Underground Supper Club . . .

It was a gorgeous weekend here in NYC, and I really enjoyed it. I did way too many things and did not get enough sleep, but it was well worth it. On Saturday, I went to another event held by the supper club group that I like so much and whose events I've been to a few times. (After my Google Alert outing. . I'm a little paranoid about including group and place names, so bear with me. .)

This dinner was inspired by an exhibit at a very cool space -- it's a small gallery, and its metal walls open up to bring the outdoors in a bit, and to invite interaction from passers by. Here is a link to a photo of the gallery that will give you a better sense of what it looks like.

From the inside, looking out.

The exhibit was based on the concept of quarantine, so we had a quarantine-inspired meal. I've never had anything even remotely like this, and thought it was amazing. Really good, interesting food, and an incredibly creative, interesting and even humorous presentation.

The first course was served in a petri dish! It was Steelhead trout roe in a gelee. The "mold" is a powder that tastes of Meyer lemon, which was a nice touch. It definitely looked like something you should NOT eat, but it was absolutely delicious!

The accompanying cocktail. . . effervescent vertical vodka. . was served in a test tube. And, between the strength of the drink and its presentation, it certainly got the conversation going.

The second course was a hirame sashimi, served in a bell jar. The quarantine concept that course represented was "fumigation," so (I think hickory) smoke was injected into each jar, and it imparted a very light flavor to the incredibly fresh fish.

Course 2: "The Fumigation" -- When I opened mine, the smoke wafted out. It was cool and delicious!

The third course, "The Installation," was my favorite. It was a ravioli, accompanied by incredible white and black truffle-infused sauces. And, everything came in hermetically sealed plastic bags. . and we all got our own pair of scissors for the course. It was so much fun to put this together, and the dish was incredibly flavorful and yummy. Another thing I liked about this meal was that all of the courses were relatively small -- and just about everything served was band-friendly.

I'll leave out the fourth (24 day dry aged beef) and fifth (cheese with fruit and bread) courses in the interest of not overburdening you with food porn. . . but I didn't want to leave out the desserts. There were five different items, each based on a different cocktail. Between the hermetically sealed bags of the third course and this tray, this meal was an OCD dream! :)


Each of these desserts is based on a different cocktail. People were especially raving about the one on the top left, which is a tangy ball of lemon curd that represented the daiquiri. My favorite was the one on the bottom left. It was a gooey chocolate truffle that was frozen in liquid nitrogen (we got to watch this before dinner), then coated in cocoa butter. Once the truffle thawed, it was gooey and delicious, but neatly contained in its cocoa butter shell.

Catherine, Jonny and Michael

A friend recently asked me whether being banded took away from my enjoyment of eating out and attending events like this. My view is that it's actually added to my enjoyment, since I get all of the pleasure of trying things without having to feel bad about it later. There is something very nice about having a six course meal like this one, being able to try and enjoy everything, but not feeling overly full at its end. No matter how many decadent things I try, I never eat enough to make a significant difference on the scale the next day. And, not having any residual guilt (e.g. about enjoying a nice meal when I should be sticking to my diet. .) is incredibly freeing and definitely lets me enjoy things like this more than I did in the past.