Underground Supper Club

A few months ago, I read an article about all of these underground supper clubs that are cropping up all over the place. One in particular, which is hosted out in Brooklyn, looked great to me. There wasn't that much information available . . just an article or two and some photos from past events. The food looked incredible, and the people looked decent, so I convinced Marjorie to come with me.


This is, of course, a bit of an adventure because it required us to actually leave the island of Manhattan and take 2 subway lines to get out to the appropriate part of Brooklyn . . to have dinner with a bunch of people we've never met! Fortunately, it was a risk worth taking -- we had a fantastic time!

Here is the menu. . .

So, you may be wondering. . . how exactly does a bandster get by at a seven course dinner (counting the amuse bouche and mignardises)? I considered telling the chef in advance that I am banded, but decided that I'd just wing it and see how it went. And, it was totally fine. I just ate a bit of each course and pushed my food around so that it looked like I'd had more than I actually did.


This was the first real course. . . the heirloom tomato salad with peaches, chevre, sweet basil and mint. It was delicious! My second favorite dish of the night. Everything in this dish is band-appropriate and easy to chew. The plate is actually quite small, so it wasn't as huge of a portion as it looks to be here. I ate about half and did the push-to-edges-of-plate trick.

Another thing that I do at restaurants (and did here) is to say how much I enjoyed the dish. That stops people from asking whether you didn't finish because you didn't like it. It's one of the more valuable tricks up my banster sleeve!

The chef came out and told us about each dish as it was served. I felt like I was a judge on Top Chef! :) In a good way!

The second dish was really exquisite . . . sweet corn velouté. This dish was definitely not calorie-appropriate for the band. BUT, it was exactly the perfect consistency, since it was pureed. . . Apologies in advance for the food porn. . . :)

The presentation started out as shown below. . . Oh. My. Goodness. Yes, that IS a piece of honeycomb underneath the blue cheese.

And, then the chef came around and poured the velouté on top. I wish I'd photographed this better. Just imagine -- this hot, sweet corn creamy wonderfulness is poured over the croutons, blue cheese and honeycomb. The blue cheese and honeycomb melt and merge with the velouté.

That dish went down like a charm and was really incredibly delicious. I had to restrain myself so that I wouldn't finish it!

I won't post all of the other dishes, since I don't want to give everyone head hunger! I will say though that I had trouble with the one shown below -- the duck breast. This was made using ducks grown for foie gras production . . it actually tasted like foie gras. Unfortunately, the texture was just not working for me -- it was too dense and difficult to fully chew apart.

I had to get rid of my first bite because I'd cut too big of a piece given that I couldn't chew it well enough. In case anyone is wondering how to do this politely without leaving the table, let me tell you. You have two options. . .


1. Pretend you are using your napkin and spit it into your napkin . . . but here we had linen napkins and were at someone's home, so that was not going to fly (how gross for our host. . .); or

2. Put your empty fork in your mouth (preferably while someone on the other side of the table is telling an engaging story), put the bite on the fork with your tongue, and put the bite on your plate (hiding it under something else). People seriously do not notice this -- and, if anyone ever does, at least you are being as un-gross and polite as possible while taking care of the situation!


I chose option no. 2. And no one noticed at all. After that, I took a few more cautious bites. . . cutting each the size of a wee pencil eraser. There wasn't going to be any amount of pushing the food around that could hide that I barely ate anything, though. So, when they came to clear, I took Marjorie's plate and stacked it on top of mine. At least by the time they saw the dish in the kitchen, no one necessarily knew it was mine! :)

Here is a photo of Marjorie, me and our wonderful chef and host. I know there is a spot on my shirt but (are you sitting down??) I did not crop the photo to remove it because (can I get a drum roll?!?) -- LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER -- I wanted to leave my hips in the picture!!

Thank you for sharing this landbreaking, non-hip-cropping moment with me! :)