders toast "dark -- you can't make it too dark. I won't send it back even if you think it's burnt," I found it a little odd to see my perversion show up as dots on plates. But those dots were remarkably complex explosions of Maillard on the Edge, and they drew sweetness out of sweetbreads that I didn't know was there.

Burnt bread, a revelation. This isn't clever food. This is remarkably sophisticated food that has no sense of limits concerning what it should or shouldn't be.

Though a few things were merely terrific (the pineapple course, say), the list of sheer triumphs is long: the lamb that changed with each cubist sauce perspective; beef heart both gamey and subtle; potato turned up to 11; the wagyu/matsutake bite; a tagliatelle dish with merely white truffles, butter, and cheese that allows each of those elements to touch, entwined, the sublime.

I'm sorry. I'll stop. I know that this is purple prose. What can I tell you? I'm suffering from a gastronomic version of Stendhal's syndrome.

If at all you can, you just gotta go.

[logicalmind]

I have to ask.....What kind of reactions do you get when you take these (I assume flash) photos in the restaurant. The night I was there I wanted to take pictures but the tables around me were filled with people who gave us an unhappy look when we had our waiter take a picture of my wife and I. After those looks I felt it was best not to take anymore photos. I guess I chickened out.

←

No flash . . . ever.

=R=

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Ditto. The trick is to use a high ISO and have lens stabilization. If the lighting is really low, it can be adjusted on the computer. Sometimes that can result in a grainy photo, but the only thing that absolutely doesn't work is a blurry shot.

←

As much as I love taking pictures in restaurants -- especially Alinea -- I'd hate to be the source of anyone's discomfort, via the use of flash. Given the choice between using flash or taking no pictures, the camera would just stay in the bag.

=R=

←

Agreed. While I have used a flash in restaurants including Alinea in the past it has been awhile since I have done so and I no longer do unless circumstances make it reasonable and necessary. I actually prefer the results without flash other than in extremely low light situations. Generally the lighting at Alinea is good enough that it is rarely a problem.

←

I guess I need a better camera. My camera needs a flash in daylight

[ronnie_suburban]

I have to ask.....What kind of reactions do you get when you take these (I assume flash) photos in the restaurant. The night I was there I wanted to take pictures but the tables around me were filled with people who gave us an unhappy look when we had our waiter take a picture of my wife and I. After those looks I felt it was best not to take anymore photos. I guess I chickened out.

←

No flash . . . ever.

=R=

←

Ditto. The trick is to use a high ISO and have lens stabilization. If the lighting is really low, it can be adjusted on the computer. Sometimes that can result in a grainy photo, but the only thing that absolutely doesn't work is a blurry shot.

←

As much as I love taking pictures in restaurants -- especially Alinea -- I'd hate to be the source of anyone's discomfort, via the use of flash. Given the choice between using flash or taking no pictures, the camera would just stay in the bag.

=R=

←

Agreed. While I have used a flash in restaurants including Alinea in the past it has been awhile since I have done so and I no longer do unless circumstances make it reasonable and necessary. I actually prefer the results without flash other than in extremely low light situations. Generally the lighting at Alinea is good enough that it is rarely a problem.

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I guess I need a better camera. My camera needs a flash in daylight

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The Digital SLR's are great. However, they are definitely an investment and -- because of their size -- they're not so easy to tote around -- but they take excellent shots. I've become seriously obsessed with food photography and having such a reliable and powerful instrument is great. With my old camera, which was a fairly decent 'point and shoot,' I began to find myself in certain conditions where I knew I just couldn't get the shot -- and that frustrated me. Since I'm often in dark dining rooms where I don't want to use flash, I decided to get a camera that I knew could handle those conditions well.

The bottom line is that as long as it's in focus, just about any shot taken at Alinea -- by just about any person -- is bound to look great. It's the artistry in the food food that makes it so.

=R=

[highflyingbird]

You know what worked best for us when we were there recently? An iPhone!

We had a good digital point & shoot but we also used our iPhone sometimes and those pics came out beautifully.

That phone seems to work very well in low light. It's 2 megapixels or more and it rocked.

Good luck to everyone!

[Lenski]

I would like to add some comments to my Alinea dining experience last week.

This was my 7th time at Alinea. This time was, by far, my best dining experience there. As usual, we had the Tour and there were only two courses that were so-so. It is, however, an embarrassment of riches, not only the tour but also the dishes become an exercise in an embarrassment of riches (see Beans and Lamb) since it becomes something akin to meta-cuisine. Amazing but it can make for an exhausting dining experience for some. Not for me. It was almost heaven for this non-believer.

THere are some comments/pics of the dishes in previous posts but there were a few new ones that merit attention. Posters have talked about the "beans on nutmeg air pillow," "sweetbreads" "roasted quince" (which might be the best concoction I have eaten all this year), "beef heart," "scallop in chamomile vapor," "lamb in cubism" and the old standards "Hot Potato" and "black Truffle" which should be qualification enough to gain entrance into the Pantheon of greatest cooks in history.

