Posts Tagged ‘Talula’s Table’
Something [Deliciously] Wicked This Way Comes …
t says: We just got back from Talula’s Garden. Literally. Attempting to write a full post while a bit buzzed on wine would probably not work out well, so we’ll just give you the sneak peak … and tell you that it was awesome … More images and reviews to come later!
Heres the entrance ... we took the photo as we were leaving. And apparently our iPhone sucks in the dark ...
This is like the back yard we wish we had! Too bad it was just a little to windy/nippy for people to eat outside. Next time!
Its a fountain bathtub in the garden!
Ok, so the above pictures were not very informative … well … here’s another one that is equally a tease …
Heres the bread. But we were hungry ...
Ok, so we wanted to show you a picture of the bread. You see, Django had flower pot bread. And Talula’s Table (and the Pop-up over the past summer) did the gruyere grougere. What’d the Garden do? It did this very interesting bread that was in the shape of a very skinny muffin, textured like a croissant, and dolloped with [green] spring ramp butter. And as you can see, it was so delicious that we ate it all before thinking, “gee, we should photograph this!”. Oh well. I guess that means that this entire post was a giant teaser … sorry guys … I promise more details and pics very soon.
What I can tell you was that the old couple to my right were hilarious. The entire time, they were talking about how weird it was that the patrons were wearing jeans (never mind that g and I were sitting right next to them and wearing jeans), and how it must have been “modern cajjjj” or “chic cajjjj” or some nonsense like that. Then they were like, “yea, there’s that guy there with jeans and a blazer with two daughters or something like that – it’s just too cajjjj.” Yea … that guy … he was STEPHEN STARR. He can dress however the hell he wants. Duh. And as for the rest of the place being “casual”, or “cajjj” as the old-trying-to-be-hip lady was mentioning – does she not understand the Django/Talula’s Table/Talula’s Garden shtick? I guess not. Then they started discussing how many restaurants they had left to visit on the Philly Mag “Best of Philly” list … ugh … go back to the Main Line where you belong …
Talula’s Table: A Whole New World
t says: We came, we saw, we conquered … Talula’s Table. After several years of waiting, we finally managed to do one of their farm table dinners … and it was awesome. But let’s back up for a second and bring everyone up to speed …
What is Talula’s Table? Read here. Ok … now everyone’s up to speed. Moving on …
g and I have been to the chef’s table at Talula’s twice before (once with kp), and both times were fantastic. We were able to hang out (ok – “spectate and politely converse” is more accurate) with Aimee, Bryan, and the staff while they prepared the meal for us (and those sitting at the farm table, who we weren’t associated with). Simply put, the food was unbelievable. From the very first bite on the very first evening, we knew that this was a special place and that we needed to bring as many people to it as possible … we needed the farm table for ourselves.
Now, the farm table is a tough reservation to get – reservations are made one year in advance to the day. That said, when I want something, I’m going to play the game (I’m a player) to maximize my likelihood of success. For instance – while most reservations are made over the phone, if you show up in person when they open at 7am, you automatically trump the phone lines. But, for me, showing up at 6:45 leaves too great a margin for getting scooped by another eager reservation-seeker. Just to make sure that no one in their right mind could beat me to the 7am opening, I woke up at 4:30 to get to Kennett Square by 5:30. To pass the time, I listened to some podcasts and read a book, sitting right outside Talula’s door in dark, peaceful Kennett Square. I think people must have thought I was crazy (surprisingly, there are a few people in the area that early in the morning – most of which were old people visiting the barber shop across the street). Good. You wouldn’t dare consider cutting a crazy person in line. I also wanted g to make me a t-shirt that said, “Step Off – Talula’s is Mine” … but she wouldn’t. She was probably afraid I’d get beaten up. She’s thoughtful like that.
So … after waiting two years (the first time I made a reservation, we had to cancel because k and cm were getting married that very weekend – one of the very few acceptable reasons to bail out on Talula’s), we pulled together a gang of friends, assigned DD’s (there were two – I was one) and the sommelier-for-a-night (thanks, a!), and off we went!
