Blind Lady Ale House

We're down to our last few days in San Diego. And as such, we're doing our last visits to our favourite San Diego spots. Zumbar. Pizzeria Bruno. And Blind Lady Ale House.

Blind Lady is named after an old window blind store (run by a lady, apparently) that occupied the space where they are currently located. They serve beer. And pizza.

The beer is excellent and varied. Like Bear republic apex double IPA.



Or the lovely raspberry dessert beer St. Louis Framboise.



They used to get their hands on Knight Salumi products for appetizers. These days, we satisfy ourselves with marinated olives.



We always went to Blind Lady for the toppings. Their thin-crust is not my favourite, but the toppings... top-notch toppings. Cheese pizzas seldom get me excited, as commodity cheeses are generally not delicious. But the 4-cheese pizza at Blind Lady includes a delicious blue, and 3 other mystery cheeses that are, well, tasty.



But the pièce de resistance is the pizza that taught me to put egg on pizza. Bacon and egg pizza. Ridiculous. Soft yolk. Tasty bacon. And green bits that are tasty. Yum.



If you're in San Diego, hit Blind Lady Ale House as soon as you possibly can. Best pizza in town.

Farewell, Blind Lady.


Blind Lady Ale House
3416 Adams Avenue
San Diego, CA 92116
(619) 255-2491
T-F 5 p.m. - 12 a.m.
S-S 11:30 a.m. - 12 a.m.


View Larger Map


By Bbq Dude

Intelligentsia Los Angeles

These days, when we travel, we inform ourselves. Chowhound. Blogs. Friends. This is how we ensure we eat and drink well while traveling.

Take coffee. Steve at Zumbar has pointed us towards several coffee places that will blow you away. Like Intelligentsia in Los Angeles. Their coffee is superb. Not a hint of bitterness. Their latte is rich and foamy made from a perfectly pulled shot of espresso.



They warned us off the hot chocolate for Bbq Jr. "Kids don't like our chocolate. It's too strong." Hah! Bbq Jr. loved it. "This is the best hot chocolate, Daddy. You should make me this hot chocolate next year for my birthday."

Even if coffee isn't your thing, the location in Venice makes for interesting viewing. The coffee hardware looks like something out of an alchemy lab.



Everything is all steel and tattoos. I swear I'm not cool enough to hang out here, but the coffee is so good that I keep sneaking back in. One of these days, they're gonna check me for hipster i.d. and turn me back at the door. But until then...



They get their pastries from Breadbar. Their perfect, buttery, sweet, chocolatey, pain au chocolat.



You need to have a coffee here.

Intelligentsia Silver Lake
3922 W Sunset Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90029
323-663-6173
Sun - Wed, 6 a.m. - 8 p.m.
Thur - Sat, 6 a.m. - 11 p.m.


View Larger Map

Intelligentsia Venice
1331 Abbot Kinney Blvd.
Venice, CA 90291
310-399-1233
Mon - Wed, 6 a.m. - 8 p.m.
Thur - Fri, 6 a.m. - 11 p.m.
Sat 7 a.m. - 11 p.m.
Sun 7 a.m. - 8 p.m.


View Larger Map

The Lazy Ox

I passed a very significant food bloggy milestone this past weekend.  It was a line I never thought I'd cross, but I did.  Mrs. Dude didn't even mention anything as she watched me cross it.  Not until later, when we whispered in the dark in our hotel room (careful not to wake little Bbq Jr).

I photographed an entire restaurant meal.  Sure, I tried to disguise it.  I was also snapping photos of the family (several of which I'm very happy with).  But in the end, the waitress came by to ask if everything was alright while I was snapping pictures of dessert.  My neck warmed and I said, "Yes, we're fine".

We visited Los Angeles this weekend, an amazing source of food and drink.  We had 2 fantastic meals, and an acceptable one.  I only photographed one of those meals, but I expect that once you cross the line, you will photograph everything...

The Lazy Ox is a cute little place in downtown L.A.  On our previous visit, we had to fight off other patrons to get some seats at the bar (literally).  This time, we made reservations, and got lovely tables outside.  Naturally, this made photographing dinner considerably easier (given that we were out with Bbq Jr, who can't be eating dinner at 9:30 at night).

Incidentally, Bbq Jr. also passed a significant food milestone this weekend.  He had his first soda.  Mrs. Dude and I aren't really soda people (she used to drink a lot of Coke, but cut back to reduce her caffeine intake).  So we generally serve Bbq Jr. milk, water or juice.  Well, we were in a slightly fancy place, and she and I were drinking wine, so it only seemed fair for him to be drinking something exciting.



