Dinner at Aldea

Aldea has been on my Must Eat List for a long long time and last Friday, I finally crossed it off my list!  Actually, now that I've eaten there, I just moved it to my Must Eat As Often As Possible List.  I completely respect that George Mendes, the exec chef, was there all night cooking the food I ate.  You really don't see that much in NYC anymore.  I think that dedication just made it all the more tasty.

he's the one without a hat

We opted for the 5 course chef tasting, but had to add on the sea urchin toast with cauliflower cream, sea lettuce, and lime.

kinda life changing

I'm a bit of a sea urchin whore.  This was awesome.  The creamy oceany roe was offset by the crunchy flat bread and seaweed.  Too friggin good.

Then came the amuse bouche, not one, but three.  Oyster w/pickled ramp vinaigrette, bacalao croquettas, lobster gazpacho w/ summer berries, wild herbs.

amuse bouche

Yes, THREE!  Three delicious, incredibly fresh, incredibly flavorful dish.  The oyster was briny and crisp.  The croquetta was light and creamy.  The lobster gazpacho was just awesome, sweet and acidic-y, summer in a little cup.

First course was foie gras mi-cuit with birch beer gelée, peanuts and cocoa nibs.  It was served with thick slabs of toast.

 foie!

This was genius.  I loved the combination of the creamy and unctuous foie with the slightly bitter sweetness of the cocoa nibs and the birch beer gelée.  nom nom nom.

Next up was the octopus a la plancha with balsamic, olive oil, and chickpeas.

octopus

The octopus was perfectly cooked, lightly chewy with a smokiness that was mellowed by the balsamic.

The third course was monk fish cheeks.  Cheek meat!  I heart cheek meat of all edible animals.  I think cheeks is the flavor of that animal times 10.  Like monk fish cheeks taste like monk fish meat times 10.

monk fish!

Then came my favorite of the night, arrozo de pato - duck confit, chorizo, olive, duck cracklings.  Seriously you guys, I'm-in-love. I kind of want to marry this dish, or at least move in together.

will u b my valentine?

It was like a paella cooked in a shallow pan, so all you get is the good stuff.  By good stuff, I mean the crunchy soccarat that you scrape up on the bottom of the pan.  And then, just to make sure that there was to be too much awesomness, they mix in duck cracklings, then top with perfectly cooked duck.

Before the dessert, we were given a palate cleanser of mint and sorbet.  Then we were presented with a banana cake thing with espresso ice cream.  I'm sure it's not a cake thing, but I can't think of the term and it's not on the online menu.  Fail!  The top layer was bruleed.  I welcome all desserts with crackly sugar layer.

dessert

Because that was not enough food, we also ate all of the petit fours.  My ability to eat beyond capacity never ceases to amaze me.

more!

I really really enjoyed Aldea.  The food was inventive and delicious.  I loved the open kitchen and great service.  I'm already planning my return trip.

The Many Empanadas of Santiago

I've been plotting this post in that brain of mine for awhile now.  But too bad for my sad neglected blog, plotting does not equate to actual content.  Better late than never right?  Right??

Empanadas are to the Chileans as street hot dogs are to New Yorkers.  Except that empanadas are actually fresh, homemade, and good.  I ate a lot of empanadas in my two weeks, fried, baked, meat, seafood.  Yep, all went in there *points to belly*.

Starting with the most popular of Chilean empanadas, the empanada de pino.  It's basically a baked empanada stuffed with ground beef (kind of like taco spices), egg, and olives.  I was getting mine from Castaño, an ubiquitous chain bakery.  No, seriously, it's on every block.  It's the Starbucks of Chile.  But more fun, with baked goodies that made me go, oooOOoooOoo

it's the triangle one on the left

why, hello olive

I also got some fancy empanadas from Patagonia, a cute little restaurant I went to for lunch one day.  Maybe it was the crab and cheese stuffing, maybe because they were deep fried, maybe because they look like little wonton, these were my favorite of the empanadas I sampled.  

crabby goodness

In Valparaiso, I had another fried empanada, this time stuffed with random seafood, i.e. marisco.  It was mostly clams.  It was good, but I'm partial to the cheesy crab stuffing of the Patagonia ones.

marisco empanada

And I ate more fried empanadas, I think these were also crabs.  I remember liking them but don't remember much else.  They were from Azul Profundo, an awesome seafood restaurant in Bella Vista.

i like fried

I love empanadas since I'm partial to anything thing that consists of protein wrapped in carbs (dumplings, raviolis, burritos, arepas, I can go on).  I also love how everywhere in Chile has its unique take.  Can't wait to go back and expand my empanada repertoire.