First, a pic of the place:
It
I realize now that in the pic, the table doesn’t look like much. That’s because it’s not. It’s a wood table. Those are wood chairs. That’s it. There’s no white table cloth, no leather cushions. It’s an ode to old-school simplicity, not the super-modern, hip, chic “simplicite”. It was more Django and less Steven Starr Pop-up. And you know what – it suited the venue and the atmosphere perfectly. The focus is clearly on friends and food, not how cool you are for being there or being seen there. I approve! For me, it was kind of like sitting at my Meema’s house (shout out to Big Bang Theory viewers out there … actually, my grandmom – we didn’t call her Meema- did have an old-school large wooden dining room table), getting ready for a family meal … except my Southern grandmother and her heavy cast iron skillets were replaced by a well-trained chef and staff and a professional kitchen. It was going get interesting …
Our wine for the evening was selected by a. He’s pretty knowledgeable when it comes to fermented fruits of the vine. Armed with the menu for the night, he picked out a variety of wines that coupled well with the courses we were going to encounter. But that’s not all. With the help of v, they generated these cute little wine lists with super-simple descriptors (e.g. pear, pineapple, vanilla) that allowed all of us, including those not super-familiar with wine, to pick and choose what we’d like to have throughout the evening. They even put down what courses they felt the wines paired with (those are the numbers 1-9). I actually don’t think that the format of the wine organization could have been any better – great job dudes! And, of course, the wait staff deserves much credit for deciphering the wine list and keeping the right ones flowing at the right times, all night!
Our wine list for the evening ...
and on to the food. The courses were:
1) Sweet Maine Jonah Crab Cake, Tartar Sauce Froth, and Crab Spice Dressed Heirlooms
2) Husk Roasted White Corn Soup, Bacon Bits, and Pan-Fried Scallop Sausage
3) Ratatouille Cannelloni, Farmstand Vegetables, and Amazing Acres Goat Cheese
4) Seared Rockfish?Tilefish?, New Jersey Clams, Chanterelles, and Clam Butter Sauce
5) Crispy Pork Belly, Refried Black Beans, Avocado Salsa, and Chile Relleno
6) Bison Tenderloin, Horseradish Root Crisp, Whipped Potatoes, and Sweet Summer Onion Rings
7) Not Your Granny’s Cheese Plate: Classic Pairings Done Right
8) Melon Terrine with Milk and Honey, Prosciutto Jimmies, Cantaloupe Broth, Cataloupe Ice
Rather than go through each, I’ll allow anyone who wants to to just tell you about the highlights and lowlights. Me first!
I liked the first course as an introduction to the meal (well – we did have three rounds of hors d’oeuvres which were all delicious, too). The crab cake was light and had a delicate flavor and texture – very different than other 100% crabmeat cakes that I have had that, while also delicious, have always been kind of rich and heavy. And the heirloom tomato salad with the tomato extract gelee had some zing to it – a great “here’s a tomato in your face!” moment.
The second course – the corn soup – blew me away. It’s ironic how something so delicious could be simply described as “husk roasted white corn soup”, as even when armed with all of the words of the English language, it’s hard for me to portray what it was about the soup that was so good. Maybe some other cast member will be able to do it. And that scallop sausage still fooled me! Even though I was told it was not a normal scallop, it still looked a bit like a scallop, so I was caught completely caught off-guard by its sausage-like texture. It’s definitely something I’d want to see again.
The tilefish was cooked perfectly, but it was the clam buerre blanc sauce that stole the show – it was beautifully textured and wonderfully mouth-coating without the sense of “I’m eating butter” – definitely my favorite liquid of the evening. My favorite solid of the evening goes to the pork belly. But is that really fair? Pork belly is pretty much uncured bacon, and when it’s executed well, it’s going to taste wonderful – period. I feel, however, that this porkbelly was extra remarkable, as it was tied with my personal best-ever-pork-belly from Morimoto, and it didn’t have the extra help from the Asian flavors that Morimoto utilized. Talula’s pork belly stood on its own four piggy feet by itself and did a great job.
The cheese plate had too many cheeses to recall. But the faves down at my end of the table were the 5-yr gouda with the caramel sauce (yes, you read the right – cheese and caramel) and the sheep’s milk brie with the raspberry butter (two people actually bought some raspberry butter to take home with them).
