Chez Panisse (Part II), Berkeley
Greetings, friends! It’s holiday season and you know what that means… it’s time to break out the elastic waist pants and start dialing for reservations at my favorite restaurants! This past weekend we ventured to Chez Panisse for a special holiday dinner. (I’ll make up any excuse to go there.) Our first experience at Chez Panisse in August was near perfect (the raviolli fritti was a bit dry) and I was really looking forward to another flawlessly executed meal. Right when we walked in, I knew we were in for another great experience. (Of course! We’re at Chez Panisse!) Something about the people and lighting of the place really makes you feel at ease and really ready to enjoy a great meal.
Before we were seated at our table, we were led upstairs to wait at the bar for just a few minutes. Like last time, I ordered with a fruit soda which consisted of sour cherry syrup and sparkling water. My goodness, this was really good! (I think last time I had the elderflower soda which was equally refreshing.) Sounds strange, but oddly I really look forward to trying the different sodas here. They’re small, so you won’t feel too full before dinner. Here comes the host, let’s head off to dinner downstairs!
On the menu:
An apertif: some sort of sweet cognac concoction that was really quite tasty. Rei didn’t like it so I glady drank his too (3*).
Goat cheese and herb souffle with rocket salad (3* souffle - good, but I was expecting something really marvelous, 4* salad - hard to tell with just a few rocket leaves but the dressing left me wanting to lick the plate)
Cioppino with local fish and Dungeness crab (3*). I was really looking forward to a more traditional tomato based cioppino, but this was really good too, especially the clams and mussels. The crab and fish were a bit tasteless though… surprisingly.
<<At this point in the meal, Rei and I started talking about how our first visit to Chez Panisse was seemingly much better. Enter the main entree and we quickly ate our words…>>
Grilled Sonoma County Poultry Guinea hen with Rhone wine sauce, green garlic and young leek risotto, and chantrelles (4.5*). Wow!! I’ve never had better chicken/Guinea hen, whatever the differnce may be. This consisted of grilled breast meat and roasted leg meat, both with super crispy skin under a velvety wine sauce. Perfection, ahhh.
Apple quince puff pastry tartlet with muscat sabayon (4.5*). Again, simple but just right. The pastry was not too sweet, not too fruity, and the sabayon added the right amount of creaminess without overpowering the tartlet. Rei really loved this and inhaled his plate in about 3 seconds.
Oh, and don’t forget to finish off the meal with pressed coffee for two. Our server even gave us two pieces of raspberry truffle and pistachio cookies!
Since this was a special occassion meal, we brought a bottle of a great Pinot Noir we discovered at Duckhorn Vineyards in Napa - Goldeneye 2003, Anderson Valley. Not sure, but I think this may have been a single vintage (my memory fails me, especially after two consecutive days of wine tasting). I wish we had purchased more than just the six bottles we left with. These babies go fast!
If you haven’t tried Chez Panisse, do make an effort to swing by at some point. I’m convinced that It truly is a great dining experience every time. Even though I may not always love all four of the courses on the menu that night, I feel that perhaps my expectations are too high becuase this place is so talked about and hard to get a reservation at. The prix-fixe dinner is $85pp, plus 17% gratuity, and taxes. Corkage is an additional $25. Not cheap, but this is definitely one of my favorite places to go for a nice treat.
