Touich Again: Awesome Family Owned Joint in Siem Reap; Free Jeep Ride

Touich Restaurant
3 km outside center of town center: call ahead at 092 80 80 40 - 012 99 57 83 or email touich.restaurant @ gmail.com
Siem Reap, Cambodia


Touich, a small Khmer restaurant set in Siem Reap's back alleys, has gained something of a cult following since I was last there in February. Owned by an English speaking and charmingly eccentric Battambang family, this surprisingly hip little joint is probably my favorite in Siem Reap. If you call ahead to make reservations, the restaurant will send a 1940's era military jeep to pick you up at your hotel, which is all kinds of fun.



Touich specializes in sea bass baked with salt and stuffed with ginger. Although fish is often suspect in Siem Reap, they know where to source it, and it's fresh and good. The waitress will skillfully fillet the fish then serve it to you at your table, after cracking the salt crust - it's served with a spicy chili sauce. Beware bones, as is the case in Asia.



This grilled pork rib with barbeque sauce was excellent and tender. So much so that my Southern father had to ask about the provenance of the pig from whence it came. "It was a very big," the restaurant co-owner said. "It won an award, actually. I think it was around 500 pounds." Well, that explains a lot. One enormous pork chop. He told us that super-size pigs are often raised in Buddhist pagodas here and raised until they attain truly monstrous proportions, when they are sold off. Both spiritually sound and delicious, I suppose.



Stir-fried squid with Kampot pepper is a perennial Cambodian favorite (in a country amply blessed with both tender cephalopods and fresh pepper) and was very good here, in a slightly sweet sauce with the very unique bite of fresh green pepper. I will miss fresh green pepper very much in the event of my leaving Cambodia. There's nothing quite like it.

Westerners who aren't from the Deep South usually are highly disinterested in eating frog, but you should really give the Cambodian frogs a try. These fat, placid beasts really DO taste like chicken, and it's worth navigating around the small, delicate bones.



Touich stir-fries the frog with ginger and some herbs. Frog is also good barbecued on a skewer. Don't knock the local protein source. Further: my mighty Louisiana ancestors have been noshing on these things straight out of the swamp for many generations right alongside Cambodia, so I'm the last to get all snooty.



Chicken soup with lemon is Cambodian comfort food, and something I eat a lot when sick, not-super hungry, or just feel like a simple meal. The tangy broth is accented with ginger and some very subtle fresh herbs, and is really refreshing after a long, hot day of touristing around the temples. I like to toss some white rice into mine for extra texture.

There's a pretty impressive wine list and a "wine rack" presided over by the Wine God. Mostly French stuff - we went with a fruity French white.

Sidenote: Touich plays awesome music. Bob Dylan, Beirut, Sinatra and Delta blues were all on the playlist when we visited.

Don't miss Touich for a fun dinner experience in Siem Reap. Scorn the massive tourist restaurants, and come for the free jeep ride and a good meal instead.

Really Really French Food at The Wine Restaurant - in Phnom Penh

The Wine Restaurant
Street 19 (Right off Street 240)
Telephone: 023 223 527
Phnom Penh, Cambodia

The obviously named Wine Restaurant is a popular oasis for French expats, who enjoy the large wine selection, highly French-ified menu, and nice, open dining area. Most Phnom Penh residents hit up the Wine Restaurant for its high value $10 three course lunches, which I can verify are very nice: goat cheese toasts with salad, boeuf bourguignon, and strawberry sorbet, all nicely prepared and at a rock-bottom sum.

A very pleasant amuse bouche of puff pastry filled with shrimp in cream sauce.

Things get a lot more expensive at night, which is when my visiting parents charitably took Phill and I to the restaurant. Everything is both ala-carte and exceptionally French, although Kampot pepper sneaks into the menu. There's an emphasis on steaks, cream sauces, fresh seafood, foie gras, and cheese - and, obviously, the wine accompaniments to such delicacies. Good news is we were feeling hungry.

My father and I shared an appetizer of seared foie gras with fruit compote, over a salad. Foie gras is an elemental, slightly perverse dish in its all-encompassing richness - you love it, you hate it, you think it's cruel, whatever. I love it, at least in somewhat reasonable quantities, and this was very nice with the slight sweetness of the jammy fruit. It was served with somewhat unpleasantly bitter greens with balsamic, which actually made a nice counterpoint if eaten in tandem with foie and jam. This stuff ain't good for you, but it's certainly warranted every once a while. Well, except for you PETA types. Sorry.

