February 28, 2014 Lunch- Anatolia Doner Kebab Dinner-Joseph’s, Santa Fe
I had to file a document today in the Lower Rio
Grande Adjudication but found time in the middle of the day to go to lunch at 12:30
at Anatolia Doner Kebab with Cliff Blaugrund.
I had the daily special of Chicken doner kebab, $ 6.49. I almost always get the Daily Special because
it is either a regular menu item or special Turkish dish freshly made with rice
and peas and a salad with pickled red onions for about $2.00 less than the
regular menu items. My Chicken was
shredded, tossed in spices and grilled until slightly crisp. I loved it. Cliff ordered Adana Shish Kebab (Spicy
Ground Beef) $8.75, formed onto a sword and grilled on an open fire and
served with the same rice and salad plus a grilled whole green chili
pepper. Cliff also ordered a Turkish
coffee that was served with our complimentary dessert, a small piece of
baklava. We talked to the owner and chef
who were proud to announce that they were finally moving to their new location
on Central between Third and Fourth streets in another week. Anatolia Doner
Kebab is Albuquerque’s only authentic Turkish restaurant/kebab shop and well
worth a try if you have not yet eaten there.
It
was fun going to lunch with Cliff, who has lots of great stories. Amazingly, as we were leaving, Barbara Page
walked in with her granddaughter, Jeannette. I had to run but promised to call her for
lunch. I went home and filed my document and we left for Santa Fe by 3:00.
We arrived at 4:00 at Andrew Smith’s Grant Street
Gallery just as he was leaving his Gallery.
We said we were interested in seeing the Nagatani photography show and
he was kind enough to walk us over to his San Francisco St. Gallery, where we
saw a wonderful collection of Patrick Nagatani’s taped photos of mainly
Buddhist Sages and Gods, plus two other series; one of collages of body builder
bodies clipped from magazines and assembled and photographed and another of
model planes recounting and commemorating the lost Spitfires of the Second
World War in Burma.
Laurie’s? Dad/family was one of the original
investors in Duckhorn Winery and now owns Van Duzer Winery that makes great Pinot Noir in the Willamette
Valley in Oregon, so when Laurie? expresses an opinion about food or wine, I
listen very carefully. I thank her for
her suggestion of Joseph’s as a choice for dinner.
Laurie? was
kind enough to provide me Joseph's telephone number and I called for a
reservation but did not get an answer, so at 6:00 we decided to drive the short
distance to Joseph’s of Santa Fe, located at 428 Agua Fria, just north of the Railyard near the corner of Agua
Fria and Guadalupe.
When we arrived there were a few tables and were
told by the hostess that we could have a table if we would leave by their next
reservation for the two top at 7:45 p.m.
We readily agreed, especially when we saw that they were serving a prix
fixe Restaurant Week Menu for $40.00.
When she took us to our table we asked the hostess what her favorite
dishes were and she said the quail and the crispy duck confit. Even without looking at the menu in detail
we felt like we were in heaven. Quail is
one of Suzette’s favorite meat and duck is my favorite meat and to have those
prepared by a great chef was a treat.
Stephen was recognized as one of the best young chefs in 2000 by Food
and Wine Magazine and we have eaten at all of his three restaurants, starting
with the small adobe house in Ranchos de Taos around 2000.
Here is the menu:
Suzette chose the Pressed Pork Belly with Brussels
sprouts slaw as her appetizer. Her plate
arrived decorated with a swirl of apple demi-glace on the plate and a fresh Brussels sprout
slaw piled on the side of a large cube of grilled pork belly confit.
Suzette’s pork belly was amazingly tender and I loved the warm slaw
salad with fresh brightly colored pink peppercorns, bits of pickled ginger, preserved lemon, and sprinkled with fresh rosemary leaves and pink peppercorns.
My Grande Borscht was served in a large soup bowl
with a small round central cavity filled with warm dark red beet soup made with pureed beets with
chunks of root vegetables and dried pink peppercorns in an elk broth, garnished
with a spoonful of American Sturgeon Caviar, small cubes of egg white, finely
cubed onion and a drizzle of crème fraiche.
Both appetizers were eye appealing and tasty. I loved the combination of vegetable flavors
mixed with the salty fishy flavor of the sturgeon caviar. Perhaps if I had the
dish again I would mix up the ingredients to integrate their flavors, but
tonight, since I was tasting for the first time and wanted to taste each
ingredient as distinctly as possible, I took spoonsful with isolated bites of different
ingredients.
I found a bit more information about pink peppercorns on Wikipedia:
A pink peppercorn (French:
baie rose, "pink berry") is a dried berry of the shrub Schinus molle, commonly known as the Peruvian peppertree.Although a peppercorn is the dried fruit of a plant from the genus Piper, pink peppercorns came to be called such because they resemble peppercorns, and because they, too, have a peppery flavour.
