L20 (Chicago)

 

(Visited: July 2012)

After a week of OK to mediocre to frankly quite vile eating in Evanston, IL, for work, we decided that on our last night we deserved something with that je ne sais quoi… so off we go to Chicago.


As soon as you enter L20 (of illustrious multi-starred fame, currently holding 1* Michelin under chef  Matthew Kirkley) you realise you are not in an ordinary place. The low lighted room is modern, cool and grand, yielding a sense of oriental calm, open yet affording a multitude of environments at the large, well spaced tables (there also an inviting separate tatami room).

There’s a four course a la carte selection ($120) and two tasting menus, one ‘basic’ (a manner of speaking as we shall see) at $150 and one luxury (called ‘Singular’) at $180. Not in the mood for choosing tonight, we go for both.


This time we won’t comment on each individual dish and let some photos do most of the talking, but here are the menus we had: they deserve reading because they make clear the interest for seafood ingredients that characterises L20:

turbot • ceps, champagne, brown butter, parsley

‘Basic’ tasting menu

• ahi tuna tartare • avocado, caviar
• mussels • clams, corn, zucchini, lardo
• agnolotti • artichoke, ricotta, clarified barigoule
• bouillabaisse • scorpion fish, daurade, mussels, fennel, tomato confit
• lamb loin • zucchini lattice, sweetbreads, squash blossom
• lemon tart • rhubarb, basil
• grand marnier soufflé • orange

lamb loin • zucchini lattice, sweetbreads, squash blossom

  

Singular Tasting menu

• Maryland blue crab en gelée • fennel cream, basil
• grilled abalone • royale of sweet corn, black truffle, chorizo
• turbot • cepes, champagne, brown butter, parsley
• st. pierre • foie gras, cabbage, matelote
• 28-day dry aged ribeye • lobster, spring onion, brioche, civet
• fromage blanc • apple, calvados caramel
• praline soufflé • hazelnut anglaise

grilled abalone • royale of sweet corn, black truffle, chorizo

 Every dish was a pretty composition, executed with great precision, on a foundation of classical techniques and little space for all-too-obvious modern pyrotechnics, the flavours complex but clean, tending to the subtle and restrained rather than ‘in your face’: real class.

Maryland blue crab en gelée • fennel cream, basil

Hard to choose in that feast, but two dishes especially will stand out in our memory. The ahi tuna tartare, 

ahi tuna tartare • avocado, caviar

the first item from the basic menu, made us understand early on how modestly described the dishes are, concealing the amount of work they embody: the tartare was encased in a beautiful and minutely constructed avocado sphere, the feel on the palate luscious, the caviar not merely a thrown in standard addition but a fundamental element to elevate the dish. 


And the ribeye with lobster from the luxury menu, with the ribeye glazed with soy and the stunning combination of flavours from the excellent produce, took our breath away.

28-day dry aged ribeye • lobster, spring onion, brioche, civet

But tonight, really, everything was masterful. And judging from the quality of the beef and lamb, the impression is that if this seafood specializing venue transformed itself into a meat restaurant it would be no less impressive.

lemon tart • rhubarb, basil

The only minor negative was that, for our taste, the meal lasted too long. This is a bit of a place for special occasions (and they see themselves in that way), given the complexity of the experience and the investment in time and money needed – the wine list is expensive too (how lucky we could have no alcohol that night….). It would be nice if they also gave food lovers the chance of returning for multiple visits of a less demanding nature.

Service was, from booking to final greetings, one of the most professional we’ve seen (only margin for improvement is in the description of the dishes, which should be slightly less rushed).


What struck us in the cooking style tonight was how thoroughly logical it was, every element in the dish having a clear function, and the lack of pointless, childish gimmicks despite the high techniques used. A sober style that we very much appreciated. After dinner we had the chance of seeing the lengths they go to to source top quality seafood: in the enormous kitchen they have huge tanks with live Abalone clams and Brittany lobsters, and the fridge was full of fantastic FedExed fish from Europe. This was very impressive, mature top level cooking, that makes L20 an obligatory stop for gourmets in Chicago and beyond.


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When All Is Said and Done…

We like going to fine dining restaurants.

And yet …and yet… we confess we get as much sheer eating pleasure, sometimes, in those simpler places with no pretense of fine dining but which offer you good materials traditionally prepared.

This is true in Italy, of course, where we are familiar with the tradition of the cuisine, and where simple food full of flavour is a staple. But also elsewhere, we more or less always discover something in this vein. When in Chicago our favourite local when when we were not in our fine dining mode (see Naha and Boka) was in the nearby historical (and university) village of Evanston. The Little Mexican Cafe’, where your guacamole is prepared on the spot by a skillful lady

who asks you what you want in your guacamole, and the correct answer is ‘everything’ (tomato, onion, garlic, cilantro -fresh coriander-, lime juice, jalapeno peppers).
Basic, delicious and beautiful:

Why is it impossible to find such good Mexicans in London? This shows that maybe even these things aren’t as basic as they look; that you need balance (e.g. to find the right proportion of lime to avocado) and good quality materials.
We went there almost every day, and we exhausted their avocado stocks.