eGullet Heartland Gathering: Grange Kitchen And Bar

I've written about my experiences at last year's eGullet Heartland Gathering in Kansas City. Between making bread in my hotel room, preparing and eating the dinner we made from shopping at the farmer's market, and the absolutely fantastic outdoor brunch we had at Crum Farm before returning home, it was seventy-two hours of driving, eating, and experiencing some really great food and people.

This year, fortunately, the festivities returned to the same city where I had first attended the gathering back in 2006, Ann Arbor, Michigan. Instead of a twelve hour drive, it would only be three. Seeing as I had a kitchen available to me on the Saturday morning of the feast, I was able to go up a day early to attend a prix fixe tasting at one of Ann Arbor's premier farm-to-table restaurants, Grange Kitchen & Bar. Chef Brandon Johns had prepared a seven course meal for us that highlighted the local, sustainable cuisine that he featured daily at his restaurant. While there would be a wine pairing available for those who wanted it (at an extra cost), I was just excited to try out what looked to be a fantastic menu.

But I am getting ahead of myself. First I should tell you that Grange was located at 118 West Liberty Steet, Ann Arbor, MI 48104 and can be reached at 734-995-2107. Since Grange was essentially located on the campus of the University of Michigan, parking can be tricky. I ended up parking in a garage about a fifteen minute walk from Grange at a cost of only $4.50. However, streetside parking was available if you were lucky enough to snag a spot.

Here was a shot of the street-facing exterior of the restaurant:


Once inside, I was directed up the stairway to the bar area where the staff had set up an extra long table for our group of fifteen or so diners. On each plate, a single piece of paper with tonight's menu had been gingerly placed:


When we finally sat down around 7 PM, we began a three and a half hour odyssey that included some great food, great conversation, and a stop by the chef at our table for each of the seven courses. Before beginning, the chef gave us some background on the type of food they were trying to do at Grange. In addition to having a garden in the back lot of the restaurant, they tried as hard as possible to limit the source of their animal and vegetable products to within a fifty-five mile radius of the restaurant. The chef also mentioned that instead of buying pre-butchered cuts of meat, he bought the entire animal, butchered it entirely himself, and used as much of the animal as was possible. In fact, he added, the menu tonight would reflect this philosophy.

With that, our meal began and the first course arrived at our table:


This was called "Nose to tail house made charcuterie" on the menu and featured a terrine made from multiple parts of the pig, a pig ear aspic, house made coppa, a tomato jam, and pea shoots in the middle of the plate. Everything on this plate was tasty. That being said, the pig ear aspic had a slightly unsettling "crunch" to it that might make the unadventurous eater a bit hesitant. The coppa was nice, being salty and spicy, and the tomato jam added a wonderful sweetness and acidity to the other flavors on the dish. My favorite item on this plate was the terrine.

Our second course were Walleye "brandade" fritters with green tomato jam:


The chef used the word "brandade" not because the fish was actually salt cod, but fresh walleye that he had preserved for one month in the same style as salt cod. He then soaked the dried fish in several changes of water before incorporating the flaked fish with mashed potatoes, formed these tiny fritters and deep fried them to a golden brown. The dish was served with a green tomato jam that added a little sweetness, but mostly the sour flavor from green tomatoes. To say that this was a hit was an understatement. The fritters were delicate and light and perfectly fried and the cured walleye was salty without overpowering the rest of the flavors in this dish. I don't think I would be the only diner tonight to wish that we could've made an entire meal out of this course alone.

The third course tonight was a Fried Pig's Head, mustard, and sauce gribiche:


Not to be confusing, but this wasn't a slice of pig's head, per se, but the meat that had been cooked and shredded from an actual pig's head, formed into patties, breaded and deep fried. While it has been suggested by several friends that anything deep fried is delicious, in this case, it was a bit of a stretch for me. Of course I ate the entire plate, enjoying the subtle mustard flavor running throughout the meat and pairing it with the chopped egg, chervil and caper laden sauce gribiche, but I kind of wish I had gotten to try the vegetarian third course instead: goat cheese stuffed squash blossoms that had been battered and deep fried. That being said, I kept an open mind and an open mouth. I'm glad I tried it, but I don't know that I'd be running back for seconds.

Our fourth course in my mind was an intermezzo, a middle course that separated the beginning tastes from the later ones. Tonight's fourth course was an Heirloom Gazpacho with Michigan Pickled Shrimp Salad:


This was the perfect amount of soup to sate the taste buds; too much would've resulted in tasting fatigue. The pickled shrimp was sour and sweet at the same time and was perfectly cooked and tender. There was a bit of laughter when talking about the fact that the shrimp really was from Michigan, but it smelled quite fresh and tasted even better. Drops of extra virgin olive oil dotted the top of the soup in order to add a bit of unctuousness to the tomato flavor.

