Category: American/New American Restaurants

I am sure that Kirk and Cathy are eating well and will soon share the details with the rest of us. Today, though, this is ed from Yuma focusing on the entrees at Passionfish on the Monterey Peninsula. Next time I post, I promise it will be about someplace different.

As most of you are able to tell by now, I am a fan of Passionfish in Pacific Grove. Not all of my meals of Passionfish have been outstanding; in particular, I can remember one clunker of a meal about five years ago. On some visits, a dish may not satisfy me as much as most dishes at Passionfish have. Nonetheless, three things remain constant at Passionfish. First, the dishes will be creative and often innovative. Second, the wine choices will be numerous and the wine will be priced close to retail. Third, the meal will represent an excellent dining value, particularly in comparison with the other restaurant choices in Carmel and on the Monterey Peninsula.

A major reason that this restaurant continues to lure me back again and again is that this is a restaurant with a vision. The couple that owns the restaurant, Ted and Cindy Walter, each has an important role in Passionfish’s success. He is the head chef, and she manages the dining rooms. The restaurant represents their personal passion and their individual dedication to the art and science of running a restaurant. Unlike so many restaurants that begin well and then go into a long declining phase, Passionfish has continually improved over the years. The dining rooms have been redecorated to make them more appealing. The chef is constantly working on new flavor combinations and keeping what he is most satisfied with and tweaking dishes that need improvement. In my third and final post about Passionfish, I want to share with you the most interesting and best tasting entrées I’ve eaten (or at least gotten a taste of) over the last couple of years.

While the emphasis at the restaurant is on sustainable seafood, the needs of carnivores are not neglected. My favorite entrée from the land has to be the duck confit ($17 last year, $19 this year):

It seems that ever since the restaurant opened, there has been a version of this dish on the menu. Last year, a moist, rich, and tender hind quarter of a duck was paired with succulent braised fennel and spicy chili potatoes. It is hard to believe that this duck has first been cooked in fat and then grilled because it is not at all greasy or oily. The meat literally falls from the bones. Braised fennel may be my all time favorite vegetable – tender, lightly flavored, and rich. The chili gratin potatoes add a nice contrast in terms of tastes and textures, while the Carmel Valley honey reduction provides a note of sweetness that helps bring all the flavors together.

Seafood, however, provides most of the entrées on the menu. I am continually impressed that the kitchen serves only fish and shellfish from sustainable fisheries; yet, at the same time, the menu will always has a wide range of seafood dishes to choose from. This year, for example, Steve ordered Alaskan sablefish crusted with pepper and accompanied by wasabi slaw and baby bok choy ($20):

The tender, perfectly cooked sablefish was moist and tasty, it’s mild flavor shown off by the intense black pepper crust. The accompanying items offered a wonderful contrast to each other. The julienned red apple slices in the wasabi slaw added spicy and fruity notes to the dish. On the other hand, warm sautéed baby bok choy contributed notes of fresh vegetable greenery. For added flavor, the fish was accompanied by a ginger vinaigrette, adding a touch of contrast with its sour spicy tang.

Another long time favorite at the restaurant is the barbecued shrimp with a spicy Vietnamese sauce:

Last year (as pictured) we had the dish as an entrée ($20); this year it was an appetizer ($10). The main difference is in the number of shrimp (eight or four) and the number of cabbage rice fritters (two or one). The shrimp are always perfectly cooked: moist and juicy inside and slightly charred on the outside. The fritters similarly showed the chef’s sure hand, the crunchy exterior completely covering the soft and moist interior. For contrast, the slaw here has strong lemongrass and chili flavors, hot and sour notes. The Vietnamese style sauce that literally underlies the shrimp also has spicy and tangy elements, but it’s more dominated by its touch of sweetness and garlic, with perhaps just a hint of fish sauce. This is a fusion dish that works extremely well.

