Category — Restaurant News & Reviews

Zentan's signature 19-ingredient slaw, sprinkled with peanuts for long life

Dumplings shaped like money; long, slippery noodles to symbolize longevity. I’ve always looked at Chinese New Year as a time to reflect on my blessings — and get back on the wagon with my (Gregorian calendar) New Year’s Resolutions.

But it’s tough since the food surrounding Chinese New Year is so spectacular. Chinese chefs around North America celebrate in their restaurants with extensive menus of symbolic foods and ingredients intended to make the coming months prosperous: scallions, with their hollow tube, represent an open mind; kumquats and oranges resemble gold and promise fortune; a whole fish, because the Chinese character for fish is pronounced nearly identical to the one for “abundance.”

“Food is knowledge, it’s history,” says Susur Lee, Chinese chef and restaurateur in Canada and the United States. “Eating is a symbolic of how much you live, how much you know…Even though Chinese are not very expressive, when it comes to food we’re very expressive. We talk about texture inside the mouth, how it smells. All that is very sensual, really connected with your body.”

Last year — the year of the rabbit — Lee featured rabbit dumplings on the menu of his eponymous Toronto restaurant. At his Washington restaurant Zentan, there won’t be any dragon — as this year’s creature is rather difficult to come by — but there will be plenty of crispy red snapper (the “abundance” course) and the knock out Singapore Slaw.

How do you say “off the wagon again” in Chinese?

Spinach-shiitake dumplings, shaped like little purses

courtesy of Stephanie Izard

You may know Stephanie Izard as the first — and still the only — woman ever to win Top Chef. On the show, she wowed the judges with bold, inventive flavors like lamb medallions topped with pistachio, blackberry and mushrooms.

But she’s taken that experience and pushed it even further, mixing and matching the biggest, baddest flavors she can find from cultures across the world. The award winning Fergus Henderson-meets-Zak Pelaccio cuisine she turns out at her Chicago hot spot Girl and the Goat features items like yuzu harissa, fish sauce vinaigrette and escargot with tamarind and miso.

“We always want people to come in take a bite and go ‘Holy crap that’s flavorful,’” Izard says. Please check out her story in this piece I did for AP.

Lobster Roll at America Eats Tavern

Though you’d never think of it now, New York was once the oyster capital of the world, with carts on every corner, the dirty water hot dog of the 19^th century.

America Eats Tavern in Washington, DC pays tribute to this legacy with a half-dozen incarnations of the bivalve taken from historical reports and cookbooks. Buttered oysters honor oysterman Thomas Downing, a free African American who stored his shellfish in his basement, which doubled as a haven for slaves escaping on the Underground Railroad. Pickled oysters – a favorite bar snack in George Washington’s time – go down smooth with an American craft beer and Oysters Rockefeller captures the young country’s fascination with “the richest man in the world.”

And who better than Jose Andres to offer America its history on a plate? An eloquent and passionate ambassador of food, culture and identity in all its forms, Andres created the non-profit pop-up restaurant in conjunction with the National Archives exhibit “What’s Cooking Uncle Sam,” which runs until January 3. All profits go to the Archives.

Crunchy, corny hush puppies salted with American caviar offer a perfect follow to the oysters. A buttery brioche bun filled with sweet lobster makes an elegant lunch. But AET’s menu begs for multiple visits, with Kentucky burgoo of rabbit, squab and lamb, an 1845 recipe for mutton shoulder and a peanut butter and jelly sandwich (with foie gras!!) just waiting for a taste.

And coming soon? Pawpaws, aka: American custard apples.

In someone else’s hands, the restaurant would have been a gimmick. But Andres’ passion and the competence of his staff come through in every bite. It’s like eating a little piece of history.

For more insight on the foodways of early America, look to “Food of Younger Land,” author Mark Kurlansky’s extraordinary curation of writings done by icons like Eudora Welty and Zora Neale Hurston as part of a 1930s WPA project.

Crunchy hush puppies get salted with American caviar