Text 32125, 104 rader
Skriven 2009-12-12 10:04:00 av MICHAEL LOO (1:123/140)
Ärende: with Patricia & Alex 510
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Afterwards, we were going for a predinner drink but went off
for a few minutes wandering looking at the Christmas lights on
the Common. Were Patricia a couple years younger and quite a
bit less married, it would have been a most romantic stroll.
But it took us away from my favorite bar, which gives frequent
flyer miles as well as offering interesting liquids.

Before the movie I'd told Alex to make a reservation at Scampo,
a fashionable joint in the Liberty Hotel (the former Charles
Street Jail, some of the most sought-after rooms having been
former cells, probably several per room - Scampo means something
like Escape or On the Lam in some variety of Italian). Stupidly
I didn't call him right after the movie, and by the time we were
at the other side of the Common, we were halfway to Charles St.,
so we decided to head directly there. The neighborhood watering
holes were all way crowded - it turns out we were there during
the Beacon Hill Holiday Stroll, and the area was just cheek by
jowl. I decided finally to give Alex a confirmatory call and
found that as Scampo had been booked until 10 pm, he had form a
plan B. He'd been snacking at No. 9 Park while trying to make
the reservation, and upon hearing the news, asked the bartendress
for a recommendation. How about here, said she; he said that he'd
eaten there often enough lately, and what would she recommend if
she weren't eating there? Ken Oringer's Toro in the South End was
the answer. She called up some of her secret contacts, and voila,
a reservation (the place doesn't take reservations). So I got all
this news, with lots of static, at 25c a minute, and we agreed to
meet at the Liberty anyway and take a cab (it was almost time for
our appointment). The cab cost $16, leaving me with $11 in cash
for the rest of the week (thank goodness for credit cards).

Toro was crowded crowded, with the end of the last communal table
set for the three of us. We were made way for as though we had
been famous. What we had:

maz asado con alioli y queso cotija: grilled corn with
alioli, lime, espelette pepper, and cotija cheese - four half
ears, roasted and very caramelly sweet; would have been
nicely balanced with the lime and pepper, but the alioli was
extremely abundant and not nearly garlicky enough, so the
effect was big blobs of mayo, and there were tons too much
cheese (I scraped my mayo and cheese off);

ventresca: Spanish tuna belly with tomato tapenade and
celery leaves - an extreme disappointment; this was just
ordinary tuna fish, not particularly fatty, not particularly
flavory, sort of like what your mom made you to take to
school years ago;

mollejas: veal sweetbreads with blood orange and cinnamon -
good sweetbreads, delicately fried, with a disastrous very
orangey (not very bloody), cinnamony, and tarragony sauce;

jamon de pato: house cured duck ham - excellent, smoky and
hammy and ducky; I thought not quite fat enough, but this is
the fashionable way these days;

bistec del faldilla a la plancha: hanger steak a la plancha
with cabrales butter and red onion marmalade - nicely done
meat, the butter low on cabrales (fine with me), the red
onion stuff cooked not long enough but over too high heat,
so onion pickle instead of caramelized;

corazon a la plancha: grass-fed beef heart with romesco -
delicious meat done rare and sliced thin thin; the sauce,
though, was tasteless;

asado de huesos: bone marrow with radish citrus salad and
oxtail marmalade; the dish of the night, a big shinbone
split lengthwise, roasted and strewn with pink salt and
baby chives, served with a salad of baby pea shoots, radish
slices, and salt-pickled grapefruit, the oxtail marmalade
being a beefy oniony five-spice scented stew (I thought it
was short rib meat) spread on croutons;

vientre de cerdo: crispy pork belly with pumpkin, escargots,
liberty apples, and smoked maple crumble - nice meat, the
snails being a puzzlement right out of the can.

I ordered the 07 Finca Losada Mencia, a deep red not quite
ready wine with hints of licorice, stewed prunes, and TCA,
which last turned Alex right off, so he had his own glass
of Grenache or something.

The portions are tapas size, except for the last three,
the heart not selling well, so we got a lot; the pork belly
probably ditto; and the marrow just crying out to be served
generously.

No dessert. We decided to have an after-dinner drink or
two or three, and to that end walked back to Ivy (the place
that gives the airline points), a mile and a half. But when
one is walking with friends, one of whom is a hawt granny,
even I can do a mile and half. Pat had Courvoisier, I had an
odd Argentine Malbec whose name I forgot, and Alex had
Lagavulin, whose aroma completely took over the area.

I pointed them in the direction of the airport hotel and went
to catch my bus, which along with another half-mile walk got
me back in bed by 0130.

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