There were also many new elements/dishes that were outstanding: "Trout roe" with coconut, pineapple and licorice (the latter very present throughout the menu), the "Duck" (butternut squah, banana, THai flavors), the "caramel corn" served in that narrow glass and it had two types of caramel corn "liquified" and syrupy. Very sweet but very good. The "Apple Cider" in walnut milk, cinnamon and vegetable ash. THis is the ball that you breaks in your mouth.

Now, for two hands-down winners: the 'Bison" with broken candy cane on top served on a Juniper branch (this seems to be another of Chef A. techniques with different aromatics and meats). It was very good, a bite of heaven.

And then, the "White Truffle." If I remember correctly, it was called the "White Truffle" ice cream. Not sure. It was served in a tube and it contained the WT, toasted oat milk, pink pepper and pear. You had to suck it out of the tube...and it was very good.

I could go on but I will not since eating at Alinea is one of those "you had to be there." I think Chef A. is in a league of his own. One of my dining companions complained about many dishes being too sweet, which is something that I have read here on this board. It does not bother me but I can see how it can bother some people. There is a tendency to lay on the sweetness and the final "pumpkin" is a perfect point in case. However, and even taking into account such criticism, it was fantastic.

Now, my only criticism. It was a very busy night. All the tables were turned while I was dining (we were the only ones doing the tour, I think) and around 10 pm there was not an empty table. I had never seen the restaurant that busy, and I only eat there during weeknights if I can help it. My service was not as good as my dining experience. Apart from a couple of understandable errors given the volume they were serving, I had the impression that the serving staff was tired which might explain their less-than-stellar attitude (Also, are those sweepers necessary every time a table is turned?) However, this time the food was so good that the subpar service did not bother me.

However, a great night of dining. One of my tops of the year (my July meal at "Alinea" was very good but not like this one). Mugaritz, Etxebarri, L'Estany Clar and Aquavit are the other tops of the year.

Questions? ask.

Lenski.

[Ndy]

hate to bump this so heavily, but has anyone visited lately?

[molto e]

hate to bump this so heavily, but has anyone visited lately?

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A friend of mine that has dined many times at Alinea told me it has NEVER been better.

[Lenski]

hate to bump this so heavily, but has anyone visited lately?

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A friend of mine that has dined many times at Alinea told me it has NEVER been better.

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That was my experience also last December. My last visit was outstanding.

[kai-m]

Hi all,

I have sort of a tricky problem and need advice:

We intend to fly to Chicago especially for a "foodie trip".

Of course we have to plan the trip and book our flights way earlier than we can reserve tables at restaurants like Alinea (and Moto and the hopefully re-opened Schwa etc.).

But, as everybody can imagine, it would be extremely frustrating to have a costly flight from germany to chicago - and then not get a table at the restaurant(s) we came to visit...

So, is there any way to avoid such a situation? Any advice for the reservation process?

Thanks

best

kai

[FoodMan]

Hi all,

I have sort of a tricky problem and need advice:

We intend to fly to Chicago especially for a "foodie trip".

Of course we have to plan the trip and book our flights way earlier than we can reserve tables at restaurants like Alinea (and Moto and the hopefully re-opened Schwa etc.).

But, as everybody can imagine, it would be extremely frustrating to have a costly flight from germany to chicago - and then not get a table at the restaurant(s) we came to visit...

So, is there any way to avoid such a situation? Any advice for the reservation process?

Thanks

best

kai

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I would try calling/emailing and explain your situation. You never know, they might give you a reservation earlier than they normally do.

[jende]

Hi all,

I have sort of a tricky problem and need advice:

We intend to fly to Chicago especially for a "foodie trip".

Of course we have to plan the trip and book our flights way earlier than we can reserve tables at restaurants like Alinea (and Moto and the hopefully re-opened Schwa etc.).

But, as everybody can imagine, it would be extremely frustrating to have a costly flight from germany to chicago - and then not get a table at the restaurant(s) we came to visit...

So, is there any way to avoid such a situation? Any advice for the reservation process?

Thanks

best

kai

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I would try calling/emailing and explain your situation. You never know, they might give you a reservation earlier than they normally do.

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That's a good idea. If you call the full month ahead, though, I think you should be able to get a rez especially if you're flexible on the time.

[jesteinf]

I don't know if this is still the case, but the reservation policy (at least the last time I made one) was they started accepting reservations two months out starting on the first day of each month. So, if you call on 3/1, you can make reservations for March, April, and May. 4/1 - April, May, June. etc.

Maybe Nick can chime in here...

[kai-m]

Okay, thank you all so far...

It was just that I thought Alinea is as difficult to book as Per Se in NYC - where, as far as I've heard, you have to hit re-dial for, like, 2 hours - just to get a dinner-table for 5:30...