Bishops dinner review and a seasoning q

[cnspriggs]

Hi all!

Last Friday night I took my other half to Bishops for a birthday dinner. We both wanted to go there in hopes of meeting John Bishops. Unfortunately he wasn't there or at least we never got to see him.

One question I must pose to the group is about seasoning in fine dining. See the review below but the quick version is-does anyone else often find fine dining food over salted? The last experience I had with tasting some food and thinking 'gosh that's got a lot of salt' was at West. I vainly attributed to an off dish but I've sinced noticed that the finer the restaurant the more I notice the salt. I was under the impression that food should be salted to the optimum balance where it livens the food but is not noticed. So, is it me being more sensitive to salt (and yes I use salt in my own cooking ) or is it possible that because salt is used so much in the finer restaurants that the staff has become accustom to higher salt levels?

On to the review. The nut shell is that we had a very lovely evening of well made if not overly exciting food. I appreciate the effort for local ingredients Bishops makes and thought the quality of all ingredients was good to very good.

amuse: A parmesan pasty puff. Subtle, simple and nice.

Appies: 1) Herb and olive oil marinated salt spring island goat cheese with baby beets and blackberry vinaigrette. The ingredients were very fresh and flavorful and the sweet baby beets made a nice compliment to the goat cheese. I couldn't help wondering if the dish would have worked better with a slightly aged and less sticky goats cheese. Especially as young goat cheese has a tendancy to coat your mouth so much that you can't taste anything else.

2) Seared scallops with ripe avocado salad and fresh mango coulis. I'm afraid I can't report on the scallops (I'm allergic) but I did get a taste of the avocado salad and the mango coulis which I loved for the bright and tangy flavours mixed with the sensual texture that avocado has. Very very nice.

Mains: 1) Roasted cowichan bay duck breast AND duck confit with sticky rice and shitake mushroom spring roll. Both this and the dish below were very large. The duck breast was extremely tender and packed with flavour. Both this and the confit were good and served simply. I can't say the duck was anything too original but I did enjoy it. However, I really enjoyed the sticky rice and shitake mushroom spring roll. It was packed with mushroom flavour and the sticky rice made it seem like comfort food yet the crunchy spring roll outside made it balanced enough in texture to not see sloppy. I'm hoping to replicate these at home.

2) Fraser valley lamb in four parts with roasted new potatoes and sweet vermouth basil reduction. The 'four parts' were braised lamb shoulder, roasted leg of lamb, a lamb chop, and a mince meat ball. Again all well cooked but not exciting. The potatoes were crunchy on the outside and soft in the middle. The sauce was well suited to the lamb. My partner seemed to feel as I did about my main-good and enjoyable but likely not something to remember forever.

A note on presentation: I thought all these dishes were nicely presented. Simple and without being contrived. I'm not a fan of the tower of food as presentation nor do I like having to guess how to eat the food. These dishes were nicely garnished and yet simply served.

Dessert: We skipped because as I mentioned above the portion size for the mains was quite large and dessert would have been too much. So we opted for coffee and green tea. Both of which were good but not special.

Wine: A red from the Rhone -100% Syrah (I forget the producers name). This was recommended to us by the Maitre d' for having nice mouthfeel and good for our dishes. It was packed with Brett and had decent mouthfeel but that classic Brett bitterness associated with it. I'm not anti-Brett so did not complain but to me it seemed an odd suggestion.

Service: Very very good in all respects. The timing was relaxed without ever feeling like we were waiting. There was no pretence or attitude in the server (though the maitre d' seemed a bit sombre). We didn't have too many questions but all were answered well.

Grand total $211

[Keith Talent]

Wine: A red from the Rhone -100% Syrah (I forget the producers name). This was recommended to us by the Maitre d' for having nice mouthfeel and good for our dishes. It was packed with Brett and had decent mouthfeel but that classic Brett bitterness associated with it. I'm not anti-Brett so did not complain but to me it seemed an odd suggestion.

←

I'm sure this question is due to the fact I'm an idiot, and once explained will be as clear to me as a certain local culinary writers fixation with Scandanvian balls, but what the hell is Brett? A heroine from a Hemmingway novel? Abbreviated region of France? Unfunny Brett Butler, butch ex-famous comic?

Inquiring minds want to know.

