Wrong...maybe if we were rich and/or famous, but we're regular, and therefore this trip to the Hills was actually a big deal, and not at all "quaint and modest". We made reservations way in advance for a well thought-out Thursday evening dinner at one of the hippest, snazziest, new restaurants in town - The Bazaar by Jose Andres. It's by Jose Andres, and they won't let you forget it. Rather than answering the phone with "Thank you for calling the Bazaar," they employ the entire mouthful "...The Bazaar by Jose Andres..." There's good reason for this. Jose Andres is THE guy that popularized Spanish fare in United States, both traditional and avant-garde, and we must all thank him for bestowing upon us his divine culinary gift.
I first heard of The Bazaar by Jose Andres in a casual conversation to the tune of "Hey, we should try this place, they're supposed to have some cool stuff"...little did I know of the epic cultural phenomenon really involved here. It wasn't until I'd read an article that my mom in Denver saved for me from the Wall Street Journal, calling it the "Restaurant of the Future", that I really understood WHY it would be absolutely imperative that we eat there - namely, they use liquid nitrogen! An added perk is the fact that they serve primarily tapas, and all the plates are tiny. Tiny plates equals more plates...see where I'm going with this? (Let this also serve as a disclaimer that more plates equals longer review.)
We arrived at The Bazaar by Jose Andres (I intend to continue typing the entire name to exaggerate their point) a bit earlier than our reservation. I wasn't entirely sure we were in the right place (despite the gigantic sign over the door we walked through) because there was not a single other patron in the restaurant. Well attuned to the fact that we were slightly uncomfortable, the hostess sent us straight to the bar. Smart lady. I orderd a sangria, not for the alcohol, but for the nifty little container which it was served in.
Sipping on what turned out to be a mediocre sangria, I overheard the restaurant's second group of patrons of the night attempting to order at the bar. Apparently, you can request the "bar tender's choice" where he creates a personalized drink just for you by combining flavors from his vast toolbox of ingredients (berries, jalapenos, edible flowers, cotton candy, to name a few). Definitely should have done that!
Two sips later, I turned around to find that the once virtually empty restaurant was now slamming with people - people dressed to impress. I immediately realized this place would be great for people-watching...and eavesdropping. I probably rubbed elbows with someone semi-important as I attempted to tour the gigantic restaurant. I say attempted because I was somewhat distracted by this:
It's the dessert bar. We'll come back to it later...at least three times.
We darted to the hostess stand in the center of the grand-entrance-like area to announce our hunger, and then followed casually to the posh table where we'd have one of the most awe-inspiring meals of our lives...so far at least.
Our waiter's name was Jorge. It was comforting to know that we'd be served Spanish tapas by a real Spaniard, or at the very least a wonderful actor. I honestly wouldn't be surprised either way...LA, remember? The most explanation we got from Jorge all night was "left side of the menu, traditional; right side of the menu: molecular gastronomy. You can't decide? I choose for you." (If you aren't hip with the food times, molecular gastronomy is basically 'chefs on chemistry'...the art and science and 'don't try this at home' of the food world). Given the magnitude of menu items and the lack of decision-making skills at our four-person table, we decided to entrust Jorge the great task of creating our evening tasting menu. Surprises make everything taste better (with minor exceptions...you'll see).
I'll go ahead and say this now: Jose Andres(of The Bazaar by Jose Andres in case you forgot) is a genius. I certainly cannot critique his art nor the preparation of our tiny plates of edible joy, as everything done in his kitchen is clearly deliberate and executed with remarkable precision. I will say, however, that half the time I had no idea what exactly made my dish taste so good. The wait-staff probably explained what we were eating, but I only caught half of what they said as they whizzed past the table, barely getting our plates to us before disappearing. In some cases I definitely missed some of the experience by not completely understanding the history of the food in front of me. But that's why I'm here now typing this novel-ish narrative of my experience at The Bazaar by Jose Andres.
And with that, I give you the main event: dinner!
Actually...at the table we ordered another round of drinks. Juve Bela, a grape soda and gin concoction, Jale Berry, with berries and jalapeno, a Magic Mojito, the classic poured over cotton candy, and best of all - the Nitro Caipirinha!
Enter liquid nitrogen.
This classic Brazilian mojito-like drink was mixed with liquid nitrogen right at our table, like something out of a Harry Potter movie.
As my camera flashed in the poor drink lady's face, I imagined her chanting to herself "double, double, toil and trouble..." while she whipped up the magic in her cauldron. I'm not kidding about the magic. What came out was not only a beautiful and delicious cocktail, but a perfectly refreshing compliment to our meal, serving to cleanse the palate between courses, much like a sorbet, but somehow even smoother. Needless to say, don't plan on sharing this. Get your own. Maybe 2 depending on how much you eat.
