Notes from Moscow Day 4
I had dinner last night at a fabulous new restaurant with two American ex-patriots and a most charming local lady who was a marketing manager for Vogue Russia. The restaurant had a relationship with Baccarat crystal and the second floor place was a Greek revival stage crowned with crystal over deco seating.
A consummate bon vivant, our host charmed the sommelier with a bottle of Canadian Icewine, which is virtually unavailable in Moscow and chatter and smiles, and we four were seated by the kitchen at a most wonderful table meant for twelve. “There is a three month waiting list for this place, he said gleefully”. But the floor and walls are simply vessels for two things. The crystal chandeliers are huge, expensive, and require Ionian columns to keep them visually aloft. Over the evening, I discover from the sommelier, our host, the waiter, and eventually the chef, the price of the larger chandeliers.
“That one is six hundred and fifty thousand.” and then pausing for dramatic effect continued with, “Euros”. Later, “that one is four hundred thousand”, pause, “Euros”. It was not the time to tell anyone how challenged I was with currency conversion. The chef, David, is a hot Moscow chef from Alsace. He visits the table and either offers, or we draw from him, the most prized of prized meals, “something off the menu”, which is usually the best of the best from a chef. After four appetizers and two bottles of amazing wines, we are not sure whether the main course has come and gone or is yet to come. The chef is preparing minimalist food and the portions are aggressively small. The soups are amazing. Excellent melon soup served in an espresso cup and with a tiny sugar spoon creates a discussion about what kind of slice of meat that is the size of a quarter is floating in the soup. Is it proscuitto or, and I forget the obscure and elite regional hams mentioned? When the chef arrived at the table and disclosed that distinct ingredient, there is a big group ah-ha and smiles all the way around.
Next, crab flakes were adorned with the Moscow fad of the moment, foam. It was important at the time to know where the crabs came from, and launched a discussion about the qualities of crabmeats from the crab regions. I didn’t think that the top hook in the packaged meat department at ValuMart qualified as a crab region, so I didn’t contribute much to the conversation.
To make the foam, cucumber juice is gasified and shot out of a seltzer bottle into a foamy fiction. It is an interesting technique and chefs across Moscow are furiously perfecting their foam dishes to join the fad. If you manage to get it to your mouth on a fork, it vanishes, leaving the scarcest hint of cucumber on your palate. It is perfect for a nouveau foofoo fad, but one craves a steak afterwards.
Our host orders a Shiraz red wine. It was simply amazing. But where is the main course? Out comes the lamb. It consisted of two baby lamb ribs and a couple of rolled pieces of loin about the thickness and size of two Ritz crackers on a beautifully painted plate, which in turn sat on a on a Limoges charger (€700 each we are told!). It was excellent, but that fabulous bottle of Shiraz far outlasted the main course, and I was thinking that I should be able to buy a couple of entire lambs for €700. More courses, but the theme seemed to be tiny exotic tastes with many exotic ingredients and served with a confusion of sauce. I mentioned the soups were excellent and poopooed the foofoo foam. However, the chef served a warm foamy soup in another espresso cup that hinted of tarragon. When the chef came to visit as he often did between courses, he advised us that it was escargot soup. It was not really escargot, but sea snails, turned into a white foam and presented with tiny little itsy bitsy rye bread squares. It was a delight, and a further delight discovering what it was after we had enjoyed it. Desert was built for us and was the biggest course of the evening. A sauterne complimented the dessert. Our host picked up the check and prevented me from the agonies of translating rubles into dollars and for that I was truly grateful. As I walk away from that episode, I realize another bucket of Moscow contradictions. I loved the place, the chef, the wines, and the sommelier. There are bright points in the selections of foods. The style of cuisine confused me. But it is the hottest restaurant in town for now, until someone outfoams the foamers.
Among the courses were stories about restaurateurs, Moscow entrepreneurship, the experienced expatriate view, and the Vogue ingénue’s native vision which all had a calming effect on my Moscow-shocked psyche. The same company anywhere would have been a consummate treat for me, but as we sat absurdly in leather chairs beside the open kitchen and at a massive crystal trimmed banquet table adorned with antique lace and in the deepest of Greek revival architecture and further, in the bourgeois center of the Empire that inspired the Klingons, all of the Moscow cacophony was reduced to a whisper compared to the lively and organized chatter of the other three people at the table.
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