Yeah. I’m crazy. Crazy for this place, and crazy in general. I can’t explain why I love Eleven Madison Park so much, it’s just one of those things I guess! But after my first visit, the seasons changed. Seasons changing meant winter to spring, to ramps, and to snails!! Minty snails!!! Yes?!?!
Yeah, I came here just for the snails. But I got so much more than that!
I opted for their abbreviated menu, and also wanted the salmon roe dish. I also asked about the menu and if I was going to get the snails, but apparently that wasn’t on there, but the waiter said they could include it as an extra. Nice! Since I ordered so much food, I wasn’t supposed to receive the bar snacks, but I accidentally got handed them, and I nibbled away at everything. The nuts were so good, and the olives were great too! The waiter even said that the chips would be good for my salmon roe!
I went for a drink pairing again, though I found out that the juices hadn’t changed from two weeks ago, so I guess the juices don’t have as much variation as the food.
And thus my way of eating the salmon roe dish! Salmon roe, avocado, and some sea urchin hidden right in the middle. There was a bowl with sides covered in radish to eat like a taco with the mix. After I used up all my radish slices, I took the waiter’s advice and started piling some onto my chips!
Sitting at the bar allows you to see so many things, including the tiny little thing on the bottom right of the drinks shelf. If you look closely at the bottom shelf, rightmost section, there’s a beam of light there. That’s actually a mirrored hinged door thing, allowing the bar and kitchen to pass things to one another – mostly cocktails, but also used glasses for cleaning. Woah! How cool! That’s actually a super amazing and neat method of sending drinks from one section to another!
Ah yes, the champagne pairing thing to go with my upcoming caviar!
EMP’s iconic caviar tin. There was a heap of caviar in this, with some asparagus, hollandaise, and ham. It also came with some super tiny mini english muffins!
EMP’s fluffy bread in a pouch! After having had Contra’s bread, this one didn’t quite seem as nice. The ramps butter, on the other hand, was delicious!
Oh no, I didn’t get a massive ice cube block this time! Only 4 decent sized cubes. Later on, I had an opportunity to ask about the ice cubes, because one of the advantages of sitting at the bar, is actually seeing the ice. Does that sound weird? Well, this ice was exciting. It wasn’t just any old ice. The big cubes actually all get branded with the EMP symbol! What? Yes! At first I thought each cube was pre-branded by way of a mold, but no, it’s actually a hot brand put on the ice before the drink is poured onto it. Woah! I wish I’d taken a closer look at my mocktail from my last visit now! The other thing to note is that they also serve spherical ice cubes for some drinks. How do you get spherical ice? Usually it’s those silicone molds yeah? No. Here, at EMP, the bartenders chisel away at the big cubes down into spheres!!! Crazy, but so beautiful to watch! I really love the craftsmanship and detail here! I knew there was a reason I loved this place so much! Bars are so fun to sit at!
Yeah crab season! This was the first of the “choose your own adventure” courses, and as soon as I heard crab, I knew this was what I wanted. Such nice delicate meat, paired with sorrel, something I haven’t eaten since I left Adelaide, and some lovely dashi jelly and amaranth.
Ah, lobster. Yeah. Wow. This was soooo good! I love green tomatoes too, so that was an added bonus! This lobster was not what I expected at all. On the first EMP visit, my friend ordered the lobster dish, and I took a small bite of it. It’d tasted a bit overcooked at the time, but since I only had tiny little portion I was unable to conclude whether or not I liked it, but after tasting this one, they’ve shown they can cook lobster the way I like it. This reminded me of Saint Peter’s yabbie scrambled eggs that I had – it was *just* cooked – so soft and tender and was just soooo nice! Yes! I love EMP spring menu lobster!
Oh, minted soda. Mint. Does that mean…?
YES. It’s my snails dish! Woohoo! Such lovely, large and plump snails, that in last year’s version, were fed with mint. I think they were still fed with mint, but my tastebuds aren’t too great so I wasn’t sure if I tasted mint in the snails themselves. Funny thing is, this wasn’t actually my favourite dish even though it’s the reason I made so much effort to do a revisit. It turns out I like snails loaded with heaps of flavour, while these ones were cooked in a way to let out their natural flavour. I loved the texture though, since they still had some bounce to them instead of being completely soft all the way through. I liked the different cooking style!
I am so glad I got to try this out since there aren’t enough places that actually serve snail. EMP is amazing!
Yay the tea pairing! I really love the smell of this one, and that means my “meat” dish is coming up.
Haha, there’s no meat in this one! This was the final choose your adventure option, and the choices were duck, leek, or veal (I think). I’d already had the duck, so I didn’t want it again, and for me, leeks and mushrooms is too good of a combo to pass up so I chose it over the lamb. I never expected the presentation to look like this, but look, it’s so pretty! And the mushrooms were pretty flavoursome too! I’m glad I went for the vege choice on this one!
Okay, dessert was one of two options. Strawberry wasn’t one of them, so it was between lemon and chocolate. I’d heard the waiter say that he liked the lemon one to another customer, so when it came to my turn, I said that I’d choose lemon too as a result of his opinion. I wasn’t disappointed! This was actually really nice! Look at that gooey lemon centre! This was a lovely dessert to end the night!
And the classic pretzel. I received another morning-after granola care package again too, which was really nice!
There of course, was one last thing to try. Last visit, I had an English Breakfast tea which was quite ordinary compared to some other teas I’ve had at high end restaurants, so now, let’s try the coffee. I actually didn’t have high hopes for this, but maybe they would do it well?
Hahahaha. What was I thinking! This was “okay” at the start, but didn’t taste great at all after a while. The drinkability test is whether or not I can drink it black, and unfortunately, this one failed. I ended up having to add milk towards the end of drinking this because it was getting unbearably bitter, and that means the diner coffee I had fared better. Well, good to know! It means that EMP’s best tea experience probably does revolve around their traditional Chinese tea service. No, that doesn’t mean visit #3 in the works, I can’t afford that! It just means I need to go to more teahouses :)
What a lovely revisit. I saw some extra things at the bar, and it was also way more relaxed. I think the room layout and the way all staff have to use the “roundabout” on the main floor made it feel busier than it actually was, whereas here, it was just a couple of bartenders doing their thing. There was also a discussion from my dining neighbours which ended up being about the best pizza in New York. That was an interesting conversation because they made a distinction between best pizza slice, and best pizza. Joe’s pizza, they said, has the best slice (but that any slice was the best slice at 3am haha), but that Roberta’s had very good pizza overall. Nice, I managed to try both of them and agree! But all that talk made me realise I didn’t have long in New York left, and that I’d end up missing the street food. Fine dining I like experiencing anywhere in the world, but you can only get a New York hot dog in New York. Ah the wonderful world of food and culture!