I selected the seared scallops with mushroom sauce. They were presented very attractively, in a circle around a subtle balsamic reduction and a bit butter lettuce with mustardy dressing: the creamy mushroom sauce was served in a small cravet on the side, which I thought was rather clever. A scallop is easily overwhelmed, and allowing the diner to select how much sauce they'd like is a good idea. The sauce itself was a nice, vaguely boozy cream sauce and very nice: it would also suit a steak.

My father, ever the meat lover, ordered a simple rare strip steak with a side of frites - a classic French dish - with a side of red wine sauce. My dad, who knows his way around a steak, reported that it was good, and the red wine sauce was also a serviceable effort. Worthy of particular note are the fries, which are crisp, thin, nicely salted and generally good. Pretty much a requirement in a French restaurant that's actually trying.

Suspicious of Cambodian beef (although I believe they import everything here, as do most expensive restaurants in Phnom Penh - Cambodian beef is stringy), Phill and my mother both ordered the seared duck. This was a seared breast of duck served with a Kampot pepper sauce, some salad, and the aforementioned Good French Fries. Accolades all around: nicely cooked and high quality meat. Duck isn't ultra common in Cambodia, but the good stuff is easy to get: duck herders sell their plucked, fresh off the farm wares on the road to Siem Reap, while duck herders move their charges about in many areas of the countryside.

We finished with fresh passion fruit sorbet with a small wafer cookie in it, perhaps the ideal dessert in Cambodia's climate. Some other French desserts are on offer. I can't remember what they are. Sorry.

The Wine Restaurant is a fine choice for a high-end Gallic meal - with a formidable wine selection - in Phnom Penh. Especially relevant if you have finally tired of fish amok, loc lac, and fried rice, and would really like to eat something incorporating a cream sauce. The dining room is respectfully hushed, while service is on-point and well trained.

All the actual French people seem to filter into the restaurant from 8:30 onwards, so you may have the place to yourself if you come early. An added plus for those with kids: there's an outdoor play area with a totally bitchin' dragon-themed play car. It's been hard to resist the urge to jump into it many times myself. Mostly when drunk.

Jacques-Imos: Big Ass Food in New Orleans

Jacques-Imos Cafe
8324 Oak Street
New Orleans, LA 70118




So I lived in New Orleans for two years and never ate at Jacques-Imos. As Jacques-Imos is one of New Orleans' new classic restaurants, it was a bit of a sin of omission. Beloved for its massive portions, funky interior, proximity to the Maple Leaf and eternally creative truck-bed outside table, it's in every guidebook and is beloved by both tourists and students alike. After all, Jacques-Imos is pretty much Tulane's campus go-to restaurant. End of the year club dinner? Jacques-Imos! Parents in town and want to eat something that ain't ramen? Jacques-Imos!

So how's the food? Pretty good. Pretty good and served in massive portions. Allow me to elaborate. My buddy Raj is leaving for school in the wilds of Ohio and invited a big gaggle of us out for dinner at J-Imos. We booked an outside table - it was a lovely May evening - ordered some champagne, and ordered an impressive array of stuff off the menu.

Which is a very long menu, featuring some classics - alligator cheesecake, fried chicken, the infamous carpet-bagger steak, etouffee, and so on - and an array of seasonal specials. All entrees come with a choice of two side dishes, which makes the rather steep entree prices a little easier to swallow. Those without massive appetites can take solace in the knowledge that there will be plenty left over.



Everything comes with these buttery corn-bread muffins, which are scandalously good. I know many college students who could happily subsist on these suckers.



I ordered the escargot with pasta, half out of a desire for snails (they're good) and half out of a desire to skeeze out my non-snail eating friends. Somewhat out of left-field snail presentation, though the pasta the snails were served in was quite pleasant, the snails being mostly a chewy sidenote. Personally, I think they're better off served in cute little ceramic containers with butter.



These beast is the eggplant Jacques-Imos - fried, covered in mushroom sauce, and served with oyster dressing (stuffing with oysters in it for you Yankee savages). It's pretty good, albeit for a bite or two. More then that and you start to feel the heart-pangs, and I'm not talking about emotions.



