May 20, 2013 Another fabulous day at NRA, Dinner – Topolobampo

May 20, 2013 Another fabulous day at NRA, Dinner – Topolobampo

We started at 10:00 am by going to a fabulous speech by Anthony Bourdain.  He was funny and insightful.  I asked a question “What do you think is the proper etiquette for a poorly cooked meal or poor service.   To make a long answer short, h said, “You give the kitchen the opportunity to fix the problem and if they can not you vote with your dollars and not go back and if it was really bad you tell others that it was a really bad restaurant.

After the lecture I went to an education session of menu development that turned out to be boring because it was from the perspective of large chain restaurant s like Popeye’s Fried Chicken, Fried Chicken, which has changed its name to Popeye’s Louisiana Kitchens n which they talked about the chain of actions required to develop new menu dishes.  It made me feel that the process was driven by produce access and marketing and made me realize that food ingredient sourcing and availability takes on a whole new meaning when you have 1000 restaurants in your chain and how that is so like working at Pier 1., where it took the concurrence of 30 to 50 people to make a decision and 100s to execute the decision, except for companies like Starbucks it takes over 11,000 managers to execute the strategy.

The other thing it taught me was that the process of developing a menu for a chain of restaurants is a whole different animal than a home or one small restaurant like the Greenhouse Bistro and Bakery or our house, where the menu is decided in a moment based upon availability of ingredients.

Talking about ingredients, after the lecture at 12:30 we went downstairs to the food booths with Anne and Elizabeth to forage.  I wanted to try the Japanese Pavilion’s products.  There was everything from grilled Satsuma beef on a dab of dry mancha and salt, to lots of types of green to freeze dried mushroom, daikon and burdock to an amazing fresh frozen wasabi, which is a mustard plant.  They even made dashi flavored spaghetti and had a cooking demonstration showing the proper method for making ramen noodles: start by heating a flavored oil to 80˚C., then combine the oil with soy and dashi and chicken stock to make the soup. And throw in the noodles.

Finally, after trying all the Japanese foods we went to the organic section and tried a few mussels at a Prince Edward Island mussel company and a few other teas and snacks.  At around 2:30 made our way to the basement to try more spirits and ciders and wines.  I must have tried at least five different ciders, Dobra chocolate liquor, a wonderful Pierre Ferrand Dry Curaçao that used the rind of the bitter orange to give an intense orange flavor to the cognac that had won the spirit of the year for 2013 in Berlin and several Italian wines, including a lovey Franciacorta.

At around 3:30 p.m. Suzette ran out of gas and we left for the hotel for a nap.

We got rolling at around 7:30 p.m.  We walked south on Clarke past several Irish Pubs toward Rick Bayless’ restaurants, Topolabampo and Frontera Grille.  We arrived at around 8:15 and were told that our table would not be ready until approximately 8:45 p.m. so we walked south and then east five blocks enjoying the amazing architecture of Chicago.

 

 

 

 

When we returned to Topolabampo and were initially seated in the bar until our table was cleared.  Suzette ordered a house made gin with a house made tonic that was very delicious.

Here is a picture of her seated in the Topolobampo dining room after we were shown to our table and given a menu and wine list. 

We immediately decided that the Topo Classics Tasting Menu for $105.00 looked great. and that we could split it, although Suzette was another entrée she wanted to try.

We discussed the wine choices with the sommelier and she described how each dish was carefully paired with each dish, so we decided to split one tasting menu and we ordered the 5 perfectly paired wines for both of us, except that Suzette also wanted to order the Guasmole de Borrego, a lamb dish with a guasmole (a mole sauce made with guajillo chile, tomatillo and fresh guaje seeds) with a Spanish Tempranillo with her lamb dish, which the sommelier agreed with and said she would make that change to Suzette's pairing. 

We were first brought a small glass cup filled with a layer of ramps flan garnished on top with a maché of toasted almonds, ramps and ancho chili topped with a sprig of baby lovage.  The picture is a side view exposing the mache on the right and the ramps custard below it on the left.

The Classic Tasting menu started with “Esquites on the Edge of Spring”, a preserved Nichols Farm Field corn molded into a column with a layer of pickled trumpet mushrooms on the bottom of the corn column and garnished with a layer of grated shaved cincho cheese and micro greens  and a young sprig of lovage and dusted with powdered guajillo chili.  The dish was served and then a waiter poured a corn and nettle broth into the bowl.  I first tried to deconstruct the dish by eating each ingredient and got a sharp hit of guajillo chili, so I decided to mix everything up into a stew and that worked much better.  The blending of the flavors worked better.  I especially liked the nettle and corn broth.

