ADVENTUROUS DINING WITH A SERIOUS TOUCH
Dinner At Fieldstone isn’t about creature Comforts And the focus is strictly on food
The sign of a top chef 50 years ago was his or her ability to recreate classic dishes. Back then, restaurants were usually categorized by nationality — French, Italian, Chinese, etc. — or even by specialty, say steak, crepes, or fondue. Upon presentation of menus, the dishes that were featured were probably familiar. Perhaps not the pu-pu platter at the Kon Tiki (ask your parents), but certainly the boeuf bourguignon at Le Paris or the veal piccata at Casa Napoli. Discovery was not the name of the game back then. What people wanted were solid renditions of familiar favourites.
Then in about the early ’90s, everything changed. Chefs were no longer focused on reworking old dishes but creating new ones. Gone were the snails in garlic butter and shrimp cocktail in favour of salmon tartare, wild mushroom risotto and molten chocolate cake. And when those dishes became popular, the next wave arrived and so on. Since then, this culinary creativity has been a constant evolution. If you want to feast on the classics, head to a brasserie or bistro, but if you are dining in a chef-driven restaurant, get ready for more than a few surprises as creation is de rigueur.
In Montreal, such restaurants have become a definite genre. Establishments such as Le Mousso, Manitoba, Diplomate, Candide, Le Fantôme and Parasol, the pop-up held in summers behind Maïs, are serving food not necessarily created to nourish, but to provoke, inspire and admire. And that’s no mean feat as the young chefs cooking this way have to follow in the footsteps of generations of chefs who have been dreaming up new ways to cook everything from sea urchin to rutabaga. Ingredients abound, cooking techniques range from Paleolithic to mod-
ernist, and influences beam in from the latest culinary hotspot, be it Mexico, Australia, Peru or the oh-so-edgy Brazil. The rules are there are no rules, resulting in some pretty exciting dining.
Or, alas, not. Despite the hits, there are also misses. Flavour combinations can be peculiar, service can be distant, background music can be jarring, and the beverage selection can include the obscurest of natural wines.
As for the critic, how to judge? Seeing as we are not evaluating classics (as in a Béarnaise sauce must include tarragon) personal taste counts for a lot, which is why such restaurants receive wildly divergent write-ups. Yes, we can judge whether the meat is properly cooked or the salting is egregious, but somewhere along the way we are either captivated by it all or … confused.
This week’s candidate, Fieldstone, is a prime example. Opened last fall, Fieldstone is the brainchild of co-owners Chanthy Yen and Emiliano Rivera. Yen is the chef and his experience includes stints at Mugaritz in San Sebastian, the El Bulli Foundation in Spain, as well as restaurants Cacao and The Mackenzie Room in Vancouver. He has been quoted as saying his influences are Cambodian and Mexican, and describes his style as “New Canadian.” OK, great.
I arrived at Fieldstone on a Friday night, quietly entering this sparsely furnished and lowlit space. Tables are bare and the chairs are uncomfortable. But dinner here isn’t about creature comforts, the focus is strictly on the food. The menu style is tasting and there are three options: five, eight and 10 services. We opted for a five and an eight, which share most dishes. I opted for the house cocktail, a martini made with St-Laurent gin (from Rimouski) and flavoured with the tropical fruit mangosteen. Yum! As for wine, there’s a small selection of privately imported organic bottles sold at fair prices. Our waiter recommended a white-grenache-based Côtes-duRhône at $52 that matched our meal perfectly. Good start.
As for the food, the first dish to hit the table was terrific. Falling perfectly into the influences stated by the chef, this amusebouche featured a fried dumpling filled with kimchee made with cactus. A tad salty but otherwise, delicious.
Then the menu kicked off with a salad of pears and radish served with Microplaned Oka cheese and roasted hemp seeds. Though I liked the various textures, the flavours lacked oomph as pear and radish aren’t exactly high on the flavour scale. The next plate featured roasted carrots and a spoonful of ricotta we were told was made with hemp. Interesting, yes; memorable, no.
I did like the third dish, which featured a large scallop flavoured with annatto seed oil, smoked turnip foam and dill. This is exactly the kind of dish you expect in a restaurant like Fieldstone, featuring pristine scallops with a shot of colour (if not flavour) from the oil, and the earthy smoked foam with the touch of dill. I relished every bite.
But, alas, the next three dishes fell flat. A timbale of smoked beet tartare with miso and bee pollen lacked an extra ingredient to give the dish depth. After two bites, I wasn’t craving a third. Then came a thick chunk of duck magret, marinated in coffee and Szechuan pepper, which was served on a sauce made from buckthorn berries and caramelized anchovies. The mix of flavours — coffee, anchovy, acidic berries — was off-putting. But what bothered me more was the excess salting of the duck and the fact that it was cooked blue. The final savoury dish, a thick slice of pork belly with a spicy chocolate sauce, was also a miss due solely to the egregious salting — a shame as the meat was perfectly cooked.
The desserts at Fieldstone still play the savoury card. The tequila-spiked strawberries with crumble were topped with a luscious, thick cream made with blue corn. Loved it. But the final dish, the Fieldstone, a beige-ongrey affair comprised of foie gras
ice cream framed in shards of charcoal meringue, left me perplexed. The idea has potential, as the charcoal in the meringue added a smoky flavour that contrasted well with the sweet, and yes livery, ice cream. But the ice cream itself wasn’t smooth, and the presentation was as sad and colourless as a Lars Von Trier film.
Though our waiter was super serious, I felt an undercurrent of friendliness. Maybe it was just nerves because on my way out he brought me a can of the mangosteen juice used in the martini. Nice move. As for the rest, I can only be honest and say it’s not my cup of tea. That said, this is the perfect example of a type of restaurant many adventurous foodies may adore. Frankly, I like more light, a more talkative waiter, a more comfortable chair, less salt and fewer caramelized anchovies in my sauce. And I also like a sunny ambience. In winter we are faced with so much grey: slush, skies, the stuff that rubs off from your car door on to your coat. It’s a time of year I yearn for colour and pizzazz, if not in my city, at least on my plate.