upstairs again; tomatoes at craigie; a new find

this year, upstairs on the square must have a new chef, because the food is a lot more exciting and adventurous than it usually is. it also appears to be suffering a bit business-wise, even though the food is better than it has ever been; so i'm doing my part towards the country's economic recovery by having had lunch twice at upstairs in the past two weeks. the first time wasn't particularly worth talking about - a clam chowder that tasted mostly of creme fraiche and a fish sandwich on too-thick bread - but the second time was really quite wonderful. i went with my mother and sister, and we had:

- chilled yellow tomato soup with a hint of scotch bonnet; crouton of wild salmon and avocado tartare

- antipasti of lourdes' mozzarella; peach and sweet summer pepper relish

- lemon tagliatelle; chiogga beets & greens, lobster knuckles, sauteed cod cheeks

- bbq pork piadina sandwich; giardiniera of farmer's market vegetables, crisp onion strings

- cheeseburger on a potato roll; gruyere, niman ranch bacon, cucumber pickles

- market fruit galette; candied almonds

- crema catalana; cinnamon & orange, pecan shortbread cookies

the tomato soup was absolutely delicious - i often find tomatoes to be too sweet, but these were sweet and plenty tart. the addition of the scotch bonnet is also quite wonderful - adding a crucial bit of warming heat to the cold soup. the avocado was delicious, but unnecessary.

i had the bbq pork sandwich as my main course - it was also quite good. it turns out that a piadina is a sort of italian flatbread, slightly thicker than a tortilla; this one was corn-based. the bbq pork was great - a lot of bbq flavor, a bit of char - and i think that it may have been cooking in the grill we saw right at the entrance to the restaurant, as the smoke from the grill matched the smoky flavor in the pork. the giardiniera, which is an actual name for an italian side dish that is a fancy name for pickled vegetables, was forgettable and a bit too vinegary for my tastes. the crisp onion strings were absolutely delicious - very lightly battered, razor-thin slices of onion - basically, ephemeral bits of onion essence.

i had a bite of my sister's lemon tagliatelle, which is fresh, house-made pasta. not as delicious as the lobster dish i had a few weeks ago, but still quite good. i also had a bite of my mother's burger, and i may have to amend my decision to name craigie's burger as the best burger around here. i've had the upstairs burger before, but long ago enough that craigie had replaced it in my esteem. however, now that i've had each burger within a week of each other, i can safely compare them. while it was worth the wait for the tomato in craigie's burger, the upstairs burger actually tasted beefier and more satisfying. the upstairs burger also earns some brownie points with its inclusion of homemade mayo for the burger or fries (mayo with my fries is one food-related affection that i've developed in my grown-up-adult phase of life). i also prefer upstairs' thick-cut fries over the shoestring fries at craigie, although this time, at least craigie had regular potato fries (i am not a fan of sweet potato fries). there is just no way to effectively eat shoestring fries; it robs you of both a high rate of potato consumption (a debatable loss), but more importantly, of the satisfaction of chewing a mouthful of potato. and that is definitely a crime.

unfortunately, although the first and second courses were delicious, dessert was disappointing. i generally caution against dessert at upstairs, unless you choose the butterscotch pudding, which is absolutely wonderful. both desserts were clunkers - the galette wasn't sweetened enough (and i'm pretty sensitive to overly sweet desserts), its crust was completely soggy, and it came topped with whipped cream that was whipped almost to the point of being butter. i really wanted to send it back, but i never know what the etiquette is for that type of thing. the crema catalana was better - it was basically a spiced creme brulee, and the shortbread cookies were good, but it was overall an average dessert.

as a side note, exciting news! i have now been to craigie enough times that i apparently am a trusted enough customer that they don't require me to secure my reservations with a credit card. i'm moderately flattered.

***

also last week, i did restaurant week lunch with my sister at asana, which is in the mandarin oriental hotel on boylston. the entrance is unmarked as far as i could see, both from the street entrance and from the hotel entrance; much as it may denote high levels of cool, i am not a huge fan of such displays. luckily, the food was wonderful, and the decor is quite nice design-wise - simple, with accents of texture and volume.

per the restaurant week menu, we had the following (the simplicity of the way the menu is worded masks some of the preparation techniques):

- heirloom tomato and lemongrass soup; watermelon, flowers

- ahi tuna sashimi; wasabi greens, yuzu vinaigrette, squid cracker

- bento box; asian bbq beef, sticky rice, wakame salad, steamed pork dumplings

- atlantic salmon; mizuna, citrus, mint, basil, sake vinaigrette

- grand marnier parfait; marinated raspberries

- jivara chocolate tart; roasted banana ice cream

i was slightly underwhelmed by the tomato soup that i had, although this is more due to my cultural conception of what a tomato soup should be. this tomato soup was more of a tomato consomme, in which the tomato juice is extracted from pulped tomatoes. it wasn't like v8 tomato juice - rather, the consomme is to v8 as fresh orange juice is to oj from a carton. it has a wonderfully fresh, delicate flavor, but i think my liking for florals in my food is pretty limited, so i was less a fan of this soup. (the two notable floral concoctions i've had were the lemonade from cafe baraka, which has rosewater in it, and the floral scent-infused sea bass chowder i had at alinea.)

the tuna sashimi that my sister had was really delicious - a good balance of ingredients in addition to very good tuna. as usual, no ability here to taste yuzu.

main courses were really good - the salmon i had was seared on one side, skin-on on the other side. the sear was very well done technically - the salmon was perfectly cooked, the sear perfectly crispy. the salmon was unadorned, really, save for the grapefruit - grapefruit with seafood is a favorite combination. i can't remember what salmon is usually paired with at restaurants, but it seemed to me that mashed potatoes and salad were slightly out of the ordinary. it was a well-orchestrated trio - the mashed potatoes were similar to the salmon in richness, while the mix of arugula and mint acted as a refreshing foil to that richness. it's not often that one gets mint in a salad, instead of as a garnish or in a pesto, and i was somewhat surprised to find that it pairs so well with arugula - the peppery flavor of the arugula and the coolness of the mint are well-balanced. i did also have a dumpling and a bit of beef from my sister's bento box, which were good and excellent, respectively. the beef was very complex in flavor, the spices balancing out the sweetness of the sauce. you could also tell that the way the beef had been cooked in the sauce was a distinctively asian preparation, not unlike char siu pork - it wasn't beef in sauce, but rather, the sauce had been reduced and the beef seared and cooked in it for some time.

