foodies at fore street. the evening of april 30, 2014 me and my partner met my aunt and uncle who were visiting from baltimore, maryland at fore street to celebrate my aunt’s b-day. this was the fourth time i had met my extended family there, and a first for my partner tom. it is worth noting that fore street is a favorite of ours - worth driving all the way from baltimore and for us all the way from burlington, vermont to enjoy their fare together.
because it was a celebration as well as a destination restaurant, we collectively did our best to try as many things as we could that evening, and the following is my attempt to review as much of it as made it past my palate.
upon arrival we were greeted with genuinely warm smiles from the host staff as well as from every other staff member we happened to catch eyes with over the course of the evening. i must begin by giving fore street a glowing recommendation for its warmth and hospitality. it feels like the staff is happy to be there and the already beautiful ambience - especially around sunset, as the light plays off the dramatic portside industrial buildings beyond the enormous factory windows - is made all the more welcoming by them.
i was also delighted to see that most of their staff are grown-ups. not the usual host of 20 somethings hired more for their looks than their knowledge of food and wine.
our waitress seemed very knowledgeable about all of the menu and if i had one small complaint it would be her timing - although that was probably more our fault than hers. we had a table-wide case of wanting everything but having a hard time paring it down to an order. after we’d settled on a wine we finally put together our first course:
my aunt and tom had the raw maine little neck clams (‘nuff said) and my uncle opted for veal sweetbreads, which were deliciously glazed with balsamico and served with a smattering of caramelized onions and hen of the woods.
as for myself, i can not resist foie gras. this bloated liver hailed from a moulard that once lived in the hudson valley and whose sacrifice was wood grilled and served with brandied raisins, sorel and a kind of salsify called scorzonera in addition to a tough, grease stained, rubbery disk of something called ramp bannock.
before i launch into how much i disdained this $30 dish, i will say that other than my chocolate dessert which i’ll get to in short order, most of my meal was great so hang on..there’s good things to come but let us get past eviscerating the foie gras (pun intended)....
for starters (haha), it arrived cold. this was not the gross salady canned type foie gras meant to be served chilled (ick)..this was a goodly sized slice of fresh liver complete with grill marks placed there to show that it was cooked but nevertheless it was served at the wrong time....like quite a long time after it was ready to come to table. with whom the fault lies remains a mystery but in terms of this level of restaurant - timing is everything. it is supposed to be served rare, but not ice cold.
i might have forgiven the coldness, but the presence of an inedible on my plate set me off on the wrong foot. this “bannock” (isn’t that what they fed civil war prisoners?) really was disgusting. it appeared to have been fried yesterday and when i attempted my first nibble, i could barely drag a piece off to chew and i dubbed it the bread equivalent of a meat jerky. i can’t believe i’m sharing this, but i actually wanted to spit it out because not only was it too much bother to chew, i didn’t want to waste a precious bite on anything not spectacular because of the marathon of eating before me.
fortunately, i remembered my manners and somehow managed to choke it down while secretly feeling sorry for myself for what i considered a wasted course, because as much as i love seafood - and that was what we were really here for - i love foie gras above all other foods and i rarely get to eat it. damn.
i did snag a bite of my uncle’s sweetbreads and they made me wish i’d chosen them instead - and my bf shared with me a couple of his sweet, firm, delicate littleneck clams. oh my they were good - served unencumbered by anything but a tiny dollop of horseradish. perfect.
next round i got the oysters. basket island, damariscotta river and western bay oysters to be specific, served raw with a simple mignonette and slices of lemon. rapture. (i politely shared one of each with my mate and he was duly grateful).
my aunt ordered pan seared atlantic squid with shaved black radish, rocket and a citrus verjuice and even though i sat right next to my uncle (couples were facing), i cannot for the life of me remember what he ordered - probably because i was pre-occupied with the mouthgasms my fresh-as-they-could-be oysters were giving me between bites of my boyfriends delicate fava, radish and marinated spring onion salad with crunchy, smoky, pork belly ruskcrumbs. i can’t say enough nice things about those tender tiny favas or those ruskcrumbs. yum!
