72. Equinox
Last night I stopped by Equinox with the lovely and talented Helen. It is located on a shady and quiet stretch of Connecticut Avenue, which I will now dub Washingtonian alley since there are three former and current Washingtonian Top 100 restaurants on this short block. Though Equinox is on the first floor of an office building and next to a carry-out deli, it has a lovely shaded patio for a few select diners. I’ll have to add that to my list of outdoor dining options. (Did you know I wrote about outdoor dining options for Prince of Petworth this week? Oh you read it already? Maybe you should read it again.) Unfortunately the storm clouds were rolling in, so there would be no outdoor dining for us. Instead we were seated in the dining room, which shall we say was light on diners. There was a big party in the strange private dining room in the back, but other than that it was us and three other tables. I’m guessing they do most of their business at lunch so I won’t hold it against them.
I had heard about the $40 tasting menu from a friend, and decided to try it without reading the rest of the menu. Or really reading what the tasting menu was either. But at $40 I figured it would be a deal no matter what. First we were served an amuse-bouche of a shot glass full (as full as a shot glass can be) of asparagus soup and a hard boiled quail egg. The asparagus soup was good but plain old cream of asparagus soup, while the egg was zingy and tangy on account of the Chick-fil-a Polynesian-style sauce served with it. I’m sure Todd Gray does not appreciate that comparison, but I love the Polynesian sauce so it’s quite the compliment. Our appetizer was a summer salad with some seriously peppery arugula, parmesan shavings and melon. I am usually morally opposed to salads with fruit in them (anything that can be a pie should not be a salad), but this was a really nice pairing. Had the melon not been there to balance out the arugula, I doubt I could have finished it. But finish it I did.
After another little amuse-bouche of a tiny tower of tomato and mozzarella, we were served our main course—fettuccine pasta served with soft shell crab and tomato sauce. I love (LOVE) soft shell crab, and was thrilled to see it on the menu. I was a little less thrilled when the dish was served and there were pieces of soft shell crab instead of the whole crab staring up at me, but I do realize that a lot of people have a hard time eating food with a face. The pasta was delicious and buttery, and the crab was cooked well. The crab was also still swimming, swimming in sauce. (Ba dum ching) The tomato sauce tasted fine, but there was way too much of it. I found myself scooting the sauce to the side so I could actually taste the pasta and the crab.
Finally, we were served our desert which was written on the menu as “Fresh Blueberries” or something like that. Since it was in quotes, I assumed the dish would come out as a hilarious take on blueberries were it was actually raspberries and strawberries dyed blue or something. Alas, it was just blueberries, served over vanilla custard. A bit of a let-down at the end of the meal, but after a heavy pasta I was glad to not have a giant piece of chocolate cake plopped down in front of me (though I would have eaten it of course).
One of the things I loved about Komi was the fact that I saw Johnny Monis, superstar chef, wandering in and out of the kitchen all night. I feel like my dinner is significantly more special when I know that the chef who designed the menu is actually making sure the dishes are heading to the dining room the way he wants them. Not only did I see Todd Gray wandering through the dining room at the end of our meal, but I also saw him when I came about six inches from smacking him in the face with the bathroom door. So I say to Mr. Gray: “whoops, sorry! Love the crab!”