The wine pairing with the corn dish was 2008 Domaine Des Baumand “Clos de Papillon from Savenniéres form the Loire Valley in France.  We had visited the Baumand Winery and drunk the wine last summer and did not like it because it was very light and lacked the mineral complexity of some of the other Savenniéres wines , but it made a nice match for the sweet corn and slightly bitter nettle and salty cheese.  But, since  I find Savenniéres so infrequently on wine menus that I can not criticize the presence of any Savenniéres wine.

The second course was titled “Three Bites of Oaxaca” that included three small cut out circles of fresh corn tortilla with three different meats, one Oaxacan chorizo coupled with a poached quail egg, the second held a small pile of pork loin coated with a cecina sauce of avocado-tomatillo salsa and most interestingly a pickled tomatillo and the third, a carne asada made with beef tenderloin laid on a clump of refried black beans with a slice of pickled white onion. each presentation was garnished with a small red kale leaf and the three were served on a banana leaf.  The second wine poured was a 2009 Leopardi Brut Rosé from Penedés, Spain served chilled.  The dark rose color belied the fact that the wine was incredibly light and yet had a slight red wine flavor.  Since I love rosé, it was my favorite wine and a new one.

The third course was the fish course, “Halibut and lobster, Green Sesame Pipián”, two small pieces of pan roasted halibut and a Maine lobster torchon or roll of lobster that had been pressed into a roll and cut into a ½ inch round and laid on pan roasted white sweet potatoes and a mound of Snug Haven spinach; all the major food groups.  As in the first course, after the plate was uncovered at the table, the wait staff poured the Green pipián sauce onto one-half of the plate that completed the dish because the combination of cilantro, epazote and hoja santa colored the sauce a lovely light green provided a lovely complement to the sautéed fish and sweet potatoes and lobster.  Although the sauce was a light green it still had small specks of black and white from the ground up sesame seeds.  Amazingly, the sauce was velvety smooth.

 

The fish dish was served with a chilled light red 2010 Petalos from the Bierzo region in Spain.

 I now need to mention that we became friendly with the two couples seated at the table next to ours. The man sitting next to me was a tall blond haired gentleman named Richard D. Debler, who was President and splits his time between Mexico City where he owns the San Angel Inn restaurant outside of Mexico and another restaurant at Epcot Center in Florida.  He said he loves Rick’s food.  It seems that he and his son or the younger man with him and their two female companions were very familiar with, not only the food served in Topo, but also the bakery next door and it appeared that he was also attending the NRA Convention.

Richard had ordered the same tasting menu as we did, so we could gauge his reactions to the same dishes we had eaten after we ate them.  He loved the simple elegance of the corn and nettle soup appetizer and the tacos.  When the Fish dish came Richard said he loved the care with which the sauces were prepared.  We agreed that the sauce on the fish dish was exquisitely smooth for what is usually in Mexico a sauce that is chunky with bits of sunflower seed.

The Fourth dish “Wood Grilled Ribeye and Foie Gras in Negro Mole” was an interesting cross cultural combination of a very traditional European combination of wood grilled 28 day aged prime beef ribeye and a small rectangle of grilled foie gras with a traditional Oaxacan Mole Negro.   The mole contained 29 ingredients and had a very rich deep chili and chocolate flavor that was perfect with the ribeye but overpowered the delicate foie gras.  I ate every speck of the sauce and Richard at the next table ate every speck of his sauce, which in my mind was an even better indicator of its superb reparation.  We both agreed that the sauces were superb in every respect.

My grilled steak and foie gras was served with a piece of corn husked chipil tamal, black beans and smoky green beans.  The glass of 2006 Benegas Lynch Meritage Libertad Vineyards located in Mendoza, Argentina went well with the bright chocolate sauce and steak’s flavor.  

 

I tasted Suzette’s Guasmole sauce on her lamb tenderloin and thought it was the better sauce, brightly flavored with guajillo chilis and a multitude of other ingredients.  

The lamb dish was served with a potato au gratin that was lovely and the 2008 Mauro Cosecho was light and delicious with Suzette's brightly flavored lamb dish.  Richard’s son, ordered the goat with the same guasmole sauce and he really liked the guacsmole sauce also. 

Finally, dessert arrived; two warm chocolate mesquite cakes with densely rich, liquefied molten centers, served in a row with a scoop of Mexican Vanilla ice cream (infused with Rosita de cacao and two cubes of sweet masa pudding (nicuatole), sprinkled with toasted almonds, cacao nibs and masa crisps and a fresh mint leaves. The dessert was paired with a glass of rather light 2010 Susana Balbo late harvest Torrontés that was overwhelmed by the rich chocolate dessert.  It was great to taste a late harvest torrontés, but it should have been paired with a flan or something lighter that it could have complemented it better.  

All in all, it was a great dinner.  The tasting menu was $105.00 and the wine pairings were $60.00 each and Suzette's dish was around $35.00.

Bon Appétit