Monday, August 29, 2005
Coisas do Brasil
Last night I attended a tasting dinner for Riccardo’s new-concept restaurant, a Brazilian café type of place that is estimated to open sometime early next year, if I remember the timeline correctly.
Now, this was my first time over at “R’s,” and I was very happy that Amy thought to invite me, so my anticipation was ramping up all day Sunday prior to the event; not only because I was looking forward to being part of the kewl krew, but because someone (chef Joe from Boston) was actually going to take the time to prepare a handful of Brazilian dishes that I became so accustomed to during my trip there this past winter.
About an hour and a half after the customary caipirinhas (smushed up limes with sugar, sugar cane juice and cachaça) were served, Joe came in with a South American smorgasbord. I didn’t eat the courses in order, but I will do my best to describe the dishes in the order I ended up eating them.
My first plate consisted of two of the fried appetizers and a trio of ceviche – tuna, scallop and shrimp. The tuna turned out tasting a little Asian due to, among other things, the abundance of sesame seeds, but the diced watermelon was a fantastic touch. The scallops was the highlight of the three, and I particularly enjoyed the bite of olive and texture of the radish it was served with – I’m already an addict, and to my taste, I wouldn’t alter a single aspect of this dish (and now I regret not taking a photo in order to recall all the ingredients in this in order to recreate it!).The shrimp ceviche was a great concept, but the execution failed in that the marinade turned out too creamy and overpowered the shrimp and fruit that it was served with. From listening to the conversation at the table, it sounded as though the consensus was that the sauce here was too rich, and there are plans in the works to modify this dish to include lobster instead of the shrimp.
Then there was the fried empanada filled with shrimp (which was pretty forgettable), and a salt cod fritter that resembled a coxinha (deep fried dough normally made with chicken filling) that was absolutely incredible. Perhaps a bit large in size, and apparently coated with panko, this “ball of love” did not resemble the bacalao it was made of, and had not a whiff of fishiness. Really, quite excellent indeed.
My second round of food was a two-part operation. I filled a small dish with a chicken empanada (not as good as the coxinhas I ate at each and every bus station and rest stop in Brazil or, for that matter, at Chris Brazil) and a concoction made with lobster and cheese that was left uneaten save the one sampling bite. This was probably the biggest flop of all the dishes served…the taste of it reminded me of what I would have thought all those Iron Chef liver and roe creations would have tasted like… I’d rather just forget it and continue on with the rest. The last item on this plate was a fried potato and bacalao mix that was really nice, albeit a bit oily. The second part of this two-part operation was filling a bowl with …. and now a drumroll please…..
Ta da! Moqueca of mixed seafood, served with white rice and farofa (seasoned manioc flour).
Ok, here’s the deal. And I thought long and hard about this. How much is my impending criticism a result of comparing what I had once consumed in Brazil, and how much is it a result of the dish itself? I mean, perhaps the moqueca that I had in Arembepe was not really all that good, but it was so good to me because I had never had it before, you know? I, for one, don’t know, but I couldn’t help comparing the two because the differences were so significant.
In and of itself, the moqueca we ate last night was good, but to me, not as good as those I inhaled in Bahia. And this is for a few reasons, the first being that the seafood with which it was made it very difficult to eat – the shrimp was left unpeeled and the crab legs left uncracked, and being that this dish is a very yellow stew, I couldn’t imagine eating this in a restaurant even if I had a crab leg cracker-openers, for fear that I would make a mess of myself. This brings me to my first point: last night’s moqueca was made of user-unfriendly seafood as opposed to the mostly fish fillet moqueca de peixe or the shrimp moqueca de camarão I had in Brazil. Having the fish or shrimp be the main event made the stew more about the seafood and less about the broth, which I felt was the attraction last night – I mean, besides the one shrimp, one calamari ring and one lonely mussel, there just wasn’t much seafood substance, mostly because the crab legs didn’t crack. And here we come to the second point: the shrimp in last night’s stew had a very funky mushy consistency, as if it was cooked way too long. ‘Nuff said. Third point, and perhaps an unfair one: I really missed eating pirão with the moqueca, farofa and rice. It’s a texture thing, like wanting mashed potatoes with steak. Or whipped parsnips with…well, anything. It’s like, you got your hard grain (rice), you got your liquids (stew broth), now you need the gunk (pirão). And pirão is nothing more than the cassava flour mixed with broth from the moqueca and some other yummy ingredients. My fourth (and I think last) point: there was something in last night’s stew that made it less “bright” than those I ate in Brazil. I can’t put my finger on it…was it a lack of lime? Was it just too heavy? I don’t know and I wish I did.
All in all, though, the event was fantastic, the food was fantastic, and the caipifrutas after dinner very yummy indeed. Joe put forth a formidable effort, R was a great host, Amy a great girlfriend, and the guests were a mixed bag of interesting conversation. Couldn’t have asked for more. I’m looking forward to seeing R’s final renditions of the food we ate last night – what he decided to keep, what to scrap and what to modify to match Atlanta’s taste buds. I'll keep ya'll posted!