You won't be surprised to hear that he was delighted.  He made at least 3 different faces as he registered the taste of this stuff.  Quite pleased.

Though you don't need to order this way, both times we visited, we've chosen to eat small dishes, almost tapas-style.  You get to sample more stuff this way, and really, more stuff!



These little ricotta fritters are great.  With four fritters for three people, we had to split up the last one.  Bbq Jr. was skeptical of these at first, but once he realized they were like French fries with cheese in them, he was all about them.



The basil vinaigrette with creamed corn served with these heirloom tomatoes was delicious.  Really bright, really sweet and perfectly ripe tomatoes.  I'm a big fan of heirloom tomatoes, and this preparation is one of the better ones I've had.  Bbq Jr. on the other hand claimed that, "Daddy, these are good.  But they're not as good as our tomatoes."

Up next?  Creamy poblano soup with crispy pork belly and crème fraiche.  Just a hint of spice, but all the rich deliciousness of poblanos.  And the pork belly was delicious.  But the real surprise?  Slices of slightly dried grapes at the bottom of the soup.  I could have eaten this whole bowl myself.



And finally, the best dish of the night...  Brick-roasted mussels with basil, white wine, house-made sriracha.  HOLY CREAMY SPICY SWEET HEART-STOPPING SRIRACHA SAUCE!  This sauce was good.  So good, we ordered two rounds of bread to go with it to mop up the extra sauce.  So good, that when we finished the bread, I had to ask if it also came as a smoothie.  So good, that when the waitress offered us a straw, I nearly took her up on it.  Only my dignity stopped me.  This is pure saucy goodness.



I would travel a distance to eat that sauce again.  Yum.

Okay. And now we had a chance for dessert.  Mrs. Dude had the creamy, lovely vanilla panna cotta with blackberries and figs.



Bbq Jr. had to have the blackberry-blueberry crumble.



These were lovely. Tasty. Yummy. But the pièce de resistance of the dessert round was the rice pudding.  It arrived in three containers:  1) the rice pudding with a nut crumble on it; 2) a carmel-cinnamon sauce; and 3) whipping cream.  One is to mix them in one's own desired proportions.  Me, I dipped my spoon into each, and gobbled it down.  This was the single-best rice pudding of my life.  This rice pudding made Mrs. Dude exclaim:  "This is rice pudding??  I thought I didn't like rice pudding!  This is amazing!"  It was amazing.



And the dessert was served with a lovely Tokaj.



Lazy Ox, we will be back.


View Larger Map

영양탕 - Korean dog soup

I was fortunate to have work send me to Korea recently.  I wish I had had time to take more pictures of the many tasty things that came across my plate while I was there.  But I couldn't give up the chance to try a Korean dish famous the world over - Bosintang.  Korean dog meat soup.

I don't speak Korean, so finding such a place was challenging.  Though illegal on the mainland, on Jeju Island (where I was staying), dogmeat is legal.  I approached the English-speaking concierge in my hotel, and asked:

"Can you recommend a restaurant where I can try dog?"

"What for?"  She looked aghast.

"I'd like to try dog meat."

"What?!?"

At this point, I was concerned.  Had I been had?  I had been told dogmeat was reasonably common in Korea, but given her reaction, I was a tad concerned that I had been misinformed.

She paused.  "Foreigners *never* ask for dogmeat."  She paused again.  "One of my coworkers really likes dog.  I'll call him to find out where the best place is."

She spent some time on the phone and returned.  She wrote out 3 notes in Korean, one was instructions for the cabbie for where to go.  One was a note for the restaurant, telling them what I wanted.  The final note was for the cabbie to help me return.

"I've tried dog soup."  she said.  "The meat smells bad."

"Hmmm." I said.  "I'd like to try it."

"You're very brave."

I don't know about that last part, but I'm certainly curious - and when will I have a chance to try this again?  I don't expect to be in Korea often, if ever again.  So this was my chance.  And off I went.

The restaurant I found was very small, on a narrow side street.  I took pictures of the sign and the menu so I could later confirm that I had, indeed, eaten at the right place.



Inside, there was a raised area with low tables, and a bunch of shoes near the entrance.  I removed my shoes, and followed the waiter in to sit at a low table.



I showed the waiter my note, and he pointed to the sign on the wall, so he could indicate the price.  The dog soup is the third one down on the left.  8000 Korean won (₩) - or about $8.



