VAIL -- LARKSPUR IS OPEN

[ddavis]

If you know much about the restaurant scene in the Eagle River Valley (aka Vail Valley), you know that Fall is pretty dead. Larkspur, like many of the local restaurants, was closed for a few weeks. I got back to the area just in time -- Larkspur re-opened yesterday and my wife and I had the pleasure of sharing this great place with another couple last night. Once again the service and the food was superb.

To start, we were served an amuse bouche of tuna tartare with avocado mousse, which was delicious. When I commented to one of our friends that I knew she was allergic to avocado, the server quickly took her plate and returned it shortly thereafter with the tartare sans mousse.

My wife had the Winter Mixed Green Salad, followed by Seared Scallops with brussels sprouts, sunchoke puree,butternut squash and caramelized onion bacon vinaigrette. Both were good; the scallops superb.

One friend chose the Roasted Butternut Squash Soup for her appetizer and Veal Scaloppini with twice baked potatoes, creamed spinach and lemon beurre fondue. Both were excellent.

Our other friend had Mushroom Consomme with lobster dumplings and micro miropoix, followed by an interesting dish, Housemade Potato Ravioli, for a main course. The consomme was rich and hearty and delicious. Our friend loved the ravioli, made rich with mushroom cream, braised endive and truffles.

I repeated selections from meals past -- Pork Belly for an appetizer and Red Wine Braised Angus Shortribs for my main. Both these dishes are incredibly rich, with flavors that will haunt your hungry moments. (My apologies to David Wade)

Our meal could not have been better and I was once again reminded of why Larkspur is my favorite restaurant in the Valley.

A real bonus came with the bill -- 40% off the entire check, including wine. This is a limited time special in honor of the restaurant's 10th anniversary, which will be celebrated in December. The restaurant says this is a limited time offer, but doesn't say what the time limit is!

[aledm]

We spent $78.37 plus tip, after the 40% discount on the entire check. Larkspur isn’t our favorite Vail restaurant. It’s a little too pretentious for us and we think that the food is good, not great. The room is nice and it was quite crowded for late November, which is low season. There are white table cloths, a nice –looking open kitchen, and an open view to wine “cellar.”

For some reason, we didn’t “take to” our server, Maureen. She’s not friendly and warm enough for us. There was an amuse bouche of carrot-curry soup with a chantarelle (marinated) mushroom which was good. We were served a (homemade) multi-grain bread that was delicious.

We started with the Torchon of duck foie gras (which according to www.foodwords.com is a method of cooking foie gras by which it is placed in a towel--torchon in French--and poached), crusted with Italian pistachios, with port pearls, ginger brioche and cranberry relish: $19. We shared it at our table and so we were not charged the extra sharing charge. Paté by any other name is still paté. It was good, however, as paté.

Then we had 2 main courses:
Heritage Farm pork chops with potato purée, yams and natural pork demi $34.50
Before ordering the pork chop Dimitri asked whether it was dry and was told it was not. (As always) the cut of meat was a bit too dry for our taste.

Veal scaloppini $34.50. Instead of the regular accompaniments of twice baked potatoes, creamed spinach and lemon beurre-fondue, we asked for the accompaniments to another dish—the duck confit accompaniments which were good: roasted chestnuts (just one, actually), Anson Mills cheddar grits, cherry gastrique. They went well with the veal, we liked them and we were happy that the restaurant was flexible enough to make the change for us. The veal was good, not great.

The 2 mains were very large and we had enough leftover to take home for another meal.
We each had a glass of wine, one was

Beringer cabernet sauvignon $12
And the other was a Le Font de Vent grenache $10

For dessert we shared (again at the table) a roasted banana and caramel bread pudding, with sesame bark, and malt ice cream $10.50. The bread pudding itself was good. The ice cream tasted like vanilla and the sesame bark was another way of saying sesame crunch candy.

So we suggest you try this restaurant and post your opinion too!