My friend Miranda ordered the fried green tomatoes with grilled shrimp, which were very good and exactly what one would expect. Crisp fried tomatoes, big old grilled prawns, and a spicy remolaude sauce on top, along with an interesting garnish of ribbon potato chips. Worked for us.



My boyfriend ordered the grilled duck with orange soy glaze, shitake mushrooms, and pecans. This was pretty excellent and had a lot of rich, oaky flavor - the mushrooms (not surprisingly) go pretty well with soy and duck. (My boyfriend also fed me all the duck fat because He is The Best).



I had mahi-mahi with avocado, which was a nice, light counterpart to the cardiac-arrest inducing other option on the Jacques-Imos menu. This was pretty good, if not great. Could have used more avocado. I must censure Jacques-Imos on their collard greens, which possess no visible bacon. Squeal Barbeque right down the street does a much better job on the collard front. The thin-cut shoestring fries are pretty tasty, however.



And on the left......Raj ordered the carpet-bagger steak with bleu cheese, onion, oysters, and Hollandaise sauce, a monolithic slab o' cow that was prepared admirably rare. This was passed around the table between roughly five people and no one could quite finish it. At $21.50, that's technically a deal.



Then on the right...there was this Thing on the menu called, I believe, the Soft-Shell Crab Godzilla or something of that nature. What you need to know is that this arrived to my friend in the form of a softshell crab stabbed completely through with a knife on top of fried eggplants with sauce. As long as you're okay with eating something that sorta resembles an alien, this was pretty good, as fried soft-shell crabs always are.

Our server was a great dude with the requisite "I'm an alternative New Orleans waiter" type-look and a friendly attitude. We were comped a bottle of champers when he realized that Raj was going to a great grad program, two people had graduated, I was in from Cambodia for the first time in a year and my friend Bojo was headed to Shanghai for a prestigious fellowship. Gotta love that.

Nahm Bangok: Thai Food by an Aussie? Trust Me.

Nahm Bangkok
Metropolitan Hotel, South Sathorn Road
Tungmahamek, Sathorn, Bangkok
+662 625 3388

World's gone insane when an Australian has one of the most popular Thai restaurants in Bangkok, right?

David Thompson is, occasionally, tongue-in-cheek referenced as the guy who "invented" modern Thai cuisine. He opened Nahm in Bangkok after winning a Michelin star for his restaurant in London - and immediately inserted his foot into his mouth by saying that Thai cuisine was "decaying," drawing the ire of many Bangkok residents.

But he's not a fly-by-night faux Thai chef either. Thompson speaks fluent Thai, appears to have done some interesting research into historical recipes that no one else was willing to do, and is committed to taking a stab at the real-deal when it comes to Thai cooking. (He's in the kitchen, too! We totally saw him!)

Nahm is set in a small and minimalist dining room in the painfully chic Metropolitan Hotel. It's an intimate and quiet space. The tables are a little long, which is good for holding a ton of food but necessitates a bit of shouting while conducting hushed, witty, dinner conversations. The clientele seems to be composed of slightly hip foodies on vacation and rich Bangkokites out for a subdued yet upscale meal. It's all very quiet, which is refreshing if you've spent a bit of time eating primarily out of Thai food carts and quick-nosh joints and are becoming sick of negotiation, chain smoking, and Thai soap operas.

You can order ala carte. Or you can partake in Nahm's set menu for the entire table, for about $50 a person give-or-take. You get a sampler of appetizers and a selection from each piece of the menu - one salad, one stir-fry, one curry - with a separate soup and dessert for each person. I'd suggest this option. Most people take it.



A small opening salvo. This appeared to consist of a sweet and savory type of confit on top of a cracker. It was also aesthetically pleasing. I am eternally grateful to restaurants with good lighting.



A selection of canapes, served on Thailand's ubiquitious crunchy rice crackers. I liked the rich boiled quail-egg in confluence with a dollop of umami-rich shrimp paste.



I really enjoyed the grilled mussel skewers, prepared betwen two sticks as most grilled-stuff in this country is. Spicy, smoky chili-heavy marinade.



Grilled prawns with pomelo, wrapped in a betel nut leaf? Yes, please. I'm a big pomelo fan. Like all pomelo salads, it's a very interesting intersection between sweet, spicy, and savory. I also like the underlying flavor of betel leaf. Wish these were more commonly used.