My Korean colleagues confirmed that this was the right dish.  The characters:

영양탕

translate to:

yeongyangtang or "nutritious soup", one of many euphemisms for dog soup listed on the Wikipedia.  This is when the only word of English passed from my waiter's mouth.  "Beeruh?"

Yes, yes I think having a beer during this excursion was more than appropriate, and indeed all of the other tables were also consuming beer with their soup.  The beer was a brand I had not seen before, labeled in English as "Cass Fresh".

As with many Korean meals, they loaded the table up with many condiments.  Naturally, there was kimchi, the fermented, spiced cabbage dish.



A spiced cucumber/zucchini like critter.



Dried, salted anchovies.  These were excellent, if a little spiky.  They poke into your mouth in a rather unpleasant way when chewing them.  I think they'd be quite nice if gently stewed (though that might take out some of the nice saltiness).



Red dragon sauce?  Maybe.



And a small bowl with what looked like serrano peppers with onion slices.



I sat alone with these dishes, nursing my beer, and trying pretty hard to ignore the older Korean gentleman at the table next to me that were staring at me.  Clearly, they were as surprised as the concierge, to see a 6' 3" white guy, about to dine on dog.

After about 15 minutes, an older woman emerged, carrying a screaming hot ceramic pot.  She scowled at me, as she set it in front of me.  It was boiling vigorously as she set in front of me.  And it smelled heavenly.



Look at that!



The broth was a bright, spicy flavour.  I had assumed there was tomato in there from the colour, but there was no tomato flavour.  Rich, bright and quite spicy.  The greens were pretty sturdy, but quite delicious, (and I always enjoy discovering new greens).  This is a very hearty soup.  But you haven't read this far to hear about the broth...

I hate when people compare one meat to another.  "It's like chicken."  No it's not.  Duck is not like chicken.  Turkey is not like chicken.  But if you are going to explain what a meat is like, I suppose the easiest way to do it is to compare it to meats people know.

Dog meat is *extremely* fatty.  Not quite as fatty as pork belly, but close.  And the texture of the meat is very beeflike.  The cuts reminded me of cuts of brisket.  But the flavour was more like mutton or lamb.  Very gamy, but not unpleasantly so.  The first few bites of meat, I put the whole thing in my mouth, but I very quickly found the fat off-putting, and pulled the large chunks of fat off.



I later read that Koreans prize the fat and the skin.  I confess, I didn't.  The meat was really flavourful, and really nice, but the fat was too much for my Canadian palate.

I really liked this soup, and found myself wondering how well dog would stand up on the barbecue, with the fat properly rendered (this is how my mind works, I'm afraid).

I'm glad I went out to try this soup, but I was embarrassed when I left that I didn't finish it.  They brought me an enormous bowl, and I simply couldn't finish it.  I finished the meat (though not the fat) - I think it's near a sin to waste meat.  But I left a fair amount of broth and greens on the bottom of my bowl.  I looked over, and was relieved to see that some of the other folks in the restaurant also were leaving some food in their bowl.

This wasn't the best meal I had in Korea, but it was by far the most memorable.

Bbq sushi

So Mrs. Dude and I had a weekend alone in Los Angeles recently.  (Bbq Jr. was home with Grandma Dude).  And of course, we have to check out the local restaurant scene.  First night up?  Kiriko Sushi.  We were a little concerned when we found the place.  It's in a dying conference/banquet center, where half the businesses are empty, and from the ground floor, it looks like Kiriko will be seeing the grim reaper soon.  But when you walk in, it's hopping inside.

This is one of those sushi joints where you sit down at the bar, and the conveyer belt in front of you brings fresh sushi by.  You grab a roll, or a piece of sushi, and eat it, and at the end of the meal they count the number and colour of the plates in front of you, and tabulate your bill.  I've only been to such a place once before, and it wasn't that good.  You can imagine, if not properly done, the sushi can age on the belt.  It's not conducive to making the freshest product.

At Kiriko, even at 6:30 p.m., the place was hopping, and food was moving off and onto the belt at a pretty decent clip.  Everything was fresh and delicious.  The various deep-fried offerings were still warm, and so delicately seasoned.  Even the spicy tuna roll, often used as a way to hide old tuna, was sweet and delicate.

This was an enjoyable meal, and we stuffed ourselves silly.  (Yes, we got a bit out of hand.  It's been quite some time since we had sushi that compared favourably to Kiriko).