Dried berries from the related species Schinus terebinthifolius (the Brazilian pepper), are sometimes also called pink peppercorns (baies roses de Bourbon). The dried berries of that shrub are employed as culinary spice.
In 1982, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) of the United States banned the import of Brazilian peppercorns from France into the US, asserting that people who eat the berries risk an array of acute symptoms, such as swollen eyelids and indigestion. In response, the Government of France maintained that the berries are safe to eat if grown in prescribed conditions.[1] The United States later lifted the ban.[
When we ordered we had a long discussion with our waiter about the
wine.
He recommended a 2012 Belle Gros
by Caymus, Sonoma Pinot Noir for $62.00, but I was in the mood for something in
the Southern Rhone category to go with the quail and duck and pork. There was a bottle of 2010 Coudoulet de Beaucastel
for about $69.00 which tempted us, but
we had just tasted Chateau Beaucastel at the Winter Wine Festival in Taos at
the end of January and found the 2010 to be a little young tasting. Finally, on the "by the glass" page of the Wine menu I saw a
Kermit Lynch Southern Rhone Blend for $35.00.
We selected it hoping that at half the price it would be better than
half as good as its more prominent relative.
I googled Kermit Lynch’s Southern Rhone on line and discovered that
it was a blend of many of the grapes of Southern Rhone, but mainly
Grenache. The wine tasted a lot like a
Chateauneuf du Pape with lots of Grenache but also discernible amounts of
Mourvédre and Syrah. It did not have a
great deal of elegance at first, but as we let it sit in our glass and open up
in the bottle its tannins began to develop and it took on a more full bodied
flavor. We both liked it and felt it was a great value and expressed the
qualities of a Southern Rhone wine that we were looking for.
The meal was served in the French manner with lots
of time between courses to enjoy conversation and wine sipping. As we waited and sipped, we asked for
bread and were served freshly baked rolls with a great compounded butter infused with
slivers of fresh scallions and green herbs.
When our main course was served we were surprised by
the large portions. My dish was a half
duck salt cured in a confit style (does this mean warm salt brine) with a Sweet
Potato Caramel Glaze on a large platter flanked by four piles, two were warm sautéed
radicchio with baby French Green Lentils and the other two piles were warm date and
pancetta salad. The combination of the
bitter radicchio, soft lentils, sweet chopped dates and pancetta with the
tender duck was mighty tasty.
Suzette’s plate was filled with two grilled quail on
a pile of warm quinoa tossed with sliced almonds, rehydrated dried blueberries and
raisins in a cilantro vinaigrette. There
was a distinctly orange colored residue on the plate and quails from the achiote,
orange and fresh oregano marinade in which they had been marinated and cooked. I loved the meat and the sides for each
dish. The duck and quail were among the
most tender I have ever tasted.
By 7:25 we had eaten one quail and half of the half duck
and we decided to box the rest and move on to dessert so we could finish by 7:45. We asked our waiter to box the rest of our
dishes and he brought us two small cardboard boxes when he returned with the dessert
menu:
As usual I let Suzette chose first and she chose the
Cloud Cake, an Italian Meringue Cake served with a puddle of caramel sauce and creme anglais, fresh tarragon leaves and slices of fresh pink grapefruit and orange. The
Cloud Cake was the most visually exciting and uniquely textured dish of a great dinner.
It was a slice of incredibly soft and airy egg white meringue with a slightly
toughened caramelized skin. Its airy texture seemed to contain very few calories or fat, a perfect Spa dessert.
I chose the second item, a small cup of Butterscotch
Pudding with a puddle of caramel sauce floating on its surface. The pudding's interesting taste twist was small
crystals of red Hawaiian sea salt that had been stirred into the pudding. Almost every bite included creamy butterscotch
pudding, slightly thickened caramel sauce and small red crystals of salt. Again, a very interesting combination of
flavors, textures and colors.
After dessert, we relaxed for a few more minutes and
sipped the rest of our wine and then asked for the check. We left Joseph’s right at 7:45 and thanked the receptionist, When we told her we hoped we had not made the next couple
wait, she said, “No, they just arrived and are taking off their coats.”
We felt great as we drove back to Albuquerque; comfortably un-stuffed, with our boxes of PPI quail and duck and memories of a great meal.
If is not hard to rank Joseph’s four restaurants, the original Joseph’sTable in Ranchos de Taos when he had just
returned from Provence in 1995 and cooked with his then wife and in 2000 when he was recognized as one of the best young chefs of the year by Food and Wine Magazine for his really fresh and creative food combinations, the new
Joseph’s is second best in my opinion; better than either his second restaurant in Taos at the La Fonda Hotel and his first restaurant in Santa Fe at the Palace location. So I share Laurie’s opinion that Joseph has returned
to his world class form, which is very good news for Santa Fe foodies. It is only a month or two in operation, but I hope that Joseph’s current unique and mercurial talent of quality and creativity holds together for a long time.
Joseph’s will be among my favorite Santa Fe restaurants as long as it does.
Bon Appétit
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