Chimera arrives in Boulder as top tier Asian eatery
Chimera ★★★¼
BOULDER» Fans of Edwin Zoe’s Zoe Ma Ma, or for that matter, admirers of finely crafted and authentic Asian food, will find much to cheer at Zoe’s latest spot, Chimera. Billing itself as a Pacific Rim cuisine venue, this welcoming restaurant occupies downtown Boulder’s former Sushi Tora space, which has been updated for this new venture. Service is impeccable, spotlighting a well-informed staff that doesn’t miss a beat, all while consistently providing a warm and personalized dining experience.
The focused menu is a well-thought-out tour of Asian cuisine, featuring unique items such as tea-smoked chicken, Korean barbecue and ramen. Small plates include oysters with Japanese flavorings such as citrusy yuzu, duck dumplings, and miso soup with little neck clams.
My companions and I started a Friday dinner with a trio of what the menu categorizes as a “little eat” and each of these hewed closely to traditional preparations. A $4 duck bao could also qualify as a lazy person’s individual serving of Peking duck. This was a finely executed and pre-assembled morsel of rich bird that wasn’t too fat, and brimming with fine flavor.
Handmade Shanghai soup dumplings, $7 for three, featured everything you’d want in this dim sum specialty, including a perfect stuffing of crab and pork, ably accent-
ed by ginger. The liquid filling will be familiar to anyone who’s patronized Zoe Ma Ma, as it features the same hearty and clean notes found in that establishment’s broth. It’s also worth noting that I found Chimera’s soup dumpling superior to that which I ate soon after at a popular California dim sum eatery.
Less common and perhaps most refreshing of the starters, was the $5 smashed cucumbers. Chilled vegetables take center stage here, abetted by a masterful blend of dried shrimp, garlic, rice vinegar and pungent sesame and Sichuan chili oils.
Growing up, when I ate chow fun, it was almost always a heavi- ly sauced beef and black bean number. Typically, we’d enjoy this down home dish in the sort of cash-only Oakland Chinatown joint where you could feed the entire family for about twenty bucks. Needless to say, Chimera’s more rarefied $14 Everybody Chow Fun course doesn’t fall into the same category as my childhood favorite. Nevertheless, it’s still legit.
Chimera’s preparation is akin to something you’d find in a more elevated stateside Chinese restaurant of the sort where the cooks, staff and money are all from Hong Kong. It’s also closer to the banquet fare you’d find at such a top tier place, with a flavor profile that’s far more delicate and sophisticated than expected and a lot less greasy. Lightly marinated and tender white meat chicken, appealingly crisp tender baby bok choy and an exquisite melding of oyster, soy and fish sauces, make for one of the best takes on this dish I’ve had in Colorado. Other classic taste touches include chili paste, and the traditional trio of ginger, garlic and scallion. Last but not least, the top notch rice noodles are properly wide, and not of the disappointing narrow gauge variety.
Representing Korean cookery, an $18 seafood soon dubu is a kimchi-scented seafood stew spotlighting prawns, clams, mussels, squid and marvelously silky tofu. While my dining companions were initially leery of the prevalence of the spicy kimchi, they found that this ingredient’s heat happily enhanced, rather than overshadowed, the seafood’s impressively fresh savor. A staff recommendation to break the yolk of an accompanying poached egg also contributed a welcome richness.
While both the chow fun and seafood hot pot set an impressively high bar, the undisputed hit of the evening was the $25 butter poached lobster ramen. In the past, I’ve experienced some disappointment with lobster ramen at other restaurants as both the size of the shellfish portion and texture weren’t up to par. Here, the serving is a whole tail, and butter poaching is the best way to enhance the clean flavor and silky texture of Chimera’s first class lobster.
But it’s not just the lobster that stands out in the ramen. While the triple threat duck, chicken, and pork broth may not be as traditional as a pork tonkotsu take, I’d argue that the richness, balance and spot-on seasoning of Chimera’s recipe represents a better way. Furthermore, the house made organic ramen is marvelously toothsome, and I’m hard pressed to identify a spot where I’ve had a better noodle of this type.
Chimera is an unqualified hit when it comes to its winning interpretations of authentic Asian fare. Dishes like the soup dumplings hew to the original recipe, but the execution is superior to that of specialized restaurants serving a predominantly Asian clientele. Fresh takes on dishes such as ramen are also remarkably successful, as is the case with the superlative lobster preparation. Too often, attempts at gussying up Asian classics result in failure, but Chimera’s lofty ambitions, passion, and top notch execution results in to a tableful of can’t miss fare.