CityZen, at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel - 2008 James Beard Award Winner Eric Ziebold - Closed Dec 7, 2014

[KeithA]

The food was a transcendental experience; cream of horseradish soup with corned beef and blue sweet potato crutons.

Please tell us more about this soup. It was my one regret about doing the vegetarian tasting recently, it sounds really good and creative. Thanks.

[rkduggins]

Please tell us more about this soup. It was my one regret about doing the vegetarian tasting recently, it sounds really good and creative. Thanks.

The soup plate came to the table with seared cubes of beef and parboiled then seared potato cubes. The hot soup was poured over all to fill the dish. The first bite was creamy, soft, velvety and smooth, then the horseradish flavor came through. Not sharp or bitter, it was rather like the scent of horseradish pervaded the dish. It never built to heaviness, but stayed perfectly balanced through to the end.

[jdl]

For those keeping score in the lounge: That soup is available on the bar menu, too.

[Pete]

For those keeping score in the lounge: That soup is available on the bar menu, too.

[jkn]

My wife and I went to dinner at Cityzen last week to celebrate our anniversary. Even though we have enjoyed dinners at Cityzen in the past, we were a little apprehensive because we have been going to Maestro and Komi to celebrate birthdays and anniversaries for the past few years and we were afraid that we would miss Maestro even more after this special occasion. I am glad to say that we had a wonderful meal and dining experience and we will happily move Cityzen into our regular rotation.

We were presented with two amuses, the first a mushroom fritter on a mushroom sauce (I could have eaten ten of those), then a cube of porcine head cheese on an artichoke puree. Even my wife, who will eat offal but isn't crazy about it, enjoyed it and commented she could have gone for another.

The first course was chilled asparagus with an oven roasted tomato (which tasted like sweet, warm and slightly juicy sundried tomato), a microgreen salad atop a tapenade-like sauce. Until I tried that dish, I had never understood the fascination with asparagus. For me, this was the most memorable dish of the evening. Each element of the dish was very good, the flavors when combined in different ways were even better.

The second course was a tempura style soft shell crab with pickled onions. Very tasty and fried perfectly.

The third course was sablefish. I don't recall what it was served with. It was very good, I remember liking it, but it was obviously not a memorable dish for me. On the other hand, my wife thought it was the best plate of the night.

The fourth course was lamb on a pea and cream sauce. Three different cuts of the lamb were served, all very good. Of course the parker rolls came out with the course. I don't think I could possibly add any superlatives about the rolls that hasn't been granted many times, so I won't even try.

The cheese course was next. My wife is way into cheese more than me, but we both loved the doddington, which we had never tasted before. And even though I was getting full, I couldn't stop eating the spiced almonds that accompanied the cheese.

We were then served a Meyer lemon sorbet before the last course came out: the Cityzen seven layer bar. I'm not sure why it's called a seven layer bar because we could not identify seven layers - we identified seven different elements separated into an ice cream pile and a chocolate custard cookie sandwich pile. It was a very nice way to end the meal

As I mentioned before, we have had very nice meals at Cityzen in the past but this meal seemed to be a major step up to us. The service was excellent, the atmosphere was nice (we were in the wine alcove looking into the kitchen), the food very, very good. One really nice touch that accentuated our evening was a Moscato D'Asti given to us just before dessert with an anniversary card signed by chef Ziebold and the staff. Major kudos to Cityzen.

[DonRocks]

Congratulations Eric!

[monsterriffs]

A bunch of us dined here on Friday evening and it's easy to see why 48 hours later, Mr. Ziebold would win this award!

The lychee sorbet and mint jelly dessert bite was absolutely one of the best summer flavors I've ever had.

[Monica Bhide]

Add me to the list of Eric's die-hard fans! Congrats, chef! Well-deserved win.

[Poivrot Farci]

A romantic era virtuoso said that “anyone who tells a lie has not a pure heart and can not make a good soup.” Consequently, Mr. Ziebold and his blue ribbon troupe are incorrputible. Nettle soup was an exercise in deliberate transformation and precise technique unspoiled by gratuitous gestures or micro nonsense. Culinary funambulism and triptychs of elements reminiscent of Alain Dutournier.

What I know about women could fit into a soup bowl and what I understand of them in a cup. Soup itself however is more forgiving and you don’t have to listen to its boring stories, but it deserves as much respect and attention. “Ooze” is le mot juste to qualify this soup’s hedonist viscosity as it pours. Croutons are indispensable, more than kitschy filler or something between protons and neutrons. At their most primal they are a centuries old vehicle for sopping and the flax ones were so swollen with soup I had to nibble on them like lovers do to earlobes in those videos...though it may have been that charming young woman’s matching green dress and ‘78 corvette curves that helped the soup evoke a morning itch to romp in a nettle patch shiny with dew. Olive oil custard not so much. Sewed up the meal with a snifter of calvados so smooth that a couple drops in the Mandarin Cafeteria punch would have the waitstaff narrating Frontline.

[DonRocks]

Andy Myers,

Your email bounced!

Click

Click, click, click.

[DonRocks]

I'd like to say a big THANK YOU you to one of our city's greatest GMs, Mark Politzer. Mark opened CityZen in September, 2004, and over the past four years, guided it into being a world-class restaurant. He was always a warm and welcoming presence on the floor, and will be greatly missed. Fortunately, we won't have to travel far to find Mark, as he is now GM at the upcoming Bourbon Steak in the Four Seasons, Georgetown. Congratulations, Mark, and we'll look forward to seeing you soon!

And also a big WELCOME to CityZen's new GM ...

drum roll ...