Just when I thought I was done, I see the sushi-maestro going all Pulp Fiction on a piece of halibut with a blowtorch.  Awesome.  Bbq sushi.  Well, you just know I had to try it.  It was a basically a California roll, wrapped with caramelized halibut, with a wee bit of Kirik Secret Sauce, also caramelized.  It tasted of smoke and fish and rice and sauce and YUM!  The perfect way to end the meal.

If you find yourself in L.A., and are looking for a place to have excellent sushi, keep Kiriko on your list.


View Larger Map

A Temple of Meat

So we find ourselves in Los Angeles this weekend to go to the Anaheim/Montréal hockey game on Sunday. And it's raining, so outdoor activities are out. (Who said it never rains in southern California - it's been raining for 2 months straight). And what are we to do, but find some delicious eats while we're here? Well, find them we did, at the Temple of Meat (Korean meat, that is): Park's BBQ. (By the way, I'm still not that guy. No pictures, sorry - though I confess I wished several times that I had brought my camera).

Korean BBQ is something pretty special, if you've never had it. They start by setting a fire in the middle of your table. (Every table has it's own ventilation system, to vent out the smoke). And then they bring out meat for you to cook at your table. We ordered the Kobe-style beef and the Seasoned Prime Short Rib. The Kobe style beef was sliced thin and well marbled. It sizzled into delicious caramelized wonderfulness. The waitress brought us a dipping sauce that was sweet and hot (fish sauce based, perhaps?) and a seasoning salt of kosher salt, ground pepper and sesame seeds. We could dredge a tiny bit of that salt on the meat to add to the flavour. She rubbed the hot grill with a cube of beef fat, and threw down the thin slices of Kobe-style beef. Once it was caramelized on both sides, we removed it, and dredged it in the salt-mix. Mein gott, the flavour. Deliciousness. Smokey, just enough fat.

They also serve what they call Wagyu beef, which is the same meat, cut thicker. I think the meat they call Kobe is also Wagyu beef, sliced thin. And meanwhile, as we ate, they piled numerous delicious sides around us. Kimchi. Sesame-seasoned greens. A cabbage salad. Some spicy seasoned crab bits (complete with crab shell). Cubes of flavoured gelatin. A rice noodle mix. And a mild broth. All of this stuff was fantastic, though the crab was a little surprising. I thought it was kimchi until I bit into a crab shell. Yowza.

We finished the meal on the thicker cut Seasoned Prime Short Rib. This stuff we wrapped in small rice sheets, much thicker than the rice sheets I've encountered in Vietnamese cuisine. Teeny, tiny little burritos were folded, and deliciousness ensued. This meat was fantastic. And given that there was charcoal in the grill, there was a nice smoky flavour in this. Really, really nice. And kinda fun for a barbecue enthusiast such as myself to tend the meat. (The waitress kept coming over to turn the meat, but I was more than happy to take over).

I really loved that sesame seasoning salt. Pure genius.

Finally, I didn't know which Korean beverage to order, so I asked my waitress for help. She set me up with some Saan-soju. This is a distilled beverage, and at 20% alcohol, packs a bit of a punch. The flavour was quite mild, and the alcohol was nearly unnoticeable. This stuff could sneak up on you. It reminded me of sake, though the flavour was quite clearly different, it was mild in that way that sake is.

All in all, a lovely evening at a lovely restaurant. We'll be back.

Butterfly wings

This past weekend we were in San Francisco for a brief getaway. Our most memorable meal of the weekend was at The House. (sorry, no photos - I'm still not that guy who takes photos in the restaurant). An Asian-inspired seafood place in a tiny little space, across from one of the best bookstores I've ever seen (picked up a copy of Hervé This' Molecular Gastronomy there) and near several peeler bars and a live-sex club, The House was filled with an eclectic mix of young fashionistas and older, bearded academics.

We started with their seared day-boat scallops, perfectly cooked (it looked like they had seared the edges, in addition to the tops and bottoms), sitting in a delicious sauce, and with sprouts piled high on each scallop. Delicious.

Then I ordered their special, miso-glazed cod on spinach, with some sort of Japanese roll of seaweed, sushi rice and some spiced vegetable or other. I could barely hear the waitress in this place, so I'm not sure what was in it, but this cod with sushi roll was out of this world delicious.

