Jan 4, 2011

The first rule of bite club...

New Year's Eve was spent at a lovely Brooklyn residence where the brilliant minds behind Bite Club plated and served a remarkable meal to me, JJ and 29 other lucky guests. What a great way to ring in the new year! I loved meeting the eclectic group of people at our eight-person table and finding out once again what a small world it is.

I know I'm probably butchering these official dish names, but we had a sort of mushroom napoleon with mushroom sauce, pumpkin dumplings, monkfish with polenta, rack of baby lamb, a fine cheese course and dark chocolate/cayenne cake with a Scotch bonnet pepper. When it comes to tasting menus at restaurants, there is almost always a dish or so that I just don't love, but I can honestly say these all tickled my fancy (with the tiny exception of the blue cheese, but I just can't get into blue cheese!). Also note the beautiful, perfect color of the lamb. Sheesh, I now have myself salivating over here.

The Scotch bonnet is one of the "hottest peppers in the world." It's meant to be a garnish, but amazingly, three people at our table ate almost the entire thing (I still don't understand how this was possible). Even as a lover of heat and spicy food, I took one bite, decided it wasn't worth the pain or bragging rights and quickly admitted defeat. It still took a while to extinguish the fire in my mouth after that. Crazy.

Daniel and Alicia, thank you so much again. So much talent!

6 comments :

  1. Wow, what a great way to ring in the new year. So much yummy food...

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  2. haha, i was about to write EXACTLY what Jacqueline said. I'm glad i stopped and read that comment before i started writing.


    that lamb looks AMAZING! one of these days when i'm out of debt, i'm definitely gonna treat myself to some good food :)

    i totally hear ya on the pepper thing. i love spicy foods but if it overwhelms all other flavors then i'm done. it's jut not worth it.

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  3. What a lovely food porn set! Nice light, well done. A little sad that you can't get into blue cheese.

    New year looks promising.

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  4. haha I wouldn't have gone near the pepper. :P

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  5. looks amazing - I wouldn't have even tried the pepper!

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