Jarad Slipp.

[hmmboy]

I'd like to say a big THANK YOU you to one of our city's greatest GMs, Mark Politzer. Mark opened CityZen in September, 2004, and over the past four years, guided it into being a world-class restaurant. He was always a warm and welcoming presence on the floor, and will be greatly missed. Fortunately, we won't have to travel far to find Mark, as he is now GM at the upcoming Bourbon Steak in the Four Seasons, Georgetown. Congratulations, Mark, and we'll look forward to seeing you soon!

And also a big WELCOME to CityZen's new GM ...

drum roll ...

Jarad Slipp.

That's great news - a great fit and a win-win situation. Welcome back Jarad!!

[Walrus]

Hooray! Makes me feel even better about requesting CityZen for my birthday dinner in October

[Walrus]

We just got home from CityZen -- and many fabulous libations, so please excuse the brevity and lack of detail in this post. In fact, I'll be pleased if it turns out it's all spelled vaguely correctly...

We had a WONDERFUL meal here tonight. Just fabulous. Each dish was a revelation, and the wines accompanying them were also divine examples of their types. For example, after two amuses, one of a mushroom fritter and one of an amazing little tempura shrimp on fresh tofu (what a lovely little bite!), we started with the amazing white corn soup -- the corn essence was so strong that the closest thing we could come up with to compare it with was eating sweet corn right off the stalk at Davon Crest II. And it was paired with a Madeira -- the Rare Wine Co. Boston Bual -- that was outstanding. I said at one point that I wished everything could smell like the nose on that Madeira, and I stand by that statement!!! The lobster custard was richly infused with lobster -- and very, very good lobster at that. We also had the shoat BLT. The top layer of this piece of pork was so perfectly crisped and so perfectly salted...well, words fail me. The lemon turbot followed, on the world's best gratin (rich but beautiful). The final entree that we shared was the guinea hen -- wow. It came with a little box of fresh miniature Parker House rolls. If you get this dish, I highly recommend eating the bottom of at least one of the rolls and then dipping the top in the jus before eating it. Amazing. Rich but not heavy, intensely flavored without being overwhelming. The cheese, with an excellent selection was next. Finally, we had the chocolate-peanut butter-concord grape dessert, with a glass of a 1977 Dow's port. Outstanding. I am not a port person, and I almost made the inexcusable error of offering my glass to Tripewriter. Ha. It was really just a beautiful beverage.

On a personal note, it was lovely to see some faces we knew as well as to meet some people we hadn't met before but are glad to know now.

This was an outstanding experience -- one of the best we've had -- and by far one of my favorite birthday meals ever (Inn at Little Washington included!).

[DonRocks]

we started with the amazing white corn soup -- the corn essence was so strong that the closest thing we could come up with to compare it with was eating sweet corn right off the stalk at Davon Crest II. And it was paired with a Madeira -- the Rare Wine Co. Boston Bual -- that was outstanding.

I'm not doubting the success of this combination, but it really sounds weird!

[bonaire]

This restaurant continues to be amazing. From the insanely delicious food to the seamless, unobtrusive service to the little touches that make your night, it is a star performance.

My S.O. and I celebrated our one-year anniversary here tonight. When I made the reservation, they asked if we would be celebrating a special occasion and I told them about the anniversary. They made our night more special by presenting us with 2 glasses of champagne and a card signed by all of the staff, as well as a dessert plate with "Happy Anniversary" spelled out in chocolate (it was pretty enough that I managed not to actually attempt to lick the plate). These simple offerings really made our dinner that much more enjoyable.

We both got the 3 course tasting menu and were glad we hadn't opted for the 5 course menu as it probably would have been too much food. I'll try to remember what we had but forgive me if the details are a little hazy. I'm also a terrible food writer.

My S.O. started with a "chicken fried beaver quail" that was out of this world. It had a light, crunchy coating that was salty without being overly salty. The quail flavor really showed through. For his entree, he had braised lamb with beans and spinach and he adored it (I didn't taste it). I can't remember his dessert.

I started with pork belly that was so good I got angry that I had given S.O such a big piece and actually contemplated taking part of it back. It came with a persimmon "ravioli" and had just a touch of some sort of apple-based sauce. The pork belly was perfectly cooked, with a nice strip of fat in the middle of it. It was, as the S.O. described it, "the kind of bacon they serve in heaven". For my main, I had a lemon-flavored turbot that was shaped like a sausage -- our server told us that the chef shapes it with plastic wrap and then poaches it. It was served with some sort of creamy, milky artichoke gratin and some fried spinach. For dessert, I had a pumpkin souffle with a side of vanilla ice cream that is covered by warm apple cider.

The chef offered 2 amuse bouches (amuses bouche??) tonight -- the first was a mushroom fritter (neither of us cared for it, but we don't like mushrooms) and the second was an olive oil custard with a paprika like oil topping. It was delicious -- the custard was firm, and the topping gave the salty custard just a bit of heat. Our "pre-dessert" was a deconstructed smore, with a dollop of dark chocolate (ganache?) placed on top of a bed of marshmallow with a sprinkling of graham cracker. Maybe, just MAYBE, I ate mine AND his!

CityZen really makes dining an event -- we spent 3 lovely hours enjoying each other, our surroundings, and the fantastic menu. Our service was beyond great (the way they replace your napkin if you get up to use the restroom is so elegant) and our server really helped to guide us through the evening. I can't wait for next year!

