Oct
19
Perfect Autumnal Meal: Nomad Restaurant via iPhone
There’s no way I’m bringing my DSLR to restaurants again. But I’m definitely coming back here, to the NoMad restaurant, where I had one of the best meals TODAY in a long time. It beat that restaurant that starts with a P and ends with an E, and a bunch of other places…Seriously. I was shocked too because honestly I didn’t think it would be this incredible… Wow is the word…
Also, I just have to say this meal was so ‘fall’, the roast chicken I had, the earthy truffle, everything. As I load these photos I am sipping on some Cup Ramen with hot sauce…. And leftover meatballs from Ikea.
You can’t believe how happy I was to be walking into a restaurant with such a casual vibe. I know it does look kind of fancy but it’s really…okay it is still a little bit upscale but not annoyingly so. There’s ABSOLUTELY no pretension here and there were a good number of people wearing jeans, like me. The best part is this casual vibe mixed with this mind blowing food. You walk in and you’re just comfortable.
A beautiful sunroof.
If you’re a Real Housewife like me you can just move to the bar after dessert.
Who wears sunglasses in a restaurant? I do. At least until the bread and wine comes.
Importance of Logos, yada yada…
So I look at the menu..
But I only see these…
One thing about this chef that I love…. He’s concise, and knows that you don’t need those stupid decorations on a plate to make a point. Because when an idea is ingenious, and not something TRYING to be an idea, you don’t need much. Just look at this bare wooden plate with a dab of salt. The idea here was to mimic the feeling of chocolate dipped strawberries and apply it to a casual, every day french snack…and that snack is eating radishes with butter. But simple is not boring here, as I continued on with my meal I noticed that the chef really cared about everything, the way the food was presented and etc. But it wasn’t overdone.
Cold butter perfection.
A beautiful presentation here too, yes it’s called CRUDITE but you know it’s really just veggies and dip, a good old snack you serve at Superbowl or whatever…Simple and refreshing.
The bread included purple taro (I think) but mostly it was just yeasty goodness. Of course when we broke the bread open it was bursting with steam.
The server stopped grating too quickly, the way I always feel about truffles. I tried to small talk him, maybe the mindless action of grating would continue on a little bit longer..but it’s fine…my plan didn’t work anyhow. They gave me enough…The smell was incredible of course. Pasta was very eggy and seasoned with cream and cheese…super simple but just the best. You could tell they are using fresh pasta…I usually always prefer dry pasta because it’s ‘harder’ but for this I think it worked well. I have no complaints.
It looked like they just broke into this huge white truffle, as you can see these flakes are choppier..But again with the presentation, it’s almost mindless the way they put the pasta there, no tricks…and I really like that right now. Effortless…or whatever stupid word people use when they describe good ‘style’…
The real dish you HAVE to order here is the roast chicken for two. I mean, I really was not expecting much..because I mean how good can roast chicken BE??? Can it really beat a piece of a bloody dry aged sirloin…? Today I learned that it can. This dish screams Thanksgiving, in fact you will NOT want to eat a dried up piece of turkey meat after having tasted this. I didn’t know that chicken could be so juicy, but definitely this chicken was fresh directly from some farm and number 2 it was probably cooked at a really low temperature for a long long time. Maybe even 150. It literally melted in my mouth. The best part is that you look at this chicken and you’re just like, whatever, that looks boring as hell. No. And that’s what I love about this restaurant, that everything is just normal, but not.
The chicken for two comes with bread and these little casserole. What they did was cut the chicken apart so that you get the breast separately, and the dark meat resides in that staub dish with the tastiest gravy. The weird thing here is that serving white meat chicken is kind of like, sacrilegious behavior… for a high end restaurant at least. Seriously???? But again, the chef proves that you can take the most drab piece of meat and turn it into gold. In fact this white meat was so good it tasted better than dark meat, and you know people always go for the dark meat because it’s juicier.
Dark meat section.
The skin looks burnt but it’s not. It’s just got some stuffing under the skin. Guess what? Black truffles and Foie Gras. Yes.
Ugh, god…
Another winning combination of this dish, yes the black truffle is great but also the foie gras stuffing is so clever. All that fat renders a piece of boring white meat…You won’t have chicken like this anywhere. Ina Garten loves to make her husband Roast Chicken every friday night, but I really want to know how he would react to this dish. What is his name..Jerry…Jeffrey…whatever.
Real housewives style, where’s my pinot??? Rows of it on the tables as you can see. Anyway, don’t judge the lady, her haircut or her style….Talking to the fashun people reading this… She was really cool and told me to order the roast chicken. I was really going to pass because I don’t order things like Roast Chicken at restaurants…but something about her made me believe that it was going to be good.
