Carrollton Market is a medium sized place out in the suburbs that has been open 4 years. The entry is into a bar area that is not very well separated from the main dining room. The small marble tables are set closely together, a tin ceiling, wood floor and wood and painted walls all add to the loud noise level in the room, even without background music. Windows along the front wall look out onto the street but otherwise there are no windows except for the interior one that looks into the open kitchen and the general light level is low. They offer only a small a la carte menu. The staff were friendly and helpful but the food was mostly unexciting and the overall ambiance is ear numbing, yet it was packed with people. There is no subtlety in the food, it tends to be over-seasoned with large portions of heavy food.
Everyone is started with a warm housemade roll. It was very doughy and soft without a crisp crust. I liked it, but I like doughy stuff whereas my husband was not a fan of it.
We shared one of their famous dishes, Oysters Goodenough. It is made with flash-fried oysters mixed with Benton’s Bacon, creamed leeks and Béarnaise sauce. There were 4 to an order and they were filled with flavor. The sauce was really good but they were served on a bed of salt which stuck to the sauce, so care needed to be taken in eating them. They were really heavy but good. If you go, these would be a must order.
The Pan-seared Foie Gras was served on cinnamon roll pain perdu (like French toast) with an Amarena Cherry gastrique. A few intact cherries were in the sauce. The ingredients went together nicely and the bread kept a soft eggy consistency. This really rich dish was also quite heavy and almost cloyingly so. The cherries were good and I liked them in this sauce.
Roasted pork belly was served with baked cheese grits, pepper jelly and baby heirloom carrot slaw. The pepper jelly made a very sweet sauce but a tad on the salty side to go with the piece of pork belly that was curved into a round. The round of cheese grits were very mildly flavored. The slaw was fun and helped to cut the grease that is part of pork belly. This plate contained few subtle flavors and tended toward heavy and salty. I would rate it just okay.
Pan Roasted Duck Breast was served with garlic and sage bread pudding, sweet potato puree, braised greens and a pecan-caramel gastrique. The breast was sliced and cooked more on one side than the other, which gave it a slight liver flavor. The fat had not been rendered well however it was a huge portion, so you could liberally trim. The bread pudding was very well seasoned and the sweet potato was quite runny. The greens were off tasting.
Considering the richness of the meal we were not inclined to order dessert, besides neither option sounded too good and I was pretty sure I would be visiting Indigestion City later as the evening wore on.