[Tujague]

Bonair--Bob and I celebrated our tenth anniversary at CityZen on Thursday night, and your post echoes many of our feelings, particularly about the wonderful service. The food doesn't so much blow you away with big flavors but with the sheer elegance and skill of its execution. I also had the wonderful pork belly, and perhaps that ravioli was the best surprise of the evening (though I loved the fried microgreens on top as well). I opted for the sturgeon aiguillette, and while it was a firmer whitefish than I usually prefer, its relative dullness was offset by the bacon and potato mille feuille, baby beets, and apple garnish. Bob opted for an opener of gouda risotto, perfectly done, and a hearty, fall-like loin of venison with rye berries, collards, and venison sausage. He was so-so about his brown sugar savarin with pear for dessert, but I loved my "dreamsicle." And as Bonair notes, the amuses were delightful--I loved the mushroom; the custard with the red pepper sauce; and the deconstructed s'more (fyi, in the middle was a chocolate sorbet encased in ganache).

What would I change? Maybe moving to the center of the room instead of in the quieter side area--nice for a romantic evening, but that banquette actually got kind of uncomfortable. And our Italian wine (name/vintage escapes me) started off nicely rustic, but got sort of boring as the meal went on. Our pre-dinner cocktails were well-made, but nothing special.

But for what it's worth, it's good to know that even when gay couples are getting their rights taken away in California, we can still get the same anniversary perks at CityZen as everyone else!

[DonRocks]

Some observations:

1. Jarad Slipp looks stately without spectacles.

2. Andy Myers was wearing a clip-on tie, but not the kind you'd expect.

3. Amanda Cook is baking house-made focaccia for the breadbasket.

4. Scrambled eggs and Alban white truffles.

5. I am left-nostril dominant.

Cheers,

Rocks.

[Waitman]

I remember a lunch at Bouley back in its heyday where I divined the talent of the chef in the spectacular superiority of his lobster salad -- hardly an obscure or innovative dish -- to every other version of that dish in the world. Same with the tuna tartar at the bar at CityZen last Friday -- the quintessential version of a classic dish.

Not that the rockfish or braised lamb sucked, either. Or the wine or the service or the sight of Mr. Slipp running the dining room.

After, I had to ask myself why we don't do this more often.

And then I asked myself when I'm getting back to see if the $50 ("for the table") shoat rillets are worth it.

I'll wager they are.

[Chris Cunningham]

I will be taking my new girl there next week and looking sooooo forward to it.

[DanCole42]

Some observations:

1. Jarad Slipp looks stately without spectacles.

2. Andy Myers was wearing a clip-on tie, but not the kind you'd expect.

3. Amanda Cook is baking house-made focaccia for the breadbasket.

4. Scrambled eggs and Alban white truffles.

5. I am left-nostril dominant.

Cheers,

Rocks.

The recent chat with Rachael Harriman (why doesn't she accept my Facebook request?) has inspired me to choose Cityzen as my romantic birthday dinner venue this year (Jan 31st reservation to celebrate a Feb 2nd birthday - stupid Monday!).

It may also have something to do with the fact that the place makes Don act like a tween girl on whom one of the Jonas Brothers - Nick, maybe - recently sweated.

My question relates to #s 3 and 4 above. Is the focaccia in addition to the Parker House rolls? Please say it's so. Were the eggs and white truffles a "Don Rockwell" special or a regular item? Say it ain't so.

Finally... has anyone tried the Bowmore or Port Charlotte Islays available at the bar? Would they appeal to my Laphroaigian palate?

Thanks! Looking forward to being wowed.

[DonRocks]

The recent chat with Rachael Harriman (why doesn't she accept my Facebook request?) has inspired me to choose Cityzen as my romantic birthday dinner venue this year (Jan 31st reservation to celebrate a Feb 2nd birthday - stupid Monday!).

It may also have something to do with the fact that the place makes Don act like a tween girl on whom one of the Jonas Brothers - Nick, maybe - recently sweated.

My question relates to #s 3 and 4 above. Is the focaccia in addition to the Parker House rolls? Please say it's so. Were the eggs and white truffles a "Don Rockwell" special or a regular item? Say it ain't so.

Finally... has anyone tried the Bowmore or Port Charlotte Islays available at the bar? Would they appeal to my Laphroaigian palate?

Thanks! Looking forward to being wowed.

Danno,

The focaccia is part of the regular bread basket (along with two other breads from Panorama). It's offered both at the bar and in the dining room, as opposed to the Parker House rolls which are only served in the dining room.

The truffled-egg dish was a seasonal item on the regular menu, but also an expensive supplement. (I suspect they won't have it available at the end of January, but who knows given Eric's proclivity towards freezing/sous-viding.)

Cheers,

Rocks.

[synaesthesia]

The recent chat with Rachael Harriman (why doesn't she accept my Facebook request?)

She knows your proclivity for chicks named Rachael

[DanCole42]

I think I'd make a good rich person.

People like Warren Buffet? Horrible rich people.

Three cubic acres of cash and he still drives around in a Hyundai and lives in the same house he purchased forty years ago for $30,000.

Not me, though. I'd light cigars off hundred dollars bills and take my monocled friends big game hunting at the secret dinosaur island that only rich people know about.

I'm sure I would enjoy Tai Pan on the ninth floor of the Mandarin Oriental. It's billed as an "Executive Lifestyle Club." That's what it says on the door. I'm don't know what that means, but I'm sure I'd enjoy it. Probably lots of mermaids riding around on unicorns and feeding everyone grapes. Also the air is full of whatever it is that makes all rich people have such great skin.