Excellent lemon tart.
The XL macaron was a total disappointment. But I didn’t care because everything else was spectacular. And I am so blown away by the chef’s nonchalant yet meticulous attitude towards food presentation.
No.
It took me a while to visit this place (As it usually does), and NYTIMES did a review on it ages ago. But I’m so happy I did. Definitely check it out. The chef Daniel Humm (11 MADISON) is a bada$$.
Looks delicious, but, shit…that’s one expensive meal.
Hahaha. Love how nonchalantly you just say of the macaron, “No.”
the second i saw that your post was up (on instagram) i rushed over to read.
the chicken looks delicious.
i know you’re korean and that you’ve no experienced good roast chicken, so may i recommend baden baden? its a restaurant/sports bar-type place that sells the. best. roast chicken. their skin is crisp and flavorful and the meat simply melts in your mouth. the veggies that are under the chicken when roasted absorb the oils and fats and blister to perfection while retaining their crunch and flavor, and the seasoning from the chicken rubs off on them. the combination of herbs used is hard to decipher, but its some heavenly mixture of coarse salt and oregano-type herbs (if im not mistaken). try the place. its in fort lee, nj. bergen blvd.
their 안주 menu is not extensive but the have the basics and they are well-executed. otherwise i wouldn’t recommend.
the second i saw that your post was up (on instagram) i rushed over to read.
the chicken looks delicious.
i know you’re korean and that you’ve now experienced good roast chicken, so may i recommend baden baden? its a restaurant/sports bar-type place that sells the. best. roast chicken. their skin is crisp and flavorful and the meat simply melts in your mouth. the veggies that are under the chicken when roasted absorb the oils and fats and blister to perfection while retaining their crunch and flavor, and the seasoning from the chicken rubs off on them. the combination of herbs used is hard to decipher, but its some heavenly mixture of coarse salt and oregano-type herbs (if im not mistaken). try the place. its in fort lee, nj. bergen blvd.
their 안주 menu is not extensive but they have the basics and they are well-executed. otherwise i wouldn’t recommend.
love this post. would love to see more restaurant reviews/reflections from you, you obviously know what’s up. awesome sunglasses-in-restaurant look!
Not awesome. Rude. Really not a good move, you and your server need to have a mutual trust – do you trust someone if you can’t see their eyes? Think about it…
why is mutual trust necessary between customer and server in a fair exchange of money and service/product?
killing me softly… now I’m hungry. I wish I’d walked block away to Popeyes before it closed but now it’s too late
That chicken looks delicious *drool* And those veggies looked like they went in the back and handpicked them from their garden.
Looks fantastic. We’re big radish eaters around here and that presentation might just get ‘interpreted’, as might the veggies and dip! Glad you had a great meal! I’m showing homemade Calzone on my blog right now …. Not presented in nearly the jaw-dropping Luxirare style, but it was good and you might like it!
Wonderful post, thank you! That meal looks absolutely divine!
If you want to try making an amazing roasted chicken at home this recipe will give you that same juicy meat and glassy skin: http://orangette.blogspot.com/2005/11/its-raining-its-pouring-and-seattlest.html
Just planted a row of taro here in Hawaii! Love your blog, it makes me miss the city!
Droool. Going to drown in my own saliva.
Very nice, Chef Daniel Humm is one of the very best.
It looks to me like purple potatoes on the bread.
I don’t see any rows of pinot?! lol everyone seems to be drinking a white wine.
pinot can be white (pinot grigio) or red (pinot noir)
A while ago I read this glowing review of NoMad’s food: http://newyork.seriouseats.com/2012/04/nomad-daniel-humm-manhattan-opening-review.html
Now I officially need to eat there.
Laughed so hard at the “No.”
amazing how a chef can make chicken, something so ordinary, extraordinary.
The prices seem pretty decent! For the quality, it seems to be a lot cheaper than what is charged at non-fine dining restaurants here in the South. For example, the crudite tray would have been $18 and consisted of pre-bagged vegetables.
Thanks for your review. I trust your taste. I’ve been to his other restaurant, Eleven Madison Park and probably had the best dining experience of my life. I also like how he thinks of the presentation along with the flavor but both parts are realized. It’s like doing something on another level – most chefs stop at one. I’ll be in NY next month and hope to eat there. That chicken is unreal!
wow wow!!! amazing cuisine
wowie, my former roomie works here and i never knew it was this great.
Мечтата на всеки един магазин – да направи една кухня за такъв ресторант http://borman.biz/?page_id=36 с качествено обзавеждане на кухненските шкафове.
Love it. My thanks for posting that. I’ll definitely check back to read more and tell my coworkers about your writing.