The Table Kevin Fehling can accomodate a couple dozen people whose arrival times are slightly staggered. Inside the non-descript brick building is a modern interior with a serpentine bar for seating and high ceilings. There is a small balcony that overlooks the dining room where guests can have cocktails prior to being seated. Shades of gray dominate the room with colored pieces curling off the ceiling that are not only striking but also provide sound dampening. Spot lighting keeps each seat well lit while the room lights are dimmed. The walls are concrete and the open kitchen is the focal point. Art and flowers provide some softness for the interior. They serve only a tasting menu and all guests have the same thing, except where allergies don’t permit. The menu changes one course every 3 months. Wine pairings (pours looked generous) are available. The pacing of the meal was great as was the portion control. They present you with a copy of the menu at the end to take with you. The staff all spoke great English and were quite friendly. The restaurant has been awarded a 3 Michelin star rating.
After wiping your hands on a moist towel a series of snacks start the meal. ‘Flowers for you’ came out with Wagyu Pastrami Sandwich. The flowers were in a cone filled with creamy stuff. The very crisp cone made it a one bite thing. The pastrami was on a bun of meringue for another one bite. It had a little flavor of barbecue and was excellent.
The Ceviche of Cod was was topped with a “taco chip” and had tomato chutney below. It was really good with lots of texture too.
The Unagi Bun was eel on a yeast bun with duck sauce, peanut cream and ginger. The doughy little bun was perfect to host all the flavors in this bite. It was stuffed with yummy flavors.
Egg Benedikt was on a chicken foot pedestal with a porcelain egg rather than the real shell. It included spinach purée, bacon, egg, cayenne and hollandaise and then was topped with panko. Some tapioca was inside to give it texture. It had a good taste, was warm and a fine version of the dish.
Fjord Trout pickled in Indian flavors was in 2 dishes and included tandoori, mango, mustard seeds and coconut stock. The tandoori was covered with hollindaise and caviar resting on papaya and eggplant and the final topping was frozen dill berries. The trout was in coconut cream alongside coriander, cucumber, dill oil and topped with mustard seeds. Both parts were really good with lots of flavors that blended well. A small cracker and the caviar both added crunch and pop textures. Very pleasant.
Organic Goose Liver was a visual feast and contained smoked eel, pineapple, pink pepper and tarragon. The pineapple was in jelly form and alongside was a scoop of foie gras ice cream. The white rectangle was the eel jelly which was particularly good with the eel. The pink peppercorns added crunch to this super dish.
Caviar “AKI” and Beef Tartare were with lemon pearls, potato dashi and foam. AKI caviar is the newest sturgeon caviar from Germany. On two plates, one contained a gel of dashi and potato topped with cavair. The other was potato foam on beef tartare topped with lemon and onion. Both were good on their own but even better when mixed together. Fun combinations of wonderful flavors.
Carabinero was crusty roast, chorizo, eggplant and tomato. Some shrimp stock was reduced and made a bed for the dish. Chorizo mixed with hollandaise was beside eggplant and on the other side was a faux olive stuffed with cow’s milk cheese in olive jelly. Some crunchy pig shoulder topped the eggplant. It was all really good and filled with textures and flavors that all blended wonderfully. It also left a nice aftertaste.
Venison with Walnut-Pepper Crust was served with fermented blueberries, sherry vinegar Hollandaise and rosemary jus. The blueberries were in a sorbet and beside it was some polenta and cabbage. The venison was topped with the walnut-pepper layer that worked great with it, as did the hollandaise. The meat was cooked nicely rare and also mixed well with the blueberry sauce. It was a fairly generous portion but went down easily.
Glazed beetroot was plated with yuzu ganache, nori crumble (seaweed) and beetroot apple sorbet. The apple and beet tastes both came through and it was a good combination but not as special as the previous courses had been.
The second dessert was Hazelnut-Crémeux with Kalamansi-jelly, guava, banana-curry ice cream and tumeric. The hazelnut cream was on the bottom topped with banana curry ice cream in a thin crisp shell and pieces of guava and a Phillipino fruit. The flavor was really tart, almost like it had lemon in it. It looked like orange slices but it was something else. Lots of flavors in this one but I’m not sure they blended into something extraordinary. It was just okay.
Lastly was a trio of Cocktails of Smoky Berry, Lillet with Apple and Rucola and Gin-Melon Sour. The last one tasted of fennel, probably because it was sitting on the seeds, and had a crisp cracker which was on top of a meringue cracker. On the right was the apple and rucula which had very mild flavors and made with nitrogen snow cone material. It tasted of smokiness. The Smokey Berry was on the left with a macaron for the base which was a tad soft. The faux berry was made of jelly.
