Gyst and Spoon & Stable - November 23, 2015
I’m a little embarrassed to admit, that for the longest time, I didn’t understand what the phrase “industry night” meant. I don’t think I got it until a few years ago when I heard a radio ad saying something along the lines of “… and remember, Monday is industry night, bartenders and servers get half off all night, just bring your pay stub…” I’ve always wondered how far the industry spreads out. Is it limited to just restaurants? What about breweries that have restaurants in them, do the brewers count as industry now? What about the farmers, bakers, and providers of other goods? I’m not sure.
One thing I have noticed though, is that cohorts in the restaurant industry generally support one another to the best of their ability. A chef gets waylaid by an accident or an illness? The rest of the community will band together to do a fundraiser. Ask a chef where to eat, they’re going to list other chefs’ restaurants before their own. Is a chef doing a fundraiser for their new space? Lots of other chefs & their establishments will take to social media and try to get the word out to the widest possible audience. That’s how I first heard about Gyst Fermentation’s Kickstarter.
I’ve mentioned numerous times how much Travail and their restaurants informed my early adventures into food that was more than just food; food that could become performance, art, exceedingly memorable. Ky, one of the minds behind Gyst, worked briefly at Travail’s Pig Ate My Pizza, so when she and her partners were launching their Kickstarter, Travail gave them a signal boost. I was tuned in.
I’ve backed a lot of Kickstarter projects, and most of them are food or beverage related in some way. A kitchen gadget here, a brewery there, oh here’s a cool food truck. Gyst was different. Gyst wanted to be a place that embraced and advocated primarily fermented foods, their name,“Gyst,” is even an olde English word for “yeast.” I’m huge fan of food and beverages produced via microbial interaction, so I was really intrigued by the whole concept. Given they were local, would be another women owned business in an industry that is sorely lacking in equal representation, and my aforementioned love of little creature created consumables, I backed their Kickstarter.
I got to be cheesemonger for a day, that was cool. As cool as that was, I was more impressed by Ky, Mel, and Jill’s knowledge about their product and how much passion they had. They also have a talent for getting complex wines that not a lot of other places would put on the menu. There’s a few from Georgia (the country, not the beautiful state) that I’ve been quite fond of. They posted on social media that they were uncorking the new Pheasant’s Tears Polyphony. That’s how I ended up there early Monday evening for a glass of wine, some cheese and some pickles.
Pickle & Fermented Plate: (I didn’t write down the various items, but recall them all tasting great)
Daily Cheese Special (Monger’s Choice of 3 cheeses): Top I think was from Wisconsin and was a cheddar that had a late innoculation of roquefort, middle was a whole milk from Illinois, and the bottom was a European goat or sheep milk if I recall correctly, Marcona almonds, candied walnuts, and pickled root. All great. I kind of wished there was a soft, funky cheese mixed in, but it was good regardless.
I was flying solo this night and while cheese and vegetables make for good snacks, they’re not quite a meal in themselves with the size they were. I’d seen a new dessert posted by Spoon & Stable earlier in the day, and my interest was piqued. I’m going there in a few weeks with a good friend whose thoughts on oranges I misunderstood, I thought she hated them, apparently mainly their use as a flavor; oranges themselves are fine. It was with this misunderstanding I went in to get the dessert that had an orange component. While there I figured I might as well get some food too.
Octopus Tacos - cranberry beans, salsa verde, manchego, and cilantro: Good flavors, the textures were good, this would be a good gateway octopus dish. Right before hitting post I realized these are Tako Tacos. “Tako” is Japanese for octopus.
Amaretto Creme Caramel with carrot cake and creme fraiche ice cream: This isn’t the dessert I came for, but it was another one I hadn’t tried. I was hungry and it sounded absolutely moreish. Great flan, nice thin and crispy carrot cake, the sour notes in the ice cream paired really well. The shredded carrot was “candied” in a simple syrup, orange juice, and vanilla mixture, and I’d be lying if I didn’t say those shredded carrots tasted exactly like Trix cereal. It was a nice nostalgia punch to go with a well executed dessert.
Lime Curd with mandarin sorbet, kumquat, and thyme: This IS the dessert I came for. Excellently done. So many textures and temperatures. Lots of techniques. The crispy milk played well with the sorbet, the curd and kumquat worked great together. The paper thin fruit leather(?) was very fun. If you ripped a small piece off and placed it on your tongue it would dissolve away almost immediately. this worked really well with the crisped milk. I definitely recommend this one.
Crisped milk must be something that’s experiencing quite the renaissance. I’ve had it in three desserts in the past month-and-a-half at three different establishments: La Belle Vie, Saint Dinette, and now Spoon & Stable. I’m not complaining, I think it adds a playful texture and great flavor in all of the uses I’ve experienced.