On the same visit that Steve ordered that wonderful shrimp entrée, I had Gulf of Maine scallops ($23 last year, $24 this year):

To be honest, I have few memories of the broccoli rabe which was underneath the thyme risotto custard. And no memory of the risotto custard at all. But I hope I never forget those scallops as long as I live. That night, I got lucky – I hit the jackpot. Never in my life have I tasted scallops so perfectly prepared. How the chef was able to put a crunchy top and bottom on each scallop while leaving the center of each one perfectly rare and moist is beyond me. Frankly, I doubt if any chef could prepare scallops that perfect on a consistent basis. Each scallop tasted outstandingly fresh and was incredibly tender. I’m sure that the tomato truffle butter went well with the scallops, but again my only memory of that meal are those scallops because they were that good.

During my most recent dinner at Passionfish, I got to sample two very fine entrées. The first was tilapia with thyme mashed potatoes and garlic-balsamic vinegar butter ($18):

The picture here does not do justice to the dish. The tilapia was tender and mildly flavored. The mashed potatoes were soft and rich. The vinegar butter was an ideal accompaniment to bring together the potatoes and the fish. This sweet and slightly sour gravy perfectly accented the flavor of the tilapia and simultaneously cut through some of the richness of the potatoes. To balance the soft textures and complementary flavors of the fish and potatoes, the perfectly cooked (meaning still very crunchy) and extremely fresh sugar snap peas added a major contrast in flavor, texture, and color.

The other outstanding entrée that evening was wild Monterey salmon topped with coriander aioli over a cucumber, dill, and medjool date salad ($22):

Nothing I have eaten in my life really prepared me for the look and the taste of this entrée. The salmon was, of course, perfectly grilled – with a slight touch of char and a wonderful moist and flaky interior. The fish itself was extremely fresh and well flavored. I have learned to expect this at Passionfish. What amazed me that evening and still amazes me is the accompaniment to the fish. While the plate and the fish were both hot, the chunks of cucumber were cool as well as crunchy. The contrasts in taste, temperature, and texture were outstanding. The medjool dates provided a hint of sweetness and the dill added a background spice note, but both were secondary flavors. I assume the beautiful green color resulted from puréed cucumber skin (because I could detect no other flavors), and the resulting two-tone color scheme of the entrée made it almost as attractive to my eyes as it was attractive in my mouth. The aioli was truly a case of gilding the lily as its flavors of coriander and roasted garlic were certainly not needed to make the dish a tasty success. The salmon was rich and flavorful enough on its own, but I was not tempted to scrape the rich aioli off the fish. This was certainly one of the best and most original salmon dishes I can remember.

The only way I can properly end this look at some of my favorite entrées from Passionfish is with one of my favorite desserts there. This simple combination of good vanilla ice cream and unbelievably fresh and flavorful raspberries in a Cabernet syrup makes for a refreshing conclusion to any of the wonderful meals at Passionfish ($6):

Kirk and Cathy are no doubt doing interesting things and eating wonderful food, but just don’t feel like posting about it. So this is ed from Yuma filling in the gap with pictures and words about the salads and appetizers at Passionfish on the Monterey Peninsula.

Many people feel that the best items on the Passionfish menu are their salads and appetizers. These days, the menu contains three separate pre-entrée categories: Teasers, First Courses, and Salads, but for purposes of this post, our focus will be on first, salads and then, other appetizers.

Often the restaurant will have some version of a roasted beet salad. Last year, the roasted beets were served with greens, goat cheese, and very thin onion rings ($8). We liked it so much that we ordered it on both of our visits last year:

Your eyes are not lying. Once the salad was made with roasted red beets, and once with yellow. In both cases the sweet earthiness of the roasted beet played off against the tang of the goat cheese. The deep-fried oniony flavor of the battered rings complemented the nutty arugula flavors. The varied textures also played across the tongue: the crunch of onion, the fleshy mouth feel of the beet, the chew of the greens, and the creaminess of the cheese.