it seems rare to me that restaurants do both sweet and savory well, but the desserts here were really impressive. i find that it's more difficult to find good places for dessert in the boston area than for dinner, so it's great to find a place that does everything well. the parfait that i had came in four small cylinders laid on a plate like logs, their tops scattered with a smattering of raspberries that had a sheen of some kind of "marinade" (like a syrupy reduction of sugar or wine), and a traditional caramelized-sugar tuile. the cylinders were the "grand marnier parfait" and tasted like a semifreddo, but firmer - as if it had been firmed with whatever the molecular gastronomy types use to solidify frozen things. the end result was that throughout eating the dessert, it didn't melt, still tasted cold, and had the slightest bit of chew to what appeared to be a soft ice cream. well, it was delicious - just a very simple preparation to end an excellent lunch. my sister's dessert was equally good - the jivara, i believe, corresponds to a specific blend of valrhona chocolate; both tart (of the dense, flourless-chocolate-cake ilk) and the banana ice cream were great.

in addition to lunch, we had a couple of tonics - i can't quite remember what they had in them, but they are wonderful, simple yet complex concoctions. it's the sort of non-alcoholic tonic that makes you feel like you're just as appreciated as someone who's drinking an alcoholic cocktail (plus, it was lunch on a weekday).

the service here is also pretty good - inobstrusive, but attentive. it's the type of place that's the dressy, hostess-pulls-out-your-chair-for-you type place - the high-end type of place that is welcome but atypical for the casualness of life in boston. i'm pretty sure that the last place where my chair was pulled out for me was per se in new york. the dining room has well-lit high ceilings, and the high-end finishes of the decor and silverware really make you feel like you're in a luxurious setting. then again, the sumptuousness of a weekday three-course, two-hour lunch certainly contributed to its air of luxury, too... (for those of you who are always conscious of food portions, the portions here are generally spot on - not too much, not too little, erring on the side of slightly generous (especially for lunch).)

i remain somewhat amazed by the discovery of a new place that's so good - simple, adventurous, delicious. i'm pretty hard to impress, food-wise, but i was impressed; it's rare that a new place is so good. i often feel belittled at nice restaurants because i appear to be young or inexperienced in the realm of good food, but the service here is fairly unpretentious. it was pretty empty at lunch on a friday afternoon - about a third of the dining room was occupied - so the scene when it's busy might be off-putting, as it seems like it's an upscale/hip enough place to attract the correspondingly pretentious crowd. however, on this day - a beautiful sunny day - it was quiet and relaxing.

upstairs at upstairs

for a few weeks, carrie and i have been trying to partake of either the bpl's courtyard tea, or the special lobster-and-corn-themed menu at upstairs on the square. as luck would have it, the menu got extended a few days past its stated last day, so we took it as a sign and made a reservation.

i will say, just in passing, that it was much easier than i had expected to get a reservation - we called the night before and were able to get a table for four. then, the following day, when we couldn't find another deuce, we were able to change the reservation from four to two.

in all honesty, for years i've been pretty ambivalent about upstairs on the square - usually the menu is seasonal classics done well with respect to technique. it's one of those places where you would take a look at the menu, and be satisfied, but not particularly excited - a feeling that's a bit strange when considering the whimsical decor. that said, i haven't stayed away just for that reason - you won't find a better butterscotch pudding anywhere, nor can you find a more perfect burger with the right balance of euro (mayo with your fries) and american (...beef, and perfectly crisp bacon).

following this past visit, i can't help but feel that things are on an upswing. we started with an amuse bouche that was a sort of gougere, its interior not unpleasantly on the wet side, with a red wine reduction and a couple shards of parmesan. technically perfect, and the ho-hum nature of the gougere, popularized as an amuse bouche by thomas keller, was definitely upgraded by the red wine reduction. bread was ok, on the salty side, but thankfully no sign of sourdough, and the butter was the consistency of a thick mayo - ie, eminently spreadable.

for starters, i had the wellfleet oysters with asian pear slivers and yuzu ice; carrie had the "native corn three ways" (corn chowder, crispy polenta with a greek salad, sweet corn flan with candied bacon). i've had a bit of a thing for raw oysters ever since i had them for the first time at pearl oyster bar; these oysters were, as far as my slightly insensitive palate goes, quite good. i think they would have been a bit better had they been a little colder, but they tasted fabulous, and the asian pear was a great counterpart. i've never really been able to taste yuzu, but presumably it added some sort of exotic, elusive flavor. carrie's corn trio was quite good as well - the corn chowder could have been called "bacon chowder" instead, so strongly and deliciously did it taste of bacon, despite its complete textural absence. the crispy polenta outdoes pigalle's deep-fried poached egg for perfect crisping, but the centerpiece of this trio is really the flan. the corn sweetens the flan enough, but not too much, and really, as carrie commented, it tastes like a perfect quiche custard, made with the richest ingredients possible, and without any additives - broccoli, etc. and somebody in the kitchen must really love bacon, because the candied bacon was clearly handled with love - perfectly crisp-chewy, with just the right note of sweetness. overall, starters were maybe a 7.5/10?

i would say that entrees trumped starters, no contest. i had grilled lobster (a tail and a claw) with bok choy tempura, spiced butter, and coconut rice. the first time i realized that i liked lobster, as it happens, was also at pearl oyster bar, the same time as the oysters. my memory is like a sieve these days, so i only have the vaguest of memories: that the lobster roll i had was delicious, refreshing, cold, tender, and sweet. you know, all of those things that really good lobster is stereotypically supposed to be. i remember that lobster roll much more fondly than the lobster tail i had at per se; my also-vague memories of the lobster at per se recall concerns over the discernible toughness of the lobster, despite it being poached in butter.

