| rev:text
| - When my wife and I moved to Madison five years ago, we weren't so thrilled with the restaurant scene. In the last few years, however, things have really been invigorated by the opening of three great gastro-pubby places: Graze, Roast Public House on State Street, and now A Pig in a Fur Coat.
We just got home from a really, really wonderful meal. We'll definitely be going back again. There were a handful of very small issues that I'll note in brackets.
- We called ahead to inquire about the wait and the hostess told us it would be 30-45 minutes and graciously took our name. We got there about 35 minutes later. The space is very nice and very bustling. It's a loud restaurant, which I happen to like. I won't go into the seating too much, since it's been discussed. We took a seat at the bar while we were waiting for a table and just decided to stay there, which worked out just fine.
[Minor complaint #1 I would love to see this place expand into a slightly bigger space. I'm not into communal dining, but it would be fine if they kept that at the core. I'd just like to see a few more options for small-medium sized parties. As it stands, I can't see taking my folks here when they visit for a nice family dinner, and that's a pity.]
- We ordered drinks. I had a beer (forgot what kind-- I'm not a big beer guy) and my wife had a very nice house-made blood orange soda.
[Minor Complaint #2: No hard liquor. I kind of expected some inventive cocktails.]
- We started with olives. This was the the low-light of the meal. We both love olives, but these were strange. I couldn't put my finger on what was so weird about them, but my wife was certain that it was the (pickled?) fennel that was overwhelming the flavor of the olives. We each took a bite of each kind and pushed the plate away.
[Minor complaint #3: It would have been nice if someone had asked if there was a problem. I didn't want to complain, since we just didn't care for the taste, but part of me was hoping that someone would ask.]
- Then we had a lamb carpaccio that was out of this world. Really, really fantastic flavor combinations on this plate.
[Minor complaint #4: It only came with two small pieces of bread. Maybe I don't understand the economics of bread, but I'll never understand why restaurants will serve you some luxurious dish and then skimp on the bread. I'd rather risk having a piece left over than have to worry about whether or not I'm putting too much on any slice.]
I'll go out of complaint mode, though, because we asked for a little more bread and it was delivered fresh out of the toaster by the chef himself a few minutes later. That was nice.
- Then we had the poutine. Wow. Really, really good. I'm a huge fan of this dish, and in the past I've generally thought that there were two kinds of poutine: correctly made traditional poutine and crappy cheese fries masquerading as poutine. This innovative take proved me wrong. The combination of the duck fat fries, generous slices of foie gras and fried cheese curds plus a sauce that wasn't quite a gravy but was really, really good just blew me away.
- Dry-aged strip. Another big winner. Perfectly cooked medium rare steak covered with generous globs of bone marrow butter and served with sweet breads and lentils. It was just as good as it sounds. Since we were so stuffed at this point we had about half of this wrapped up. I think I'll eat it right after I finish this review.
Overall, this was a really, really fantastic meal. One thing I really appreciated was the portion size-- I kind of expected that their "small plates" would be much smaller, and I appreciated the bang for the buck. We would probably substitute out the large plate next time for another small plate and dessert.
This is really great food in an energetic space with a very friendly staff.
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