Dovetail last night

[buttertart]

This is a very good restaurant. The food is excellent and the service impeccable - needs seemed to be anticipated in a way I have only otherwise encountered in top flight restaurants such as Taillevent (indeed was better than I remember it being at Per Se the one time I was there, in the summer of 2004).
The room is attractive in a low-key way, with exposed brick and beautiful wood paneling (bird’s eye maple?).
Tables are reasonably well spaced. It was somewhat noisy once the place filled up but not unpleasantly so.
Drinks were generously poured, Pernod for him, a delicious Kir Royale with a blood-orange tang for me.
There is an a la carte menu and a tasting menu, dishes on the tasting menu can be ordered a la carte and the whole table is not required to order the tasting if only one person wishes it.
The three amuses-bouches started the meal off well. The standout was the smoked salmon on a horseradish panna cotta.
He had: the sweetbreads (deep-fried in panko, with a tart-sweet sauce) - just done, wonderfully tender within and crisp without, followed by the duck (med-rare breast, port wine? flan)
I had: the oysters - small but plump, on top of a cauliflower purée that elongated their flavor, topped with a brunoise of crunchy raw things, surrounded by a very tart clear broth - utterly divine, the best treatment of oysters I have had since Jasper’s in Boston’s oysters on the half shell with the tough bit that attaches the oyster to its shell underneath replaced with a similar-sized piece of lemon filet, a lovely conceit - followed by the Dover sole in sesame-seed crust with eggplant-miso puree and tiniest Shanghai cabbages sautéed with pieces of crunchy seaweed - delicious, I would have preferred the fish a hair more well-done and hotter, but the flavors were very fine.
(In the case of this meal, referring to another thread, unlike our usual habits, it strikes me that he had the “guy” food and I the “girl”.)
We had a good bottle of Aligoté and a half of a Chilean Merlot which I did not taste but which suited its drinker well. Wine prices are pretty standard for restaurants of this caliber, but the list includes a page each of interesting white - the Aligoté was from this - and red bottles under $75.00 (I have my eye on a St George from Nemea for next time).
Were too full for dessert (the dessert menu was however very interesting, with lots of choices including several tart/sour possibilities, to refer to yet another thread), but the strawberry pates de fruit and the chocolate-coconut petits fours topped off the meal excellently.
This came in at just under $300.00 including tip, a good rapport prix/qualité in our estimation.
The restaurant serves lunch and brunch and we will definitely return to try those as well as dinner.

[kelea]

Thanks for this. I haven't been to Dovetail for dinner in almost half a year now. The last time I went for brunch everything was delicious but just a tad salty. I plan to take my parents there in next weekend so it's good to hear it still performs :)