In delivering our fifth course, I could tell we were squarely into the main entrée portion of our meal. Here was Duck, Peaches, Coriander, Honey Glaze, and Whole Grains:


The duck breast had been seared to a beautiful medium-rare, sliced, and fanned out on top of cooked wheatberries and spelt. Grilled peaches had been placed atop the duck breast and the entire dish was then sauced with a honey glaze that had been infused with a warming spice, like cinnamon. The whole grains popped in my mouth and gave just a bit of resistance when chewing. The savoriness of the duck breast matched well with the sweetness from both the peaches and the honey glaze, which turned out not to be cloyingly sweet, but fairly subtle. Overall, I'd had to say that this was my favorite savory course, next to the walleye fritters.

Our final savory course, the sixth one overall, was a Whole Roasted Tenderloin, Pickled Oyster Mushrooms, and Heirloom Carrots:


Two slices of perfectly crusted tenderloin sat atop the pickled mushrooms and heirloom carrots. While the outside layer of tenderloin was perfect, the middle was extremely rare (what some might term Black and Blue) and as much as I like beef carpaccio, this was a bit too rare for my taste. Everyone else proclaimed the perfect doneness level to the beef, so perhaps my expectations were off, but I would've liked it at least rare (preferably medium-rare). Nevertheless, the parts that I did eat were absolutely delicious and the acidity from the pickled mushrooms went quite well with the savoriness from the meat. I could also tell that the dish had been finished with a bit of fleur de sel, which I appreciated with every bite.

Dinner now almost complete, our impeccable service staff cleared the table in preparation for the final course, dessert! Tonight we would be having a Plum Upside-down Cake with Goat Cheese Ice Cream:


While it was original supposed to be goat cheese sorbet, apparently there had been a slight change-up at the last minute. I tasted the goat cheese ice cream first and was literally in heaven. The tanginess from the goat cheese paired from the sweetness of the sugar and the creaminess of the ice cream base all came together to make an absolutely delicious combination. I then turned my attention to the upside-down cake. On the top was the crispy cake layer which crunched under my spoon as I cut into it. At the bottom of the cake was a warm layer of cooked plums which thankfully still had some of their acidity in them to cut through the sweetness of the dessert. The combination of the textures and flavors was quite good and had I not already had six courses prior, probably could've eaten another one of these desserts.

Having started dinner at 7 PM, looking at the clock, it was now just a little past 10:30 PM. Dinner service for the restaurant had more or less come to a close and Chef Johns joined us at the end of the meal for a heartfelt round of well-deserved applause. While not everything I was served tonight was something I would've sought out on my own, he definitely expanded my horizons and for that, I am exceedingly grateful. While we didn't have a chance to order anything off of the regular menu, I have no doubt that it is in the same spirit as the menu we enjoyed tonight.

I heartily recommend that if you live in or will be visiting Ann Arbor soon, definitely make Grange Kitchen & Bar a must-stop restaurant for an gastronomic experience that is unlike many others. I will be the first to admit that a meal at Grange isn't inexpensive, but considering the many exciting tastes and preparations you will receive, the value certainly matches the price.

Dinner For Thirteen At Vaccaro's Trattoria

I suppose that no one, restaurants included, can ignore the laws of physics: For everything that goes up, it must eventually come down.

I have written numerous times (here, here, here, here, here, and here) about my adventures eating at Vaccaro's Trattoria. In fact, when asked, I have also recommended them numerous times to friends and family who are looking for an Akron-based restaurant that serves upscale food without being pretentious or stuffy. While I stand by every single word I've ever written about my previous experiences at Vaccaro's, I have to admit that I have had several people who had taken my suggestion later return to tell me that their experiences weren't as stellar as mine. While my gut reaction is to respond that every kitchen has an off night now and again, I feel like saying this makes me an easy target to be labeled an apologist.

Since landing on Raphael Vaccaro's radar last summer after my first review, I have had an interesting relationship with him. I now understand why professional food critics must keep personal distance between themselves and the restaurants, chefs, and owners that they review. I can surmise that any restaurant, not just Vaccaro's, wants to hear nothing but praise for their efforts. And as much as I want to say, "they just had an off night," and leave it at that, it would be unfair to those of you who have chosen to place value in what I say about this and other eateries that I have reviewed.

I contacted Raphael about six weeks ago to float the idea by him of a prix fixe dinner. We decided on six courses at $40 per person with beverages, tax, and tip extra. He was to take care of the menu and I would be coordinating the guests. Immediately, a Facebook event went up detailing the time, location, and a description of the dinner and I invited seventy of my closest friends whom I thought might be so inclined as to participate in such a meal. While the number guests constantly fluctuated between the time I sent the invitation and just two hours before our meal, in the end thirteen of us showed up, the notions of what to expect having been set by either previous visits to the restaurant or bolstered by the menu that Raphael had sent out roughly one week prior.

