As a very special birthday present this year, Jeremy took me to Eric Ripert's top-rated and famous
Le Bernardin. There are a few dining options to choose from - 2 different tasting menus and a prix-fixe. We decided to go with the 8-course Chef's Tasting Menu and it was glorious.
The atmosphere felt very high-end and fancy - jackets are required for men after all. The decor was mostly fitting to this, except for a massive painting of ocean waves. I don't know why, but something was weird about this, though I get the connection with it being a seafood restaurant.
As you might expect, the service is impeccable from the moment you walk in. The staff is on their toes at all times and ready to please. They do look pretty stiff in their uniforms, but it also creates an accurate depiction of their attentiveness and knowledge of everything they are putting in front of you.
After we notified our waiter of our meal selection, the bread guy came over with a 2-foot basket full of at least 8 different types of bread. We tried a sundried tomato roll and a slice of olive and rosemary bread. Both soft, moist and homemade (so much so, that we grabbed a few more pieces when the guy came back around later on).
First came the amuse-bouche, which set the tone of excellence for the rest of the meal. On the left was a mini roll of goat cheese and some kind of basil cream. The basil was insanely fresh and potent. In the middle was a mini tuna tartare taco in a tortilla shell. On the right was a cauliflower cream soup shooter with foam and topped with a Parmesan crisp.
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| Amuse-bouche |
The first course was a cluster of Nantucket bay scallops marinated with Granny Smith Meyer lemon vinaigrette and topped with sea urchin. The scallops were raw, tender and small, and the vinaigrette was light and fruity which complimented the dish. The sea urchin was creamy with the usual ocean flavor, and paired well with the both the scallops and vinaigrette.
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| Bay scallops and sea urchin |
The second course was strips of King fish sashimi topped with caviar. The dish was served with just the fish and then the server poured the mariniere broth around the 3 pieces of fish as he explained what we were about to eat. The caviar really gave life to the fish and the seafood broth provided a buttery contrast.
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| King fish and caviar |
The third course was sauteed langoustine (type of lobster) over frisee with truffle and aged balsamic vinaigrette. The langoustine looks and tastes very much like shrimp, but the only thing I was focusing on was the massive piece of black truffle that was shaved on top. The vinaigrette also had truffle in it, so naturally that pretty much overpowered the dish. This was very good, but not the most memorable of the courses.
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| Langoustine |
The fourth course was lobster "lasagna" with truffle butter sauce. I love lobster so of course I enjoyed this generous portion of it. This wasn't typical lasagna as it was not baked and the pasta layers were homemade and soft. The truffle butter sauce was just that - extremely truffley and buttery (starting the sense a theme?).
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| Lobster "lasagna" |
The fifth course was more of an entree dish. The pan roasted monkfish was served on top of a perfect square of some kind of potato puree and sauteed cepes mushrooms. The server poured the lemon-paprika sauce around the edges and dotted the dish with a few pearl onions that were soaked in sherry and finished with creme fraiche. The fish had a perfect crust on the outer edge and the center was soft and flaked apart. And those onions were amazing. They were like little pockets of tang tucked away in the smokey paprika sauce.
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| Pan roasted monkfish |
The sixth course was really the main event. A little surf and turf action in the classiest of ways. On the right was white tuna (or escolar) that was lightly grilled and topped with a soy-lemon emulsion and sticks of Asian pear. In the middle was kimchi topped with a piece of baby bok choy. On the left was seared Wagyu Kobe beef (the real authentic kind) with a homemade barbecue sauce drizzled on top.
The escolar was out of this world. It was soft inside and flaked apart, and really just melted in your mouth. The outside was so lightly and perfectly grilled, and the sauce was light and mild (finally no butter!), plus the pear added a refreshing crunch. The kimchi/bok choy was spicy and kind of random, but it added some spunk to the dish. The Wagyu Kobe beef was the most amazing piece of beef I have ever had. It was only about 1.5 sq inches, but I cut off little pieces to try and savor each bite as much as possible. Inside it was the most perfect pink and the outside was crisp and savory. I have never tasted beef so flavorful before.
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| White tuna and Wagyu Kobe Beef |
The seventh course was the first of the two desserts. They called this a "palate cleanser" since it was cold and refreshing. It had roasted Bosc pear with vanilla ice cream and topped with Bartlett pear olive oil. There was some kind of "pear ice" as well that was very interesting.
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| Pear and vanilla ice cream |
The eighth and final course was the maple candy dessert. There were 3 cubes of maple candy cap cremeux (French pudding) with maple and huckleberry confit. There were chocolate and caramel (I think) cubes that were fluffy and mousse-like with a strong maple flavor. There were some sort of caramel crisps stuck in the cubes that gave the dish a nice presentation. The huckleberries were tasty and a nice contrast to the rich cremuex cubes.
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| Maple dessert |
To wrap up the meal, every table gets a little cookie plate that we rook advantage of. We also ordered cappuccinos that were so excellent, I didn't even need to add sugar to (which is quite rare).
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| Cookie plate |
Overall, we had such a special evening. We got dressed up, were waited on hand and foot, and ate spectacular food. My takeaways from the experience are that the French really like butter, truffles, and decadence (and are not overly generous with the portion sizes), but Le Bernardin are truly the masters at preparing, handling, and cooking seafood and can really put on show.
