La Botte - Santa Monica

On a particularly crummy day, after a failed attempt at retail therapy, it became apparent that a nice dinner out would be just what I needed.  To me, trying new restaurants is like taking a mini-vacation; it's always exciting.  A spontaneous dinner trip, much like a spontaneous vacation, can cure a bad mood in a heartbeat, especially if the destination is as fantastic as La Botte.

La Botte was on our list of 'restaurants to try', but we had no idea how or why it got there.  Obviously we put it on the list, but couldn't remember where we'd gotten the hint to do so.   'The List' contains all the big fancy restaurants and the big famous chefs we hear about, and some smaller names that we somehow stumble upon.  Knowing very well that a spontaneous trip to the most popular restaurants would leave us without a table, we opted for the lesser known places, and somehow honed in on La Botte.  I consider us especially lucky to have been able to call the restaurant at 730pm on the evening we intended to dine, and make a reservation for 830pm...and it was Friday night!

We walked in and realized, within a couple minutes, that the reason La Botte was on our list was because it's a Michelin-starred restaurant, as we were informed by a large sign with the marshmallow guy waving and smiling at us.  That's right, the same Michelin that brings us tires for our cars also tells us where to eat and who's who of chefs in restaurant-land.  I find it a bit odd that we take, as gospel, the advice on the best restaurants from a bunch of guys that make tires, but the coveted Michelin star (or two or three stars) is like the Academy Awards for restaurants and chefs, and don't we all run out and watch the Oscar-winning movies after they've been recognized by the illustrious Academy?

Nevertheless, there we were at our first Michelin-starred restaurant, and I have to say, aside from the huge sign, I'd never have gotten the "who's who" feeling from this place.  Not because it wasn't a nice place, but because it was quaint - cute and quiet, with just the rumblings of restaurant, without the noise of the over-dressed, over-excessed crowd of trend-followers.  The decor is simple and lovely  - the room lined with bottles and bottles of wine in a gigantic wooden rack, and tables simply decorated with tea light candles in holders that allowed the light to shine in a sweet pattern on the tablecloth.  The staff is friendly and surprisingly entertaining, goofy almost, which I consider a key ingredient to the experience of eating at La Botte, as so many fine dining establishments train their waitstaff to be uber-professional, which I find stuffy and uncomfortable. 

Everything on the menu sounded incredible, so in order to avoid a drawn-out decision-making session, we opted for the tasting menu.  Yes, it's a lot of food, and yes, it's more expensive, but there's something wonderful about not having to make decisions and something exciting about not knowing what you're going to eat next.  "Please just make my tummy happy, chef.  And yes, we'll have some wine. Red please."

And so our first dish arrived, the cold appetizer - ahi tuna tartar.  Ugh, I thought, tuna tartar is so overdone.  It's lost all sense of intrigue and interest because you find it literally everywhere.  I hoped to be shocked and amazed by this tuna tartar, so I eagerly dipped my fork in the sauce and took a small bite of tartar.  Shocked and amazed and relieved, I was so happy that my tuna tartar did not have the usual harsh ginger, soy, and wasabi flavoring (and why would it? it's an italian restaurant).  This tartar is sweet with a balsamic reduction and accompanied by smooth avocado puree, and is so pleasant and refreshing to eat.  Topped with an edible flower, it's a beautiful start to an incredible meal.  Still, I would have preferred something a little more unusual, a little more Italian.  But that's what you get for avoiding food decisions!

Next up, our hot appetizer - potato leek soup.  Again, I thought, "soup? really?"  Fortunately, I've been on a leek kick lately and was excited about that aspect at least.  Well...I polished off my soup like it was a snowy day and I had just finished shoveling the driveway (which I've never actually done since I have spent most of my adult life here in sunny california missing the fluffy white winters).  The potato leek soup is not on the regular menu, but was a special at the restaurant for the day.  So lucky were we to have gotten such a wonderful off-menu item that we may or may not be able to get ever again. 

Our first pasta dish, a clone of which is currently underway in our kitchen, was a plateful of the most scrumptious gnocchi imaginable accompanied by some incredible flavorful chanterelle mushrooms.  Another off-menu item, which is quite unfortunate, because it is likely one of the best things I've ever eaten (are you listening, Food Network producers of 'The Best Thing I Ever Ate'?)  The tasty little pillow-like gnocchi are lighter and fluffier than I ever thought they could be.  The chanterelles are rich and earthy, but the powerful flavors are restrained enough to play the supporting-actor role to the subtle pasta, allowing the gnocchi to shine in a starring role.  Truly incredible. (FYI...the attempted clone in my kitchen was very good, but not quite La Botte-tastical).