Here was the menu that Raphael had sent me:

Course 1 Soup and Sandwich: Smoked Tomato Bisque / Mini Grilled Cheese Panini Course 2 Baby Arugula / Fresh Citrus / Scamorza / Cirignolo Olives / Cinzano Vinaigrette Course 3 Fried Green Tomato / Shrimp & Langostino Course 4 Local Heirloom Tomato Sauce / Fiocchetti Pasta all Uovo Primavera Course 5 Surprise Main Course Course 6 Housemade Ricotta with Lemon Mousse / Fresh Berry Compote / Toasted Saviordi

I was excited to see that all of our courses tonight (well, with the exception of course five) would be totally off-menu. It isn't that I don't like their current menu, but it was nice that for our dinner party, we would be having something just a little bit different.

I arrived about five minutes before the starting time to find an already half-filled table. After seating myself next to my date, the sharp witted and ever-so-slightly irascible Miss Penny (of Dante fame), our server for the evening approached me and referenced me by first name. I had never met this particular server before, so either he had done some research on his own or Raphael had prepped him about our dinner party this evening. Service tonight was good when our server was around, but as he was taking care of more than just our table, there were definite lags when he was occupied with his other guests. On several occasions, diners were left with courses sitting in front of them with inadequate silverware to consume the food.

In what was to be a bit of foreshadowing for this evening's meal, bread and dipping oil arrived at our table shortly after 6:00 PM. Unfortunately, no bread plates accompanied the bread. When we finally managed to track our server down, he explained that there had been a miscommunication and there wasn't even supposed to be bread on the table. When asked about the possibility of getting some bread plates, he surprised most of the people at my end of the table by saying that they had actually run out. Really? I guess it was fortuitous that they had accidentally brought the bread because we didn't get our first course until forty-five minutes later at 6:45 PM. People began nibbling bread sans plate to ward off the rumblings in their stomachs.

While the $40 per person was just for the prix fixe menu, I decided to order a glass of the Gavi di Gavi off the wine menu to compliment my dinner:


Miss Penny had requested a white wine that was somewhere between dry and sweet and having had this before, I knew it would be an excellent choice. While my goal wasn't to pick a single glass of wine that would go with every course (especially considering I had no idea what course number five would be), I did want an easily drinkable wine that wouldn't interfere too much with the flavors of the food. In that respect, this was an excellent pick.

When the first course finally arrived, I had my second inkling that there might be continued problems with our meal. Here was the course that Raphael had titled, "Soup and Sandwich":


To the left was a bowl of fire-roasted tomato bisque:


And to the right was a deep-fried panko crusted cheese sandwich with an assortment of cheeses including a smoky scamorza and creamy chevre:


The problem with this dish wasn't in the flavor; in fact, the flavors were actually quite good. It was the size of the dish. For a first course, it was enormous. In fact, Miss Penny commented that were she eating a normal dinner at home, this amount of food would've been more than enough for an entire meal. It's never a good sign when diners are requesting take-out containers for leftovers on the very first course.

The tomato bisque was actually quite good. It was a bit rustic in texture, and the smoky, tart, and sweet flavors from the fire-roasted tomatoes balanced each other quite well. The smokiness from the scamorza was easily discernible and the creamy zing from the goat cheese added extra layers of flavor to the sandwich. The panko crusted and deep-fried aspects of the sandwich made it unusual, but tasty.

Our second dish was the salad course:


Comprised of baby arugula, escarole, small planks of Fontina, grapefruit sections, supremed orange wedges, raspberries, and strawberries, it had been dressed with a Cinzano vinaigrette. Strangely missing were the Cirignolo olives the menu had described. While I love bitter flavors and I know how much Raphael loves to play with bitter elements on the plate, I know it was too bitter for some of the guests. The sweetness from the fresh fruit helped to tame some of the bitterness, but in addition to being too bitter, several of the diners thought the salad was too salty as well. Personally, I felt that the salt level in my salad was fine and suggested that maybe because of the extreme bitterness, it somehow enhanced the sensitivity to additional salt when there really wasn't any. Or perhaps, the salad had been dressed in two separate batches, and one batch did actually receive more salt than the other. As with our first course, I ended up eating only half of my salad in an attempt to pace myself. While I appreciated this dish, I also know it wasn't universally enjoyed.

Our third dish arrived and I was happy to see that the portion size was much better suited to a six course tasting menu:


While the original menu that Raphael had sent me indicated that there would be fried green tomatoes on the plate, what arrived was a baked ring of squash, called cucuzza, that had been filled with a shrimp and langostino salad, dressed with a bit of Balsamico and studded with several long strands of chives. The cucuzza was actually quite delicious and had an almost baked eggplant flavor to it. It was just the tiniest bit sweet and the texture was soft without being mushy. The seafood salad was dressed nicely and the slight sweetness from the shrimp and langostino complimented the acidity from the Balsamico. I enjoyed the delicacy of this dish; Miss Penny did not.