but this is just a long-winded setup to tell you that this lobster dish is possibly the best lobster i've ever had. the lobster was tender without being mushy, and that is saying something. the ample amounts of lobster concealed rice that was savory and strongly imbued, somehow, with coconut flavor and subtle spicing. even the bok choy was better than i had expected - the really leafy bits tasted a bit like kale chips, and the body of the leaves contrasted nicely with the tempura batter. speaking of the batter, it had quite a bit of chew to it, in comparison to most tempura batters, which are soaked with frying oil and almost ephemeral flavor-wise. the crunchy bits of tempura that broke off the bok choy were delicious with the rice and lobster, providing a welcome bit of textural contrast. i'm not sure if that was the intent, but i like to think that it was - that whoever designed this dish thought about what would happen, physically, to the food as it was cut up and consumed.

in other news, carrie had a lobster salad - peppercress (from eva sommaripa's garden!), avocado, citrusy dressing with chunks of lobster. i tried just a bit, and the peppercress was really fabulous, and well taken care of - still crispy and springy. the salad was really the complete opposite of the grilled lobster - the crunchy birkenstock-wearing californian, as opposed to the cold-weather, comfort-food-craving new englander. all in all, quite delicious.

i was disappointed not to see the butterscotch pudding on the dessert menu; we settled on sharing the special dessert - corn ice cream atop a blueberry cobbler. the corn ice cream was really good - again, not too sweet, and it didn't taste of corn, per se. it tasted like somebody made corn sugar out of the corn, in some way that tasted of corn that happened to be sweet
(as opposed to the straight-out sugar sweetness of refined corn syrup). what it reminded me of most was this dessert i had at alinea that had tonka beans in it, really. the ice cream topped a shallow ramekin of blueberry cobbler, which appeared to have equal amounts of topping (with only a smack of oats) and blueberry. somehow this wasn't a problem, because of the shape and size of the serving dish. the shallowness of the dish ensures that there isn't too much blueberry for a given amount of topping, which was in larger crumbly bits than in a normal cobbler.

so, a delicious, relaxing dinner upstairs at upstairs on the square. i hadn't had dinner in the soiree room before, but it proved to be a relaxed respite to the bustle of the larger dining room downstairs. seemed like the downstairs also has more harder surfaces than the upstairs, because the sound echoes there a lot more. just checked the restaurant week menu, and it looks promising.

craigie on main

restaurant openings in my neighborhood always cause me some pain along with the joy. i very much like craigie street bistrot, and am quite happy that now it's around the corner on main street. at the same time, i really am not that happy that craigie street is what moved in on main street, because its prices are so high that it's not affordable for the vast majority of the neighborhood. while i don't object that much to the influx of well-heeled yuppie/upper-middle-class strangers coming into the neighborhood - who are we kidding, i mind a whole lot - it's more that i think that restaurants that purport to be so neighborhoody should pay more attention to who lives in the neighborhood. it just doesn't seem ethically right that a restaurant should locate itself in a place where most of the diners are not natives (unless we're in new york). not even brunch is affordable! contrast craigie on main with tosci's - tosci's is a true neighborhood place where you can sit, linger, and brunch for not too much. i just feel that craigie is being a little insensitive.

ethical tension aside, craigie on main is pretty good in the food and service department. first, let's do a couple of notes about decor. overall, quite nice - easy to hear, nice colors, no clashing, etc. but the two-tops are spaced too close to each other. i mean, really - i'm not a huge person, and i had trouble getting in and out of my seat because it was back to back with the seat behind me. you know how you feel like the restaurant doesn't think you're going to be that profitable for them, and they give you the most rotten tables? that pretty much sums up how i felt about that table. and the table size is fine - all the plates fit - but the spacing is pretty much horrible. also, i kind of like having the kitchen out in the open (concerns with food odors saturating your clothing aside), but it leaves the entryway space feeling really cramped. i don't know who their designer was, but they did not do that great a job - good idea, middling execution. i wonder if the draft from the door affects temperatures in the kitchen, or if it's far enough away?

anyway, the food. we came because they had a restaurant stimulus menu - a $35 3-course prix fixe. it was relatively unexciting, though, and the first course was crispy smelts that i wasn't sure i would like, so mary and i ordered a la carte. usually craigie street has a $30 3-course prix fixe, so i'm curious to know if at craigie on main, it has been edited out. because i would certainly go more often if there was a more affordable option.

appetizers: i started with grilled octopus with chorizo cream, cipollini onions, and hearts of palm. i'm not a fan of hearts of palm - they just taste bland to me - but the rest was an excellent combination. i haven't had octopus that many times - i can probably count the number of times on one hand - and the last one i had was at babbo, and it was fantastic. this one was excellent as well; the chorizo cream was a particularly good pairing. i find the difference between the textures of squid and octopus to be really intriguing - you wouldn't expect such similar creatures to taste so different. mary had the cream of cauliflower soup with rabbit sausage and a bit of brussels sprouts. the soup was pretty delicate in flavor, but was fantastic in combination with the rabbit sausage; in turn the rabbit sausage was definitely the best preparation of rabbit that i've had - i don't typically like rabbit because i find it bland.

by the way, bread service: generally blah. the bread was fine, but i don't see why craigie street always insists on serving butter that's too cold to spread.

for main courses, i had the slow-cooked sea trout with frizzled ginger, rock shrimp, and mussels, all in a bit of serrano ham broth with almonds (hot ham water, anyone?). i assume that "slow-cooked" means "sous vide" and i'm coming to understand that i don't really like the texture of things that are cooked sous-vide. i think i prefer food, or at least meat, with texture and chew to it, rather than it being food for babies and people with dentures. however, the flavors of this dish were really excellent - better than the octopus, i would say. everything was very complementary, and the rock shrimp were almost as good as the ones i had at babbo (the last place i had rock shrimp). the trout didn't taste overly trout-y (as mackerel sometimes taste overly mackerel-y), and every time i have mussels, i increasingly realize that i really like them.

