An Evening at The Bazaar

Upon returning from a most wondrous evening of fun, food, and friendship, I have a couple of warm thoughts to share about my evening at one of California’s most elite eateries The Bazaar, cultivated, inspired, and imagined by Chef Jose Andres and the other amazing staff. Personally I’ve wanted to eat at The Bazaar for a very long time but finding a companion to share in my love of high priced amazing quality food sometimes is a bit difficult. Lucky for my I have Nathalie to enjoy fun food adventures with. The Bazaar is located in the posh and privileged area of Beverly Hills at the SLS HOTEL. As you head toward the entrance you encounter a long line at the valet with an unlimited amount of high end fast vehicles and limousines pulling up to a lovely hotel of grand esteem. Walking into the restaurant we were greeted by a host of lovely young women and were seated rather promptly as we arrived just in time for our reservation. To a bit of our dismay we were seated in the patio, which had a more Mediterranean feel to it with very modern art work and deep colored vibrant décor.

Rojo Room Terrace lighting Interesting modern lighting Bar Centro Jamón y Queso bar

As I walked through the dining room on a Tuesday night the air was fresh and energetic with the culinary moments being shared at all the large tables in the restaurant seated in sections of white and red. The Blanca (white) room of the restaurant had a very warm light core to the atmosphere; it showcases the elegance of Spanish cuisine with a modern twist, with warm brown and beige couches and woven materials used to let the organic texture of the room shine through. The Rojo (red) room which was a dark room with lots of red (hence the name) and deep brown bark surrounding the focal point of the fast paced service of a packed hot line and a brigade of chefs carrying out their culinary mission, as well as a Jamón y Queso bar that had chefs slicing cured Spanish meats as well as shelling fresh sea food. Service was just at its peak, highlighting the vibrant movement of food from the kitchen to the tables. People were enjoying smoking cocktails and new age gastronomical cuisine something you could feel in the air of the restaurant. Bar Centro was buzzing with all the hip interesting crowd of people enjoying the company of whoever was amongst them, serving a large singular table in almost communal style, people sharing in the evening with one another. Over all the atmosphere of The Bazaar is something to behold, a magical hodgepodge of the most elite ideas and imaginative Spanish and Mediterranean influences. Tables are set with a simple fork and napkin and small goblet water glasses.

We were promptly greeted by our waiter Terrance. His demeanor and presence was well kept with the pace of our meal. He answered all of our questions and gave prompt and pleasant service through the meal. We started looking over the menu and decided that the two of us would par take in the DineLA three course tasting which ended up being about a 5 course tasting in the end. We were 1st to choose our appetizer which I chose the “Philly Cheesesteak” air bread, cheddar, and Wagyu Beef. This was a wonderful little appetizer the cheese to me overwhelmed the lightness of the bread and the very rich flavor of the beef. But overall I understood the concept very well its very inventive and unique. I loved the air bread something between a cracker and bread or just a very thin piece of crust is how I think to best describe it. The cheese came flooding out and you are carefully instructed by the food runner as to what you’re eating and how to eat it. They tell you please don’t cut it bite into the bread over your plate and that’s exactly what I did. It’s fun food that’s for sure. The beef is a wonderful high grade of Wagyu it just melts in your mouth you don’t even really have to chew at all. Delicious. The other appetizer we ordered was the Tortilla De Patatas “new way” Potato Foam, Egg 63, and caramelized onion . What interested me the most about this was the egg 63. Egg 63 uses the technique of sous vide which is generally thermal immersion circulation of food which essentially means cooking food in a water bath with a machine that regulates the temperature of the water by circulating it and keeping it at the exact temperature you want it. Most of the time Sous Vide is done in a vacuum bag but for the eggs you drop them in carefully with their shell on once you take them out it has cooked to a perfect 63 degrees and is still runny and perfect. Which in this dish it was, the egg was floating under a layer of potato foam light and fluffy which was a wonderful creamy luscious flavor to add to the sweetness of the caramelized onion. The directions for this dish were to stir the whole thing to break up the egg so each bite had a potato egg onion melting wonderfully together with the creamy light start to a very amazing meal. Presentation of this was delightful so playful and fun with the small spoon

Tortilla De Patatas “new way” Potato Foam, Egg 63, and caramelized onion

Moving on to the entrée portion of our meal, we were now instructed to choose three selections from a rather long list of menu items which would come in the order they would most like compliment our pallets. The 1st items that came were Embutidos Platter of Chorizo, Lomo, and Salchichon which was served with Catalan style roasted bread with tomato. I was going back and forth as to if I should get this but I decided on it because the other night I was really craving cured meats. These Spanish cured meats really peaked my interest. They were so thinly sliced, the Lomo which is pig loin was fantastic it had a very mild flavor and melted well, the Chorizo a little thicker sliced was spicy, smoky, and fatty delicious, and the Salchichon made of hearty fatty pieces of pork was salty and heavy. They all brought a different element to my pallet and the bread with tomato that came with the meats was wonderfully simple, crusty with a touch of rosemary and concasse tomato spread thin with a very Smokey Spanish olive oil. .

