Food Thoughts: Journeyman Restaurant

[kniedzw]

So, my lovely wife and I were in the Boston area for a primarily family-oriented trip, though we did make one side-trip to our friends' recently-opened restaurant, Journeyman. They have past menus up on their site, so I suspect, as a result, that they'll have this past week's menu up soon enough. In the meanwhile, I'll try to review it as best as I can based on my imperfect memory.

The short form is that dinner was most excellent. I am a poor foodie, in part evidenced by the fact that I did not take pictures of our meal, but both of us opted for the five course omnivore meal, though the lovely wife, being somewhat contrary, asked for an alternate entrée. The courses in some degree of detail:

• We started off with a pre-appetizer house-made tofu with scallions and soy sauce, which went quite nicely with the vermouth that they served alongside, chilled. I was somewhat confused at the idea of serving vermouth on its own, but it actually worked remarkably well.
• The soup was a lovely carrot with some sort of cold dairy ... object on top which offset it nicely. I opted for the wine pairing, and I was served an interesting white alongside, though I can't remember specifically its provenance.
• The appetizer was a butternut squash concoction with some greens alongside and some fish eggs of some sort, which offset the paired riesling quite nicely.
• The fish course was cuttlefish with somewhat mild kimchi, paired with a Hefeweizen, which was an interesting choice and worked better than I expected.
• At this point, the chef, Tse Wei, dropped off an additional fish course at our table, as we have a remarkable store of blackmail on him. It was a lovely sea bass served on an eggplant sauce of some sort which surprised me mainly because it was richer than I was expected.
• The entree was served at this point. In my case, it was pork loin with three sauces (only one of which I recall -- Huckleberry), paired with a red which distinguished itself mainly in my mind for not giving me a splitting headache, as most non-organic reds give me. The lovely wife, however, opted for a beef cheek which was tender enough that she needn't have bothered with a knife. I was rebuked by Tse Wei toward the end of this course for not eating the crackling, which was, as he said, "tasty and will make you cry."
• Then we had some sort of palate cleanser which was a refreshing lime gel, the components of which elude me again.
• Dessert, meanwhile, was three forms of chocolate: a white chocolate with a fascinating infusion of Chartreuse, a chocolate ganache, and a dark hot chocolate drink on the side, with a slice of levain bread. The server referred to this as a "choose your own adventure" dessert, which worked remarkably well. The fortified wine pairing from Sonoma would have probably left a better impression with me if I hadn't gotten the dregs of a bottle, but it was good nonetheless.

Following on the blackmail material I mentioned above, we also got a second dessert consisting of some lemon curd, a butter cookie, and a peach (or perhaps apricot; my memory fails) jelly, followed by a nice chat with Tse Wei, who explained what Chartreuse was and offered us samples, along with soda water to cut it. (Note that I recommend cutting it with the soda water unless you love anise.) We finished off with some Lemon Verbena and Rooibos teas, though my better half rebuked me for spoiling the former with too much sugar, turning it into a "lemondrop."

Overall, an excellent dinner, and I can recommend Journeyman unreservedly to anyone in the Boston area who wants an extended localvore dinner. I believe I'd do so even if I wasn't friends with the owners, though I suppose you should take my advice with a grain of salt.