the surprise of the night was dessert - gingerbread pain perdu, and it was a knockout! I don't typically think of dessert being a strong suit for craigie street, but this was the best thing we had all night. it was two triangles of cake that had a lot of egg in it - enough for a very moist, almost custardy way, but custardy in a cooked in a hot water bath for a while, rather than a typical creme caramel custardy-ness. it's difficult to describe, and i'd be curious to know what the preparation was. whatever it was, the slight crunchiness of the very top layer was absolutely delectable, and it was fantastic with the ginger ice cream. it was kind of like a ginger-spiced version of sticky toffee pudding, minus the copious amounts of caramel sauce.

service was excellent - it seems like the restaurant is really trying to please diners so they come back, in these difficult economic times. well...i mean, my views on this are pretty clear. i wonder if it's just not economically feasible to lower prices, or if there's a certain level of produce quality that can't be trimmed in any way to make the restaurant more affordable. regardless, it's nice to have some seriously good food in the neighborhood - it's definitely better than everything else (with the exception, perhaps, of salts, a restaurant i haven't been to). let's just hope that someday the locals will be able to partake.

review: chocolate lounge @ mariposa

also several weeks ago, i had enough time (!!!) to go with carrie to the chocolate lounge at mariposa. on thursdays at 7pm, a mini-enterprise takes over the space at mariposa and it becomes a short ode to chocolate. because who wouldn't be excited by a chocolate lounge? yeah, that's what i'm talking about.

the chocolate lounge is fun, but is a little limited. there are some different types of hot chocolate, then a series of desserts and chocolate flights. the desserts are pretty standard: a chocolate cake, chocolate ice cream, etc. i had the milk cake with chocolate sauce; the edges were really quite delectable, with the sugar-crunchy crust, but the cake was a bit dry for the amount of chocolate sauce (which was perfectly fine) that was poured on top of it. i may have also been expecting something different despite the accurate description by our waitress, since long ago at lmf, luis used to make a tres leches cake that was essentially a vanilla cake soaked with a mixture of milk, condensed milk, and evaporated milk. god that was good.

the most interesting thing about the chocolate lounge is the flights of chocolate. unfortunately, i didn't have one. chocolate flights are a curious thing, because you have to really be a chocolate buff to pay $8 for a flight of chocolate. chocolate is so compact that the american value of getting as much bang for your buck doesn't apply correctly here; yet it governed my choice to not get a flight, anyway. there's the fear that you don't know where the chocolate is coming from; the fear that you don't know if your palate is sensitive enough to taste the difference between various chocolates, etc.

sidebar:
that said, flights of chocolate are not absent from my life. i got a free ticket a few weeks back to a chocolate tasting of richart chocolate (located in copley) by the lab for chocolate science and mit-france. i went with celina, and of course, like in all lectures, i fell asleep for most of the lecture. but i had a nice nap, and i pretty much knew all of the information in the lecture anyway. the best part of the whole thing was the smell of a room full of chocolate. if you haven't yet experienced this, you should. because it's amazing. the chocolate tasting was quite fun as well - if you haven't had a good milk chocolate (the "upscale" symphony bar is not an example of a good milk chocolate) the richart one is pretty darn good.

back to the chocolate lounge. i would say that in general, it's a fun thing to do, but still kind of expensive. in an area full of students, i think that a menu of little $4-5 treats is the best way to go, with coffee and tea in addition to the chocolate (this may actuall exist already, but i don't remember).

review: central kitchen

central kitchen / 567 massachusetts avenue / cambridge ma / 617-491-5599 / sun-wed 5:30-1am, thu-sat 5:30-2am / reservations accepted for parties of 6+ (recommended) / entrees moderately expensive ($18-25)

i have no wish to tackle my thesis at the moment, so instead i'll write about food. i had dinner with rob at central kitchen, which i had been to once before with celina back in june when i had just moved into 24. while it's not mind-blowing, it's good, solid, above-average stuff. it's a bit expensive for students, but has a great atmosphere - hip but not pretentiously so. it's a small place, balanced lighting, cool dented chrome tables.

neither of us was particularly hungry, so we split an appetizer and an entree - mini portuguese style stew (clams, mussels, and sausage in a tomato broth with bread) and mushroom ragout with ricotta dumplings and creamy polenta. the portuguese stew was good but pretty standard; the ragout was really quite good. the ricotta dumplings were an interesting idea, and really good with the mushrooms (shiitake, hen of the woods, lobster, i think...). and creamy polenta is always a good idea. it had peas in it too, which added some color and a bit of sweetness to the heft of the mushrooms.

for dessert we had an orange chiffon cake with mascarpone cream and a bit of diced tropical fruit. it was pretty good, but i wouldn't have described the cake as a chiffon cake - it was more like a lighter pound cake. the mascarpone was a great addition, and probably what made it for me. in general, it was very enjoyable, if the service was a bit neglectful at the beginning. the high point was definitely the mushroom ragout, and the portions are pretty big, so we were rather full even having split what one person would have ordered normally. i hadn't been out for a while because of studio, so it was really nice to have dinner out somewhere - it's as enjoyable as cooking dinner with friends, just different. makes me feel like i'm a normal person again, really. funny how that is.

central square + gentrification

from stuff@night (my comments at the end):
From fast to fine
Hot restaurants, tasty events, and the buzz on Boston's dining scene

BY LOUISA KASDON

Only a chef-owner as gutsy and farsighted as Steve Johnson — formerly of the Blue Room — would look at Central Square’s old Burger King space and see a potential site for a fine-tuned urban bistro. Until last spring, the site had all the hallmarks of mid-Cambridge grunge: a seedy Mass Ave storefront and even seedier patrons. No more. Johnson is well under way with a new project, the Rendezvous at Central Square, a near-100-seat bar and restaurant that will showcase his elegant, earthy European palate. If construction continues apace, the new restaurant will open sometime in early October and serve dinner seven nights a week. It will have a full liquor license, a big bar for eating and drinking, a communal table, and a menu rooted in Johnson’s French culinary background. We’re talking real restaurant, with an atrium, bright skylights, banquettes, trained waitstaff, and prices from the low $20s on up. With this one new restaurant, Central Square could be on the cusp of a neighborhood reinvention.

