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Brohim and I went to Emilie's last night (Friday).  We had a 6 p.m. reservation but arrived at 5:30 p.m.  They promptly seated us at the counter and gave us the menus but it was a little while before someone came to take our drink orders. 

The cart menu was a little confusing and we had to have it explained twice.  No bread comes with the dip, so you have to order bread (focaccia or sourdough) from the kitchen menu for $9.  However, if you order a bread, it comes with your choice of one dip.  Each additional dip is $3.  In our case, we ordered focaccia - 4 pieces of rather chewy and dense foccia.  We ordered the chicken liver pate and sichuan honey butter but due to their delay, they gave us all 6 dips (babaganoush, apple butter, seaweed butter, and mascarpone & jelly).  I thought the chicken liver was fantastic.

For apps, we ordered 

SCALLOP CRUDO - crispy okra, curry leaves, chili oil.  

BEEF TARTARE - cured egg yolk, crab fat mustard, pecorino.

The scallops, after swishing around in the sauce, are fantastic.  The beef tartare were even better. Mixed with egg yolk and pecorino, it had the texture of almost cooked meat.  The combination of ingredients were new to me but the best that I can think of.

Finally, we shared the PORK BLADE STEAK vermicelli, nuoc cham, peanut sauce.  This is a straight up Vietnamese dish with a different cut of pork.  The pork was tender, well seasoned, but fatty and sinewy which made it hard to chew.  You can get almost the same dish at 1/3 of the price by going to Eden Center but that's an entirely different atmosphere.  So I recommend you try both and see which you like better (just order grilled pork w/ vermicelli at any Vietnamese restaurant for comparison).  

This place will be a winner, similar to Rose's Luxury.  Great, seemingly creative food that's really not, served at hipster prices for those who have disposable income, who rather stay in the city instead of venturing out into the burbs for authentic food.

The lighting was awful.  The only light source is the fluorescent light in the display kitchen.  I also used a iPhone 6....and couldn't hold still while taking the tartare shot. 

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On 11/23/2019 at 6:23 PM, Ericandblueboy said:

This place will be a winner, similar to Rose's Luxury.  Great, seemingly creative food that's really not, served at hipster prices for those who have disposable income, who rather stay in the city instead of venturing out into the burbs for authentic food.

Eric I thought this review was shockingly positive for this kind of place from you until this line 🤣.  The pork steak description did surprise me during the menu preview for the exact reason you said - even by the chef's admission you can get the same thing at Eden Center - they just use a more expensive cut here (but it doesn't sound like it tasted particularly better).

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Went here tonight and ordered the following:

sourdough bread with : chicken liver mousse and nori butter with cane sugar—- the liver was the winner here— smooth , subtle spicing, delicious.  Nori butter was fine, tasty but the cane syrup was out of place

pickled enoki mushrooms from cart:  pleasantly sour,tasted like they put maggi seasoning in it— enjoyed it

gem lettuce salad with scallion vinaigrette:  had nice crunch from sesame seeds strewn all over but scallion vinaigrette had very little acid to it and just came off as oniony and salty.  We added the pickled mushrooms to the dish and it fixed the flavors

Scallop crudo with fried okra and curry leaves — this was excellent.  Fresh, crisp , bright.  My only quibble was the used a kaffir lime oil in the sauce that overpowered some of the other flavors—but it was a minor issue only

cavatelli with vegetarian nduja— this was excellent.  Tender cavatelli with a tart sauce . Bread crumbs added nice crunch.  Sautéed with lettuce leaves that did not hold up to the rest of the dish

Branzino with maitake mushrooms, pickled mustard greens, ginger scallion oil, and a Sichuan flavored dipping sauce, and a cup of dashi.  This dish would have been excellent but for the cooks heavy heavy hand with the salt.  We were at the bar watching him cook and we could see him dousing the mushrooms and the fish with salt.  The condiments tasted great but were, as they should be, salty further accentuating the over salting .  The fish itself was expertly cooked with skin crisp from being coated with toasted rice powder prior to frying.  With a less heavy hand with the salt this dish would have been perfect.