Embutidos Platter of Chorizo, Lomo, and Salchichon which was served with Catalan style roasted bread with tomato

With this came my second choice which I ordered Mussels, these mussels came in a small silver dish shelled and steeping in a cool bath of luscious Spanish Olive oil and sweet citrus infused vinegar with pimenton which is Spanish paprika which has a slightly smoky sweet spice flavor to it. The mussels were soft and not chewy at all they carried that creamy brine that meshed well with the lush seafood flavorcut by the citrus vinegar. Just a really beautiful dish

Mean while I decided I would have a cocktail. I choose Liquid nitrogen Caiprinha. This is a brazillan drink made of cachaça, lime juice, and sugar and then it’s frozen in front of you tableside with liquid nitrogen. It’s like frozen lemonade with booze. Amazing and so much fun it melts as you drink it but never gets watery because there’s no ice in it and it also made the drink very soft instantly melting in your mouth and whimsical.

Next we had The Ultimate Spanish Tapa! esaladilla rusa potatoes, carrots, mayo, and tuna belly. The dish itself is not one of my favorites. Over all the flavors of peas and carrots and the foam overwhelmed the tuna belly which seemed to me all cooked in some kind of fragrant poach which ended in a lot of perfuming from the vegetables and a bit of a heavy salt content on the mayo. The mayo was probably my favorite part of this dish because it was a light foamy topping but over all I barely remember the tuna belly which I would think would be the high light of the entrée. Even our waiter commented that he didn’t believe it was really the ultimate tapa either.

We then moved on to my third choice which was the Sea Scallops and Romesco sauce. I love scallops so I had high hopes of this dish and I also really like romesco sauce. These scallops were sadly very salty. They were cooked well but the salt content from the pine nuts in the romesco and the salt on the scallops was just really something that needed checking. I unfortunately had to send the scallops back, they remade them and they were a little better but such a wonderfully briny scallop does not need much in the way of salt in my opinion. The romesco on its own had lovely notes of roasted pine nuts, smokyness from the chilies, a little bite from the garlic and a vibrant red color that was just stunning. I wish they tasted as beautiful as they looked.

Croquetas de Pollo chicken and béchamel fritters

Then came the other two items which were Croquetas de Pollo chicken and béchamel fritters, these lightly fried cylinders just ooze with chicken and béchamel they too seemed to be a tad bit on the over salty side of the meal. The chicken was very tender but the dish was extremely rich and left me wanting a little bit more with the presentation. We also had the wild mushroom rice with Idiazabal cheese, the presentation on this dish was a little muddy. Idiazabal cheese is a sheep’s milk cheese which was a very strong flavor in the dish not bad but heavy. The rice was cooked in a very pungent mushroom stock and only a mushroom or two topped the plate. The rice was creamy and luxurious but after all the rest of the food I felt as if these last two courses were a cream overload. What’s dining out without a little over indulgence anyway which brings me to our last course.

We ordered off of the regular menu Cotton candy Foie Gras. Yes it lives up to all the hype you heard of, who doesn’t like cotton candy and who doesn’t like creamy beautiful goose liver on a stick. The sugar just melts at the tip of your tongue and your left with a soft cool creamy Foie the ultimate definition of luxury dinning. Fantastic.

Traditional Spanish flan with vanilla foam and orange supremes Creamy Chocolate Heart with Coffee and Cardamom

So we cleared our plates and were told that to conclude our meal we would be heading over to the Patisserie to have our final dessert course. 1st of all having a Patisserie section of a restaurant in genius, it is the answer to all those front of the house dilemmas of people dining at their table longer then they had expected. They move you over and if you’re not familiar with why they would do that you think wow it’s just another part of the restaurant they want to show you instead of no they want your table. Anyway the Patisserie is like a little candy factory. There are at least 4 pastry chefs huddled back there for when it gets really busy but at this time they didn’t seem to have very much going on. We sat down and our desert came to us we had Traditional Spanish flan with vanilla foam and orange supremes, the flan was smooth and the caramel was nice, I enjoyed the vanilla foam which looked like vanilla ice cream but when you tasted it, it was light as air. And we also had the creamy chocolate heart with a very strong coffee almost espresso like chocolate glaze and cardamom scented cake also served with a candied ginger cream. I liked the ginger cream and the cardamom in the cake they were scented very well and the flavor was nice. The cake wasn’t the best chocolate cake I’ve had but it was very good combination of subtle flavors. So we finished our night here. I took another couple of looks around the restaurant peaking into the kitchen a couple of times to see what everyone was up to. Over all this is such an amazing restaurant you can see how much goes into putting on a show every evening for hundreds of diners. The ambiance is fantastic, hip, and still as fresh as the day they opened. The level of attention to details and the science of new gastronomical Spanish influenced cuisine is something wondrous to behold. The world of molecular gastronomy is definitely something I’ve been accustomed to and this was just an amazing experience to see it all at work and to also have some extraordinary food in the presence of amazing company.