review: chez panisse

chez panisse / 1517 shattuck avenue / berkeley ca / 510-548-5525 / reservations recommended (see reservation policy for hours) / 3-course prix fixe menu varies from $50-100

jessica wrote me in a letter that we were going to go out to chez panisse on youngsun's last day in the city. chez panisse is jessica's restaurant mecca, as alinea was my ultimate dining experience. anyway, since i received the letter after i left for california, our 8:30 reservation at chez panisse was a total surprise for me. a pleasant one, of course!

we headed over to berkeley after walking around golden gate park for a while. it gets quite cold in san francisco in the evening, which was a welcome change to me after the sweltering humidity of chicago (note to self - never return to any disgustingly humid place unless it's called boston). chez panisse is located on the outskirts of berkeley's central area near the university. there is one menu that is changed daily, and it's a three-course meal in the regular downstairs dining room unless you opt to add a cheese course. there's a vegetarian option, though the night we went, it was either lamb or a stuffed tomato - you can probably guess what we all chose (jessica is only vegetarian in boston).

points off for the snobby maitre d', who, upon looking at us, asked if we were dining in the cafe. sigh. i hate it when people assume such things. the way one is dressed is not a fail-safe indicator of how much one will tip. european (he was half-french and half-italian - the people behind us asked him if he was french, in french - i expect that he didn't think we understood him, either) doesn't mean class.

however, we were duly seated, and the dining room is all warm light and slightly frank lloyd wright-ish lighting fixtures. the tables are great - just the right size. our amuse-bouche type thing was prosecco with blackberry syrup, and a little dish of olives (the night's menu was mediterranean-inspired). the olives were great - concentrated, soft olive flavor without an edge to it - mellow would be a good word.

the first course was field greens with ricotta cheese and roasted figs (and toasted almonds, but i didn't eat them). i can safely say that this is the first time i've ever had field greens that i've liked - they were obviously chosen and combined with care. they were probably just really good field greens, too. the figs were good, but really, the best thing was the ricotta. it was, by far, and i mean by far, the best ricotta i've ever had. i could eat just that for days! i guess that's what fresh ricotta is supposed to taste like.

the second course was roasted lamb with eggplant puree, green beans, cucumber-yogurt stuff, and...um...crap, i forget the last thing that was on the plate. oh! purslane! purslane is pretty good. anyway, the lamb was great, if not totally remarkable. it was really good in combination with the eggplant and the green beans. i think there were maybe too many things on the plate. but it was good.

we declined the cheese course because it didn't sound that interesting to us (the next night jessica and i had a blue cheese and a sheep's milk camembert that tasted like cheese-y butter - good, but so rich).

the dessert was by far the most stunning thing on the menu. it was a perfect ten : a terrine consisting of a pistachio cake, wildflower honey ice cream, and peach ice cream. i thought that the first bite - of peach ice cream - was good, but the wildflower honey ice cream was even better. even better than a bite of the whole thing, which was not at all shabby. that ice cream was the best ice cream i'd had since the white chocolate ice cream i had at craigie street bistrot. it tasted so wonderfully fresh, too... and on the plus side, i didn't get an allergic reaction to the peaches on the side of the dessert (unnecessary but good).

we stopped by the kitchen afterwards and talked briefly to the sous-chef and the pastry chef. the sous-chef told us that one shouldn't buy anything but japanese knives, and that they should all be $60 or less, but conceded that, after all, it's what feels comfortable. i covet a santoku knife, but they're rather expensive. i wonder where he got his. the pastry chef told us that the peaches had just been "marinated" in a sugar syrup. the one thing i would have liked was to have seen alice waters in the kitchen. i mean, i know that she's a busy woman, but if somebody is the chef of their restaurant, i like to see them in the kitchen.

bottom line : this is an excellent restaurant, if not the best ever. it's wonderful in its simplicity. there were several things that were really fantastic, but some of it was merely very good. there were three people we were walking behind on the way to the restaurant - we passed them, then they passed us and stopped at the menu of the restaurant (full for the evening, i think). i'm sure they gave us either surprised or baleful glances as we passed them on our way into the restaurant.