For decades, Central Square has been the multi-ethnic ridge of Cambridge, slightly tawdry and joyously funky, but lost in a zone just beyond Harvard’s reach and not quite in the crook of MIT’s arm. It’s home to a fair number of pubs and bars, lots of Indian and Asian budget eateries, and the Middle East and Phoenix Landing. Other than to visit Central Kitchen, however, no suburban gourmet has ever looked up from his or her newspaper and said, "Hey, honey, let’s go see what’s new in Central Square."

That could change very soon, and Rendezvous could be the catalyst. Although it’s still a construction site, the new space’s bones are emerging — and the bones are good. It’s a big space, airy and crisp, like Eastern Standard in Kenmore Square. One side will feature banquettes for fours and sixes; the central area will have traditional dining tables. The front window will house a big communal table for all those cozy Cantabrigians who like to dine en masse. The bar will serve liquor, of course, but Johnson emphasizes that it’s to be a dining space where people can drink, rather than a drinking space where people can eat. "This is a restaurant with a bar, not a late-night place," he says. "We’ll be done with dinner by 11 and mopping up the floors by midnight. Central Square has enough bars."

Although he wasn’t in a hurry — after all, there was a lot of good sport fishing from his boat in Bristol, Rhode Island — Johnson had been seeking a new location since he left the Blue Room more than two years ago. He’d casually considered every space and potential concept from Boston to coastal Rhode Island. But Johnson always had a hankering to work close to his home near Central Square. One day last April, after looking at restaurants for two years, he was walking down Mass Ave and saw a for-lease sign in the window of the former Burger King. "I’d looked at every space in the city by then, worked with all the usual suspects, the realtors and landlords," Johnson recalls. "And here I was just ambling by and saw a phone number to call." The process has been fast by anybody’s standards, less than six months from beginning to end — including getting the blessing of the neighborhood association, often the most difficult part of opening a new restaurant in Cambridge.

The Central Square Business Association is overjoyed by Rendezvous’s impending arrival. It’s been hoping for a wave of gentrification in Central Square, but one that would re-invigorate the area without erasing its ethnic complexity. It invested in new parking lots (three public lots are within a block of the new restaurant), installed sidewalk benches, and improved the streetlights. Central Square merchants had been unhappy for years that the old BK was owned and operated by an absentee landlord, out of touch with the kind of clientele his franchise was attracting. Recently, a new owner bought the building; he hopes to turn the property into a source of neighborhood pride, and has been diligently working with Johnson to make sure his new tenant has everything he needs to succeed — most importantly, a full liquor license. At the Licensing Commission hearing, Johnson got the green light from the city with no muss or fuss.

Of course, it’s a gutsy move. The site is definitely not an "A" location. Only a chef of Johnson’s reach and reputation could turn an old Burger King into a destination that will woo the kind of diners who go to the South End, but only because all the bistros there have valet parking. On the other hand, Mass Ave has an appealing, almost Parisian grittiness, what with the Middle East next door and the scads of interesting characters who make the scenery more interesting than in Newton.

Johnson has hired as his chef Deepak Kaul, who cooked with him for three years at the Blue Room before moving to San Francisco to cook at Jardinière, a restaurant very much in the tradition of Alice Waters & Co. The GM at Rendezvous is Nicole Bernier, another Blue Room alum. "It’s great to work with people I know well," Johnson says. "It feels like a Blue Room reunion." The menu at Rendezvous will be more French than fusion, and will have fewer Asian influences than the Blue Room during Johnson’s tenure.

Urban storefronts are like dominoes: when one store changes hands, it sets a chain in motion. A new chichi bistro like Rendezvous may be the key domino to regenerate Central Square. If it could happen in Kenmore Square, it can happen anywhere.

* * *
i wonder what the person who wrote this is like. i wonder if they know what happens when a neighborhood goes through gentrification. i wonder if they know that central square is good as it is - that something that might be good for one neighborhood is most definitely not good for a different one, because they are inherently different. i would really like to know if she thinks anyone who lives in central square and loves it would ever use the phrase "chichi bistro" in a positive manner.

review: meet and greet at the green street grill

not really a meet and greet, but more of a we-love-you-please-mingle party of those of us who are graduating and our families - miriam, shaunna, austin, carrie, jessica, and me, joined by keith and v. we settled on the green street grill as it was one of the few places with enough space left to accommodate us. it's caribbean/soul food type stuff, and i'd heard of it and never been there before. sadly, josh couldn't come because it wasn't the type of food his grandparents would stand for.

it was a bit difficult to make our parents mingle; i think the parents most willing to move were miriam's parents, unsurprisingly. mine did too - my mom sat with me, carrie, keith, jessica and shaunna, while my father sat with carrie's parents.

green street grill is probably the type of place i'd come back to with my friends, rather than my parents - it's definitely more of a younger crowd place, though i saw a few people i knew with their parents. i had a maple-brined pork chop with collard greens, some sort of bean-and-salt-pork thing, and corn grits, as well as a side of fried yucca. the pork chop was enormous, but i was really hungry and ate the whole thing. the fried yucca was fantastic - just the way i had remembered yucca from luciano's restaurant (which is now closed). it was crispy on the outside, with a perfect amount of deep-fried-crust, and came with a "mojito" dipping sauce, which was slightly sour, slightly spicy, and quite good with it. the grits were great with the pork chop and the bean thing, but i think i'm not a fan of collard greens, sadly.

and that's where the story ends, because we didn't do dessert (too full!). ok, more about the pork chop. i'm not so sure about that maple-brined business, but it was perfectly done inside, nice and thick, and wonderfully crusty on the outside. mmm...i would go there again, though i think it was a bit too exotic for my mother.

