The reservation line for Animal does not open until 5:00PM each day, Pacific Time. I did the next best thing. I call the concierge at the hotel. “Humm.., Animal is extremely hard to get in…you usually have to call at least a month away… it’s a small restaurant… I’ll give it a try,” came the reply. I didn’t know. I didn’t know that it’s such a highly regarded restaurant. I didn’t know that it has a cult following. I didn’t know it’s known for its creative use of animal parts. I didn’t know that it was the Best Restaurant of 2010. Brian didn’t tell me any of these. He only told me that the food was good.
The dinner menu changes every day. There are twenty six items for this night. They all looked good. With only the eating power of two people, we had to do something very painful and not usually done at our meals. We ranked the items! It was painful to eliminate the chicken liver toast, the bone marrow chimichurri, the crispy pig’s head, the oxtail poutine… in order to force ourselves not to over-order.
We started with a glass of 2008 Cotes de Provence “Nowat” from Dupere Barrera ($14 ). We thought the wine was too acidic, and might have been a bit oxygenated. The waiter had no problem replacing it with a 2009 Barbera d’Alba, ‘Sori del Drago’ from Brovia, Piemonte. We enjoyed this wine much better.
Hamachi Tostada
A tostada with flash slices of Hamachi, herbs, fish sauce vinaigrette, and peanut. The Hamachi was delicious, however, the meat was buried deep under the greens and the sweetness of this delicate fish was overwhelmed by the vinegar in the dressing. I liked the crunchiness of the tostada against the soft texture of the meat. The sauce reminded us of a Vietnamese salad; unfortunately this sauce also killed the delicate sweetness of the fish. ($15)
Rabbit Loin Spring Roll
There was a good amount of meat in the spring roll. The rabbit was perfectly cooked. It’s tender, moist, and tasted exactly what any good rabbit meat would taste like – bland. Luckily, it was saved by the sprout vinaigrette sauce. Although it was called a vinaigrette, I would say it was more of a sauce bursting with Asian flavor than a true vinaigrette. ($14)
“That’s all yours…I wouldn’t eat that …” Tourist Tree said to me when we were deciding on items to order. However, this Buffalo piggy wiggly with its seductive aromatic sauce got the best of her curiosity. It tasted just like an upscale version of Buffalo wings except the skin was thicker and hence sustainably more crunchy, and the meat was super tender and flavorful. Yes, there’s bone in it and also small pieces of soft cartilage. I could do without the ranch sauce. It just wasn’t doing its job to balance out the Buffalo sauce. It was a very nicely done dish but the most important thing was it getting Tourist Tree’s seal of approval. ($11)
Pig Ear, Chili, Lime, Fried Egg
There could be more than one surprise a night sometimes. This is one of those dishes I did not think the Tourist Tree would let me order. Surprisingly, she did not even make a face after the waiter described the dish. The ear is stewed till tender soft, then julienned thin, fried, dusted with chili, and dressed with lime vinaigrette; then topped with an egg. We cut the egg up to let the yoke go wild. The pieces were crunchy and followed by a nice hot spicy unexpected left-hook. The egg and its soft yoke made a nice contrast to the spicy and crunchy ear.
We found the lime dressing would have been perfect if the kitchen had dialed down the vinegar end of it. Despite this little shortcoming, the Tourist Tree enjoyed the dish without reluctance. As she had put it, “It’s different from a regular ear...” ($12)
There are times when certain thing would give you “the moment”. This is one of those things. Foie gras, corn butter, and truffle cooked together before being injected into the yoke base agnolotti. “The moment” comes when the little piece of agnolotti bursts in the mouth flooding it with intense dose of foie gras truffle butter liquid of gold. This is melted goodness at extreme. We could taste the cholesterol going in with each bite, but if that’s what cholesterol tastes like, I would die a happy man. On a side note, the pasta was perfectly cooked and dusted with parmesan cheese. This dish was featured in the special foie gras dinners that were held over the weekend. It was so well received that it was carried over to the regular menu for this night. We didn’t mind that at all. ($19)
This was also another item that was carried over from the special foie gras dinners. From the description, I wasn’t too crazy about it since I couldn’t quite picture what it would be like, but I was surprised that Tourist Tree actually was interested especially since it involves another body part that she usually would be quite squeamish about.
The smoke foie gras was a smooth mousse with salt sprinkled on top. The veal tongue was super tender and accompanied with a sweet Asian influenced sauce. The pumpernickel was the little crispy pieces which provided the crunch, not the bread that I expected. The spread on the side was the crab apple. This is a dish to be played with. Eat one item at a time, add it with another one, or combine everything together. Each combination of items resulted in a different flavor and texture. ($14)
The most expensive dish in the restaurant also happened to be a low-brow comfort food. But don’t let the thought of comfort food fool you. The perfectly seared piece of foie completely changed the profile of this dish both in terms of flavor and texture. Except the a bit heavily handed ladling of the sauce, foie and spam turned out to be a good combo which could dance a nice dance together. Foie and rice were also good mishmash. It made us kept wanting more! ($35)
We switched up to the 2003 Barolo, “Rocche dei Brvia”, Brovia, Piemonte ($24 /glass) toward the later part of the dinner. The wine was very earthy, dry, and a bit more refined than our first wine. Looking back, we would have had beer with the dinner. Some of the flavors of the dishes, especially those with the lime or vinegar, were killing the wine. The restaurant offers several beers that would work very well with the flavor profiles of their dishes: Avery “The Beast” Grand Cru ($18 ), the Mama’s Lil Yella Pils ($6) or the Unita XVII anniversary Barleywine ($8).
Bacon Chocolate Crunch Bar, S & P Ice Cream
It was not a crunchy crunch bar per se, there was a lot of stickiness in this bar yet it was not a sticky gooey type of bar that you would imagine. The bacon definitely had made it presence known. Its smokiness and saltiness certainly made this bar a standout. The salt and pepper ice cream was unique. It was one of the more unique flavors I have had tasted this year. The balance of salt and spice was just right and it was matched by a subtle amount of sweetness. A good complement to the bacon chocolate bar. ($7)
When the Tourist Tree wanted this dessert, I wasn’t sure exactly what we were getting. It came in the form of a sponge cake; very light in texture, moist and delicious. The caramel sauce was quite good, but it could become an issue with the slowly building up of sweetness which could lead to a surprised overdose. ($7)
It was a wild journey through the animal kingdom. We had trouble narrowing down our choices but a less adventurous diner may have a problem finding something he could eat. That would have been a shame. Besides missing out on some of the more interesting ingredients, he is also going to miss out on creative preparations and ingenious techniques. We never tested out the “Changes and modifications politely declined” as printed on the bottom of the menu. Tourist Tree decided to Benadryl this meal so she could put all the hassle aside and fully enjoy everything. I was glad that she did. Plaid shirts, hipster jeans, a few tattoos and piercings here and there, the wait staff may not be dressed for a refined restaurant but their service was certainly refined, attentive and friendly.
Our walk on the wild side was rewarded with more than a few wowing dishes. We certainly hope to go back for another walk soon and highly recommend those less brave ones to follow our footsteps.
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