Being rich is all about waste. It's about keeping a massive fire going behind the bar because, hey, rich people know there's plenty of oil beneath the secret dinosaur island. It's about serving scotch in a glass that weighs eight pounds because, hey, if you're rich and someone asks, "Do you want more glass/diamonds/gold/Bentleys?", the answer is always, "Sure, pile it on!" It's about making someone who's not rich fold a hundred white washcloths and line them along the back wall of a bathroom because, hey, even though rich people poop smells like rainbows, they still wash their hands and they know that your hands get drier if your laundered washcloths are folded nicely.

You can imagine my surprise, then, when I encountered the food at Cityzen. Where was the waste? The excess? The mind-bottling complexity? Instead I was confronted with food of powerful simplicity. Intense simplicity. It was prepared with supreme care and attention to detail. The ingredients shone boldly. There were no corners cut. No gold flakes, no mile-high presentation of a thousand ingredients, no endangered species on the menu. To paraphrase Chef Ziebold, it's about what you can take away, not about what you can add on. Horrible rich person.

I know, I'm weird. But... weird is good. Weird is food without excess served in an excessive hotel. Weird is interesting. Weird is boundary pushing.

The Yellowfin Tuna Ceviche was weird. I remember in science class the first time the properties of additive color were shown to me. Combining red and green light makes yellow. I remember being enthralled and thinking, "Holy shit, that it so WEIRD!" in a profoundly wonderful way. I thought the same thing when I ate the ceviche: tuna, almonds, sour orange cardamom vinaigrette: ingredients as boldly simple as red and green and yet, when they combined in my mouth, something new and wondrous appeared. Holy shit indeed.

The sweet butter poached Maine Lobster was also delightfully weird. Plenty of summers in Maine taught me what lobster was supposed to taste like. This wasn't it, though. This was something new. The lobster was there, yes, but the skilled kitchen had brought to fore layers of subtle complexity I'd never encountered before and didn't think lobster had. Oh, and the buttery lobster sabayon was incredible. I wanted to take it home and put in on steak, and sandwiches, and in my coffee.

The rib-eye was weird. The colors were beautiful and by sheer coincidence matched my bedroom (weird!), which was mildly annoying as due to a caffeine crash from an earlier espresso binge I was starting to yearn for my bed anyway. But I pressed on. What really made the dish for me was the horseradish. It's weird to find horseradish that is complimentary and not overpowering, that's creamy and not mushy. Rib-eye and horseradish is as simple and basic a pairing as you can get, but when simple is made weird in deft hands, it becomes sublime.

Parker House rolls. Weird! My desire to stuff my mattress with them and then eat my bed each morning. Weird! Amanda's focaccia. Weird! How does she season it so perfectly?

Weird by virtue of that fact I'd never had it before was the rabbit liver served over potatoes confited in duck fat. It was a gift from Rachael. An experiment the kitchen was trying. And it was fantastic. Earth and creamy. It was like foie but with a raw and unpretentious complexity. It's a flavor that will stay with me for the rest of my life. Happy birthday to me, indeed. My Facebook status is currently: "Dan demands that additional rabbit livers be brought to him!!!"

Also weird is the fact that meeting great chefs makes me get star struck. I worry that it's like a Trekkie meeting William Shatner. He just wants to live a life away from what is essentially just a job and go off to make TJ Hooker, not talk shop with a blathering geek. I don't think that Rachael Harriman or Eric Ziebold have careers as Priceline negotiators, but I do very much appreciate them coming out to say hello. They should be grateful I'd had a scotch earlier to calm my nerves. Otherwise I would have been as giddy as a schoolgirl.

And how does Rachael manage to look so great after spending hours slaving away in a kitchen? Probably because she's spent so much time in her weirdly successful young life cooking for rich people.

The service was everything you would expect at a rich people restaurant. Although, I did notice things I'd never noticed before. Weird things. When our table was bussed, even if the utensils were sitting right next to each other, they'd be taken away one at a time and placed quietly on the plate rather than picked up all at once. When water was poured, Nicole our server held a napkin up on the opposite side of the glass to prevent splashing. This happened even when my wife was up from the table and no where near her water glass. Whenever we got up, our napkins were taken away and replaced with fresh ones (waste and excess - WOOO!). Our napkins were placed in our laps for us. Unlike the rest of the evening, this was weird in a bad way because it brought to mind my fear of being paralyzed and unable to take care of myself. If they'd picked up the napkin to wipe my mouth for me I probably would have fallen under the table and started crying and sucking my thumb.

I'm so weird.

I do want to say, though, in all seriousness that the service was impeccable. Everyone I spoke to knew the answers to every question I had about anything.

Also, why do the tables have their legs on the corners? Sitting at a long booth and moving the table in and out whenever I wanted to get up was like being buckled in. Although, I suppose you COULD say that dinner was like "a roller coaster thrill ride of fun and flavor!!!" But that would make you sound weird.

But then, I hope I've shown you all how weird can be good. Wonderfully, fantastically good. Weirdly good.

Getting up from my simple meal and heading back to the valet (where even validated parking costs $7 - I feel like a rich person again!), I thought about how soon I'd be able to get back there for the bar special. I also thought about how much I'd have to tip the bartender to get served the Parker House rolls at the bar.

So a huge thank you to everyone at Cityzen. It was a weird and amazing birthday. For a wannabe rich person, that's just perfect.

PS - Rachael Ray is out. Rachael Harriman is in. Sorry.

[Pool Boy]

I remember those parker rolls. That's the one thing I'd go back there for. And next time I'd order exactly what I want off the menu instead of doing the tasting menu.

[synaesthesia]

I'm so weird.