review: moving day dinner (central kitchen)

central kitchen / 567 massachusetts avenue / cambridge ma / 617-491-5599 / sun-wed 5:30-1am, thu-sat 5:30-2am / reservations accepted for parties of 6+ (recommended) / entrees moderately expensive ($18-25)

celina and i have been trying to make indian food together for approximately four months now. as we'll be in different cities for the summer, we'll have to postpone that dinner for a few more months. on the bright side, we did manage to make it out to dinner on moving day. having spent the entire day moving stuff from lmf and my sister's apartment, i was absolutely gross and sweaty. despite this fact, we wandered into central kitchen, which i've always wanted to try, and which i never had until now.

the interior of the restaurant is much nicer than the outside, which is a bit drab and looks very much like a slightly rundown, community-type neighborhood place. or rather, not rundown, but well worn from a lot of use. the interior is mod in a welcoming kind of way, with a bar surrounded by tables. the tables are chrome with dents in them - you have to see them to like them as much as i do, probably. the lighting is fairly dim, but since the walls are in warm dark colors, it's somehow just right to be completely flattering. we were sitting between the bar and the street entrance, but there's also a back area next to the back of the bar that has these fantastic lighting fixtures that are part lightbulbs, part lit-up old wine bottles.

the tables were set with regular silverware, then tiny, tiny water glasses - basically juice glasses. i got the chopped salad - arugula, a lemon dressing, bits of lemon, some sort of pancetta-like bacon-y thing, pea tendrils, and asparagus. every single restaurant i've been to recently has asparagus on its menu. as i love asparagus, this is a good thing (also, i very much appreciate that morels have been in season while i'm here). it was pretty good, though the greens were a bit tough. the lemon was quite nice, and the entire thing was on the large side.

our entrees were absolutely enormous. the prices are in the high teens and low twenties, but the portions are enormous (ie, large enough to feed one rower who's just had practice, or one short asian girl twice). i had roast chicken (seeing a trend here? it's the at-an-expensive-restaurant-but-not-wealthy-enough-to-afford-the-steak syndrome), which came with mashed potatoes, green beans, and caramelized vidalia onions. mmm....i do love caramelized onions. oh! and it had morels...not as good as the ones at craigie street, but they were morels, and that's all that mattered. not the most earth-shattering entree ever, but it was good stuff. oh, about enormous - so i got not one chicken quarter, but two. it wasn't even just the quarter - it was a leg attached to a breast, actually. consequently i had snack food for the next three days as i finished moving.

i was so full by the time i finished half of my entree that celina and i split dessert - blueberry bread pudding with a white chocolate sauce. it was an outstanding combination, and probably the most sophisticated part if you care about that kind of thing. overall, central kitchen is a great neighborhood place - the type of place where you could go frequently, which isn't too expensive (for the amount of food and the quality). it would be a normal neighborhood place without the decor, which definitely makes it a better place to hang out in.

review: wind, rain, and almost hail... (craigie street bistrot)

craigie street bistrot / 5 craigie circle / cambridge ma / 617-497-5511 / tu-thur 6-10pm, fri-sat 5:30-10:30pm, sun 5:30-10pm / reservations recommended / entrees expensive (dinner will run you $35-70)

goodness! not that i really care, but i can assure you that after having been out in the rain on the way to and from dinner, my hair has lost everything from the post-haircut blowout except for that intoxicating stuff they spray on it at the salon i go to.

today was probably the last stop on jessica's and my restaurant tour (the money has run out, sadly - must pay my rent), and it was craigie street bistrot. craigie street bistrot had been my favorite restaurant in cambridge, and i'm happy to report that it remains my favorite restaurant.

what i had liked the first time i went to craigie street bistrot (it was sometime last fall or the one before that, with a bunch of french house people) was the simplicity of the food and the flawless preparation (a point to which our waitress at no 9 park agreed, having previously worked there). when i was last there, i had the pork rillettes (a kind of pate-confit type thing) and the roast chicken, and then we split a bunch of desserts. i remember the chicken as being the best chicken that i'd ever had; the desserts were also memorable for this reason - good ingredients.

i wasn't disappointed this time, either. jessica was a bit put off by the way our waiter and the menu were in our faces about fresh local produce; i suppose i'm just used to it now. i'm afraid i've been spoiled on good food since i last went to craigie street bistrot, so that i am getting accustomed to really good chicken. i started with the "crispy pork confit," a sort of country pate that's reminiscent of the appetizer i had at aujourd'hui. it was crispy by virtue of being pan-seared, and came with a poached egg on top, and in a shallow pool of french lentil (lentilles de puy) puree. oh, and morels - it came with morels. i love morels to death; they are my favorite mushrooms. i suppose there was a bit more pretention than usual at the restaurant - the girl who brought me my first course told me that i would maximize my utility if i broke the egg over the whole thing. as if i would have done anything else. and seeing as the egg was on top of everything, it wasn't possible to take any other course of action.

as a second course, i had the chicken. it still had fennel with it, but it was much more of a background thing; the previous time i had had it, fennel was the main vegetable with it. this chicken was roasted with tarragon (and it must have been a lot of tarragon! i had roasted chickens with tarragon about a month ago, and it was nowhere as tarragon-y). this chicken came with roasted potatoes and more mushrooms, and had a relish-type thing of golden raisins, capers, and pine nuts. it was quite good, especially the combination of golden raisins and capers - i'll have to remember that one.

and finally, for dessert, jessica had dessert grits (i forget exactly how it went) and i had the chocolate tart with white chocolate ice cream. as i had ascertained from my previous visit, the ice cream at craigie street is the best ice cream i've ever had, if not the most imaginative (the best ice cream flavor i've ever had was blueberry at tosci's when i was in eighth grade). the chocolate tart was fantastic - very, very chocolaty, and no weird floral or fruity notes. the crust was also the most delicate, thinnest crust i've ever seen on a tart - that perfect shade of golden. it was basically crispy butter, with a dab or two of flour. but it was great with the chocolate. and add the white chocolate and you have the butter, the bitter-smoky, and the softly sweet.

