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| - Given all the hype about NOCA, I decided to give it a try when a friend and I decided we were going to meet somewhere in that area for dinner.
I will say that, without a doubt, this place has some of the very best service I've seen in Phoenix: the door is opened for you coming and going; the waitstaff stays out of your way and allows you to eat, but is very attentive and fills your water constantly; and they suggest menu items without being pushy. That along with the amuse bouche to start, the cotton candy when I'd typically send out petit fours, and (tonight at least) a piece of chocolate chip shortbread, gift wrapped to go, were all little extra touches that say, "Thank you for coming in. We appreciate your business." Those little touches definitely won me over, though I'm going to admit that I'm not a huge fan of the cotton candy... I don't like the idea at all, but I wouldn't knock them down for doing it. It's a nice gesture.
I love the plates, the presentation, and the small open kitchen. Great ambiance, especially for a place that looks like nothing much from the outside.
So... what gives with my 4 star rating if I liked it so much?
Tonight I had the Summer Melon Salad. Loved the melon components. Loved the sorbet (even though I typically don't like sorbets in savory applications) and thought it worked very well - I think it works so well because it has that great chill that is so appealing about well-chilled watermelon in the summer. HOWEVER, and this is a huge however in my book at this price point, the micro green salad was ridiculously over-salted. Maybe it was supposed to be over-salted to compliment the watermelon that was a full 6 inches away on the plate, but I don't think so (i.e. I doubt anything plated that far away is intended to be a compliment to the extent that the over-salted greens are intended to balance the watermelon). Had this been a $5 salad, I might have let it go, but for a $14 salad, the cooks should at least taste what they're sending out. And it shouldn't taste like a salt lick. Big point loss on that one for me.
I'm sure they would have corrected it had I brought it to someone's attention, but even had they corrected it, they lose points for sending it out that way in the first place. It's a cardinal sin, in my book, to send out food that you clearly haven't tasted.
Onto my entree: Atlantic Skate. Perfect execution on the saute. The fish was very well cooked and seasoned. The fingerling potatoes, on the other hand, were mildly underseasoned. The veal demi on the plate was good, but I think it was too much on the plate for the aesthetics and not enough for the flavor. It was spooned on very thin and artistic, making it hard to get much of the flavor with the fish or vegetable garnish. IMHO, sauces shouldn't be used solely for decoration, if a sauce is on the plate, it should compliment the dish well (which this sauce did) and there should be enough of it to get a little with every bite of whatever it was intended to compliment (which there wasn't).
My dinner is only a single observation which I'm willing to write off as a statistical outlier given how much everyone else raves about this place, but I think the cooks were having seasoning issues tonight. I'll go back, and we'll see what it's like next time.
For roughly the same price, I could have gone to Lon's at the Hermosa, which is one of my favorites. Given tonight's meal, I'd have taken Lon's over NOCA.
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