The Corson Building
5609 Corson Ave S in Seattle - ph: 206-762-3330
These motherfuckers at the Corson Building are HARD CORE. They grow their own crops on the premises. Yes, the herbs and vegetables are THAT fresh. A chicken coop provides eggs and chicken meat, and they even have PIGEONS. And in case you think pigeon meat is gross, I've got news for you: I'd rather eat 1000 pounds of squab than ONE shitty fucking Hot Pocket. And that's not only because I'm an elitist jerk (though that is pretty far up the list); it's also because pigeon meat RULES YOUR FACE TO THE MAXX. It rules your face so much, in fact, you're legally required to spell "max" with TWO X's.
The first course was a salad of yellow watermelon, pickled red currant berries, and salted tuna. The currant clusters were still on the stem and were the single biggest pain in the ass to eat of anything I've ever eaten. When you tried to scoop them up with your fork, they just rolled around on the plate, mocking you, and when you tried to stab them with the fork they ejaculated a squirt of tie stainingly bright pink juice. When it was possible to get a bite of all three ingredients together, the tart berries and salty tuna meat contrasted well against the melon, but it's easier said than done to get all of that shit on your fork at once. So my complaint against this dish is its structure rather than its composition.
Next up we had a caprese salad, of sorts: red and dark red heirloom tomato slices were tossed with buffalo mozzarella, some kind of bitter greens which could have been kale but were probably some other shit, purslane, and sauteed chanterelle mushrooms. Fucking tasty. I'd never tasted purslane before. It's a thicker leaf, more like a jade plant than lettuce, and tart. This tasted pretty good with the mozzarella, which tasted home made and was as creamy as a princess's thigh, and of course the chanterelles provided the meaty kick to the nuts for which they're known. The only thing I don't like about chanterelles is when people over enunciate the name and say "chan-ter-elles," instead of "chan-trells." Those motherfuckers sound like Katherine fucking Hepburn when they talk like that. It's unbecoming.
Course number three was a melange of sauteed shrimp, yellow wax beans, green beans, and cauliflower. The whole thing was tossed in an anchovy, roasted garlic, and parsley paste. This was REALLY fucking good. The anchovies were 'fruit forward,' as the forward fruits in the wine industry would say, but I didn't care because I love anchovies. But I love shrimp even more than anchovies, and in this dish there were many. The beans were lightly sautèed and still crisp.
With the appearance of the next dish, we were halfway through this gluttonous marathon. Grilled eggplant was served with sauteed okra, artichoke hearts, and 2 kinds of beets. I began to see a pattern: each of the last three dishes had TWO DIFFERENT COLORS OF THE SAME VEGETABLE. Obviously this was some secret code planted by Leonardo daVinci to let me know that Jesus fucked someone, and all of Jesus's other secrets can be revealed if you're only willing to destroy Westminster Abbey. How's that for a plot synopsis of a shitty book, assholes? And by "shitty book" I actually mean "shittiest book of all time." And by "shittiest book of all time" I mean, of course, The DaVinci Code. Forgive my digression, and let's segue to the one vegetable that's as shitty as The DaVinci Code: okra. I don't like okra, even though I'm from the south. Okra is, in fact, one of the reasons I left. But the presentation here was so masterful that I didn't mind chowing down on those slimy slivers.
The fish course was a halibut cheek, braised in tomato sauce with chickpeas and topped with a brief squirt of bechamel sauce. This dish is the 'your mom' joke that writes itself, because I once gave a brief squirt of bechamel sauce onto your mom's halibut cheeks. But this halibut was much better than that. The halibut disintegrated beneath the fork and the chickpeas were soft and buttery. I ate this dish as quickly as I just described it. But the meat barrage was just beginning, because following the fish was an extremely tender chicken: it had been braised with apricots and anise hyssop, which as the name suggests is vaguely licorice flavored.
Before I could catch my breath after scarfing down a drumstick and some apricots, out comes LAMB. The shock and awe flavor bombardment continued with a leg of lamb, roasted rare, with a parsley and carrot slaw and stir fried zucchini tendrils. A word about the lamb: it was so fucking succulent you probably could have spread it across a piece of bread. The parsley and carrot slaw was dominated by too much parsley, though, and the zucchini tendrils were sometimes tough. After packing in SEVEN COURSES they made us eat dessert, though I would expect no less. Dessert was a sticky glutinous rice pudding, very dense yet somehow simultaneously light, with blackberries and apricots. It wasn't too sweet, and was accompanied with an herbal mint tea and, as if I wasn't fucked up enough after 8 glasses of wine, a shot of OUZO.
The total bill is a prix fixe of $110 per person, which might sound pricey, but it was for 8 COURSES, all of which came with at least one but usually TWO glasses of wine. Not all of the dishes hit the nail on the head (e.g. the parsley/carrot slaw), but fuck it. If you don't like a particular ingredient, I suggest you man up and just fucking TRY IT. You may be surprised to find that the same rule governing anal sex also improbably works for fine dining. The whole point of the Corson Building is elegant experimentation, and if you don't like it, you can go somewhere else for dinner. I hear the Cheesecake Factory serves the same 80 pages of dog shit 365 days a year. Fuck.
Rating: 9 precision gustatory assaults out of 10
September 2008