i would say that nothing could beat the magical experience that was my first visit to craigie street, as that visit was probably the first time i really spent a lot of money on dinner at a restaurant. but this second time was great (oh, i also had a kir royale, which was pretty good). jessica had this sweet red dessert wine with her dessert, which wasn't as good as the one we had in our wine tasting class, but which was still quite good. looking at craigie street's wine list on their website, i believe it was the 2001 domaine du traginer banyuls "rimage" (roussillon). i think i also just like the three-course dining experience in general; to me it seems to be the right way to have dinner. the american in me takes hold when i am in studio and unable to devote real time to food other than semi-palatable subs and other prepared foods from star market, but the francophile in me always aspires towards three courses.

oh, so the wind, rain, and almost hail...i had been intending to get a new umbrella and after this visit i definitely need one. i set my umbrella down on the floor in the house 5 elevator lounge, and it looks like it's some sort of sculpture - "destroyed umbrella rising out of ground." it was so windy that my umbrella finally kicked the bucket; we got totally soaked on our walk from the kendall T stop, but caught saferide back, luckily. we intended to stop by betsy's room-warming party, but got to the area too late, and it was raining so hard we conceded defeat and went home.

review: that difficult work-to-no-work transition (upstairs on the square)

i'm somewhat at a loss because i've gone from such a high level of production (final review) to nothing. well, if "nothing" means "eventual packing." i feel as though i should be relaxing, but am finding it difficult to do because i'm still coming off the mad dash that is my mental state during finals. it's like trying to brake when driving a freight train full of lead weights.

well, at any rate, jessica and i are determined to hit up some restaurants before she leaves for california and then oxford, so we began our culinary trek today with brunch at upstairs on the square.

first of all, the entrance is on the side, not at the top of the stairs like one would surmise upon glancing at the front of the restaurant. the inside of the restaurant strikes a balance between being designed by women, and being feminine - and luckily, it's the right balance. the room is green with gold accents, with every trendy lighting fixture you can think of, and random details everywhere, like a tiny balcony to the left of the bar, an alice-in-wonderland type of mantel and mirror on the south wall, and "go red sox" painted onto the mirrors above the bar (plus a huge wide-screen TV perched on top of the back of a banquette, ostensibly for red sox games). as i look around, i spot what is the best table i've ever seen in a restaurant, ever - a tiny table tucked into an oddly-shaped nook under a window, big enough for two people. so, if you go there on a date, that is where you should sit. it's on the side of the room opposite from the mantel, closer to the kitchen side.

and of course, there's the food. we went there for brunch, so i think the food was a little less imaginative overal than dinner tends to be - it had the typical french toast, salmon, bagels, omelettes, etc. the attention to detail was probably what made the food so good. i would say that i wasn't totally knocked out, but i was more than pleased and would go back. dinner is probably even better. what also made the food good was flawless preparation - which is also what makes craigie street bistrot (my favorite restaurant in boston and cambridge) so good. while jessica and i waited for shaunna, we were brought a basket with little breakfast-y tidbits - the breakfast version of the breadbasket. everything was, of course, in miniature, and was quite good. there was a tiny chive-cheese scone, banana-chocolate chip muffins (but the banana was very subtle...it took me a few minutes to realize that it was banana. or, rather, jessica said "banana!" and i suddenly realized that that was the flavor i couldn't place), a couple slices of pound cake, and a couple slices of spice cake (very molasses-y). as for first courses, i started with the muesli, which was bits of granola (house-made, of course), assorted nuts (cashews and..macadamias?), and some raspberries. wow, those raspberries were good. the yogurt was also fabulous. anyway, i don't usually like muesli but i did like this one. i have rarely had fried potatoes that good - and you would think that they're a very simple thing to do, but i've had the whole range of fried potatoes, from grim to transcendent. i would say that these were fairly close to transcendent - crispy on the outside, and somehow perfectly balanced, herbs-wise. maybe my palate is too undiscerning, but the steak (oh, so i had the steak and eggs) was good but not particularly spectacular. it was cooked perfectly, though (rare, as all red meat should be), and had some sort of relish/mayonnaise-consistency type thing on it which was spicy and a nice counterpoint to the steak. the eggs? eh. i don't think i'm such a fan of steak and eggs together. in general, though, i don't really go for typical breakfast foods at breakfast. i would much rather have cold pizza than cereal, for example.

the high point, as it always seems to be for me, was dessert. we were all full, but couldn't resist the dessert menu. i do believe the dessert menu was the most creative part of the menu, with things like a coocnut panna cotta (ok, not so exciting), lemon custard cake with rhubarb (rhubarb! i love rhubarb!), cornmeal upside down plum cake (oh, plum cake...), and a couple other things. but shaunna and i eyed the butterscotch pudding and went with it. jessica got the panna cotta despite the gelatin. let me just say that that pudding is the best pudding i have ever had in my life. or, at least, the best butterscotch pudding i have ever had in my life. my other pudding high points: the best recipe's double chocolate pudding recipe is the best pudding recipe in the world; and the joy of cooking milk-and-cornstarch vanilla pudding is just fantastic. but this butterscotch pudding was pretty out-of-this-world - silky, creamy, dense but not too desne...oh, i want more just thinking about it. i think the one thing it may have been lacking (and this is a very contentious "may") was some salty counterpoint - in the same way that caramel is a thousand times better if it's slightly salty, a burst of salty something in the pudding would have been fabulous.

all in all, though, upstairs on the square is a fabulous place, and definitely belongs on your to-do-list. i would like to go there for dinner sometime, to see if there's a big difference in the experience. don't forget the dessert!

favorites : restaurants

favorite restaurant of all time
cyclops in the belltown neighborhood of seattle. $15-20. a neighborhood restaurant that changes its menu frequently, which i like to view as a desire to experiment with new kinds of food. in the summer of 2002 i had the most exquisite chocolate pot de creme: intensely chocolate, just sweet enough with no sour aftertaste, dense, flavored with grand marnier, with a curl of candied orange peel on top. oh, and did i mention that it was baked in a teacup? one small teacup - about a third of a cup in volume - was enough for two people. nothing i've had since has even compared.