And the dessert was … intriguing. There was a triple-melon terrine (layers of panna cotta and fruit gelees pressed in a rectangular mold) as well as shaved cataloupe “ice” and a chilled cantaloupe soup. But what made the dish were the “prosciutto jimmies”. That’s right. Tiny bits of prosciutto deep fried and candied. Overall, the dish was a souped up (ha ha – I’m funny, too!) prosciutto-and-melon. Really, the only thing missing from the dessert was some kind of cookie. Not “cookie” where they give you a super-hard, super-thin wafer, but an actual cookie – just to give me something to really chew on as the textures of the rest of dessert, aside from the jimmies, was soft or liquid. Nevertheless, it was a most pleasant swan song to summer.
Now, don’t get me wrong, the rest of the food that we had was absolutely delicious and completely worth the cost of admission. But I did notice a difference between this meal and past ones that we had at Talula’s. In the past, Talula’s “shtick” for us was always “surprise”. You see something on the plate, and you’re surprised because that’s not how you had imagined it would look when you read the menu’s simple list of ingredients. Then you put it in your mouth and you’re surprised because even though you knew and saw everything that went in your mouth, the tastes that were delivered were completely unexpected. And then … they’d change in your mouth over time, as you chewed. It was like how the flavors in a fine wine evolves on your palateafter you swallow. Every dish was an adventure! This time, things were different. The focus wasn’t so much on “surprise” (yes, there were some surprising preparations like bacon jimmies and scallop sauasage), but the tastes, themselves, were less unexpected (i.e. they were expected). On a whole, the food was less “fooled around with”, if you will. Each dish paid respectful homage to whatever the star ingredient of the course was. For instance, when you ate the pork belly – you tasted an excellent, unadulterated pork belly. The fish was an excellently prepared piece of fish. The buerre blanc’s clam had the taste of clam without overhwelming the fish. The melon tasted like … melon. Now, part of this may be due to the ingredients of the evening; with a summer menu featuring such light and delicate flavors, you might not want to mess around with them too much or risk losing the focus (our past experiences had heavier components that begged to be played with). Part of this may also be due to a change in chef; Bryan seemed very good at novelty, while perhaps Matt is more comfortable with shining the light on the ingredient, itself. I’m not saying one approach is better or worse – they are different and, in my opinion, equally successful.
Finally – which is better – the chef’s table or the farm table? They, too, are equal but different. To be honest, I was initially hesitant about the farm table: would be as much fun as the chef’s table? The experience of being in the kitchen was truly unique. We were afraid that the farm table would come off as “restaurant-y”. Fortunately, this was absolutely not the case. There’s something about being in that space with the lights turned down low and the sun setting in Kennett Square. It felt like we were at a good friend’s home. We were relaxed, we were loud. This level of comfort could not have been had in any restaurant I’ve ever been in, because how many other places give you that feeling that the entire place is yours? Yes, we knew there was another table in the kitchen (we saw some older patrons using the bathroom), but we just didn’t care. With the farm table comes an entirely new experience; it’s the anti-restaurant.
a says: I found the first and third course to be the weakest. Their execution was inventive but the flavors were not compelling or intriguing. I thought courses 2 and 4 were the best: The white corn soup had great smoky corn flavor and the “scallop sausage” was lovely. I had never had tilefish before but will certainly have it again after Talula’s – cooked to perfection over a luscious clam butter sauce. The pork belly was outstanding but that seems like a given at a top-notch restaurant and the portion was on the small side. This was also true for the Bison which was tender and juicy but just as easily could have been (a very small) filet mignon. The setting is perfect for a group of 10 close friends or 10 acquaintances hoping to become closer. Aimee was a gracious host and the wait staff never missed a beat. I can’t wait to return with my parents and any friends that want an $130 education in gastronomy.
t says: Finally, here are some excerpts from our dinner conversations:
Re: Food/Drink:
-“Scallop and sausage in the same sentence?!”
-“It was corn like I’ve never had it before.”
-“Holy crap.”