The second pasta dish (two pastas is better than one!) was the pistachio pappardelle with braised lamb ragout, a regular menu item.  This one had a tough act to follow with the gnocchi, but still, it was very good.  I had a bit of a difficult time picking out the pistachio flavor beneath the pronounced lamb flavor.  I generally find that lamb has such a strong flavor that any subtly in accompanying flavors, like pistachio, gets completely overpowered and lost to the meat.  A touch of saltiness might have helped a bit, possibly in the form of parmesano-reggiano generously grated over the top (which the waiter offerred but never returned with).

So...these are all generously sized dishes here.  I'm not talking one or two noodles.  Each of these pasta dishes could have been a nice-sized meal, but we got two, and then a main dish.  By the time the meat came, we were stuffed, but the waiter so enthusiastically shoved plates of meat in front of us and informed us that the main dish was spectacular this evening.  Wagyu beef with chanterelle mushrooms (it must have been chanterelle day at the farmer's market) and roasted artichokes.  Wagyu beef, also known as kobe beef, is well-known for its intense marbling which enhances the flavor and tenderness of the meat.  This was my first wagyu/kobe experience, and I was amazed at how tender the meat was.  The accompanying flavors are quite similar to the gnocchi with the same chanterelle earthiness, but this dish feels much heavier given the intensity of the meat.  Perhaps it was the fact that we'd just polished two plates of pasta, a bowl of soup, and some tartar.  I forced the last biteful of wagyu and prayed that my dessert would still fit.

Sometimes I wish I went out just for dessert.  It is my favorite part of the meal, but I am almost always stuffed to the brim by dessert time.  I commend the chef at La Botte for his choice of dessert to finish off our tasting.  The light and sweet berry sorbet is completely refreshing, and the token chocolate dessert, made with special European chocolate, is creamy, rich and indulgent; a perfect pair of sweet treats to finish of a remarkable meal!

I waddled out of La Botte, plopped myself in the car, unbuttoned my pants for the ride home, and promptly proclaimed, "...so that's what a Michelin star tastes like!"

Pizzeria Mozza - Mozza2Go

Mario Batali is a genius.  Who else can get away with wearing orange crocs around?  This guy has given me a new re-found appreciation and a completely new perspective on Italian cuisine (not to be mistaken with Italian food - meatballs, lasagna, spaghetti).  Combine his talent working with fresh ingredients straight from Italy, most of which I've never heard of, with the amazing bread-working talent of Nancy Silverton (and also Joe Bastianich who often partners with Mario), and voila, you have the best pizza ever made...and Pizzeria Mozza, the smallest and busiest, but by far the best, pizza joint I've ever seen.

I've been twice now (required reservations both times), first long before this blog was born, and most recently in a more unusual fashion.  We actually made reservations for a wine class the restaurant was holding in the back room (closet).  They bring in the restaurant wine-director and six types (three white, three red) of wine that come straight from winemakers in a specific region of Italy, this time the Trentino-Alto Adige region, which is somewhere in northern Italy.  Of course, the whole point is to taste the wine, but they don't just give you a tiny tasting pour you'd get in Napa Valley, they poured almost half a glass of each wine.  Clearly, this is meant for people that don't get tipsy after half a glass, as you're expected to comment on and identify components of the different wines.  Given that this is not something I'm not yet sophisticated enough to accomplish even sober, I sipped my wine, nodded my head and smiled, letting myself go ahead and get tipsified.

Finally, I thought, they brought in some "antipasti" to demonstrate food pairing with the different wines - apples, asparagus, and speck (prosciutto-ish).  I really don't know if my judgement was yet altered when we received our food pairings, but I could swear those are the best apples I've ever had.  I think they had pepper on them actually...confusing, I know, but really they were amazing apples.  The asparagus was also phenominal, but that's because it was wood-grilled and topped with grated Italian cheese (not the parmesan substance that comes in a green carton at the grocery store, or even the stuff they dump on your plate using that turny thing at Olive Garden).

