30 (and Corduroy)

It finally happened: I became a grown up. Despite knowing for 29 years and 364 days that this would one day happen, I decided the final week of twentydom to eschew the hand-wringing, knitting-class-enrolling, flinging-with-24-year-olds, or Las-Vegas-Strip-indulging that previously seemed the appropriate response for a terrified 29 year-old. Instead, I ran head-long in, hurtling toward 30 and hitting four top 100s in six days. That's right.. I've been busy spending 25% of my salary (I calculated it) on bars, drinks, and requisite hotel rooms to welcome myself into a third decade but not writing a single thing about any of it.

This presents a bit of a problem, particularly for an amateur food writer with the memory of a fruit fly. Particularly fruit flies 29 1/2 years her junior. I'll cover them all, but the fact that this following week has been a parade of Netflix films, Lean Cuisines, and polishing off a magnum of generic red wine (read: three strong indicators of laziness), I make no guarantees this will be a prodigal or quick return.

But how better a way to ring in a new first digit of one's age than a trip to a fancy schmancy white-table-clothed restaurant with old friends Dotti and Eric (over medium rare venison and conversations about Paris no less) at Corduroy; a bawdy (yet classy; they are not mutually exclusive) dinner with Christine over Chiantis, Brunellos, and Calvados at Tosca; a dinner with a new friend who passed the test of patience with both food photography AND a tasting menu at Sushi Taro; and three Dotti meals (only one of which was the build-up-to-3o week; I'm behind) all around the city where we planned European vacations and the post-top-1oo project, Where the Men Are, a geographical inquiry into men-rich regions.

I'll begin with the most recent, because that's the only hope I have. Eric, loyal reader of early top 100 Proof fame, chose Corduroy and Dotti and I were glad to redux over more red wine. She and I drove in to the big city, valet parked our car, and ordered two Bordeauxs, please, at the bar, because that's what 30 somethings do. And talk about their sophisticated international travels, as we all did, over more fancy red wines. A bottle, to be exact, which of course paired well with the chewy, porous, deliciously fresh bread.


Eric started with the soup--the most impressive dish of the evening, which is a rare feat for that category of appetizer and one of the few presentations of a dish for which I wish I had had the foresight to record it. I'm truly an amateur.

The soup was served with a cracker-thin ring of cheese (I think?) that rested atop the bowl's lip. The staff, already impressive in reciting the menu-length list of specials, poured the cauliflower bisque into the reminiscent-of-ice-fishing hole in the middle.

I had the surprisingly good scallop tartare, cleverly arrayed in its own scallop shell with an accompanying cabbage salad with shiso, a charmingly punch-packing Asian green. Two tablespoons of raw fruits-de-mer, though, ensured I was starving for my main course.


I had the venison with the chestnut puree. It also had limp green beans, but I'm wiser now and didn't eat them. It had a delicious red wine reduction and the chestnut puree was nutty, albeit a bit saccharine. Sucrosey? But the venison, oh it was tender and juicy.


Dotti and Eric did better in their choice of pork, adorably served with mini-squashes. The sauce was good, despite me having any recollection of what it actually was.


Dinners like these are especially nice if they finish with a reminder of someplace else, a recollection of a beautiful memory or locale, particularly a place that was discussed over the first few glasses of wine (if you guess Paris I'm predictable). Eric was clever enough to propose the cheese plate for dessert, and we chose two (delightfully ubiquitous but unique chèvre cheeses), a few French and Spanish ones, and my stinky favorite, a bleu. How ridiculously delightful is an evening filled with conversations about France, food (we learned capon was a castrated rooster... well, it was described more delicately than that), and love? Hello 30, 14 more restaurants await.