PS - Rachael Ray is out. Rachael Harriman is in. Sorry.

Yes. Amazing. And HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

[DonRocks]

I made myself a kidney sandwich this evening with half a rabbit kidney (sliced on the horizontal axis). Took a Parker House roll and sliced it, too, on the horizontal axis. Inserted the half-kidney (which looked like a gigante bean macerated in red wine) in the roll. Put the roll back together, then enjoyed the little popper in two bites so as not to be piggish.

Repeated, the second time chasing the kidney with the roll, in order to experience the sequence of flavors and how they related, one to the other.

Cheers,

Rocks.

[Walrus]

We had a superb dining experience at CityZen last night -- from start to finish, it amazed, impressed, and astounded us We had guests in from out of town, and this was our "fancy" meal of the week. And what a meal is was. We started with cocktails for the others (kir royale and a manhattan) and an Albrecht rose for me. Just the right way to start a night of decadence. After some decision making, we all chose the tasting menu, though one guest and I asked to exchange desserts, as banana desserts just aren't to our taste. We had two amuse bouches that set the tone for the meal: a mushroom fritter in a mushroom sauce -- crisp yet velvety, it made a lifetime mushroom-disliker very happy indeed. The second was a perfect little cylinder of rabbit confit with a creme fraiche dill sauce. Delicious. Before I get to the meal, let me first comment on the breads -- I love the foccacia. Love it. It may not be to everyone's taste, but I love the crispness and the salt of the crust and the mouthfeel of the bread. Yum. I'm going to resort to the menu for the real names for our dishes (as otherwise you'd be reading about "that fish thing that was so good"). Our first course was a merlu confit with a brandade canneloni. I loved the textures of this dish. The merlu was slightly crispy, and the brandade was creamy. Both were delicious. This was followed by a beef carpaccio -- more specifically, a Kagoshima Kurobe beef carpaccio. It was accompanied by pickled baby leeks, really cool marinated mountain potato, and fried shiitake mushrooms. I thought the mushrooms were divine -- crispy, salty, with a great flavor. One of our guests had never had a carpaccio before and was entranced by the texture and the flavors. One of the dishes I was most anticipating was the next item, the butter-poached lobster. The claw meat in particular was perfectly cooked -- so tender it dissolved in your mouth into an explosion of butter and lobster. As much as we enjoyed the lobster, though, and particularly the sauce (oh, the sauce!) that it was served with, the star of the meal for me was the lamb. According to the menu, it was a pan-roasted rib-eye of Elysian Fields Farm lamb, with toasted pine nuts, cauliflower florettes, a crystallized orange slice, and Merguez oil. Oh, the lamb. It was perfectly, inimitably cooked, and the oil gave just the right amount of spice, while the pine nuts and cauliflower added a little firmer texture and a toasted flavor that added a richness to the dish. The lamb was so tender, you could have cut it with a baby spoon, much less a fork. Like the lobster before it, it also melted in your mouth. This dish, I think, is the one that had me almost dancing in my seat. The orange slice was particularly interesting to several members of our party -- crispy like it had been fried, but clean, with a powerful orange flavor. We asked and were told that the chef slices the orange on a mandolin, brushes it with simple syrup, and then oven dries it. I have a feeling that several of our party are going to try to make these slices at home (but little faith that they will be as good as the one we had last night). We had a great time selecting cheeses from the very nicely done cheese cart. Three stand-outs for us were the Rolf Beeler Alpenzeller, which some of us had experienced before, but which all of us agreed was a perfect accompaniment for the meal; the Rocbleu French blue brie; and the Bayrisher Bavarian blue, which may have begun to convert me into a liker of blue cheese, rather than an avoider. For dessert, two members of the party had the dessert listed for the tasting menu -- a black bottom banana pie with thin slices of banana bruleed a la minute. One member of the party had the dessert listed for the vegetarian tasting menu, which was a sticky toffee pudding. I -- being the most difficult, of course -- had something off the regular menu -- the pineapple with cardamom and angel food cake croutons. I can only speak for myself, but I thought my dessert was best I did get a taste of the banana tart, thanks to Tripewriter's generosity and tendency to look away from his plate every once in a while, but as mentioned earlier, I'm not much of a banana lover. Bananas = yes! Banana food = no I wasn't able to distract the diner who had the toffee pudding, so I can't report on it, other than to say there wasn't a crumb left. We ended with some delicate and delicious petit fours -- my absolute favorite being the cinnamon macaroon. A huge flavor for a wee tiny cookie. The final taste was moscato d'Asti and ginger shortbread. And then we knew that we could die happy.

A note about the wines. All perfectly paired -- of course! -- and three that really stood out to me. First was a Virginia wine, which was both delicious and a surprise because it was a delicious Virginia wine. It was a 2006 Horton Vineyards Petite Manseng from Orange County, VA. The riesling, a 2007 Meulenhof, Erdener Treppchen, Riesling Kabinett, Mosel, Germany, was a star for the whole table, and the Elio Perron moscato d'Asti was a lovely finish. The other wines we had were also very good and excellently paired, but these three are the ones I'm going to ask Arrowine about

We've been eating excellent food all week, and will continue to do so until our guests leave on Wednesday, but this meal was one for the books.

[joncephine]

We also were there saturday - I'll post a review of the veg menu when I get a chance!