-“It was awesome – it was 110% of everything I thought it could be.”
-“Ah, pig. Is there any part of you that isn’t delicious?”
-::Cough Cough:: “Pork belly!” ::Cough Cough::
Re: Purchasing Talula’s Products:
-“Yes, I’ll buy a jar of raspberry guilt.”
Re: Our table-mates:
-“He’s either Chinese or Eric Clapton.”
-Directed to a doctor at the table: “Working at In-and-Out Burger would be a step up for you.”
Re: The wine service:
-“Excuse me, why are the glasses getting bigger?”
-“One time we had a lady that brought pre-mixed Appletinis … I kind of didn’t want to serve it to her.”
Re: Too Much Wine:
-“That’s what she said.”
-Three of us (not me or g) sang out loud the refrain from “A Whole New World” … when I apologized to the server for our horrible/embarassing singing, she replied: “That’s ok, I like Aladdin!”
Talula’s Table Pop-up: Maybe a Taste of the Future?
t says: As I mentioned before, g and I were lucky enough to score reservations at this Stephen Starr event. Three of us went – it was a g, t, and cm outing! I’m telling you right now … there’s going to be a LOT to read – so let’s get started!
7/2010, Thursday 8:30pm, Party of 3. We arrived, not quite knowing what to expect. Would it be a restaurant? Would it be a warehouse? Would it be a tent? No idea! All I knew is that it was not BYO …
The venue turned out to be this place right on Washington Square that had an indoor section and an outdoor section. You enter what looks like a large outdoor patio, complete with umbrellas and lounge-worthy sofas and chairs and tables, and then find an entrance to the actual restaurant off to the side. It was a very unique layout. The outdoor patio also had a bar towards the back that was selling a selection of mixed drinks and wine. I have come to understand that anyone is allowed into that outdoor patio/bar area, even without a reservation – and cm believes that food was offered out there as well – so there may be a back door into these events. The drinks were quite pricey, but perhaps on par with what you’d expect from Mr. Starr …
Speaking of which … we saw him. That’s right. Mr. Restaurant, himself, was seated in the outdoor part with another guest (no idea who it was). I guess he wanted to mingle over some drinks in lieu of eating the very fine meal? The funny thing is that g was the first (and only) of our party to recognize him and pointed him out in a very dramatic fashion: “cm … … that’s Stephen Starr …”. We confirmed via iPhone google images to ensure that she was correct. Never doubt your wife. We didn’t have the nerve to really say anything to him – but we really wouldn’t know what to say, as in all honesty, Morimoto and this pop-up are but shining stars in a sea of over-hyped mediocrity (cm and k also really like Buddakan – we have no beef with Buddakan – it’s good! – but we love Morimoto much more, given our penchant for raw fish – Pod is also good, but only on all-you-can-eat night).
As we waited for our table, we decided to enjoy a drink outside. g and cm both went for the raspberry sunset, featuring Patron, Cointreau, lime, and raspberries. From what I understand, it was quite tasty. I, on the other hand, went for the mojito. We all agreed – there was something special about this mojito. The ingredients didn’t seem like they were that different from the usual suspects that you’d find in a mojito (Appleton Estate V/X, mint, lime) – the only difference was that instead of mint it was “Aimee’s mint” – but I doubt that the source of mint, alone, could have made up for the dramatic increase in taste versus any normal mojito I’ve ever had (including the countless 10Cane mojitos I’ve had). In the end, we still don’t know what the secret was!
Right when we placed our order for drinks, we were told that our table was ready. We waited around for our drinks to be prepared and headed inside to be seated. The inside of the place was quite nice – almost like a Stephen Starr “light” restaurant. There wasn’t too heavy of a theme in there (after all, it is a “pop-up”), but, there were tall ceilings, nice tables and chairs, and, much to our chagrin, too much modern … “art”. A lot of the pieces that adorned the walls as well as the free-standing sculptures around the room were trying just a little too hard to be cool. This place was so not Django, which was more of a “rustic home” – with flower pot bread, mismatched silverware, well-worn Laguiole knives, servers in jeans, etc. So not Talula’s, either, which is even more rustic with its farmhouse table and chairs. In these places, because the atmosphere-o-meter was turned so far down, you could focus on the two most important things – the people you were there with and the food you were eating. What more would you need? So, yes, this restaurant was Starr-ified a little – but the one element that I think best captured Djano/Talula’s was the use of potted herbs as centerpieces … cute – very cute.