One last weird point— we sat at the chefs counter.  It was counter height but with normal chairs instead of counter height seating— I felt like I was a little kid at the table— it’s a beautiful counter but they need to fix the seating.

overall takeaway— good flavors but needs some care for details with the salting and acidity of some of the dishes.  I

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On 12/3/2019 at 10:55 PM, malokd said:

Branzino with maitake mushrooms, pickled mustard greens, ginger scallion oil, and a Sichuan flavored dipping sauce, and a cup of dashi.  This dish would have been excellent but for the cooks heavy heavy hand with the salt.  We were at the bar watching him cook and we could see him dousing the mushrooms and the fish with salt.  The condiments tasted great but were, as they should be, salty further accentuating the over salting .  The fish itself was expertly cooked with skin crisp from being coated with toasted rice powder prior to frying.  With a less heavy hand with the salt this dish would have been perfect.

I'm going for a second visit on Saturday night.  My meal on the first visit was excellent, although one of our pasta dishes - the cavatelli- was also over-salted.  I had a friend tell me that a couple of the dishes he ordered here were inedible due to too much salt.  So I'm hoping they get a handle on this, because otherwise I think they're off to a very strong start.

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I went last week and the bread is now $12 and comes with two dips. I noticed above and in Tom's review apparently it used to be $9 with one dip. I enjoyed everything and didn't notice any salting issues (and I think I'm more sensitive than most to overly salted food). We had both breads and four dips (wish I could remember which ones, but I don't remember chicken liver mousse as an option), the champon noodles, the cavatelli, the branzino, the pork blade, and one really delicious smaller dish with uni that I don't see on the online menu.

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was here with two others and ended up with the bread, scallop crudo, kanpachi crudo, champon noodles, fried chicken, jewel bowl (the uni dish maybe?), and the pb&j panna cotta. no salting issues, everything was varying levels of fantastic. i can walk here from home, so i'll be here a lot.

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On 3/18/2020 at 12:52 PM, lotus125 said:

FYI, Emilie's is operating a to go menu: https://www.emiliesdc.com/menus/

Emilie's is knocking it out of the park with their to-go cocktails, at least the frozen ones.  This is not usually a style that appeals to me but my wife has gotten two (the all-day froze and another called Lucky Frog -- cachaca, Singani 63, coconut, lime, passionfruit, pandan...I don't see on the menu right now even though she ordered it earlier today) that I would happily finish off if given the chance.  Check them out.

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29 minutes ago, DonRocks said:

Don't assume Hamilton Johnson is a downgrade just because he doesn't get as much press - "Hambone" (as his friends call him) is really good.

Regardless of skill I associated Emilie's with Kevin Tien's unique food style.  I'm interested to see how it goes but like new iterations of Mirabelle and Himitsu this is gonna feel like a completely new restaurant now.

The main thing I wonder is if the seeds of this were sowed a while back or whether the issues came out because of the pandemic.

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5 hours ago, FranklinDubya said:

Regardless of skill I associated Emilie's with Kevin Tien's unique food style.  I'm interested to see how it goes but like new iterations of Mirabelle and Himitsu this is gonna feel like a completely new restaurant now.

The main thing I wonder is if the seeds of this were sowed a while back or whether the issues came out because of the pandemic.

I've been wondering that as well. Just a couple of weeks ago Kevin had said that they would not be opening to in person dining until a vaccine was found. Then last week Emilie's announced they were opening. 

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23 hours ago, Mark Dedrick said:

I've been wondering that as well. Just a couple of weeks ago Kevin had said that they would not be opening to in person dining until a vaccine was found. Then last week Emilie's announced they were opening. 

They reposted a story on their Instagram mentioned "new chef, new staff" which makes me think a lot of the formal chef may have followed Kevin Tien out.

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8 hours ago, FranklinDubya said:

They reposted a story on their Instagram mentioned "new chef, new staff" which makes me think a lot of the formal chef may have followed Kevin Tien out.

Yeah, I read somewhere that basically every chef and cook that Kevin brought in has also left. It may still be a very good or great restaurant, but it will be a completely different restaurant. 

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Paraíso Taqueria & Mezcaleria is now in this space. I have friends who love it and encouraged me to go. I've been here for one happy hour and can report that service is wonderful. We didn't have much food, but both the yucca fries and guacamole were excellent. The guacamole comes in an artful molcajete along with tostadas that can be broken into chips for dipping.

The ventilation inside seems good. It has very high ceilings. Unfortunately, high ceilings and hard surfaces can make it hard to hear if there are many people. I hope this iteration of a restaurant succeeds here.

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