[Pat]

Our dinner at CityZen last night is one of the best I've ever had, in all regards. My husband and I both went with the 3 course prix fixe menu and both got incredible meals. He's partial to soups when dining out, and he thought the white corn soup (with shoat crouton, I believe) was quite good. I was pleased with the shrimp and baby vegetable salad I had to start. I'm not sure what they did with the shrimp, or where they got them, but they were the most delicate shrimp (ethereal?) I've had in a long time. The salad also featured red atomic carrots, yellow beets, and okra. My second course was pan roasted duck with spinach duxelles and a beggar's purse of duck confit. I was starting to get full (oh, the focaccia and Parker House rolls... ), so my husband finished the pastry and confit, along with polishing off his plate of lamb, eggplant, and green tomato marmalade. The marmalade had a fascinating taste and texture. The bite of lamb I got was done perfectly. I selected the Boston Cream Pie Souffle for dessert but couldn't finish it. I finished the bing cherry ice cream that came with it, though . My second choice had been the candy bar, which my husband got, and I hope that's on the menu for me to order next time.

We asked our waiter for recommendations for wine, and each of us got a glass that matched our food selections well. We enjoyed the amuses--the mushroom fritter over mushroom puree and head cheese croquette--but the star of the small plates from the kitchen was the intermezzo palette cleanser: Greek yogurt sorbet over cantaloupe granité. We could have eaten bowlsful of this for dessert.

Since we were there celebrating our anniversary, we also received the special treats as described previously. The "Happy Anniversary" written in chocolate on a plate was amazingly intricate in its design. My husband got both red velvet cupcakes on the plate, since I couldn't eat any more. He didn't complain . I noticed a number of other tables were celebrating anniversaries (or perhaps other special occasions) as well. I can understand why. This is a special special occasion restaurant. No doubt about it.

[MeMc]

Damn. I'd been craving but staying away from CityZen this month because I thought it was closed in August. (: This sounds great!

[Pat]

Damn. I'd been craving but staying away from CityZen this month because I thought it was closed in August. (: This sounds great!

A number of the items on the chef's tasting menu and the vegetarian menu looked appealing too, but we ultimately decided to stick with the regular menu. When we asked if we'd both have to get the 6 courses if one of us did, our server said that they could pace a 6 course and a 3 course menu to work together. Many places won't do that, but I'm confident they could put it off successfully. Everyone was very accomodating.

[Escoffier]

The Chef's Tasting Menu at CityZen. Beyond good and pushing past excellent.

[Waitman]

Any update as to whether the bar deal is still available? Or would the advice nowadays be to try Sou'Wester?

I had a wonderful meal at the CityZen bar not long ago and would absolutely go there again.

[Waitman]

I shy away from words like "best" because they're subjective and hard to calibrate, but the funnest thing I've eaten in a long time was the lamb at the bar at CityZen last night. A strip of skirt (?) pan roasted, fatty rich and crunchy, and little pink chewy cubes of lamb sausage sauced, if you will with green tomatoes in brine. Very much a deli-type special. Though, you know, ethereal.

[zoramargolis]

We had a lovely meal to celebrate my birthday last night, my first visit to CityZen. We had the "six course" tasting meal, which turned out to be an inaccurate number, given the substantial amuses, the "pre-dessert" tapioca pudding, and the second, "birthday" dessert--a chocolate chip cookie souffle with milk ice cream, followed by a cookie plate.

Highlights for me were: the 2nd amuse, an eggy, savory custard with a spicy caper sauce on top; the first appetizer--pickled mackerel with celeriac slaw and clear apple "sauce"; butter-poached lobster with Anson Mills lobster bisque; the roasted beef rib-eye cap with bordelaise sauce and crispy potato cake. The selection of cheeses was an embarassment of riches. The only off-note was the second appetizer--the large amount of tart cranberry sauce overwhelmed the delicate foie gras. And I was full enough when the banana fritter dessert was served, that one small fritter was more than enough. But then that amazing souffle was presented, and I found room.

The service was attentive and friendly, with everyone, including EZ himself, offering birthday wishes.

[DonRocks]

Anyone who thinks CityZen isn't one of the greatest restaurants in the history of Washington DC needs to reevaluate their credentials as a restaurant critic.

[Mrs. B]

Anyone who thinks CityZen isn't one of the greatest restaurants in the history of Washington DC needs to reevaluate their credentials as a restaurant critic.

you guys ate all that

[RWBooneJr]

Anyone who thinks CityZen isn't one of the greatest restaurants in the history of Washington DC needs to reevaluate their credentials as a restaurant critic.

I'm actually now a little disappointed in my last meal there which, though fabulous, did not include a Clown Sundae.

[DPop]

Clown Sundae FTW!

[jparrott]

Made from real clowns?

[Dave Pressley]

Anyone who thinks CityZen isn't one of the greatest restaurants in the history of Washington DC needs to reevaluate their credentials as a restaurant critic.

F*ck. That menu looks absolutely awesome! What were the standout courses?

[Mark Slater]

Anyone who thinks CityZen isn't one of the greatest restaurants in the history of Washington DC needs to reevaluate their credentials as a restaurant critic.

Jeez, did you eat all of that?

[Waitman]

Pretty good dinner there last night, though the poussin with truffles came up short. Fortunately it was served with a good-sized chunk of foie which moistened the breast up nicely. Service was extraordinary as always and Andy, in addition to a smashing Pommard, turned us onto a $25(!) half bottle Pinot Grigio (he got us with the line "usually I hates me some Pinot," because that's the way we feel) that went swimmingly with the obscene cream of artichoke/shrimp tempura soup and an marvelously refreshing octopus with fingerlings and preserved lemons. The night was marred only by the absence of Floor Boss Jared Slipp, who is out in Napa with John Wabeck for the Master Som exam (good luck!) and the total damage -- given what we've done in the past -- was relatively modest. A good night all around.