[Hestia]

brettanomyces; brett

[breht-tan-uh-MI-sees, BREHT]

A spoilage yeast that grows on grapes and in wineries. Because brettanomyces (brett, for short) is almost impossible to eradicate, most winemakers take great pains to avoid it.

Sorry, theres more...

Brettanomyces is a particularly nasty yeast that is often the bane of the collective existence of many winemakers. Its foul-smelling byproducts have often been called "barnyardy" or "mouse pee-like" on the sensory scale and it can often be detected in very minute quantities.

Edited July 20, 2005 by Hestia (log)

[kontemporary]

Wine: A red from the Rhone -100% Syrah (I forget the producers name). This was recommended to us by the Maitre d' for having nice mouthfeel and good for our dishes. It was packed with Brett and had decent mouthfeel but that classic Brett bitterness associated with it. I'm not anti-Brett so did not complain but to me it seemed an odd suggestion.

←

I'm sure this question is due to the fact I'm an idiot, and once explained will be as clear to me as a certain local culinary writers fixation with Scandanvian balls, but what the hell is Brett? A heroine from a Hemmingway novel? Abbreviated region of France? Unfunny Brett Butler, butch ex-famous comic?

Inquiring minds want to know.

←

"Brett is basically one of the many natural species of yeast that begins to make its presence known in red wines after fermentation, while they are aging in the barrel. Although I have found few vintners anxious to discuss this, in recent years it has been understood that Brettanomyces, more than anything else, is largely responsible for the earthy, leathery qualities long associated almost exclusively with European wines."

http://www.wineloverspage.com/randysworld/brett.phtml

[butter]

I'm sure this question is due to the fact I'm an idiot, and once explained will be as clear to me as a certain local culinary writers fixation with Scandanvian balls, but what the hell is Brett? A heroine from a Hemmingway novel? Abbreviated region of France? Unfunny Brett Butler, butch ex-famous comic?

Inquiring minds want to know.

Thanks for asking the same question I had. Is this going to be the new trendy thing a server says? Is it to make the customer feel uncomfortable? I know when I went to Cin Cin the server started to explain what an amuse bouche was and my friend and I wondered why he did that. Did he think we were idiots? We decided it was difficult for a server to know how experienced a diner is. I can't wait to ask a server what the Brett level of my wine choice is.

[kontemporary]

Gah.. it's even worse when you're a student! I had a server that explained to me what TAPAS were in a restaurant that won't be named that prides itself in selling "tapas" when these small entrées were FAR from being tapas.

[chef jeff]

Is Brett a good thing under controlled conditions? I like earthy and leathery, but it sounds like a negative as well with the mouse pee, and the spoilage.

[kontemporary]

Depends on if you like it or not. Read the page I linked to, it's a good article on it.

[cnspriggs]

My apology on the Brett thing! To be clear, the character from this yeast is not always considered a fault (much the same way that a bit of volatile acidity or other wine faults can be complexing at low levels). It is dependent on the level of the compounds and the style of the wine. Also, to make things more complex there may be different sensory characters imparted from this yeast depending upon the strain some of which are more and less desirable. Oh and 'earthly and leathery' are not necessarily from Brett either.

[mtigges]

Brettanomyces can be a very good thing. It is commonly used in many Belgian beers. There are two commercial species, Brettanomyces Bruxellanus used today was cultured from urban breweries in and around Brussels. Brettanomyces Lambicus from countryside breweries is what lends much of the distinctive flavours to lambic beers. The former yields earthy flavours, so could be what is spoiling wines, I have no idea, not much knowledge about wine, lambicus yields leathery/barnyardy flavours.

Like wine and bread, the vast majority of beer is fermented with Saccharomyces.

Mark.

edited to add:

As per your seasoning question. I hadn't noticed. Been to both Lumiere and West this year and both seemed fine. La Regalade last week was also normal. Contrary to you, I typically find that lesser restaurants are the ones over seasoning. My cyncical streak usually chalks this up as a silly attempt to make me order more beer. (Silly because I would order more beer regardless.)

Edited July 20, 2005 by mtigges (log)

[Daddy-A]

Good to see lots of new faces here.

I just want to remind everyone this is the Vancouver/Western Canada forum. Continued discussion of "brett" needs to take place in the Wine or Beer forums. The same goes for a general discussion of food seasoning in restaurants.

Discussion of cnspriggs' meal at Bishops and others' experiences there, are welcome.

Thanks

A.