favorite restaurant in boston/cambridge
pigalle. $36 (3-course prix fixe). i went there with two friends during restaurant week, and fell in love. a smallish restaurant with a great waitstaff. impeccable pacing of the meal, and the food was simple, but absolutely wonderful.

french
craigie street bistrot, harvard square area. $60 (appetizer, main course, and dessert). on the more traditional side, with very simple preparations and exquisite ingredients. the result is absolute food heaven. on the downside, it's also exquisitely expensive.
pigalle, theater district. see above. more modern than craigie street bistrot.
aquitaine, south end. $20-30 (appetizer + main course; desserts $8). more affordable, but very good. always busy, especially for sunday brunch, which is excellent.

the hamburger
joe sent me, between alewife and porter square. $6-10 (burger + drink). unfortunately more accessible by car than by anything else, but it has burgers as good as bartley's (if not better). it's also cheaper, although you may spend the saved cash on transportation. joe sent me is dominated by the bar - think massive plasma screens all over the place, showing football, basketball, baseball - and law and order. really good chicken wings. go here to escape the collegiate types.
bartley's burger cottage, harvard square. $10-14 (burger + milkshake). closer than joe sent me, with a longer menu (joe sent me has about 10 burgers). really good milkshakes.
pour house, boylston street near the pru. $5-8 (burger + milkshake, or appetizers + milkshake). go here more for the "collegiate atmosphere," milkshakes, and appetizers, not the cheap, prefab, cardboard burgers (half-price on saturdays).
aquitaine, south end. $10 (burger). sunday brunch burger is absolutely fabulous. the yuppie burger, too: on a toasted brioche bun with gruyere cheese. worth it, though.

indian
a taste of india on huntington ave near symphony hall. $20 (naan, appetizer, main dish). i think it's changed names, but it's still owned by the same people. best indian food i've had in boston, plus great decor. tiny, too, so it has a great, intimate feel (yes, i went there on a date).
bindhi bazaar, mass ave. good, serviceable indian food. some people say it's authentic, some people say it's not. at any rate, it tastes good.

fast food
wendy's, boylston street across from copley square. $3-5. i always get the same thing: a junior bacon cheeseburger, chicken nuggets with honey mustard sauce, and a frosty. cheaper, better fast food can't be found anywhere else. the added plus of the boylston street location is the second floor window area, where you can watch people go by on the street.

chinese
peach farm, chinatown. $7-13. for real chinese food. really cheap if you go with lots of friends and eat family-style.
mary chung, central square. $7-16. for american chinese food. i always have the peking ravioli (fried) with its exquisite, spicy ginger soy sauce, and the suan la chow show.

best decor and lighting
lumiere, in newton. $20-30. the whole room is white - but it's an off-white, and it glows rather than dazzling and blinding you. somehow it makes you feel happier.

pizza
picco, south end. $7-10 (just pizza). fabulously chewy-but-not-too-chewy, cracklingly-crisp-just-on-the-very-bottom crust. in short, the perfect pizza crust. good toppings, with specials every night, and great decor (including an upscale diner-like bar counter).
emma's pizza, kendall square. $7-10. great pizzas, but sometimes a little too thin crust for my liking. has a traditional, floury pizza crust, rather than the picco crust, which has a closer resemblance to foccacia.

note: all prices include tax and tip.

craigie street bistrot

back when bastille day was coming up, craigie street bistrot announced that they would have a "french speakers only" table at the restaurant to celebrate. shortly thereafter, they announced that they would be extending that special, which came with a $30 prix fixe menu.

we made a reservation for seven (miriam, allie, keith, v, josh, carrie, and me) for the "french connection." i'm afraid that i ignored my common sense again and didn't look at a map before we left for the restaurant. 45 minutes later (or was it an hour?) we made it to the restaurant, having made phone pleas to various friends to look at a map on our behalf.

the restaurant is unassuming, with a sign near the sidewalk in an otherwise residential neighborhood. the restaurant is on the bottom floor, so you descend into it. it seats maybe 40 or 50 people, with soft lighting (the best lighting i've experienced in the recent past has been lumiere, which managed to make an entirely white-walled room warm and inviting, which a sort of glowy light that you don't often see in restaurants - it's a type of light that is bright without the glare).

the "french connection" special didn't really seem to exist, but after we explained that we were here for that experience, we got a waiter who spoke french to us. he started out by speaking to us as if we were the typical americans who know a little bit of french, but ended up asking us if we knew the word for blackberry, later on during the evening.

however, the really high point of the evening was (and always is) the food. one of the strengths of the food is that it relies upon traditional foods and quality of flavor, rather than a fancy, overcreative confection. our appetizers: salad, corn soup, and pork rillettes. i ordered the rillettes, not knowing what it was, and was really pleasantly surprised. the dish came in three parts: a large ramekin of the pork rillettes (which are apparently a sort of pate) with a layer of lard on the top, a small plate of toasted bread, and a plate of "traditional accompaniments:" cornichons, pickled onions, tiny piles of salt and pepper, a tiny salad, and an unidentifiable thick maroon sauce that was piquant, spicy, and nothing short of fabulous.

the other highlight of the evening was dessert, after an excellent but slightly less exciting main course (which included the best chicken i have ever had, due to the fact that it was happy, farm-raised chicken from vermont). we had a couple of berry crisps with canela ice cream, the chocolate mousse with chocolate mint ice cream, and the sorbet trio. the sorbet trio was comprised of blackberry, raspberry, and wild rose petal sorbets, all made in-house, and all exquisite. i think i may finally understand why people like the flavor of blackberries (which the seeds take away when you eat the berry itself). the raspberry sorbet tasted like summer raspberries - much like the difference between the mathilde raspberry liqueur (summer raspberries) and chambord.