A guest blog entry from my lovely sister, Erin Cluley
After a fun filled weekend of great food, crazy cocktails, surprise appearances, mustache culture, beer, rain (we Texans loved it), non-100-degree-temps, friends, family, a Sox win...we still had plans for my baby brother’s official 30th birthday dinner on our final night in Chicago.
Reservations were made by John and Wendy months ago for the acclaimed Girl & the Goat restaurant in the West Loop in the Randolph Restaurant Corridor. I had no idea what would be in store. Although, knowing John and Wendy, I was confident that it was going to be interesting. Interesting doesn’t even begin to describe this culinary experience….
In attendance: Dad, Mom, John, Wendy, myself and Clark Turner (John’s friend from college who made a surprise appearance for the Dirty Thirty weekend).
We arrived and as we waited for our table we noted that the atmosphere was great. Spacious but cozy -- and lively but not too loud. We got seated at a great table by the windows at the front of the restaurant. Our resident music critic, Clark Turner, also observed throughout the night that music selections were top notch.
As we sat and perused the menu we came to realize it would be a shared plate experience. Big Papi was a bit skeptical that what was written on the menu was code for something else. “You mean to tell me -- they serve pan fried duck tongues??” But before long, Marty (the soft-spoken, granola-esque young woman who was our server) was at our table, giving us the scoop and guiding us. She knew the menu inside and out and had an easy personality. This is a big deal and we knew we had a winner.
One of our first questions was - can you tell us about the name - Girl & the Goat? Marty informs us that all chef’s like to name things after themselves (wink, wink). Stephanie Izard (you might have seen her on TopChef), is the executive chef. Her last name comes from the name of a mountain goat that lives in the Pyranees Mountains. So there we have “Goat”. Izard then asked a friend to give her words that described her. One of the words was “Drunken”. So the name became “Drunken Goat”. Soon thereafter (but not before press releases went out), they realized that there is a cheese company of the same name. So it was a no-go. Izard (who may or may not have been drunk at the time) walked by a painting in her own home and was inspired. Seen in the restaurant, it is a fantastical painting (a la Tim Burton) of a goat and a girl walking through a field painted in bright vivid colors.
And so the name came - Girl & the Goat.
Our next question - are there really duck tongues served here? Marty informed Papi that, yes, they indeed serve duck tongues and they were about an inch and a half long each (we asked -- she did not just offer up that info). Her advice - order 14 dishes for 6 people. Make notes on one of the menus. First Wendy ordered a nice bottle of Tempranillo that ended up going great with our dishes (two times). Wendy also led the charge of plate selections. It was fun…no one was shy about what sounded good so we all began rattling off what we would like.
Let’s get 1 of the beef tongue! One of this! One of that! In no time, we had a delicious list of 12 selections with two orders of bread.
In no time, the taste extravaganza would begin…our wine came out along with the bread. The bread is made fresh in house. And as a family that loves and adores sauces and condiments, we were happy. Accompanying the sourdough and faccacia like bread was a fresh herb oil (Dad’s favorite), a tomato aioli (Mom’s favorite), a chive yogurt sauce (my favorite) and a sweet onion butter. Warm and yummy -- the perfect start.
First up was the kohlrabi salad with fennel, blueberries, almonds and a ginger dressing. Next squash blossom rangoon. Mom had recently made her own version of squash blossoms. As she was describing them to us, the dish came out…it was great timing! She was excited to see they looked much like hers did!
Each dish was loaded with so many different ingredients that you would never imagine paired together. Sometimes (such as in the chickpea fritters) the relish or salad that was served with the main ingredient was actually the main event. It was fun to try and guess the ingredients in each one. I kept a menu on hand to read back the description as we were eating. Clark and Mom were pro at guessing the ingredients in each dish.
Our mouth watering selections continued to come out….esgargot ravioli with bacon and tamarind-miso sauce, seared tuna with lamb sausage and blueberries, goat chorizo flatbread, roasted cauliflower with pickled peppers, pine nuts and mint, seared scallops with smoked goat, spiced canteloupe and coconut-cucumber salad, braised beef tongue with masa, beef vinaigrette and salsa verde, chickpea fritters with eggplant tomatillo caponata and mozzarella, grilled pork ribs with tomatillo-mushroom slaw and scallion vinaigrette and last but certainly least - the richest dish of them all - oven roasted pig face with a sunny side egg, tamarind, cilantro and potato stix.
The pork ribs were the crowd-pleasing highlight. Even though after EVERY dish, Clark would say, “That one was my favorite”, I think the grilled pork ribs were TRULY his favorite. They were delicious down to the bone. Perfectly grilled on a delightfully textured bed of slaw with mushrooms and a zingy scallion sauce on top. My mouth is watering…
It was sad to see the last dish come out….but we were all feeling comfortably full. BUT it didn’t take long to declare - we can’t NOT order dessert!
Peaches with blue cheese gelato, honey and almonds. The gelato was overlooked at first and then we read that it was blue cheese flavored. John, Clark and I had another go at it and said - WOW. It really was blue cheese flavored!!
We also ordered pork fat dougnuts with honey yogurt and carmelized figs. Crazy weird but delicious.
Marty overheard John mention that his lovely wife is a fan of chocolate. On the house (and with a birthday candle in it) - Marty brought us the bittersweet chocolate with shiitake gelato and toffee crème fraiche.
We sang an off-key happy birthday to brother. He made a wish and blew out the candle. What a perfect end to a perfect weekend in Chi-town.
Thanks Mom and Dad for treating us to this awesome vacay. And thanks to John and Wendy for being the ultimate hosts. Love, love, love.
No comments:
Post a Comment