(September 14th, 2013) Has it been a year already? It's amazing how time flies when you: 1. buy a new house, 2. get married, 3. start writing a book, and 4. have a kid on the way. Yes, the last year has been quite busy, and, as you can guess, things will only get busier...
Anyways, it's time to finish up with Torino. The last thing that I had wanted to talk about was La Baroque (sorry, no web page for you). Luckily, as we all know how good my memory is, I took notes:
La Baroque. Fish tasting menu.
Everything on the menu looked so good...I couldn't decide. Luckily the tasting menu had most of the dishes that I was contemplating (except the fresh eel, but I'm sure that I enjoyed the red mallet much more than I would have the eel. I'm trying to think of the last time that I had a meal this satisfying...certainly, this was better than the multi-starred restaurant in Paris.
0: goat cheese mousse with raspberry sorbet. Light, creamy, but melted in your mouth. Very smooth, I didn't know that you could get that texture out of goat cheese.
1: marinated, raw scallops, toasted quinoa, daikon, burrata sauce. Textures complimented each other perfectly. Scallop flavor paired well with burrata sauce, though a little rich. And the toasted quinoa...crunchy but still quinoa, one of my favorite grains.
2: fish of the day, a red mallet, served with burraba beans, a seaweed cream wine reduction, topped with salmon roe and finishing salt. The sal de mar, cubed, had just the right crunch and taste to finish the dish off as the other flavors were all mild. Italian white wine from nearby piemonte. Hints of pear amidst its floral notes. In contrast to the later wines, almost had a Chardonnay flavor....but very subdued compared to an actual Chardonnay... much more pleasant really.
3: squid ink tortelli, stuffed with angler fish in a wine sauce. Wine pairing was a local piemontese grape I had never heard of (Erbaluce). Slightly creamy with a wee bitter note at the end. Very graceful (ie smooth and pleasant).Matched the sauce well. Just about the thinnest pasta of my whole trip. Delicate, but flavorful. Accentuated the angler fish stuffed inside.
4: white fish (mollet? From sea south of Italy) with porcini, creme de celery, mustard sauce, wilted spinach. Tamarind decorating sides of plates. Fish a bit like rockfish, but much larger (see the size of the steak!). Wine from umbria....subtle flavor to contrast the potency of the celery cream and mustard. Finishing salt a flake...punctuated other, creamy flavors.
5: goat cheese cheesecake, with raspberries and pistachio ice cream
topped with crushed pistachios. Slightly nutty and chocolatey base. All
together, fantastic. Different texture than a normal
cheesecake....creamier really. Harkened back to the goat cheese mousse
that started the meal. To drink, a Sicilian dessert wine. Very sweet and
thick like a port, but lighter in character.
6: chocolate and crispy rice...reminiscent of voodoo donuts. Cookie: slightly nutty cross between a french cookie and a butter cookie. Nut covered tart filled with a lemon cake. pistachio canolli...ricotta cream was so fresh and va bene. Macaroon with extra dark chocolate shavings. So bitter by themselves, but an after thought with the creamy macaroon. Raspberry custard tart...trio of flavors and textures meshed so well...tart alone like an egg tart. Cinnamon cookie had a pleasantly contrasting texture to other morsels. Perfect compliment to the espresso. Truffle: uncoated chocolate ganache rolled in bittersweet chocolate. Very soft, melted in mouth.
And yes, I ordered an espresso for all of the sake of everyone back home since I don't drink coffee.
It's amusing to think that I was worried that I'd leave hungry when I first came in here. For one of the first times since I arrived in Italy, I am full.
Description of restaurant exactly as billed, though easier to find. Inside it was elegant, like Lauduree but with ample spacing between tables. Louis Armstrong gently played in the background, and my timing had been impeccable as the restaurant went from empty to full within minutes (I was the first dinner guest at 7:50.
The evening grew late, Louis continued to serenade me, and the wines slowly were imbibed...
Anyways, it's time to finish up with Torino. The last thing that I had wanted to talk about was La Baroque (sorry, no web page for you). Luckily, as we all know how good my memory is, I took notes:
La Baroque. Fish tasting menu.
Everything on the menu looked so good...I couldn't decide. Luckily the tasting menu had most of the dishes that I was contemplating (except the fresh eel, but I'm sure that I enjoyed the red mallet much more than I would have the eel. I'm trying to think of the last time that I had a meal this satisfying...certainly, this was better than the multi-starred restaurant in Paris.
0: goat cheese mousse with raspberry sorbet. Light, creamy, but melted in your mouth. Very smooth, I didn't know that you could get that texture out of goat cheese.
1: marinated, raw scallops, toasted quinoa, daikon, burrata sauce. Textures complimented each other perfectly. Scallop flavor paired well with burrata sauce, though a little rich. And the toasted quinoa...crunchy but still quinoa, one of my favorite grains.
2: fish of the day, a red mallet, served with burraba beans, a seaweed cream wine reduction, topped with salmon roe and finishing salt. The sal de mar, cubed, had just the right crunch and taste to finish the dish off as the other flavors were all mild. Italian white wine from nearby piemonte. Hints of pear amidst its floral notes. In contrast to the later wines, almost had a Chardonnay flavor....but very subdued compared to an actual Chardonnay... much more pleasant really.
3: squid ink tortelli, stuffed with angler fish in a wine sauce. Wine pairing was a local piemontese grape I had never heard of (Erbaluce). Slightly creamy with a wee bitter note at the end. Very graceful (ie smooth and pleasant).Matched the sauce well. Just about the thinnest pasta of my whole trip. Delicate, but flavorful. Accentuated the angler fish stuffed inside.
4: white fish (mollet? From sea south of Italy) with porcini, creme de celery, mustard sauce, wilted spinach. Tamarind decorating sides of plates. Fish a bit like rockfish, but much larger (see the size of the steak!). Wine from umbria....subtle flavor to contrast the potency of the celery cream and mustard. Finishing salt a flake...punctuated other, creamy flavors.
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| If you ever want to be very nice, send me one of these bottles... |
6: chocolate and crispy rice...reminiscent of voodoo donuts. Cookie: slightly nutty cross between a french cookie and a butter cookie. Nut covered tart filled with a lemon cake. pistachio canolli...ricotta cream was so fresh and va bene. Macaroon with extra dark chocolate shavings. So bitter by themselves, but an after thought with the creamy macaroon. Raspberry custard tart...trio of flavors and textures meshed so well...tart alone like an egg tart. Cinnamon cookie had a pleasantly contrasting texture to other morsels. Perfect compliment to the espresso. Truffle: uncoated chocolate ganache rolled in bittersweet chocolate. Very soft, melted in mouth.
And yes, I ordered an espresso for all of the sake of everyone back home since I don't drink coffee.
It's amusing to think that I was worried that I'd leave hungry when I first came in here. For one of the first times since I arrived in Italy, I am full.
Description of restaurant exactly as billed, though easier to find. Inside it was elegant, like Lauduree but with ample spacing between tables. Louis Armstrong gently played in the background, and my timing had been impeccable as the restaurant went from empty to full within minutes (I was the first dinner guest at 7:50.
The evening grew late, Louis continued to serenade me, and the wines slowly were imbibed...
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