By the time our fourth course arrived, we had been at the restaurant for a good two hours. Tables around us had already been turned once and were now being occupied by a secondary round of guests. It became clear that we were obviously in for an entire evening of food. Here was our fourth course:


This was a local heirloom tomato marinara that topped fiocchetti all uovo, an egg-based pasta which when I originally did some research on the Internet thought it was shaped more like farfalle. Clearly that page had been incorrect because tonight's pasta was definitely not in the shape of bow-ties. A grating of fresh cheese topped the pasta and the entire dish was adorned with a single fresh basil leaf.

First, the good. I loved the tomato sauce. As did everyone around me, too. The sharpness from the aged cheese was also a welcome addition as it provided a bit of saltiness and depth of flavor that matched the marinara well. Second, the not-so-good. While I personally didn't have a problem with the texture of my pasta, others around me felt it was cooked a little too al dente (or perhaps undercooked might be a better adjective) and wished it had been cooked just a minute longer. Given that the texture was probably not what you would've received had this been ordered off of their regular menu, I'll have to concede this point to my guests. Had this been just a meal out with a couple of friends and not part of a prix fixe dinner, the pasta more than likely would've been sent back to the kitchen and re-fired.

The problem that I DID have with this dish was one that is all too common at other Italian restaurants and I was surprised to encounter it here tonight:


What you see in the above photo was the amount of water at the bottom of the dish after I had eaten the pasta. At first I had thought that maybe it was liquid from the marinara, but given how thick and uniform in color the marinara was, I surmise that this liquid was a result of not draining the pasta well enough after cooking. Besides diluting the marinara somewhat, it also made the pasta a little more difficult to eat as the potential for shirt-staining drips became more likely.

We finally arrived at the mystery course for tonight's dinner, course number five:


This course turned out to be a thickly cut lamb tenderloin still on the bone served over creamy mashed potatoes and topped with an apricot compote. As I cut into the lamb, I was rewarded with a beautiful medium-rare steak:


This dish really worked for me. While the first two courses had been enormous, this was the perfect little bit of meat and potatoes. The potatoes were seasoned on point and the richness of the lamb paired really well with the subtle sweetness from the apricot compote. There was very little gaminess to the meat and if you hadn't been told, it would've been easy to confuse this with a beef loin. Of course, the presence of the bone at the other end of the chop might've been a dead giveaway, too. Sadly, Miss Penny's cut was just a bit too rare for her taste and another diner's cut was too well done. Had the two dishes been switched, both diners would've been happier. Bad luck of the draw, I suppose.

By the time the sixth, and final, course arrived, we had headed into hour three of our experience. Fortunately, the dessert was on the smaller side as well:


From the menu Raphael had originally sent, I knew that this was supposed to be a housemade ricotta and lemon mousse with a fresh berry compote and toasted Saviordi. The Saviordi actually took its place atop the dish as finely crumbled Lady Fingers. Both myself and others around me felt like the restrained level of sweetness in this dessert was really one of the best aspects about it. The ricotta added a depth of flavor to the mousse, but none of us really got any lemon flavor. The fruit and syrup from the compote added a nice acidity to the subtle sweetness of the mousse. I was happy to see that there were many empty martini glasses by the time we finished the dessert course.

Noting the time that I finished my dessert, I realized that we had been there for three and a half hours. While it occasionally felt like the distance between courses was belabored at times, I finished the meal feeling full, but not overly so. At the very least, it had given all of us a chance to share quite a bit of time talking with each other, which I suppose is the other positive aspect of planning a dinner party for thirteen people. I was impressed that our server seemed to know who received individual checks and who received checks for two and even more so that he apparently got it completely right on the first pass.

Overall, I will say that I enjoyed my meal tonight, although not as much as other dinners I have eaten in the past. Based on the dishes I was served, I felt that there were both good and disappointing points to our meal. The feedback I received from other diners in our party ranged from very good to disappointing. And while I certainly am not writing a review on my blog from someone else's point of view, I think it is helpful to consider the entire range of tonight's dining experiences so that you get a more balanced view should you decide to entertain the idea of going to Vaccaro's for a meal yourself.

I personally intend to continue patronizing Vaccaro's Trattoria, but I know that based on some of the comments other diners made tonight, that might not be the case for them. As I mentioned earlier, tonight was the first major meal where I had experienced this level of inconsistency and having eaten at and written about them for over a year now, I know that the kitchen is capable of such wonderful cuisine. In the end, my hope is that they can work these inconsistencies out.