My mom ordered a Pimms Cup in a fit of colonialist feeling. They have a pretty wide selection of creative fruity cocktails. There's also wine. I had prosecco. For some perverse reason, I really like prosecco with Thai food.



A clear and delicate crab and snake gourd soup with egg. A very mild flavor. Went nicely with the big set of courses, though I found it a bit odd that they brought the soup out along with all the other stuff included on the set menu - gave it potential to get chilly if you're not a voraciously fast eater like yours truly. My mom picked the roast duck soup, which was rich and intense. Made me think of my usual breakfast when I'm spending time in the big city.



Scallop yam - this is a classic Thai-style seafood salad with a bunch of fresh herbs and onion. This was quite tasty. The scallop's creamy, intrinsic meatiness goes very well with fresh herbs and a dollop of crunchy onion. These are not subtle salads, but they are unequivocally delicious and refreshing. Sort of a breath freshener.



This is a Northern Thai-type relish, involving a peanut-and-chili dip, cut fruit and vegetable sticks, and fried soft-shell-crab. Relishes/dips like this are a bit hard to parse out for the Western among us, but are a nice complement to a full meal like this one. It's a good concept. The soft-shell crab was fried to the approximate texture of a potato chip, which was delightful.



Stir-fried fish dumplings with pak wan, a tasty Southeast Asian green. (There are a LOT of varieties of Southeast-Asian-green-thing). I liked the delicate fish dumplings in combination with the greens. It's a good dish, albeit not an incredibly refined one. Then again, refined isn't really the point of Nahm, as Thompson himself would tell you - it's about interpreting and using old Thai recipes. Some may object to this philosophy when dropping down $50 bucks a head on dinner in an otherwise remarkably budget-friendly city, but, personally, I can work with it.



The Massaman curry was very rich and very filling, as Massaman ought to be. I like the thick, dense flavor of cinnamon here - the spicing in this dish was much more complex and interested to figure-out then other Massaman's I've sampled, with an almost Indian depth of flavor. (Not surprising, really - Massaman, after all, directly translates as "Muslim" curry, It's rich as hell and a bit difficult to finish, but I believe we did it justice. It's definitely the chocolate-double-fudge-cake of Thai recipes. Man, that was a weird analogy.



I had jackfruit simmered in coconut cream with steamed sugar palm pudding (a squishy cake, for the non-Anglicized among us). Jackfruit is pretty much like durian's less anti-social younger brother. I really like it. This is a fairly typical Thai dessert, and for good reason.



Finally, another Thai classic - simmered black rice with (more) coconut milk and a side dish of some chewy and slightly jelly-like coconut confection. Thai desserts don't really get enough respect, is what I'm getting at. I like how light and fruit-centric they are when compared to Western confectionery.



We found the selection of Thai sweets fascinating. These are flavors and textures that just don't make it out West much, unless you're going snooping in the Asian grocery store. We were particularly taken by the light, slightly chewy texture of these coconut confections. One beef: Nahm's menu is not posted anywhere on the Internet, which means I can't, unequivocally, tell you what this stuff is. (Other then the extremely obvious - and curiously hollow - meringue.) Considering that one of Nahm's functions is educational - well, fix it, guys.

Needless to say, I can give Nahm a whole-hearted recommendation. What I find most interesting - and appealing - about Nahm is the way all of these dishes work together to produce a fairly traditionally minded Thai meal. I've had all of these dishes (or some variation on the theme) on their own, but I haven't had them all at once in a large, synchronized meal before.

Some Southeast Asians who have reviewed Nahm have noted that it reminds them of home cooking. Which is exactly the point, and something those of us hailing from the West haven't really experienced before. Although the restaurant is a bit spendy for Bangkok (and would be highly reasonable by San Francisco or European standards), it's worth it for an upscale and thought provoking Thai meal. You can get your kicks eating weird things off the street also - I mean, I do - but Nahm could be a nice departure from the norm for food obsessed Bangkok visitors. Try it.

Comme Maison: Francophile Food in Phnom Penh

Comme a La Maison
#: 023 360 801
#13, Street 57
Open everyday, from 6.00 to 22.30.