But enough about atmosphere – let’s talk about food. After we had ordered [I’ll tell you what we ordered below], we were presented with the “cheese bread”. No, they didn’t call it that – I call it that. It’s this small dinner roll-esque bread that is made with gruyere cheese. It was warm and airy and even more delicious than I have ever had it at Talula’s. It melts in your mouth as the flavor of gruyere comes on and fades away like a peaceful wave at the beach. It definitely brought me back to those chef’s table dinners. The three of us fought valiantly against our primal urges to demolish these poor defenseless little rolls. We lost the battle … and the rolls lost their lives. But then … magically … as if we had willed it into occurring with the sheer sorrow in our hearts for the shameful deed we had just done … our waitress came around and formally introduced us to the cheese bread they were serving that night and gave us each a roll. Holy crap. She totally forgot that she had already given us one! Score! The second one was as good as, if not better than, the first. We did take our time with our second rolls, but we ensured that our plate was absolutely clean … just in case she actually had anterograde amnesia (i.e. think “Memento” … or “50 First Dates” …).
When the wine guy came around, g had another moment of recognition. It was Brian [Freedman]! It was the dude from “The Wine School”. A while ago, a few friends and we took a few-hour course on Italian wines at the Wine School (Groupon rocks!), and we were super-impressed with both the presentation and quality of wines sampled (and quantity, too!). We highly recommend it. Brian was our instructor, and, while most of his jokes were “canned”, we liked his enthusiasm. He was no less enthusiastic at the pop-up restaurant. His passion for the wines he described as well as the descriptions, themselves, persuaded us each to venture an additional glass of alcohol. g and I went for two different glasses of red (mine was Spanish “Cap De Barbaria 2005”, g’s was an Austrian “Sattler St. Lauren 2006”), while maybe cm went for some French bubbly? They were all delicious and went well with the food – but I’ll leave the descriptions of the wines to those wine professionals out there.
Now, I feel obligated to warn you in advance that my descriptions of the food are going to be a little spotty. On one hand, a substantial amount of time has passed, and g and I have eaten out a LOT recently due to our move, so we’ve had a lot of very delicious food, and I’m easily confused. On the other hand, because I ordered a glass of red wine in addition to the mojito I mentioned above, my Asian genes probably kicked in, interacted poorly with the alochol, and prevented long term memory consolidation … sorry! Maybe g or cm can fill in the blanks?
We ordered three “middle” courses and shared. These were the smoked scallop ravioli, the chicken sausage, and the fried squash blossoms. g’s fave was the fried squash blossoms. I appreciated the play between the delicate blossom and the delicate fried-ness. They were accompanied by a green tomato ketchup which tasted so good that I wonder why green tomato ketchup is not commercially available (yes, I realize that perhaps one time Heinz may have had green-colored ketchup, but I don’t think it was the same as this ketchup made from green tomatoes … I hope …). Now that smoked scallop ravioli was something else. It had a sweet pea sauce and some micro-greens. And somehow you’d get that smokey flavor radiating throughout your mouth, surprising you as you chewed. The greens and peas added just enough vegetal zing so the dish felt light and summer-y. That was definitely a dish that had Talula’s written all over it – it was the kind of dish that made you close your eyes so you could concentrate on your mouth. The chicken sausage dish was good, but to be honest, I’ve forgotten any and all details about it, so it was definitely outshined by the other two.
We ordered three “dinner” courses as well. I was a little surprised at the expense of these courses, as I was clearly promised $22-28 on the phone both when I made the reservation and when I confirmed. The actual range was $28-30. Liars! I wave my fist at whoever it was propagating the deception.