[hillvalley]

Yeah, but did you get a clown sundae for your birthday?

[DinerGirl]

Anyone who thinks CityZen isn't one of the greatest restaurants in the history of Washington DC needs to reevaluate their credentials as a restaurant critic.

Remarkable. Absolutely remarkable.

[Waitman]

Yeah, but did you get a clown sundae for your birthday?

What did the cannibal kid say to his dad served him clown sundae for dessert?

"Daaaaaaaaaaaad, my food tastes funny."

[ulterior epicure]

Below is a lengthy excerpt of my blog post. Photos and more verbiage can be found over there.

************************************

I have very good instincts about restaurants.

They work for me, anyway.

I'd say that about 80% my restaurant experiences match my expectations.

I tend to walk in with a glass slightly less than half-empty and hope that the restaurant can fill 'er up. If it doesn't, there's not a tremendous sense of loss.

Rarely, however, I encounter an unexpected knock-out; a restaurant experience that far surpasses my expectations. Thrilling, these are the meals I live for.

My recent dinner at CityZen, unfortunately, was not one of them.

...

Then there's Eric Ziebold, Corey Lee's predecessor at The French Laundry.

I have been fascinated by him ever since he first arrived at CityZen in 2004.

Like the rest of his Keller colleagues, his ascent onto the national culinary scene has been impressively quick and refreshingly quiet.

In 2005, he was named one of Food + Wine's Best New Chefs. In 2008, he won the James Beard Award for Best Chef Mid-Atlantic. These awards, having come and gone, haven't stolen him from his position as a working chef. Indoctrinated with the Keller work ethic, he has seemed far more dedicated to his craft and kitchen than to pursuing fame or fortune.

Every one of Keller's disciples, whose restaurant I've had the chance of visiting, has been in the kitchen the night I visited. Ziebold was no exception. Of course, Ziebold has an extra incentive to show up for work - his kitchen is open to the entire dining room.

Our table, in the smaller dining room often used for private parties, was the closest one to the pass. Sitting on a concrete floor next to a glass wall lined with metal, I was surprised to find the noise level quite manageable. Only the deafening clatter of the whisk and copper bowl, which injected itself episodically throughout the evening, was slightly annoying.

Neither Houston nor I were terribly hot on the six-course chefs' tasting menu ($110). Preferring the luxury of choice, we ordered three prix-fixe dinners to share. We selected nine dishes, asking for the third main course to be halved. Therefore, we had two sets of first courses, a main course each, shared a cheese course, and each finished with a dessert course.

-

Amuses Bouche

Vichyssoise Panna Cotta

Smoked olive oil, Steelhead salmon roe.

Olive Oil Custard

Red pepper butter sauce.

First Courses

Clam Chowder Crepe Soufflé

Littleneck clams, Peruvian purple potato, Applewood smoked bacon.

Grilled Guinea Hen Liver

Confit of Savoy cabbage, Perigord black truffle, and roasted guinea hen jus.

Pan Roasted Loin of Kanagy Farms Shoat

Sauteed apple, Brussels sprout leaves, faritytale pumpkin, and shoat jus.

(First course portion $18 supplement)

CityZen Pork Bun

Minced pork cheek, spinach and kumquat

Wrapped in a black pepper dough with melted head cheese.

(Supplement $17)

Main Courses

Pan-Roasted Guinea Hen

Boudin blanc, pommes Sarladaise,

chanterelle mushrooms and foie gras emulsion.

Crepinette of Florida Red Snapper

Caramelized Savoy cabbage, applewood smoked bacon, pearl onions, and grain mustard sauce.

Mini Parker House Rolls

Cheese Course

Ticklemore: Goat. Devon, U.K.

Idiazabal: Sheep. Spain.

Abbaye de Tamle: Cow. France.

Bleu d'Auvergne: Cow. Auvergne, France.

Accompaniments

Spiced Marcona almonds and candied walnuts.

Apricot compote and a pear-red pepper chutney.

Pre-Dessert

Mango Sorbet

Vanilla bavarois.

Desserts

Banana Fritters

Creme brulee ice cream and mocha coulis.

CityZen Rootbeer Float

Sassafras soufflé with tonka vanilla ice cream and spiced milk broth.

Petits Fours

Oatmeal Cookie Cream Pies.

Spearmint Marshmallow.

Toasted Hazelnut and Dark Chocolate.

-

I have to be honest: Ziebold's menus have never interested me. Perusing them regularly over the course of five years, my imagination has never been captured.

And that seems to have been my reaction to every Keller and Keller alumnus restaurant I've visited. I've left every one of them shrugging.

So why visit this one?

Because everyone I know who has been to CityZen has highly commended the restaurant to me. And, because, I am on that eternal quest to have my expectations unexpectedly surpassed.

Hope springs eternal.

I arrived with my expectations heavily checked, though.

Whereas I expected to be mildly bored, I actually left the restaurant deflated.

By the end of the night, CityZen had managed to siphon off a good deal of my slightly half-empty glass.

Service, at first, seemed razor-sharp. But it quickly dulled.

It was a very busy night. And it was apparent in the lack of attention and wildly inconsistent pacing. We waited at least 25 minutes between a couple of our courses, even longer for dessert. This wasn't as much of a problem towards the end of the night - we were getting full - as it was towards the beginning.

Some restaurants are able to pull off the round robin-style of service seamlessly, a relay with well-rehearsed baton passes. Our rotating servers seemed more like last-minute covers trying to fill in the gaps.

My empty wine glass sat on our table for more than half the night, even though I said I wasn't having any wine. Silverware was misplaced.

