Saturday, January 5, 2008

We had dinner at La Broche, probably Madrid's top restaurant, which is at the forefront of the foam revolution. The interior is dramatic, all white, with even the windows covered with white fabric so the only color in the whole room comes from the food. The chef, Sergi Arola, used to work at El Bulli outside Barcelona, usually voted the best restaurant in the world. Service is very competent, friendly but definitely maintaining a reverential attitude toward the food. Every aspect of the meal service has been rethought, like the bread service pictured here, really thin strips of crisp bread with various sauce options. We had the tasting menu, which was full of interesting twists and turns. He takes foams to the logical extreme, pictured here, since foams usually accompany the main food but he serves plates of foam alone. And the green soup dish is sure to be a stoli favorite, a hunk of sea urchin surrounded by algae with a dollop of green pea ice cream to finish it off. Somchai was universally wowed by the food, while I loved the inventiveness, but a couple of the dishes didn't quite work for me. This of course is to be expected at this kind of avant garde restaurant, so overall a very strong recommendation. (Food-19, Decor-16, Service-17).

















3 comments:

Anonymous said...

hey, i fry up that dish for joe every st paddy's day, with a side of ham....oh, wait.

doesn't seem appealing, obviously.

Anonymous said...

You mean El Bulli outside of Barcelona don't you boys?

Yum.

Anonymous said...

Is that you Michael?? Anyway, yes, you are correct. I'd go in and change it right now but I'm in Manila and leaving this comment took me over an hour, so I'll wait until I get back to civilization before I make the correction. But good catch!