This year we tried two other new salads. The baked Gorgonzola with curried greens, candied pecans, and golden chutney ($8) was an amazing tastefest:

This amazing salad combined tastes that I never would have imagined putting together. Of course, if you’re going to use a curried dressing on a salad (a thought that never occurred to me, I must admit) , it does make some sense to pair that salad with the complex sweet and fruit notes of a mango and currant chutney. But candied pecans? Yet the nuts added a different type of sweetness and certainly a distinctive crunchy texture to the salad. Most amazing in this context is the hot packet of crispy dough lying atop the salad. When cut open, the packet yields creamy melted Gorgonzola, the molten cheese adding salty and funky flavors that offer a total taste and textural contrast to the rest of the salad.

Another winner was the goat cheese salad with apples and toasted pecans ($8) (Steve and Helen split this salad – at no additional charge – so this picture is of a half portion):

Again, the chef has sought to balance cheese flavors and textures with nuts, fruit, and greens. Steve and Helen wolfed down this salad so fast that I am unable to comment further as to how it tasted.

Last year, I enjoyed perhaps my favorite salad from all of my years of visiting Passionfish. Strangely enough, it was listed not with the salads, but as a first course: smoked sturgeon with celery and dates ($6):

The pristine Salinas Valley mixed greens were topped with four slices of succulent smoked sturgeon (as you can see, I ate half of one of the pieces before I remembered to take this picture). The firm flesh of the sturgeon had a distinct smoky flavor but was equally fresh and moist. It would not have been out of place on nigiri sushi rice. As the chef often likes to balance flavors, the savory fish was matched with sweet and sugary mashed medjool dates – as seen at the top and bottom of the plate. On each side of the plate were slices of crunchy celery in a celery puree. Once again, when I looked at the dish described on the menu, I had trouble imagining why these ingredients were together. Once I started putting them into my mouth, the chef’s skill came through clearly. Celery and dates go together well, and both of them seem to bring out smoky and slightly fishy taste of the sturgeon. And all the other textures in the salad stood out from the firm cool fish flesh.

One of the oddest appetizers I have ever eaten at Passionfish was on the menu this year. It was modestly called oysters with a cucumber relish ($8). If Melanie Wong hadn’t expressed her enthusiasm about the dish, it never would have occurred to me to order this rather peculiar looking appetizer:

For me, this little appetizer was much like two appetizers in one. When I took the first bite of one of the long flatworm-like objects tangled together around the middle of the plate, I was happy with the flavor but also puzzled, because I had forgotten some of the details of Melanie’s discussion of this dish. My mouth was crunching on something with a very familiar flavor, but the input from my eyes and the input from my mouth didn’t agree. I couldn’t figure out what I was eating. Luckily our very friendly and competent waitperson was in the area and I asked her what those things where. When she told me that they were shaved fennel slices with seaweed, suddenly my culinary confusion was gone. When I put the next long slice in my mouth, I first could taste the light licorice flavor of the fennel, which I had not noticed on the first bite. Then I recognized the dominant flavor, which was the seaweed, even though visually the seaweed is a small element in the appetizer. Overall, the center of this appetizer tasted like a lightly fennel flavored and very crunchy seaweed salad. Really amazing.

Around the edge of the seaweed/fennel combo were four plump briny oysters swimming in a sea of cucumber purée. The oysters were clearly the star of this part of the dish and the cucumber relish showed off their flavor very well. Nonetheless, unlike Melanie, I felt that the two halves of this appetizer never truly went together. When I tried to eat fennel slices and oyster simultaneously, I loved the textual contrasts but found that to my mouth the tastes jarred against each other. Your results might differ.

No discussion of appetizers at Passionfish would be complete without a look at what is many people’s favorite, Dungeness crab cake with a lime relish ($8 last year, $11 this year):

This is an outstanding crab cake. While the lime and tomato elements in the relish add a nice contrast in flavors and colors to the plate, here the Dungeness is king (please excuse the crab joke):

They say that a picture is worth a thousand words. In this case I will spare you those thousand words because that picture makes the best conclusion possible for a look at the salads and appetizers at Passionfish. Yum.