Bread, which was served from a large cigar box, was stone-cold. It wasn't quite icebox-cold, but it was unnaturally cold. Cold focaccia is not good focaccia.

The cheese course, which had me particularly excited (a trusted friend had said the selection was especially notable), arrived on a plate, not on a trolley, as my friend remembered. It's not the trolley I missed, but rather, the implied ability to choose from a larger selection. More troubling, however, was the fact that our server wasn't sure how to identify two of the cheeses she was serving us. For a restaurant of CityZen's caliber, this was disappointing.

But these are all trivial concerns next to the extremely fishy-tasting snapper I had as a main course. I smelled its fishiness before it landed on the table. The snapper - two thick filets wrapped tightly in caul fat, skin-side out (a cleverly bound "Crepinette of Florida Red Snapper") - was beautifully cooked. The fish was moist and soft within, crispy on the top and bottom. But it was ruined by its odor. I left the majority of it uneaten, focusing instead on the bed of softened Savoy cabbage, whose hamminess helped mask its fishiness.

The pommes Sarladaise that accompanied Houston's "Pan-Roasted Guinea Hen" were limp and greasy; the guinea hen, unspectacular. The boudin blanc and a swatch of creamed spinach, however, were very good. Ziebold could have started and stopped with those two items and had a blue ribbon plate.

And this is what I learned about Ziebold's cooking from my narrow experience: I preferred his heartier, bolder-flavored creations. They seemed more honest. More present. Maybe, even more Ziebold?

My favorite dish of the night was my first course, "Grilled Guinea Hen Liver." It had all of the guts and gusto of a rustic country dish, yet the precision of a Keller alumnus. It was head and shoulders above the rest. It was the type of dish - the quality, not necessarily the content - that I expected to parade out of Ziebold's kitchen consistently.

The nuggets of livers were amazingly tender and the confit of cabbage unnaturally silky, bathed in a rich guinea jus. If there was one disappointing thing about this dish, it was the black truffle, which had no aroma whatsoever, tasting instead of bitter flecks of char.

Houston's first course, the "Clam Chowder Crepe Soufflé," was wan by comparison, not rich enough to be a chowder. It was like all of the ingredients of a traditional chowder washed up in a tidal pool next to an omelet. Creative, overly precious, forgettable.

Ziebold's more refined dishes struck me as being Keller clones. That chowder soufflé even arrived on Keller's signature houndstooth Bernadotte china.

The "Pan Roasted Loin of Kanagy Farms Shoat," for example, looked and tasted like it could have walked straight out of per se under Benno's tenure. The shoat was wonderfully tender. It came with excellent jus (clear as a bell, clean as a whistle), and perfectly turned canons of fruit and vegetables. It was all very textbook, and just about as exciting as one.

Both of the amuses bouche were bold and delicious volleys with which to begin the meal, if not a bit predictable. Something creamy with something salty. I especially enjoyed the red pepper butter, which punctuated silky olive oil panna cotta with sweet-salty savor.

Then there was the "CityZen Pork Bun," which was very odd. I had imagined it to be something akin to a steamed char sui bun filled with melting head cheese. Instead, this "bun," shaped like a burrito, was more of an over-sized dumpling. More dough than filling, it relied mostly on the golden, pan-fried crust on the outside for personality than anything in it. But the rosy bed of "minced pork cheek" - corned, apparently - was delicious.

Headed by James Beard Award-nominee Amanda Cook (best of luck in May!), the pastry department here is solid.

Those cheeses, as common as they were, were exemplary, especially the Bleu d'Auvergne, which was especially meaty that night.

Both of our desserts were sophisticated versions of simple classics. Sweet teeth should look elsewhere for a fix, these desserts were lean on sugar, focusing instead on the natural flavors of the ingredients. Cook targets dessert-eaters like me.

The highlight was my "CityZen Rootbeer Float," a creative reinterpretation involving a sassafras soufflé and an edible straw (made of potato flour, I believe). It would have been even better had the "spiced milk broth" been served in a little creamer so that I could pour it into the warm, fluffy soufflé like you would do with creme anglaise normally. Instead, the wonderful spiced milk - subbing in for the frothy head off a root beer float - sat in a shallow pool around a quenelle of vanilla ice cream.

Houston's "Banana Fritters" were surprisingly hefty nuggets, each filled with a mashed banana filling. They were accompanied by a daringly bitter chocolate sauce that was two parts smoky, one part earthy. This was an adult dessert. It begged for a glass of red wine.

CityZen is a handsome restaurant. It's predictably sleek and modern - grand, even. But it has hardly any character. It might be listed under "high-end, nondescript hostelry" in a catalog somewhere: plush settees; high thread count linens; floor-to-ceiling, wall-to-wall, temperature-moderated , glass-encased wine racks. A gleaming kitchen. High ceilings. There's some Las Vegas in its pedigree.

Highlights, there were a few (I failed to mention the warm, buttery mini-Parker House rolls that arrived in a small cigar box with our main courses, and the excellent "Jack of Allspice" cocktail that came in a pretty, long-stemmed coupe). Disappointments, there were more.

Shrug.

[ulterior epicure]

Yay, I'm happy as a "clam!" Finally graduated from my shrimp shell.

[fuzzy510]

Amanda Cook is reportedly leaving CityZen in order to "do her own thing."

I haven't had the chance to dine at CityZen, but her reputation precedes her. Best of luck with whatever may come down the road.

(and despite what my posting tendencies today may be indicating, no, I don't follow Sietsema on Twitter for a living)