That was all to pair with the white wines, I later learned.  Red wine time = pizza time!  They generously plopped fresh wild mushroom and cheese pizzas on our table.  Funghi misti, fontina, taleggio & thyme, according to the menu.  Yum, according to me.  I don't care if there's funghi on my pizza when it tastes this good. They use shiitake mushrooms, button mushrooms, and a constantly changing third mushroom (we think this time it was oyster), along with a combination of cheeses, providing a perfect balance of sharp and earthy savory flavors.  The crispy wood-fired crust is absolutely amazing, and as the crust is my favorite part of all pizza, I was thrilled with the flavor and texture of this crust. 

As if we hadn't already had enough, we decided that some pizzas to go would be most necessary.  Since I didn't anticipate the need for more pizzas two weeks prior, we knew we wouldn't get a seat in the dining room, but thanks to the nextdoor Mozza2Go, we could order a couple Mario/Joe/Nancy amazing pizzas, wait 20 minutes and head home to gorge ourselves in the privacy of our home with our friends, and a cheap bottle of Trader Joes wine.  Ok, so the drive, with a detour, is long enough for us that we had to reheat the pizzas when we got home.  Nancy kindly leaves a note on reheating, pleading "Please do not microwave my pizza. Place in the oven at 350 for 12 minutes and enjoy!" (By the way, Pizzeria Mozza is kinda near Wilshire, and if you go far enough west on Wilshire, there's a Sprinkles - the detour I mentioned.  I did make this case and we did get cupcakes. That's what you do when friends are coming over...it's only appropriate.)

The first time we visited Mozza, someone nearby had a sausage pizza and the entire room filled with the incredible aroma of fresh fennel.  Desperate to try the homemade fennel sausage, we ordered the fennel sausage, panna (italian cream), red onion & scallions pizza, and the Coach farm goat cheese, leeks, scallions, garlic & bacon pizza because it sounded amazing.  Both are fantastic.  The fennel sausage is homemade, and therefore definitely worth trying, but sausage isn't usually my favorite pizza topping, and this didn't really change that for me.  The goat cheese, leeks, garlic and bacon pizza, however, might have changed my life.  This is a fantastic combination of ingredients, flavor and texture, and executed so perfectly, complete with lightly charred edges on the ridiculously thinly sliced vegetables and the crispy crust.

The only real trouble with Mozza2Go is that you can't order the gelatos they serve in the dining room.  It's a real shame, too, because they have the best gelato I've ever had.  Besides just the gelato, they do have a much more extensive menu in the dining room than on the 2Go menu, so if you absolutely need bone marrow or some other weird delicacy, make some reservations well ahead of time at Pizzeria Mozza!

Wurstkuche

When my boyfriend asked if I wanted to go to Wurstkuche, I was slightly offended. "What the heck are you talking about?"  As it turns out, Wurstkuche is the place he'd just gone with his friends for beer, fries, and sausages.  Sounded like a guy place to me, but then he showed me the menu (he sure does know how to sway me with food), and I was, at the very least, intrigued.  Actually, the menu is quite simple - sausage, beer, fries.  The list of sausages is huge, full of unusual combinations of meats and vegetables (rattlesnake and rabbit...if that even sounds good to you), and a few regulars that we know and love (good ol' bratwurst).  Equally astounding is the extensive list of German and Belgian beers ON TAP.  But it wasn't really the sausages or the beer that caught my attention, it was the fries...more specifically, it was the description I got of the thick, crunchy, salty Belgian twice-fried fries and a mouth-watering blue cheese walnut and bacon dipping sauce.  "Mmm...when can we go?"

Saturday for lunch!  Lunch is an interesting time for sausage, fries, and beer, but I've heard that at any other time (namely dinner time), Wurstkuche is jam-packed.  After all, where else do people go for sausage and beer?  The restaurant is situated in the heart of downtown Los Angeles, so a daytime trip is certainly easier for parking purposes, and less scary for me.  I'll admit that I was somewhat skeptical walking into Wurstkuche and really for the first two thirds of the way in.  The entrance is a bit like a deli, you walk in and are greeted by a glass case full of uncooked sausage...every girl's dream, right?  You order at the front counter, take a number, and then walk through a long, dark, scary hallway to get to the place with the tables, where the light finally shines! 

