Restaurant Tallent
Here in Indiana, the weather can’t seem to make up its mind (81˚ Friday, 35˚ Monday) … go figure. Among the casualties of this uneven start to spring has been the early harvest of local vegetables. Indiana asparagus recently became available, as did some local greens like spinach; but otherwise, it’s been a little thin. Knowing this, it could have been a less than ideal time to explore an Indiana restaurant that has been getting great reviews for its use of local seasonal produce: Restaurant Tallent in Bloomington. It was an incredible meal, and it was a magnificent example of the opportunities when we cook (& eat!) closer to home.
Tallent is located on the square in downtown Bloomington. If you decide to go, give yourself an extra hour to walk the downtown and shop in some of the locally owned stores. You’ll find some interesting options ranging from a good used book store to some global gifts inspired shops. A couple national retailers are squeezed in, but it’s an otherwise pretty local group of stores, almost a throwback to the downtowns of our imagined youths. We were fortunate to have a beautiful sunny Saturday night to walk (even if it was a bit too brisk for late April!).
The space Tallent occupies is perfect: subdued colors with minimal artwork allow the space to feel open, airy and conversational. A detail like the restaurant’s small bar being made of old wine cases give the space winks of personality – not quite quirky, but certainly fun. You can sit and eat at the bar (they actually have a slightly different bar menu, which typically includes a house made ricotta), or you can sit in one of the two dining areas. If you’re interested, the first area allows you to see through “the pass” and into a large portion of the kitchen. You’ll see a well run kitchen with subdued but firm commands from the chef, and tight movements from each of the stations.
Letting your customers see into the kitchen sends a big message: it incorporates everyone into the experience of the meal and it says you have sufficient control of your operation that you’re comfortable seeing inside the kitchen will add to the customers’ evening. I love open kitchens, because I think too many people who love haute cuisine wouldn’t dane to break bread with the people who cook their meals (if you didn’t know who Marco Pierre White was you’d probably think twice about sitting next to him, but you’d eat anything he put in front of you!).
There is a subdued control that permeates Tallent’s food: every plate had a balance to it that is very hard to find. A first course of asparagus w/ cured ham, some local greens, cheese and 25 year balsamic, was amazing, but made even more so with the accompanying truffled egg. The chef had soft-boiled an egg, peeled it, then coated it in bread crumbs and deep fried the whole egg. The top of the egg was taken off with a knife and the molteny goodness of the yolk had a truffle oil folded into it. Grab a little bit of everything and dip it into the yolk … it could have been decadent, but managed to be just the perfect dressing to the asparagus and greens. I had that with a Cotes du Rhone Guigal, which is an amazing wine especially with a dish where you want a little alcohol to cut through the richness of the first course.
My wife had the sweet pea agnolotti – a house made ravioli which exploded in your mouth with a wonderfully rich taste. Coupled to this richness was the earthiness of the local sweet peas. Since we both thought the dinner portion of spring vegetable risotto looked amazing, we shared that as a second course. This might have been the highlight of the meal: topped with red pepper marmalade, the risotto had Capriole goat cheese folded within it at the end of prep, along with some lightly sautéed spring peas and asparagus. Again, this dish managed to be light even with the introduction of goat cheese, but it was revelatory with the tart marmalade. Jen had a glass of the sparkling Chandon Rose which was an excellent choice for the parmesan goodness from the agnolotti.
Main courses were good, but not quite as amazing as the first courses. That’s an interesting comment that I seem to find at more and more restaurants. It’s something Bruni and Ruhlman have both blogged about: that more chefs seem to be expressing themselves creatively with appetizers and playing it safe with main courses. Ruhlman goes so far as to order multiple appetizers and no main course; but hey, he’s Ruhlman, he’s cool, and I’m not. So I ordered a main course. For me, the sea scallops with braised pork belly and a lemon-cream sauce (my apologies to the chef as I don’t recall the exact name of the sauce). This was very good, but I thought the dish could have used a bit more acidity in the form of the lemon-cream sauce, and somewhere the smokiness of the pork belly didn’t always work for me. Maybe a little more would have helped, especially to offset the mouth feel of the white beans, but then again I usually think more pork helps most things. Jen’s snapper was perfectly cooked, and came on a bed of eggplant puree. I like eggplant, but for some reason eggplant puree is not one of my favorite things. We had a good bit of it in Turkey last summer, and I just couldn’t say I enjoyed the flavor. It always seemed too basic for my pallet.
If we’re going to drive over an hour for dinner, we’re having dessert. And yes, if you’re going to drive to Bloomington (and you are) to go to this amazing restaurant, you’re going to order dessert. Why? Because the chef’s wife (Kristen Tallent) is also a trained pastry chef and restaurants with pastry chefs rock … all I can say is you must order her interpretation of a Smore. That’s all I’m going to say … well, actually not all I’m going to say … if you make the drive only for the Smore, it will be worth it … seriously, it’s incredible!
It’s unclear to any of us where the local food movement is going or what precisely it taps into. Somewhere within the American culture, we don’t have the same sort of culinary heritage of other countries; and that’s a shame. It’s probably a combination of our drive to succeed and utilitarian view of pleasure, but as society changes, in particular as we have to learn to stay a little more locally focused, we’re going to find out the hidden treasures that are within arm’s reach. Admittedly, a restaurant such as Tallent exhibits this at a very high level of execution, and yet by its example it gets us to think again about what we might have missed locally, about the things which add depth, nuance, pleasure and complexity to how we live, eat and love.
previous post: Integral Summary
next post:
Leave a Reply
About MysteriousFaith
“If anyone can show me, and prove to me, that I am wrong in thought or deed, I will gladly change. I seek the truth, which never yet hurt anybody. It is only persistence in self-delusion and ignorance which does harm.”
Themes
Now Reading
Search
Favorites
Personal Writing
Theology
Categories
Meta Data