Now, this was my first time over at “R’s,” and I was very happy that Amy thought to invite me, so my anticipation was ramping up all day Sunday prior to the event; not only because I was looking forward to being part of the kewl krew, but because someone (chef Joe from Boston) was actually going to take the time to prepare a handful of Brazilian dishes that I became so accustomed to during my trip there this past winter.
About an hour and a half after the customary caipirinhas (smushed up limes with sugar, sugar cane juice and cachaça) were served, Joe came in with a South American smorgasbord. I didn’t eat the courses in order, but I will do my best to describe the dishes in the order I ended up eating them.
My first plate consisted of two of the fried appetizers and a trio of ceviche – tuna, scallop and shrimp. The tuna turned out tasting a little Asian due to, among other things, the abundance of sesame seeds, but the diced watermelon was a fantastic touch. The scallops was the highlight of the three, and I particularly enjoyed the bite of olive and texture of the radish it was served with – I’m already an addict, and to my taste, I wouldn’t alter a single aspect of this dish (and now I regret not taking a photo in order to recall all the ingredients in this in order to recreate it!).The shrimp ceviche was a great concept, but the execution failed in that the marinade turned out too creamy and overpowered the shrimp and fruit that it was served with. From listening to the conversation at the table, it sounded as though the consensus was that the sauce here was too rich, and there are plans in the works to modify this dish to include lobster instead of the shrimp.
Then there was the fried empanada filled with shrimp (which was pretty forgettable), and a salt cod fritter that resembled a coxinha (deep fried dough normally made with chicken filling) that was absolutely incredible. Perhaps a bit large in size, and apparently coated with panko, this “ball of love” did not resemble the bacalao it was made of, and had not a whiff of fishiness. Really, quite excellent indeed.
My second round of food was a two-part operation. I filled a small dish with a chicken empanada (not as good as the coxinhas I ate at each and every bus station and rest stop in Brazil or, for that matter, at Chris Brazil) and a concoction made with lobster and cheese that was left uneaten save the one sampling bite. This was probably the biggest flop of all the dishes served…the taste of it reminded me of what I would have thought all those Iron Chef liver and roe creations would have tasted like… I’d rather just forget it and continue on with the rest. The last item on this plate was a fried potato and bacalao mix that was really nice, albeit a bit oily. The second part of this two-part operation was filling a bowl with …. and now a drumroll please…..
Ta da! Moqueca of mixed seafood, served with white rice and farofa (seasoned manioc flour).
Ok, here’s the deal. And I thought long and hard about this. How much is my impending criticism a result of comparing what I had once consumed in Brazil, and how much is it a result of the dish itself? I mean, perhaps the moqueca that I had in Arembepe was not really all that good, but it was so good to me because I had never had it before, you know? I, for one, don’t know, but I couldn’t help comparing the two because the differences were so significant.
In and of itself, the moqueca we ate last night was good, but to me, not as good as those I inhaled in Bahia. And this is for a few reasons, the first being that the seafood with which it was made it very difficult to eat – the shrimp was left unpeeled and the crab legs left uncracked, and being that this dish is a very yellow stew, I couldn’t imagine eating this in a restaurant even if I had a crab leg cracker-openers, for fear that I would make a mess of myself. This brings me to my first point: last night’s moqueca was made of user-unfriendly seafood as opposed to the mostly fish fillet moqueca de peixe or the shrimp moqueca de camarão I had in Brazil. Having the fish or shrimp be the main event made the stew more about the seafood and less about the broth, which I felt was the attraction last night – I mean, besides the one shrimp, one calamari ring and one lonely mussel, there just wasn’t much seafood substance, mostly because the crab legs didn’t crack. And here we come to the second point: the shrimp in last night’s stew had a very funky mushy consistency, as if it was cooked way too long. ‘Nuff said. Third point, and perhaps an unfair one: I really missed eating pirão with the moqueca, farofa and rice. It’s a texture thing, like wanting mashed potatoes with steak. Or whipped parsnips with…well, anything. It’s like, you got your hard grain (rice), you got your liquids (stew broth), now you need the gunk (pirão). And pirão is nothing more than the cassava flour mixed with broth from the moqueca and some other yummy ingredients. My fourth (and I think last) point: there was something in last night’s stew that made it less “bright” than those I ate in Brazil. I can’t put my finger on it…was it a lack of lime? Was it just too heavy? I don’t know and I wish I did.
All in all, though, the event was fantastic, the food was fantastic, and the caipifrutas after dinner very yummy indeed. Joe put forth a formidable effort, R was a great host, Amy a great girlfriend, and the guests were a mixed bag of interesting conversation. Couldn’t have asked for more. I’m looking forward to seeing R’s final renditions of the food we ate last night – what he decided to keep, what to scrap and what to modify to match Atlanta’s taste buds. I'll keep ya'll posted!