In hindsight, yes, 'dark and scary' seems overly drammatic, but really, you never know what to expect from a downtown LA sausage place.  And it really is a quite drammatic change in atmosphere once you enter the great dining room, which is bright and cheery, and filled with long wooden tables with benches and little cafe tables with sitting stools.  Having never been to Germany myself, I took the liberty of imagining this is what it must be like to be in a restaurant/bar in Germany.

We picked a small table on the outskirts of the restaurant, and I promtly kicked my feet up on a stool (because it's that kind of place), and took a big sigh and bigger sip of my giant $5 Franziskaner beer, which was actually quite delicious, especially since it's rare to find such an inexpensive beer that's not served in a can in Los Angeles (happy hour excluded from this generalization).

I was completely happy before our food even arrived (ok...maybe tipsy), but the addition of some sausages and fries to our table was very warmly welcomed.  We ended up with three different sausages to try, and an order of THE fries with blue cheese walnut bacon dipping sauce.  My immediate reaction was something to the effect of "Yeah...we're gonna need some more of that blue cheese bacon stuff"...

I like to save the best for last, so I'll start with the sausages.  I forgot to mention the fact that ordering these sausages was incredibly difficult...you don't just decide on the type of sausage, you have to also decide on which two toppings (choice of caramelized onions, sweet peppers, spicy peppers, saurkraut) should be on top.  If you're not a sausage aficionado, this is a difficult task.  In any case, for us, Sausage #1 was duck and bacon with jalapenos topped with caramelized onions and sweet peppers; Sausage #2 was alligator and pork smoked andouille also topped with caramelized onions and sweet peppers; and Sausage #3 was kielbasa with saurkraut which we ordered specifically for the saurkraut pairing.

Sausage Observation #1: Those aren't caramelized onions, they're sauteed onions.  Yes, there's a difference.  Caramelized onions are caramel colored and oh-so-sweet.  I don't necessarily mind sauteed onions, but please don't tease me with a caramelized option if it's not actually thoroughly caramelized.  And the onions and peppers overpower the sausage just a bit.  Not that the sausages aren't completely flavorful, because they are, but there's a bit too much going on with the onions and peppers.  Simple might be better in this case.

Sausage Observation #2: Great buns (that's what she said?).  They're ever-so-slightly grilled on the outside, but not to the point that they're super crispy and scratch the top of your mouth like a Quiznos sandwich.  Also impeccably executed is the proportion of bun to sausage.  Too often, the buns are way too big or way too thick; in this case, the buns are appropriately sized with a thickness that serves the purpose of holding the sausage and adding a nice bready taste, rather than smothering the sausage and forcing a giant mouthful of bread.

The sausages themselves were quite good too.  They do a nice job of preserving the flavor of the unique meats while ensuring the typical burst of spice and flavor you expect from your sausages.  The duck, bacon, and jalapeno sausage has a very unique fresh flavor, likely from the jalapenos themselves, but the flavor of the duck meat is still distinct.  The alligator and pork andouille is hot and spicy and tastes just like your typical andouille, but there's an obvious and interesting twist provided by the gator meat. 

The kielbasa was our safety net sausage and, after the wild-and-craziness of the "exotic" sausages, was much appreciated.  This perfectly executed classic turned out to be my absolute favorite of the sausages.  The balance of bun to meat to saurkraut is so nearly perfect it almost made me want to put mustard on it (which I never in a million years would expect to do).

Now, as I said, best for last - Belgian Fries. Wow.  I might never care to eat another McDonald's french fry again.  I'd never seen a fry crisped quite as dark as these (not burned, twice fried), but that's where all of the flavor is.  Well, that and the sea salt crystals that appear to be hand-placed on each fry (and gravity-defiant) in a way that provides the perfect amount of salt in each bite.  There is no need for ketchup here.  But, since we had it, we happily dipped into (and by that I mean fought over) the delectable blue cheese walnut bacon dipping sauce.  Scrumptious!  I'd go all the way downtown again just for the fries...and maybe the Franziskaner so I don't get thirsty!

Overall experience: great!  I left my Saturday afternoon lunch ready to plan a trip to Europe for similar but authentic (non-LA-fabricated) experiences.  For now, though, it's certainly cheaper and much more convenient to pop over to Wurstkuche for a pretend escape from the daily LA grind.