Rudder and I have a new candidate for Most Romantic Restaurant in Town (actually, just outside town). We've been to a lot of the other candidates, and though we've been impressed with some, we never thought they were as romantic as billed. At some, Rudder hasn't been impressed with the food - he's not a big fan of cuisine that attempts the unusual just to be unusual, or puts sweet sauces on all the meats or that doesn't provide enough food to be filling. (He's not just a meat-and-potatoes man; he's more adventurous an eater than thatt, but I think he wants those basics fulfilled before a chef starts trying to get fancy.) At others, the atmosphere hasn't been terribly conducive to romance.
For some specific examples, at Wrigley Mansion, I liked my meal, but Rudder didn't like his food at all. The mansion itself is beautiful and the view from its hilltop is amazing, but we didn't have a view at the table, and the room layout was very open so that we didn't feel secluded from other tables. At T. Cook's, the food was excellent (my journal entry from that day says I had lobster tortellini and he had a steak) but the atmosphere was romantic only if you believe that anything French Provincial is so by definition. Actually I'd call the decor "French barn"; we loved the look of the building and would like a house designed that way, but it was light and open, with again, no seclusion from other tables. The worst for romance may be Fleming's. We've been there several times, because they have the best steaks in town and one of the best wine selections. The room is darkened, with wine displayed around the walls and the service is always good. However, they also have a high noise level and a TV at the bar that faces into (and can be heard from) the restaurant. Maybe it's just me, but I consider "TV" and "romance" to be antonyms.
OK, so. On Friday night we went out to celebrate Rudder's annual bonus, and had decided to try a place I'd heard about in the Indian reservation just south of us. The restaurant is Kai, located int he Sheraton Wild Horse Pass resort. The chef (Janos Wilder) is classically trained but is mindful of his surroundings; using local products and influences in every dish. The servers were all attentive and well educated, and took care to point out the vegetables that were raised for the restaurant in a project at nearby schools, and the other local and traditional ingredients. The presentation of the food was also impressive, though the chef did fall prey to the Tower of Pisa shool of thought a bit too much. That's the one in which all food must apparent be somehow guided into a round shape and then piled up so that all flavors are layered. It does generally end up leaning, at least after the first bite.
The obligatory list of what we ate:
For appetizers, Rudder had butter-braised lobster with tear-drop tomatoes and avocado mousse (unexpectedly tasty) and something or other else I forgot. (See, you can tell it's a fancy place because the appetizers had their own little side dishes.) I had baby greens in pomegranate vinaigrette. Even the greens were round and vertical, in three little bouquets sprouting from rings of beetroot. On the side was a thinly sliced tiny pear no bigger than an olive and a bit of something unidentifiable and slightly sweet, with a texture partway between cornbread and granola bar.
For dinner, he had a buffalo tenderloin (there was sweet sauce, but it was drizzled in a thin ring around the platter, so the meat wasn't marinated in it and I had salmon and lobster. The salmon was rolled into three roulades with wilted spinach with slivers of mushroom on top of each, all sitting on lobster tabouleh, with a lobster claw perched atop the whole thing. For dessert, Rudder had Kahlua ice cream with whipped cream and cherries on more fry bread - fry bread is a traditional Navajo (and, I think, Pima) food and apparently the recipe used there came form their baker's grandmother. I had three types of not-too-sweet sorbet (one was strawberry-chipotle) with slices of grapefruit between.
The food quality was definitely there, and the sense of place added by the local ingredients and recipes added to the experience. So did the Navajo flute music playing quietly int he background. As for romance, we were seated at a small table by a window, from which we could look over two pools, a lake and part of a golf course to see the sun set over the Estrella mountains. The room was open, with no division between tables, but the low light and the few tables in the place kept it feeling intimate. The wine list was also fairly detailed. Nothing on it looked terribly unusual, but the Karralaa Shiraz we had was very good. We'll definitely be going back - not soon, because the price was an fancy as the food, but we'll be going back. (Of course, just because this place gets our vote for Most ROmantic, don't think we didn't have the usual geeky conversations about flying or whatever.)
The resort the restaurant is in in very nice, too; it's very careful to be appropriate to its place, with little plaques explaining ornaments of design features (one wall is designed to replicate one at the Casa Grande National Monument, not far away). It's only about 15 minutes from our house, so definitely seems like a good place to go for a glass of wine of an evening - or a spa weekend, if I had some spare cash and could talk Rudder into it.
Posted by dichroic at February 28, 2005 01:18 PM