we were all licking our chops and well into our second bottle of wine (to lubricate the process) when our entree arrived.
my uncle ordered the maine farm lamb (jealousy) served with grilled raisin brown bread and butter braised beets. apparently, it was three cuts on the plate - a sausage, a braised shank and a grilled chop. the meats were accompanied by a ramp relish. if i weren’t devoted to cramming as much seafood in as possible, i would have ordered this. in vermont we have no shortage of lambs, but absolutely no seafood (he did give me a little nibble though and it was sublime).
my boyfriend ordered atlantic halibut with hen of the woods, fennel, leek and emmer salad with tarragon and ginger relish. i have to say, the flavors were nice together but the method was flawed. they cooked it in a cast iron pan which was brought to table which possibly was cooked to perfection in the kitchen, but continued to cook from the residual heat and was over-cooked before the diner was able to finish. my aunt’s pollock was similarly prepared and she had the same issue.
at fore street guests can order family style side dishes and i think we ordered them all: rich and crusty, browned-on-top garlicky mashed potatoes, perfectly roasted baby beets with sherry thyme vinaigrette, and some much needed green broccolini with maine farm goat cheese.
despite the showy lamb dish, everyone agreed that my dish was the winner: barnegat light (house?) scallops pan seared to perfection served with roasted parsnips (undercooked), chicory, exotic mushrooms and some bits of pancetta. the whole thing was drizzled simply with parsley oil. other than the poorly prepared parsnips, the dish was spectacular and i had all those other sides to nibble on and an increasingly full belly so i wasn’t too put out. the scallops in and of themselves were the best thing i ate all night.
for dessert my uncle tried the house-made pink peppercorn meyer limoncello (oh dear gawd so good!), my lovely love tried amontillado, vina ab, gonzales byass and i ordered a nice old fonseca 20 year old port and an espresso.
i have to say, that even though it was still chilly outside, and probably because pastry is my area of expertise (i’m a chef), i found the dessert menu a bit heavy. allow me to elaborate:
there was a chocolate pot de creme, almond pound cake french toast, warm pineapple upside down cake, banana caramel bread pudding and a dark chocolate torte along with an assortment of sorbet and tiny desserts and their usual house-made chocolates.
there is no escaping richness in those choices unless you go with boring ices.
i love pot de creme but i can’t resist a good chocolate cake so i went with the torte which turned out not to be a cake at all, but more like the pot de creme slid out of its terrine. it was served with a chocolate cookie crust (i missed that part somehow..was that the crumbs on top of the sauces?) as well as a vanilla cookie praline, vanilla pudding sauce and chocolate almond brittle ice cream with milk chocolate almond bark. there was no relief from sweet. it was chocolate on top of chocolate on top of candied candy. i didn’t finish it. me...i did not finish it. not even close. and it’s not because i was too full (yet - i am highly capable of fooling myself into overeating when a truly fine meal is on the table - it’s a talent).
my bf got the bread pudding which was tasty yet also uber sweet and my uncle wisely chose the upside down cake and i say wisely because the tart pineapple was a welcome relief from the overwhelming sweet. auntie got the almond pound cake “french toast” which was really just pound cake that was so heavy with almond flavor as to be uninteresting to me. i like it in small doses and i love the nuts themselves but the extract flavor is too much for me.
overall, i’d say dessert was a wash.
to sum up, i’ve had better meals here. i’ve had meals where i could not find a single thing to complain about except my aching belly. i’m not saying they should throw in the towel - i hope they never do! i want to come here for the rest of my living days but i do hope they tighten up the ranks a bit. maybe they were understaffed. any kitchen can have an off day - but things like roasting the fish in iron pans that keep cooking and putting chocolate on top of chocolate on top of chocolate is well, to put it gently, under thought out.
and please never - never ever - serve “bannock” ever again. let it rest with the dead civil war soldiers who hated it probably more than i did.
*note: apparently it’s touted as an easy “man” food for camping: http://www.artofmanliness.com/2011/04/04/baking-in-the-wild-how-to-make-bannock-bread/