The Kennett Square mushroom gnocchi was definitely the most massive of the three “dinner” dishes. It featured mushrooms, gnocchi, and cheese – what more do you need? The gnocchi were very soft and pillowy – less “bite” than I’ve experienced from Django. They actually verged on being as volatile as Vetri’s. That said, they were insanely rich – they filled your mouth with goat cheese that just begged to be foiled with the salty grated cheese and the mushrooms. A few interesting notes:
1) Outside of her mom’s Thanksgiving stuffing, these are the only mushrooms I’ve ever seen g eat.
2) The cm and I actually disagreed with g about whether the mushrooms were too salty – and it seemed that cm and I, two people who tend to want to add more salt to things, were arguing that perhaps there was too much salt, while g, who is super-sensitive to salt, argued that it was just fine. I think what we later found was that the grated cheese, itself, was very a very salty cheese – reminding me of a pecorino romano, so that’s probably the reason why the mushrooms had quite a salty twang to them. We agreed that the mushrooms in combination with the goat cheese was the way to go for maximal per-bite enjoyment.
Another dish was the beef cheeks, risotto, and cheddar. The beef cheeks melted in my mouth. I am going to find beef cheeks. Seriously. They were that good. The risotto was well-cooked – and I’m sure there were other components, too, but those beef cheeks … And you know what? g ate the beef cheeks, too! She normally doesn’t go for cuts of meat that sound gross (e.g. oxtail, pork belly), but she ate these beef cheeks. For me, of the three larger dishes, this one most reminded me of Talula’s, as, much like the smoked scallop ravioli, there were a lot of different flavors at play. It made me want to sit back and just think about them. I like food that makes me question the meaning of eating …
The other dish was a duck (prepared sous vide) in cherry sauce with tater tots. I’ll leave it to my trust dinner mates to describe it because I just can’t remember it at all! I know it was there, but it was one of the last things I had tried, and by that time, I had reached the bottom of that glass of wine …
We did venture the “Not Your Granny’s” cheese course. And while I could tell you each of the cheeses (I have the list right here), it’s better if I just tell you that the cheese were great, and their pairings were awesome. I’m going to stick all of my “vintage gouda” in caramel from now on … I will admit a little disappointment that Aimee, herself, didn’t present the cheese plate (some other blogger mentioned that she did), but they seemed very busy that night, and, to be honest, we could just visit her in Kennett Square, so we’re not crushed.
Finally, we were given an Eclat chocolate with our bill. Gotta love Eclat. It’s not your normal caramel-filled chocolate. If you have no clue what I’m talking about, go and buy some right now.
Summary: There was a lot of good food to be had. I personally feel that the highs were right on with Talula’s (which is not shocking as I saw some of these dishes on their menu!). True, some of the dishes missed the mark for me, but a “low” for Talula’s is still above mediocre dishes I’ve encountered elsewhere – so perhaps that’s not a fair assessment. I suspect that given more experience with serving up 90 diners a night in lieu of less-than-20, they’ll be able to pick up right where they left off with Django. We liked what we saw, and we hope that Aimee finds her way back to Philly, although I personally hope it won’t be in the form of a venue that’s this large and “classy”, I’d even consider going even if it wasn’t BYO (just so long as Brian’s still there picking out interesting wines for reasonable prices).
Talula’s Table Pop-Up Restaurant
t says: Via her connections with Stephen Starr, Aimee from Talula’s Table (one of our fave places to go, ever!) will be returning to the city for a three-day dinner event at Washington Square. Read here.
Yes, the reservations were all gone in less than 2 days.
Yes, we got one: table for four between 8-9pm on July 1 (I don’t want to give away too many details – we might compromise our anonymity). Boo-yah. On one hand, we are super-super excited for the event – we kind of hope that everything goes splendidly and Aimee decides to open up a Center City outpost. On the other hand, we’re a little bummed it’s not BYO and no definite pricing can be found ($20-29 is quite a range). Well, we’ll let you know how it goes …
PS While I haven’t seen/heard about this yet – I suspect that there has to be some reservation-scalping going on somewhere. I wonder how much the reservations are going for? I don’t quite know how much someone would have to pay me to give up such a precious reservation …
GTC: We found GTC’s Achilles Heel
t says: In the world of Garces restaurants, we like GTC a lot. It’s a fun concept that reminds us a little of Talula’s Table, but with slightly heftier/fancier lunch options available; you can get good food without having to do the whole formal sit-down thing – which is great. And, as far as the food is concerned, I think between our experience, and k and cm’s experience (k and cm fully approve of the vichyssoise and flatbreads as well as the ability to pick up a nice, inexpensive bottle of wine), we haven’t yet found something wrong with GTC. I even bought a mess of their desserts for an Easter celebration, and they were all delicious – g’s mom said that their lemon tart has the best lemon substance she’s ever had! That’s some serious praise.