Phnom Penh, as you're probably aware, is a relatively Frenchified city. It was called the Paris of the East prior to the wars, known for its long avenues, European-inflected architecture, and wealth of green spaces. That's all faded now, covered in a veneer of grime, vaguely scented of trash, but you can see it sometimes, in snatches, if you look up at an apartment building.

This French background is also reflected in the city's food. Few Khmers are left who speak any French, but plenty of French people visit here and work here, and Phnom Penh hosts a profusion of French restaurants. Comme Maison is among them, and a very worthy contender in a field that occasionally delves into European-inflected horror. It's located in a small and very private garden dining-space on Street 57, near the expat ghetto of Street 278. (Ye shall know it by overpriced NGO boutiques with exotic-patterned wrap-dresses and lots of garden-cafes with menus focusing on mashed potato and alcohol).

You can sit in Comme a la Maison and quite handily forget you are in Phnom Penh, away from the constant sound of motorbikes, back-firing tuk-tuks, and people shouting at one another on the street.. The menu is fairly simple French cafe food, with a very light hand compared to most Francophone restaurants abroad. There are steaks, pizzas of various sorts, quiche, composed and high-quality salads, ratatouille, an extensive dessert list (the chef was an ex-pastry chef), and a lot of wine on offer. There is also an excellent fruit salad. Sounds mundane, can be difficult to correctly execute.

There are usually a number of specials, many of them involving kidneys and other "variety" meats suitable for the hardcore. There is merguez sausage on the menu and exceptionally pricey lamb chops, which I have eyed hungrily but have not quite pulled the trigger on yet. A shame that lamb is difficult to find here.

I shall commend them for a steak both good and economical. You can order it with a couple of side dishes - the first is free, the second costs a $1.50. The mashed potatoes are excellent, and so is the ratatouille. The steak was rare and slightly bloody, just the way I like it, and was offset beautifully with a bit of mustard and a glass of good red wine. The bearnaise sauce was excellent. You can also get a shallot compote, a pepper sauce, and a number of other things. This is an establishment where getting sloshed on red wine with friends is both perfectly acceptable and perfectly normal.

I have also tried a very nice baked seafood casserole here. My friends also swear by the chocolate mousse—my utter lack of a sweet tooth hinders me a bit here but I'll go off hearsay. The bread here, if you're one of those bread basket freaks, is pretty good. If you are one of Those People who demands oil and vinegar with bread, this is possible but will involve the high level interrogation of an innocent waitperson.

Prices are expensive by Phnom Penh standards, but not insane—the quality of the food is high, and the dining room is lovely. I have been told it is a grade A date place, if you were wondering about that sort of thing. It is 100% guaranteed that no street urchins clutching books will bother you while making a move.

DELIVERY FOR THE OFFICE-ENSLAVED: They deliver. It's a bit pricey, but it's the same stuff as at the restaurant, and makes a nice luxurious splash-out during a long day.

Boucherie Again: Mmm Duck Confit

Boucherie
8115 Jeannette Street
New Orleans, LA 70118-2851
(504) 862-5514


I've reviewed Boucherie before. Boucherie is, after all, one of my favorite neighborhood spots in New Orleans garden district. It's easy to see why the restaurant attracts crowds of local food obsessives: it offers high-end dining with interesting preparation methods, a highly seasonal menu, and surprisingly reasonable prices (especially in New Orleans, Land of the Expensive-Ass Dinner). Located in a tiny old house right off St. Charles, the dining room is classy but cramped, and reservations - or at least calling ahead- are very important indeed, unless you're the kind of person who is perfectly okay with mooning around waiting for your table to come up. That sort of thing happens to make my eye twitch and my tiny and desiccated heart fill with a profound and totally unjustified rage. You know, different strokes, blah blah blah.

We made this visit at the end of May, and thus our choices reflect that seasons menu.



Blackened shrimp on a grit cake with a bacon vinaigrette. In all honesty, I've never loved blackened foods. They always taste too salty to me. This was the case here, although the shrimp are nice and fat. I find it rather difficult to distinguish "grit cakes" from "unsweetened cornbread". Maybe someone can help me.



Steamed mussels with collard greens and crispy grit crackers are an eternal fixture on the house menu, and it's easy to see why. I really like the unique, vinegary broth the mussels are cooked in, and the rich vegetable flavor of the collards gives the mussels a distinct, but just subtle enough flavor. The crispy grit crackers are all right. Better when soaked in the broth for a bit.



