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| - What a great place. Attentive service, yummy cocktails, a menu limited to only the most excellent options, delicious meats with subtle flavours in a fun atmosphere (get ready to chat with the people who are sitting next to you - well, practically on top of you).
My friend and I showed up quite late on a Monday night, thinking we might be able to avoid the crowds. Ha! The place was rammed. A super-friendly hostess quoted a 30-45 minute wait, took my name and number and promised to call when a table became available, and recommended the Press Club up the street for drinks.
I was doubtful about hearing back given that my name was written quite far down the list and they were set to close in about an hour and a half, but I received a call within half an hour.
For some reason, I was kind of determined to hate Black Hoof, but the place and the food charmed me out of it. A recommendation to pair their octopus dish with Barbera wine - a drawing of an octopus joyfully brandishing a wine glass with the caption "octopus + Barbera = true love" - was drawn in chalk on the wall facing me, and melted my heart before I'd even downed a cocktail. The cocktail was a Savage Dandy and was delicious. Highly recommended if you like bourbon cocktails. My friend opted for a gin-based cocktail and had a Basil Fawlty and it was also excellent - very refreshing.
Our waiter ran through the menu and described the dining as "tapas style", which we eventually discovered referred to the sharing aspect and not to the size of the dishes. Bear in mind - the portions here are either big, filling, or both! The next time I go, I'll order more dishes if I'm still hungry, rather than ordering all at once.
I hear tell that standard practice is to order two dishes, but that didn't seem to offer enough variety so we opted for four. This was too much, so I think that "ordering up" is the ideal solution here. The only useful strategy in our case was to befriend the people next to you and trade off bits of dishes! We ended up giving much of one, and a little of another, of our dishes to the friendly couple sitting next to us. They traded us some of their cheese platter. Good times.
On to what we ordered:
- much-recommended charcuterie platter: delicious meats with subtle flavours, and recommended again here. The duck was the winner, although it was hard to choose.
- foie gras mousse: the waiter warned us that this was rich and he was right! I was surprised by the size - it was as big as a large coaster, and about two inches thick. It was also the only disappointment of the evening. The foie gras tasted SO strongly of butter all the way through that the taste of the meat was indiscernible. We might as well have ordered a slab of salty butter. Too bad. I also suspect that this was the thing that filled us up! So if you want to taste more, I'd steer clear of this foie gras (there is another on the menu that is apparently less rich, though, in case you need your fix).
- tongue on brioche: my friend was reticent to try this one because of the stigma around tongue but I refused to let it pass us by. It was almost unbearably delicious. The tongue was soft (as tongue tends to be), but with none of the harsh, weird undertones often ascribed to the meat. This tasted more like silky smoked meat, and went wonderfully with the brioche. It was also huge! My only regret was that we'd filled up on the foie gras and couldn't enjoy this as much as we should've.
- glazed pork belly: four inch-thick medallions, perfectly cooked and succulent, served on top of a tangy (but not overpowering) barbecue sauce and some sauteed onions. Was basically in a meat coma by this point but managed to eat two pieces, my friend had one, and the last went to the couple next to us.
Given the quality of the food and size of the portions, plus cocktails, the bill was surprisingly affordable - around $90 or so. We stumbled out, sinuses packed with meat. I'd return in a heartbeat as I'd love to try some other offerings on their oft-changing menu, but next time I'll stagger my order!
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