One Year Anniversary Dinner: Blackbird

September 12, 2010

Thanks to an extremely generous wedding present from Ben and Allison, Liz and I got to have dinner at – a place I’ve heard Ben rave about before.

We ended up getting the tasting menu, so that we could sample more of what the restaurant had to offer. On arriving, we chose to sit inside and the only complaint I have of the place is the spacing – it was pretty tight quarters. Looking back, I wished we had chosen to sit outside, as I think there was a bit more room between tables.

I had a few photos, but they came out pretty terrible. I’m not very good with low light, and after looking things over… decided only to share a few. Even the ones here are not so hot, but will hopefully give you a sense of the place.

For a starter, we had shrimp with pickled corn, baby leeks and fermented black bean. Liz actually enjoyed this, despite her not liking shrimp much.

I have to confess, when I first saw this I was thinking… man, if all the dishes are this small, I’m going to have to eat more when I get home.

So, so wrong about that.

White sesame and squash churro. I think I’ve only had churros a handful of times, and I forget how delicious they are each time. Biting into this was like tasting crispy butter. These were served alongside…

Zucchini gazpacho with sepia and charred tropea onions. I don’t know that I’ve had gazpacho very often, but this was one of my favorites. Combined with the texture of the churros, this was really, really great.

Next was coffee-scented fluke tartare with lemon cucumber, saffron, and bread sauce.

Then, sauteed skate wing with peach molasses, eggplant confit and chammomile.

Pan-seared scallops with green papaya, dandelion, greens, walnuts and charred beef vinaigrette. This was delicious, and while Liz didn’t finish hers completely… it took a lot of willpower to not reach over and clear her plate for her. I’m glad I didn’t, because around now is when it started to dawn on me that I was getting pretty full.

Scollops were incredible though. Melt-in-your mouth great.

Next was Hudson Valley foie gras torchon with black garlic, preserved plum and shrimp salt. I’ve only had foie gras a handful of times, but biting into this was like nothing I’d ever had before. This sounds strange, but it tasted a bit like rich, creamy chocolate.

Then we had roasted Colorado lamb saddle with pistachio polenta, fennel, honeydew melon and buttermilk ricotta. This actually came out of order, and was supposed to come after the Swan Creek Farm suckling pig with lilet-stewed apricots, snow peas, water chestnuts and beer vinaigrette.

Our hostess came out to apologize to us about things being out of order. And before we could tell her no problem, she said that our drinks were on the house. Totally unnecessary, but was really surprising. I didn’t really argue.

Then we had not one, but three different deserts. First was cucumber sorbet with apples, raisins and shiso. Incredibly crisp and clean. Very refreshing.

Then, there was the brown butter cake with red raspberries, correl and goat’s milk caramel ice cream.

And along with coffee, we had Criollo chocolate with blackberry, milk meringue and tonka bean ice cream. The ice cream was somehow tucked inside the ball of chocolate in the middle. And that smaller circle of chocolate on the right, when cracked open, was full of melted chocolate that spilled everywhere. Amazing.

Like I said – these photos don’t do the meal justice. This was an incredibly unique experience, and Liz and I had an incredible dinner to celebrate our one year anniversary. Ben and Allison, you guys rock!

The entire evening, Liz was remarking about how it didn’t seem like a full year. Time has just flown by, as it tends to do. The fact that it feels like it’s passing quickly is, to me, a sign we’re doing something right. I’ll close with a few photos from our wedding (yes, we’re still working on sorting through all our photos – soon, we promise to have them soon).

On the Red Line, newly married and on route to the reception.