Restaurant review: Alinea

 My account of the meal Carla and I had at Alinea has been a very long time coming.  Since I hold down a full time job, the task of tackling such an event before work is intimidating (I prefer to post stream of consciousness start to finish).  Today is a day off, so here I go.  There is a bit of story around it, which adds to the magic on our end - I include a bit of it here to show that sometimes someone's looking out for you.

Back when Carla and I were balancing a relationship between Canada and Mexico, I flew down on a standby flight (on crutches no less) for a visit.  On the way back, the usual layovers in San Francisco or Los Angeles were booked up, so I was sent on a milk run through Chicago with a 12 hour overnight layover.  I'm sorry, but O'Hare airport at night is about as exciting as paint drying.  I noticed that transit ran to the airport 24 hours a day, so I decided I might as well have a look around town.  I was smitten.  Between the bridges, lake, and all the history, I was sorry I hadn't planned this route and spent a few days there.

the entrance

Flash forward a year - Carla and I went backpacking in Peru, but this time planned ahead, and scheduled a three day stint in Chicago.  I also went as far as getting a reservation at Moto.  At the time, the buzz in the industry was about a new restaurant, Alinea, which was likely going to be the next French Laundry.  Before leaving Vancouver, I tried for reservations, but there wasn't even a website - I couldn't find any contact information at all.  During a pause in Mexico city on the way back from Peru, I finally found an address on opentable.com - I thought no way getting in, but maybe I could stop by and get a copy of the menu to show the guys at work.

Totally by luck, the weekend we spent in Chicago was during the blues festival.  Blues legends playing for free in the park - world class city all the way.  It was also a scorcher of a weekend.  So Friday afternoon, after listening to music, cooking in the sun and running through the waterpark, we thought we would walk by Alinea and try to get a copy of said menu.  We misjudged the map.  I'm not sure how far it is (maybe some Chicago locals can tell me), but we walked from Millenium park to Alinea, and almost missed it, they aren't big on the street level advertising, I think it was the valet sign that let me know.  So we poke our heads in, walk down the hall and peek in the dining room, shorts, t-shirts, sunburns and all - "may I help you?" - the maitre d' 

 - "yes, well, I'm sure you're full up, but I'm a chef from Vancouver and I was hoping I might get a copy of the menu to show folks back home.  We're all very excited about what you're doing here"

 - "well, sir, I'm afraid you just said the magic words.  If you can find a suit and get back here in two hours, we have a table for you"

the kitchen

 - "Really?  Uh, wow.  We'll be right back."

We couldn't have been staying farther away.  We raced across the city (to our $12 hostel), showered, dressed up and raced back.  We even ditched the subway partway and jumped a cab. We made it.  It was still scorching hot - I was trying not to sweat up my suit, putting on the jacket and tie outside the door.

 - "well you two sure dress up nice - champagne?"  and it began.

Alinea is not a big place, intimate, modern basic tones so as not to try to compete with the food (it couldn't anyway).  Looking in the kitchen, I saw an army of cooks - rather than trying to squeeze the most volume out of each cook, the focus is clearly on quality.  These guys work long days no doubt, but the approach to each member's tasks is what sets restaurants like this apart. Focus.  One image I have in my head was someone cutting fish - referencing to the environment I worked in at home, it was in slow motion, but absolutely perfect with every slice.

pb&j

We were sat at our table, then brought the bread service - our first taste of the legendary goat butter.  Our amuse came held up by wires - peanut butter and jam - wafer thin toasted bread wrapped around a grape with peanut - delicious, modern, acrobatic, imaginitive and playful - this is how they roll.  

hearts of palm

A couple courses later came the hearts of palm - a series of five miniature pedestals, each with a different filling (among them green pea, parmesan, black truffle) and designed to be eaten in sequence from most mildly to strong flavoured - beautiful and elegant.  

beef with A-1

Beef with A-1 brought us a perfectly sous-vide portion of meat and perfectly smooth pomme puree surrounded by all the flavours found in A-1 sauce, deconstructed and each element dealt with in it's own way.  How many moves on that plate?  Delicious again of course, and showing a true academic approach to one of the most commonplace condiments.  

hazelnut puree

Hazelnut puree came next, which I really enjoyed since you had to break the suspended tube of granola and spill it's contents into the puree - audience participation and really illustrating how fine dining can be at best a temporal art form - if it doesn't perish, it never fulfills it's destiny.  

foie

A few courses later came the foie gras, one of the greatest enigmas of the meal for me.  Served with sweet onion and walnut, at first glance looked like about the most perfect torchon of foie you are likely to see, then cutting into it, we found that the foie was completely encapsulating a perfect cylinder of rhubarb foam - I was completely stunned.  Being trained as a chef, you often sacrifice a bit of surprise when eating (not enjoyment) simply because you have learned a few tricks of execution and refinement.  The joy of the surprise of being surprised cannot be described.  I think I know now how the foie dish was done, but to be honest, to go there would almost spoil it. 

burnt orange

Believe it or not, at this point, we were about halfway through the meal, and we were served a couple sweeter courses so our palates wouldn't get overwhelmed - midway "dessert" courses as it were.  Almost back to the start of the meal, the burnt orange was served suspended on a wire, to be eaten "hands free" - just lean over and eat it all one go.

porcini

The porcini soup was lovely, served with a plantain ravioli, kola nut and sunflower seeds.  When you see a lot of wild mushroom soups, it's nice (and a bit pricier) to once in a while focus on one and pair it up with some specific flavours.

The bison was the meat course of the "second round".  It was served with beets (in a sheet) and blueberries and a side dish of smoldering cinnamon for aroma.  Note the colour on the meat - how it's a perfect medium rare right to the seared edge - that's what new techniques can accomplish.

bison

bacon on the rocking horse

To keep the surprises going, we had been trying not to glance at other tables too much, but we knew something funny was coming - periodically, a table in the room would break out into giggles and laughter.  Bacon on the rocking horse was the reason.  Crusted with butterscotch, apple and thyme and hanging on a wire, it hits your table and rocks erratically back and forth.  Tasty?  You bet, but how nice to have such an elegant room and unbelievable food and maintain a sense of humour.

sassafras cream

As we entered into the dessert courses, the sassafras cream presented another challenge - how do you get the creamy centre into the disk of mandarin ice?  Chef Achatz gives us that one in the book, but I'll let you look it up.

strawberry

The strawberry dish was another creative eater.  Lemon verbena foam, argan, and freeze-fried strawberries all held in a tube.  Grab it and suck the contents through and let it mix in your mouth.

"Liquid chocolate" looked like a little mousse cake, but was actually a tile of  loose ganache held together only by the chocolate coating.

liquid chocolate

Finishing off was the sponge cake - skewered on a vanilla pod sitting in a glass with tonka bean and vanilla froth.

spongecake

We were done.  Amazing.  We had lost track of everything but each other and the food.  With everything we had eaten over the course of the hours, the amount of food was perfect - you didn't have to roll us away from the table, though the sensory overload left us a bit dazed.  For a meal we weren't even supposed to have, it sits at or near the top of our all time best meals list (once a meal hits perfection, it seems unfair to put one over the other).  Alinea is like Disneyland for foodies, and for cooks, it's like going back to school.  I know I thanked them repeatedly that night for the last minute reservation and I'll thank them again now.  Thank you. And thank you Chef Achatz and crew for all the good hard work you do - I hope I've done some justice to the experience of Alinea.