Dinner at Manresa

Figured since I posted my Cyrus review, referencing my dinner at Manresa, I should also post my review of Manresa (320 Village Lane, Los Gatos), which I went to two weeks ago.

It always cracks me up when they carefully coordinate to do simultaneous service and simultaneous picking up of dishes. Or when they HAVE to do everything from your left side so they have to walk around the table to do something for each of you. And it's a bit..embarrassing and odd when you get up to go to the bathroom and like six waiters and busboys and maitre'd people all point you towards the bathroom. I guess the appeal of fancy restaurant service kind of goes right over my head. What I do appreciate - prompt service, good pacing of the courses, and Manresa had both.

As for the food, which is what my bf and I really care about... we both loved the amuse bouches, thought they were both very interesting and really tasty. The first was some sort of sweet corn, garden tomato & basil concoction in a wine glass that was super yummy and a really nice combination of flavors. The second was the..arpeggio? served in an egg shell - nice runny yolk, cherry? vinegar and maple syrup - also very tasty and nicely textured. My bf doesn't like egg and he even liked it. The bread was good - really buttery brioche, a good multigrain, and a nice French rustic sourdough. So we were both very enthusiastic to see what came next. Unfortunately the actual main courses were a bit of a disappointment. I got the "from the garden" - a collection of vegetables freshly harvested from the garden that morning and prepared in a mixture of ways, is how it was described to me. What I got seemed more like a little salad with one leaf of each of a bunch of different things and some random other little slices of various vegetables, flowers, and roots. Some were bitter, some were savory, some tasty...it didn't really work for me, especially because I'm really not fond of bitter raw greens. Not what I was really expecting. The bf got the crispy soft shell crab with nectarine, which we both liked - really nice light fry of the soft shell crab which paired well with the nectarine.

Second course, I got the local halibut with crispy mussels. It was again a nice fry on the mussels, but I don't really like mussels themselves and when I got through the nice outside, it still was a mussel inside and eh. The halibut was fine but nothing special. The flavors were all very subtle - subtle to the point of blandness. The bf got the albacore confit, which was also very subtly flavored. He liked it ok but nothing special.

Third course, I got the rack of veal which was ... a bit chewy, kind of fatty, and again kind of bland. It had some crispy potato that was really tasty (they seem to fry things well there), some chanterelles (I think) that almost tasted like butter, and something else that slips my mind. Bf got the porcelet, which had a nice crisp skin but, as he said, smelled better than it tasted.

We liked the intermezzo - coconut tapiocia, yuzu sorbet, and citrus grenadine. The yuzu was really strong, but it was a nice fresh combination of flavors.

Dessert was better than the main courses but not outstanding. I got the "taste of New Orleans" - 3 little beignets, a pecan praline bar type thing, a really well caramelized banana, coffee cream, I forget what flavor ice cream... pretty yummy. Bf got some kind of bittersweet chocolate sorbet (very tasty) with all these dots of various flavored creams - hazelnut, chestnut?, etc. The sorbet was good but some of the other flavors were a bit odd.

They finished off with a small slice of a dense flourless bittersweet chocolate cake, which was good, though I have had better.

Overall, it was an interesting experience and I really did like those amuse bouches but I wasn't as impressed as I'd hoped I'd be. Having now eaten at Cyrus, though, I have to say...I think I might prefer Manresa a bit. Subtle/bland is better than having off-putting flavors. But in general, neither were quite the type of dining experience my bf and I tend to like. Interesting to try once, but...