Boucherie makes a fine duck confit, with crispy skin and a lovely, rich, interior. This was served with a fairly simple bread salad and a light reduction sauce. A good thing: no need to gild the lily with this stuff.




Smoked scallops are omnipresent here, but the dish seems to change twice a month. This go round wasn't all that successful: the scallops themselves were good and prepared correctly, but the pasta was overcooked and the smoky, slightly spicy cumin scented sauce was simply too robust for these tender little guys.

Service here is usually pretty good - hard to lose track of someone in such a small dining room. I'd suggest Boucherie for a casual-upscale near the Tulane campus - the eternally changing menu provides a pleasant change from Riverbend's endless armada of sushi and Lebanese joints, and you can feel fancy without starting up a side business in drug trafficking. Win win!

Aziza: Super Refined Moroccan Food, Still Superb

Aziza
5800 Geary Boulevard
San Francisco, CA 94121-2005
(415) 752-2222


Aziza is nothing if not distinctive. This restaurant is unlike any other ultra high end restaurant in the Bay Area, departing from the cookie-cutter Seasonal Sustainable Fusion Menus that infest the area and focusing on something different: Moroccan food, interpreted with an artist's eye. That artist is chef Mourad Lahlou, who opened Aziza roughly ten years ago and has seen its impressive rise in ensuing years: he faced off against Cat Cora on Iron Chef in 2009, and will star in a public television television show featuring Moroccan food in 2010 (Is PBS hip among the foodie cognoscenti? Is it tolerable? What's the deal here?)

The menu has undergone a lot of tweaking in the past few years, and has been simplified since my last couple of visits in 2008, which is by no means a bad thing. Menus change very often to reflect seasonal ingredients, and the kitchen works closely with local farmers and producers - one fun aspect of eating at Aziza is exposure to some fairly esoteric local produce. Yes, I had to look up "minutina." This may be related to San Francisco restaurant's minor obsession with out-locavoring the competition, but I feel a bit under-qualified to comment on that.



I love the unctuous, interesting flavor of fresh sardines, and Aziza does a really lovely job with them, serving them simply grilled on top of a fresh brioche crouton, with shaved artichoke, a delicate oyster infused sauce, and minutina greens (10.00). A gorgeous presentation as well, which I didn't exactly notice until reviewing the photos.



This is basteeya, the delicious and surprisingly hard to find Moroccan chicken and almond pie (18.00). It's an ultra rich and very unusual dish, combining meaty chicken with a slightly sweet almond filling in a flaky puff pastry crust - which is then dusted with powdered sugar. The combination of sweet and savory is really pretty superb. It is traditionally made in the homeland with pigeon. Surmising the kitchen didn't have any on hand. San Francisco eaters are probably the USA population most likely to be down with eating pigeons, come to think of it. (They love it in China).



I am what may be defined as a "scallop whore" and find myself almost unable to resist them when on the menu, especially in coastal regions that actually know something about seafood. Thus I picked out the scallops with prawns, savoy cabbage, turnips, and a passion fruit sauce (28.00). This was a delicate and very well executed dish, but I regretted ordering it: it wasn't particularly different from any other scallop dish served in the Bay Area. Big meaty dishes are where Aziza really shines and innovates, in my estimation.



My mom picked out the chicken after an enthusiastic recommendation from our server. Chicken is one of those things generally best avoided at high-end restaurants, but Aziza really redefined the whole dry chicken paradigm here. The chicken is cooked at high heat to give it a crispy, ultra rich crust, then is served with a thick pork cheek, wheat berries, carrots, and snap peas. The combination produces some sort of unholy and delightful alliance between chicken and pig, making it difficult to tell where one ends and the other begins - in a good way.



My dad chose the lamb merguez sausage with charmoulla, black garlic, and swiss chard. Merguez has an excellent spicy, dense flavor and these were some lovely specimens - the vegetables were pretty much gilding a meaty, lamb fat infused lily (25.00). (Christ, now there's a metaphor. It's early).



Desserts at Aziza (last I checked) are done by Melissa Chou, and they are pretty excellent. One of Aziza's strengths is its always innovative and unusual dessert selections - I went with the citrus option this time, featuring meyer lemon cream, a blood orange flavored meringue, some preserved kumquat, and a warm huckleberry cake (9.50). Quite nice and very refreshing, and in accordance with spring ingredients and flavors.