Well … today we may have stumbled upon GTC’s weakness. It all started when I saw scones while waiting in the checkout line. They were peach-ginger-cranberry. It sounded promising. I started having visions of the lemon-ginger scones at Talula’s Table, which makes the best scones that g and I have ever had. Could it be possible that these are even half as good as those? I could get a scone fix without going to Kennett Square? If anyone could do it, surely Garces could, right? I ordered it on a whim and g fed it to me in the car as we made our getaway.
The result: salty. That’s right – the scone was salty. It actually reminded us of the time we made David Chang’s Momofuku shortbread biscuits, but used Morton’s kosher salt in lieu of Diamond Crystal brand – it was ridiculously salty. g pointed out that she hit some sweet sections that were less salty and very delicious, so perhaps it was a mixing issue, and not a salt level issue. In any case, I really couldn’t taste much of the peach, which was sad. Cranberry was the biggest non-salt thing I could taste, but the bits of cranberry were more like Craisins than actual cranberries, so they were a bit tough to chew. The cake was also a little dry, so maybe it was sitting out for too long (although we’ve had day-old Talula’s scones on several occasions without a problem). Well, I hope that Jose fixes this problem soon (as I’m sure he’s an avid reader of “the sneeze”). Then again, it’s not like if he didn’t fix it that I wouldn’t go to GTC … I just won’t get the scones, cuz everything else we’ve had is awesome.
Bryan Sikora Does Scrapple?
t says: Foobooz says that Daniel Stern says that Sikora is to come on as a culinary director, with his first task being to focus on the scrapple-obsessed Midatlantic Restaurant and Tap Room. I love scrapple. g doesn’t. I love the crisp outside and the smooth, porky inside. g thinks it tastes like someone chewed up sausage, spit it out, shaped it into the brick and fried it. Result: we haven’t gone to Midatlantic – it’s not even on our radar. I’m willing to give Bryan a few months to see if he can offer some noteworthy dishes that would entice g to go. I wish him good luck with that … he’s going to need it …
Talula’s Split Goes More Public
t says: This had been reported a while ago, but now that it’s in the Inquirer, I feel a little more confident in its truth. I do want to say that it is kind of weird that this is front page news, but I guess if you consider the impact that Django had on the Philadelphia restaurant scene as well as the foodie-prestige that Talula’s brought to the area, it is somewhat big news.
What do I think? Well, regarding the article’s focus on the Aimee-Bryan relationship (and comments below the article), I feel that most readers will feel that LaBan is most certainly painting a stunning portrait of Aimee, and a less-than-stunning one of Bryan … but … if Bryan did truly pull a Tiger Woods here, then I’m totally fine with that. Obviously, there weren’t many details.
As far as the Bryan-cooking relationship is concerned, it’s quite a shame, because when we talked to Bryan in the kitchen in June 2009, we loved his attitude about food and cookery and restaurants. He even admitted that his days at Django killed him with stress, and that he liked Talula’s food-centric, slower-paced gig. But now the Inquirer claims he doesn’t want the cooking-for-one-table job, either, because he has to do some schmoozing? So he doesn’t want to cook a lot because it’s stressful, and he doesn’t want to schmooze because he doesn’t like it, but he does want to be “in the loop” as far as thinking up that prospective new place with Stephen Starr?
Finally, what do I think about the future of Talula’s? Well – g and I have been to the market and agree that they still have excellent food. As far as the dinners are concerned, we also have 2010 Labor Day Saturday reservations, and if we can get together the minimum number of people, we are in! If you want to come with us, let us know!
after dinner sneeze 