But the cod is not why I'm posting about this meal. Mrs. Dude ordered the mushroom rice with grilled prawns. When they brought the dish to the table and set it down in front of her, we immediately noticed that it was covered with little insect wings, flapping slowly up and down. The effect was more than a little disconcerting, but mesmerizing. This was one of the few times I could hear our waitress clearly: "Those are butterfly wings.". She laughed. "Actually, those are bonito flakes. The heat from the rice is making them wave." Well, they continued to wave for a good ten minutes while Mrs. Dude devoured the dish. Visually enthralling, and exceptionally tasty to boot.

The bill at the end of the night? 1 glass of wine, 2 appetizers, 2 main courses, 2 desserts and we got out of there for $110. Score.

We'll be returning to The House the next time we're in San Francisco.

A tale of weal and woe.

As this is October, the month of Hallowe'en, I feel it is only appropriate for me to tell a scary story. This is a tale of weal and a tale of woe. And ultimately, it is a tale of poor planning and bad results. I am solely to blame. I will carry the guilt of my choice for the rest of my life.

We are traveling across California for vacation. We've visited some really beautiful and fantastic places. Sequoia National Forest.

The Aquarium in Monterey.

And we've had some good meals. And even some memorable meals. But this is not that happy meal story.

Family vacations are often a tale of negotiation and compromise. I wanted to visit Santa Barbara, and sample the fabulous wines. My wife wanted to visit Sequoia National Forest. The little one loves sea critters, so wanted to visit the Monterey Aquarium. Fitting these in requires a bit of planning, and a lot of driving.

After a long day drive from Monterey to Santa Maria (at the gateway to wine country), we were tired. We'd been in and out of the car all day, and seen some spectacular sights along the coast. We'd made reservations, via Priceline, at the very cute, extremely old, and slightly rundown hotel, the Santa Maria Inn. It's the perfect setting for a ghost story.

Santa Maria Inn claims to have had all kinds of famous guests. Gregory Peck. Clark Gable. Jack Lemmon. Walter Matthau. You'll notice, of course, that they are all dead. Curious...

Well, as I said, we were tired. Exhausted even. So we decided we would eat in the hotel restaurant. The dreaded "Garden Room". I quote from their brochure:

Embraced by a crackling fire and a casual, yet elegant atmosphere, our guests enjoy true personal service and fresh, imaginative California Cuisine.

Hmmm. We should have noticed the warning signs: The maitre d' in a cheap suit. The monogrammed plates, bowls and glasses at every table setting. The smell of 40 years of stale cigar smoke.

We nearly escaped. We sat at the table, looking over the boring, standard menu for nearly ten minutes before a waiter even looked at us. I glanced over at my wife and said, "If we wait 2 more minutes, I want to leave. This is ridiculous." If only. One minute after that statement an annoyed-looking waiter graced us with his presence. "Would you like something to drink?"

We were ready to order. Everything. And we did, a glass of pinot noir for me, a glass of cabernet for my wife and a glass of milk for the little one. The milk would prove to be the only good choice. Chicken tortilla soup for my wife. A caesar salad with "seasoned" tri-tip steak for me. And a cheeseburger and fries for my son. These are simple things. Hard to screw up. You almost have to try to screw them up...

The wine that arrived was not good (this is in wine country, mind you). It had clearly been open for a few days, and had that lovely oxidized flavor. The milk seemed to go down well. The soup? Simply appalling. It was CostCo brand spaghetti sauce with cheese and stale chicken in it. Not even any seasoning. Yuck. The caesar salad - well, the lettuce wasn't rotten, and the Kraft dressing they drenched on there was of a quality to be expected from Kraft. The seasoned tri-tip? Neither seasoned, nor tri-tip. Indeed, it had been cooked and cooked again, based on the dryness of it. The cheeseburger? Thankfully my son didn't notice that it was a pre-cooked burger that had been microwaved for him. Gross.

Towards the end of the meal, the waiter handed us a comment card and asked us to fill it out. But where to start? "Dear sir/madam: Please steam clean the drapes and carpet. Wash the walls. Throw out the menu. Hire a cook. Just start over. Sincerely, your customers."

Now this isn't the worst meal of my life. I've had worse. But at $52.00 for the meal, this was without a doubt the worst meal, dollar for dollar, that I've ever sat near, much less eaten.

When you see the warning signs, flee. Don't ask questions. Don't look back. Just run, and don't even think about who you're leaving behind. Leave your family behind. (This is a horror story, remember, there's only ever one survivor in those stories). There will be plenty of time to mourn them later...