Jorge started us off with one of the best dishes of the night in 'put your best foot forward' fashion: Roasted piquillo peppers (traditional tapas menu). The piquillos are stuffed with the creamiest goat cheese I've ever had. The peppers are lightly drizzed with two exquisite reductions, one of which is creamy with a hint of citrus, the other a delectable sweet and tart Pedro Jimenez reduction (dessert sherry...and I can only assume that Pedro Jimenez is superior quality liquor). We debated licking the plate, but decided against it given that we were in a relatively fancy restaurant. I did sneak a finger-full, though, while no one was looking.
Our next surprise was Olives. Olives aren't my favorite, but they're Spanish, so I took it as a key component to the progression of the meal. These guys are professionals after all, so I had to trust their judgement. Well, as it turns out, at The Bazaar by Jose Andres, they don't just serve olives. They serve traditional olives (stuffed with roasted pepper and anchovies) accompanied by...get this...liquid olives. Somehow they take the flavor of a smooth, salty olive and make it into a liquid olive-sized blob packed inside a micro-membrane of sorts. You put the little bundle of olive confusion in your mouth, and are immediately overcome with a flood of olive flavor. Whether you like olives or not, this is pretty cool.
If you just can't handle the strong olive taste, fortunately they employ the same magical liquid flavor technique in the "Not Your Everyday Caprese Salad," with cherry tomatoes, basil pesto, and liquid mozzarella. I love traditional caprese salad, so I was more than excited to try the modern twist on the classic. Turns out, I actually really do appreciate the textural components of the classic salad, so I wasn't overwhelmed by the molecular gastronomy version, despite the fun of the squirt of liquid cheese.
We must have still been in shock from the wonder that had just been on our plates, because when the waiters brought over a tray of ham and some bread covered with a crushed tomato topping, we all looked slightly confused and almost disappointed. But, as I said before, this is where some history would have helped our appreciation of the food in front of us. This 'plate of ham' is actually a trio of cured Jamon Serrano, Jamon Iberico, and Jamon Iberico de Bellot, some of the best cured meats in Spain. In fact, I understand that you can't even get some of this stuff anywhere else in the United States. Had I known I was eating the "creme of the ham crop", I think I would have scarfed it with a bit more consideration than "let's finish this and get the plate out of the way so we can try that other stuff!" And that 'plain-old' tomato bread is actually a traditional and beloved Catalan dish, called Pa'amb tomaquet. Despite my ignorance of its roots and purpose on my table, I did take the time to thoroughly enjoy the pa'amb tomaquet, mostly due to my preference for baked goods. I might have been the only one at the table to notice the amazing little pockets of butter running throughout the chewy bread, which was nicely balanced with the soft, sweet and salty tomato topping. Nothing fancy here on the surface, but YUM. I do give credit to any restaurant with awesome bread.
Speaking of fancy, and in this case by fancy I actually mean extraordinary, our next dish was a modern play on the popular Philly Cheesesteak, and OH MY GOODNESS...
I've never actually had a normal Philly Cheesesteak, nor have I really cared to, and now I can't imagine that I'd ever want a Philly Cheeseteak that didn't come from The Bazaar (by Jose Andres). These mini sandwich bites are so far beyond "normal", and might have been the overwhelming favorite dish of the night, the one thing we kept talking about long after we finished eating. "How the heck did they do that?" Airbread, liquid cheddar cheese, and Wagyu beef. Fancy. Delicious. Amazing.
Personal preference definitely still plays a part here. I went into this entire meal expecting to love everything. I didn't love the seared chicken with dates, but not because it wasn't wonderful (it was actually a favorite among my co-eaters). The chicken is indeed beautifully seared and pairs well with the sweet, tender dates (which I did enjoy), and is placed delicately over a sea of mustard. I hate mustard. I get queasy thinking about mustard. I did dive into this dish with an open mind; after all, if anyone could get me to eat mustard, it would be Jose Andres. Incidentally, Jose Andres cannot get me to eat mustard.
Possibly the weirdest thing we ate all night was cotton candy covered foie gras. It's clever because of the playfulness of emotion that goes along with eating it. You get a blob of sweet cotton candy that's inevitably too big to fit in your mouth, but you try to shove it in anyway just like you did when you were a kid. Once you reach the center, you get a mouthful of cold, smooth foie gras (duck liver), which you certainly wouldn't have touched as a kid. Foie gras is interesting to me. I haven't quite figured out if people actually think it tastes good, or if they eat it because it's the ultimate indication of culinary sophistication.
We were showered with food for nearly three hours. The "corn-on-the-cob" is actually a plate of baby corn, artfully crafted such that each bite tastes a little bit different - sweet, salty, buttery - to ultimately give you the feeling of eating an ear of perfectly cooked corn-on-the-cob. The tuna ceviche wrapped in cool avocado is light and delicate and probably very popular. The wild mushroom rice, similar to risotto, is rich and creamy and deliciously comforting amidst the bizarre and confusing flavors dancing around the table in other dishes. The Wagyu beef cheeks, possibly the most tender meat I've ever had, are nicely accompanied by sweet and sour clementines, and are carefully topped with a touch of sea salt to provide a surprising crunch of flavor. The watermelon and tomato skewers might have been surprisingly delightful had we not previously been introduced to the unique combination of flavors, admittedly in a slightly more delicious preparation, in a different restaurant. Don't get me wrong, they were still delightful here, just not suprisingly so.