Another perfectly executed meal at Aziza. Still, I had a curious sensation of not being full when I left - whether this may be attributed to our ordering decisions or some sort of odd lightness about Aziza's meaty Moroccan cuisine, I can't say. There could be more substance to some of the dishes, certainly - I recall my earlier visits (back in 2008) evidenced a more robust, if less refined cooking style from chef Mourad. Figuring this out naturallly warrants a future visit, probably one where I order half the menu. Weep for me.

The American Sector: Great War Flavored!

The American Sector
945 Magazine Street
New Orleans, LA 70130
Entrance on Andrew Higgins Drive

John Besh is big in New Orleans. Real big. The blonde and wholesome looking Cajun chef has decisvely out gunned and out-charismaed "fuzzball" Emeril Lagasse as NOLA's predominant celebrity hash-slinger, boasting Restaurant August, La Provence, Luke, Besh Steakhouse and other popular eateries in his ever-increasing portfolio. The American Sector represents Besh's foray into "themed" dining, operating as it does under the historical auspices of the National WWII Museum.

The name, "American Sector," apparantly is a reference to what that particular chunk of the Warehouse District was entitled in pre USA days. The restaurant name is controversial among some New Orleanians: some view it as an attempt to white-wash or Americanize what was never a very culturally "American" chunk of the city in the first place. Decide what you want. Let's talk food.


Complimentary bread and butter pickles. Very good.

The menu is supposed to represent WWII era favorites in tandem with Southern soul food classics, all screwed around with in Besh's signature upscale manner. There's an impressive mixed drink selection, lots of appealing looking small snacks, sandwiches, and some sort of overpriced looking entrees. I began with a special blueberry mojito prepared with fresh berry pulp, which was a winner: not sickeningly sweet or insipid like many fruit drinks, and a good hard pour. (Gettin' liquored up at lunch time: another delightful tradition of the 1940s!)



My dad chose the spicy garlic glazed fried chicken with an assortment of pickles (9.50). It's a snack size type thing and consisted of lightly fried chicken drumettes with a vague sort of garlic flavor - all right, nothing particularly exciting. The assorted pickles that accompanied it were, however, quite nice: watermelon rind, beet, and one other. I wish relish trays would come back.



I went with the shrimp and sausage gumbo with sassafras (6.00) which was pretty standout: a dark, deep, funky roux with a generous amount of seafood and andouille. Some would probably consider it a "muddy" gumbo but I liked the deep funk and the rich, fatty flavor of the stuff: would order again. I ordered the collard greens (4.00) to go with: a big "eh". Not enough meat flavoring and cut into large and awkward chunks - I wouldn't bother.



I also tried the crab ravigote salad with avocado and bacon (12.50), which was a nice riff on a typical New Orleans crab preparation. The ravigote sauce was light and nicely lemon scented without becoming overbearing, and the deep fried avocado was a surprising and delicious touch. Besh knows how to source superb bacon, as evidenced by the meaty chunks found here.

On the whole, the American Sector offers an alluringly up-market choice within the museum, and might even be worth a special trip for visitors who'd like to sample Besh's cooking without dressing up or emptying out their pocket-books. The dining room is a bit chilly (both temperature wise and in terms of decor,) so don't schedule a romantic date here unless you both really get off on 40's kitsch. I'll try not to judge you.


Speaking of Besh, personally. Have seen the guy attending the downtown farmers market with his equally charismatic black hunting labrador retriever. Seemed to be authentically nice as hell. Wish I could gleefully relate that he was a grade A douche-bag who demanded personalized squashes in the shape of alligators for his restaurant menu, I really do, but that is Not The Truth.

Ambience Restaurant: Carmichal Fancy Schmancy?

Ambience
6440 Fair Oaks Boulevard
Carmichael, CA 95608-4019
(916) 489-8464

Prix Fixe Only: $45.00

Fine dining and the Sacramento suburbs don't seem immediately synonymous. But into the Jim Boys, thrift-store, and loitering punk-rock kid void steps executive chef and owner Morgan Song, whose original success in Redding led him to open a high end restaurant right here in Sacto. The restaurant took over what was once a cops-and-robbers themed doughnut place (really) and began as Maritime Seafood. The restaurant was not as successful as Song had hoped, and Maritime was recently re-hauled as the prix-fixe only Ambience. The five course, 45$ menu indisputably looks like a heck of a deal for high end dining: but how's the food measure up?