Providence

I recently made a broad, sweeping generalization about East coast eating vs. West coast eating, on the basis of several years of living on the East coast, and 1 year living in San Diego. Basically, I lamented the lack of decent up-scale dining options on the West Coast. I'd like to take it all back. Or at least most of it. There is fabulous dining to be had on the West Coast - in Los Angeles. I still haven't had truly world class food in San Diego, but we had a crazy good meal at Providence in L.A. We were concerned that the food in Los Angeles would be all about the "scene", and not about the food. And perhaps many are. But we succeeded in finding fabulous food at Providence.

I'm still not that guy who takes food in restaurants. I tried once, and I just couldn't do it (and I still don't have a decent phone camera). So I rely on others' photos. Fortunately, JTSO23 at Flickr took pictures of the dinner (very similar dinner!) and graciously allowed me to use the photos.

I started off with a cocktail, the Dark 'n' Stormy. Fizzy ginger beer mixed with Gosling's dark rum (has to be Gosling's, read the link). It was nice, gingery and sweet, but they didn't let me finish it before they brought us the amuse-bouche. This was my main complaint there - they were in too much of a rush. I wanted this meal to take us three hours, they cleared us out of there in two.

We went for the five course tasting menu with matching wines. It was delicious. First up, an amuse-bouche.

This is a trio of interesting dishes. From left to right, it's a gin and tonic cube, a mojito ravioli and a cold carrot soup. The gin and tonic cube wasn't notable, but the mojito ravioli was *great*. It's gelatinized using alginate, so there's a thing skin of solid material around a liquid. You place it in your mouth, and when it breaks you get a splash of liquid mojito. Really fun, and tasty.

The carrot soup was also yummish, with cream and curry flavours. Really fun.

The first course was raw kanpachi with crispy rice crackers, flowering coriander, endive sous vide, soy crème fraiche. This is a dish where the crunchy rice cracker counterpoint to the fish was really nice. The coriander added a bright flavour, and this was really fun to eat. The matching wine was Txakoli, Txomin Etxaniz 2008.

Second course was hokkaido sea scallops (japan), chanterelles, haricot vert, applewood smoked bacon, jurançon sec.

One of my wife's favourite things is scallops, and this scallop was perfect. The sauce around it was particularly nice, and made a nice mild accent to the scallop. The matching wine: Riesling Spätlese, “Alte Reben” Kaseler Nies’Chen, Erben von Beulwitz 2007.

Third course was wild day-boat pacific halibut with burdock, shiso and lemon.

The halibut was like butter. Just fantastic. We asked the server how it was prepared, and he said it was cooked in a "vapor oven". After much prodding, it turns out it was cooked sous-vide, but I think he didn't want to take the time to explain what that meant (as it happens, we knew what it meant). The burdock root was delicious and crunchy, adding a fun textural component to the dish. The matchine wine: Bourgogne Blanc, François Mikulski 2006.

The final course before dessert was veal tenderloin with crushed butterball potatoes, spring onions, hazelnuts, spring garlic confit. Also cooked sous-vide this was deliciously prepared. I was prepared for this to be my favourite course of the evening. It was perfectly cooked, and melted in my mouth. I'm salivating, just typing this.

Look at that veal! Delicious. Matching wine: Sean Thackery, Pleiades XVII.

I confess, I was prepared to be bored by the dessert in this tasting menu. It was miso cheesecake. I'm not a huge cheesecake fan. It's often heavy, and too sweet. Cheesecake done well can be quite good, but it's a little boring, and I was hoping to be excited by the food at Providence.

Well, they didn't let me down. Miso cheesecake with assorted stone fruit, black sesame, white peach sorbet was incredible.

The "cheesecake" was more of a flan, really. And it blended perfectly with the miso sauce and raspberry splatter on the plate. And the sesame cracker underneath added a really nice, mild touch to the dinner. This dessert alone was worth the price of entry. And I had expected it to be my least favourite. Matching wine: Jurançon, “Clos Uroulat” Charles Hours 2007.

All throughout the meal, they matched the wines perfectly. They would bring us a glass a few minutes before the course, and we would sip it and comment, "Mmmmm... this is nice." Upon delivery of the matching course, we would comment, "Holy deliciousness of crazy yummy wine!". The wine matching was really extraordinary.

All in all, we had a fantastic time at Providence, and would go back again. Next time I would try to get a later seating so that we don't have the waiters bringing us our courses so quickly to get us out the door. But beyond that complaint, the dinner was excellent.

Again, a big thanks to JTSO23 for allowing use of the photos.