We waited 10 minutes near the end of our meal for our last plate, uni (sea urchin) buns, so by the time we got them, the anticipation was so high that they really had very little chance to wow me. Given the amount of wow I had already experienced that night, I had very little wow left in me, and needed to save some wow for dessert! They did come in a really adorable bamboo steamer basket that I wished I'd had a big enough purse to steal. Again, personal preference here, but I wished my bun had come without uni. I tried to love it, but unfortunately, I don't love uni even wrapped in a sweet, squishy bun. To me it tastes too much like the ocean, and yes, I realize that's because it is indeed from the ocean, but I much prefer my seafood to not instantly remind me of the many times I've been unpleasantly slammed in the face by crashing waves of salt water. The sea urchin aficionados at my table did point out that this particular instance of sea urchin was actually not too salt-watery...what do I know?!?!
On the verge of bursting, we were all very excited when the waiter told us we'd be moving into the Patisserie for our dessert. YES! The Patisserie is the cute little area of the restaurant that home to this precious masterpiece:
Eager to see what sweetness Jose Andres (or his pastry chef) had in store for us, we plopped ourselves at our dessert table to check out the menu, and promptly ordered some beverages to accompany our desserts. If you're going all out anyway, dessert must come with coffee (I prefer espresso), but beware, it's VERY bitter...probably something most of us Americans are not at all used to. They also serve Absynthe, by the way, if you're brave (don't all rush there right now, it's not the full-proof crazy stuff).
The dessert menu is splattered with candies, bon bons, and other bite-sized treats in addition to their full-sized small-plate (confusing, right?) desserts. My decision, of course, could certainly not be made without knowing what the desserts looked like. Fortunately, they have this:
...the dessert bar (did I not say I'd come back to this three times?)! The bon bons, candies, cookies, cakes, and plated desserts sit prettily under their glass domes on this heavenly display. The glass domes really serve two purposes here: visual effect, and protecting the delicate candies from droolers. It's also incredibly difficult to put your face up against the glass if it's dome-shaped (as opposed to normal dessert counters, many of which fall victim to nose-prints as well as finger-prints!) After two trips to the dessert bar (for me at least), we finally decided on the nitro dessert (of course), a tres chocolate mousse, and an apple bread pudding with saffron sauce.
Our dessert took an extraordinarily long time to come out, and our dessert waiter was nice enough to bring us a plate of candies and a cone-full of chocolate pop rocks! They immediately transport you back to your childhood, but you're happier than you were back then because now they come in chocolate!
The nitro dessert, actually called Nitro Coconut Floating Island, was "nitro-ed" in the back, so we didn't get to oooh and ahhh. The coconut dome tastes a bit like frozen cool-whip (this is not a bad thing, but not something I needed to go to Beverly Hills for), and sits atop some bananas and a sea of passion fruit and vanilla sauce. Light and sweet, it's a nice finish to a big meal. BUT it's not chocolate (there is no competition between chocolate and nitro in my book)...
The SLS Tres Chocolate Mousse has THREE chocolates, well three layers of mousse, and is topped with chocolate crunchies and served with a pipette of chocolate sauce that you can either drizzle over your dessert, or aim straight into your mouth (which I did because I wasn't trying to impress anyone that night). What's not to love?
Apples "Carlotta" is a delicate apple flavored bread pudding, served with a saffron sauce that I wish they would have just brought to the table in a cup...I would have poured it over my Tres Chocolate Mousse.
I made one last trip to the dessert bar to debate the purchase of take-home goodies. I made the wrong decision and left empty-handed. I was incredibly intrigued by the mini chocolate chip cookies. Not because there is anything intriguing about a small chocolate chip cookie, BUT because I happen to make THE best chocolate chip cookies ever, and I sometimes wonder if I might one day meet my match (not including my mother whose recipe I use). Afraid to be outdone, I did not get the cookies at the Patisserie at The Bazaar by Jose Andres. Please, someone buy some and tell me how they are.
The Bazaar by Jose Andres is certainly not just a place to get a good meal, but a place to go for a completely unique and bewildering experience that you shouldn't miss if you have a couple hundred dollars to spend on dinner. I say a couple hundred not because you're going to spend all of that on food and drinks, but because I personally felt the need to make a charitable donation (in my case Haiti disaster relief) prior to spending an exhorbitant amount of money on a fancy meal. If nothing else, it helps cope with the inevitable accusation, "You spent how much on a meal? Don't you know there are starving children in (fill in the blank)?", which you could promptly follow up with, "I took care of them before we left...have YOU donated yet, cheapo?"