The dinner began with a complimentary amuse bouche. The menu listed it as a "Salmon Scallop Mousse Brioche with Tomato Casino de Paris and Smoked Mozzarella," but all I tasted was buttery pastry and a vague sort of hint of something seafoody. This wasn't much above a zap n' serve Pepperidge Farm hors d' oeuvre for me.



Second courses. I, being a member of a decadent and debauched society, chose the lobster for a $3 supplement. (And Jesus Christ, how often in life does three dollars bring you lobster?) The dish was somewhat bizarrely served in two separate segments: a lobster creme brulee came first.




This was followed by a dish of seared lobster on cucumber with Wasabi coulis, green caviar, and fondue sauce (whatever that means). The lobster creme brulee was tasty enough, if innocuous, but the seared lobster was delightfully fresh and flavorful, avoiding the perennial trap of overdoing the wasabi.



My dad chose the eggplant stuffed with albacore and served with whole grain Dijon mustard. This was a inventive and rather tasty dish, giving a heavy, meaty weightiness to the old standby of albacore tuna.



My mom selected the Ahi tuna sampler with tomato-ginger coulis, cilantro oil, pine nuts, and spicy green tobiko fish eggs. The combination of flavors was really quite spot-on, and the super fresh fish worked in elegant concert with the other ingredients. It also looked lovely - Ambience is definitely the Sacramento region's hands-down champ when it comes to drop-dead gorgeous plating techniques.



The fourth course was Dungeness crabmeat and vegetable ragouut on a polenta crouton. This was rather underwhelming: seemed to me more like a pretty good fried crabcake with some mildly interesting accompainments. Not that there is anything WRONG with a crabcake, but...



I picked the special, which was rabbit cooked three ways - braised leg, seared tenderloin, mousse, accompanied by white corn, pearl onion confit, and whole grain mustard cream. This was a very interesting dish from an intellectual standpoint, engaging three different preparations, but it also tasted excellent. The tender meat had a delightfully earthy flavor, and the mustard sauce had enough kick to keep things interesting. The reduction sauce on the seared tenderloin seemed to be an ultra intense combination of meat stock and balsamic: a real winner.



My mom went with the braised white veal shank on a bed of parsnip potato puree, accompanied by creamy tomato vegetable ragout and fried golden beets. The dish is somewhat offputtingly pale but had an excellent long-cooked flavor, and the accompaniments worked very nicely. This was very much akin to similar dishes I've had in Italy.

My dad chose the seared elk flank steak with sauteed chard and arugula, black wild rice, and a herb balsamic glaze. The photo came out so awful that I would be run out of town on a rail if I posted it, but he assured me that the steak was delicious. Ambience seems to be doing very nice things with game meats.




My dad picked the apricot creme brulee with apricot brandy and fresh berries. Another two part dish - I am still assessing how, exactly, I feel about that. Regardless, the creme brulee had a pleasingly spring-like apricot flavor, and the plated presentation was, of course, gorgeous.



I picked the raspberry and mango mousse cake with ladyfingers, as I am occasionally partial to a good tiramisu when the mood is exactly right. This was a pleasantly light and ethereal dessert, with plenty of concentrated fruit flavor and a nice bit of chewiness provided by the ladyfingers.



My mom picked the chocolate sabyon cream parfait with candied almond and coffee chocolate truffles. This was an interesting chocolate dessert with a good concentration of intense cocoa flavor, but holy god, check out those....tendrils...emitting from the center. They were edible and made of sugar. Awesome.


The interior of the restaurant is serene, quiet, and intensely private - almost to a creepy extent on a slow night. Make sure you actually like your dinner date or things could swiftly get awkward.

On the whole, Ambience is a great addition to the Sacramento dining scene - and at 45$ a prixe fixe meal, an incredible deal to boot. I wasn't as enraptured with the food as some other critics have been, but the kitchen is masterful when it comes to its specialties. Keep an eye on the wild game and Japanese-accented seafood preparations. It's a pleasure to have a restaurant turning out ambitious and interesting cuisine in Carmichael's strip-mall hell, and I wish them all the success in the world.