The Mousse That Baaa-ed: Black Sheep Is Back

Since closing down on September 4 at its longtime Ortega Street location, the Black Sheep has been reborn on Cota Street a mere three months later. In addition to the location change, it's now officially The Black Sheep, SB Brasserie, which is fitting as the new location was for two decades the home of one of Santa Barbara's legendary restaurants, Mousse Odile. Co-owner, GM, maitre-d Ruben Perez definitely hopes to invoke the French spirit of the spot, offering coq au vin and cassoulet and more, but with a definite Santa Barbara, contemporary twist. He found a great partner in the endeavor, chef Jake Reimer, who has done the high end executive chef for restaurant groups and the private chef gig, among others, but seems very happy to have fun with Santa Barbara produce and seafood.

We had the great fortune to be hosted for a culinary trip through permutations of the tasting menu they are already billing as "famous," which might not be conceited much as predictive. For everything we tasted rocked--vibrant flavors, thrilling freshness of both ingredients and concepts. So while I could go on and on about, say, the perfect steak frites, starting with the tender Entrecôte meat itself, and then a secret sauce that's got some anchovy in it but is otherwise vegetarian and rich and almost worth licking the plate to enjoy (luckily instead you have plenty of yummy handout fries), I won't.

I also won't talk about the reinvigorated creme brûlée, spanking the oft-tired dish back to life with a pinch of salt and what must be a fistful of Tahitian vanilla bean.

Nope, to focus, let's just talk about the three dishes that opened the meal and hit the table simultaneously. Above you see an essay in fishy contrasts, some lightly pickled sardines atop some sprouts atop some tuna you can't see, but it's confit and rich. Then there's a slice of baguette on the plate awash with a mustardy sauce. The contrasting textures and flavors kept your mouth alive to flavor's possibility.

Here's the evening's crudo--it's listed on the menu as d'jour, as it sort of has to be as it needs to be something just caught to sing. This one did a little aria, so might have crawled into the kitchen on its own. Well, if scallops crawled. Again, all the accents aren't just for show but push the dishing fascinating angles and richness without hiding the pleasing, starring salinity of the scallop.

And then, as a true Santa Barbara nod, here's uni with "dirty" rice, seaweed, and tobiko. Things get a bit soupy as you eat it, but with the rice it's kind of a wet porridge of big flavor delight. Here the accoutrements reel the urchin's assertiveness in just a tiny bit, which works with all the other vivid reminders of the sea in the bowl. It's a great example of lots of technique being brought to bear on something that seems simple. 

It's wonderful to have the Black Sheep back.

It's a Cinch to Want to Go to Finch & Fork

Many restaurants are taking the opportunity to come out of COVID (ok, let's pretend we are) with a reset, and no one has done that more seriously than Finch & Fork at the Canary Hotel. They've redone the room--say goodbye to the previous darker, wood, shuttered club feel and welcome lots of white, and sun, and video screens that run different modernist art prints. It's all very beach resort appropriate, if a bit generic, not that a dark, come-dine-in-my-library look is particularly novel, either.

The key is, you're going to be paying attention to the food and drink anyway. For as part of the reset, F&F has a new executive chef, Craig Riker, with a varied and storied resume (including Rustic Canyon, Patina, bassist for Deadsy) who locals will know from his time at plant-based Oliver's in Montecito. Now getting to play once again with any foodstuff he finds fascinating, Riker and his kitchen are hitting on all cylinders, doing what he claims is mom and grandma food, as read through his worldly travels as a touring musician. It's elevated comfort food, both because of his access to so much great produce and because of his skills. So imagine a deviled egg, and then a little raft of perfectly rendered pork belly atop, riding the wave of the creamy yolk. Now that's a bacon and egg bite.

We had the wonderful opportunity to taste through a good 60% of the dinner menu this week, and I'm not going to do a dish-by-dish recounting but do want to focus in on two items as exemplars of why you need to get yourself to F&F. And that's without talking about the three fine desserts (nothing like a banana cream pie style shake to awaken and appease your inner child), or the fine service that the charming Tim Thomas, Director of Food and Beverage, oversees, or the locally-focused beverage and cocktails list, put together by Santa Barbaran Jazz Moralez (how deliciously clever to come up with a Francesco Franceschi cocktail, of course botanical-forward, featuring green chartreuse, Fernet Branca, pineapple, lime, and chili threads for quite a kick). 

But then there's the hamachi crudo you get to see in the photo above (stolen from the F&F website, as lousy Blogger won't let me post my video) bathed in cucumber aquachile. A lesson in balance, this is. As flavorful as hamachi is, it's pretty darn delicate, so it's easy to have the amberjack swim away in a too powerful sauce or accompaniment. Not here. First, there's an itsy scoop of avo inside each swirled slice of sushi, its fat pushing the fat of the fish into yet more flavor. And that aquachile brings warmth more than heat, extending all the flavors with each taste. Those flavors include citrus to give the acid zip any dish needs, and then some jicama for just as much cooling sweetness as required. This could be a meal for me and I'd be happy.

Not that I wouldn't be happier with this scallop dish, too. Again, it's a dish--the components are meant to play well with each other (perhaps food is the only place anything does this anymore, alas). The scallops are scintillatingly seared so almost crispy, and just cooked to the center as you would hope. Then there's the Roman artichoke, shaved to only the tastiest parts, like a little thistle cone of delight. Or consider it the ice cream, as the cone is actually a wrap of Serrano ham, all porky-salty goodness. Add it up for a truly imaginative surf and turf. 

But then there's that risotto I would order all on its own. Calling out Acquerello as the brand of risotto isn't just for the mellifluous name--F&F serves you seven-year old rice because it cares and wants you to, too. And how bright and green it is, redolent of shallot and basil and Grana Padano and no doubt a bunch of great stock and sea salt. Fancy without any shmancy, homey without being homely.

Piperis's Perfect Potent Potables

Repeal Day is one of those odd negative holidays--hooray, we're not getting beaten anymore!--but that said, aren't you happier you have a glass of something in your hand right now? Even if you don't drink, I hope the notion of Prohibition, saying you legally can't do something that's not morally wrong, should rankle. Well, December 5th was repeal day, the 85th year of the return for legal drinking (and producing and selling) in the USA. And there's just one MAGA I support: Make America Grape/Grain Again.

All that's prelude to getting the chance to sample the latest cocktail creations for the fall-winter season from one of our town's masters, George Piperis, at the Finch & Fork at the Canary Hotel this December 5th. I've had the luck to drink with and write about him before, but he's the kind of talent that lands drinks in Imbibe Magazine and geeks out on his milk punch project, which he talks about like making boozy cheese in reverse, and along the way points out Benjamin Franklin did it first. Hoping to have it ready for Christmas, he concludes, "I could do an eggnog, but that's so boring."

Boring has no room in a Piperis menu. The current one carries over some of the previous's greatest hits, from the delicious AND gloriously goofy Barbie's Bath Bomb to the old fashioned with the very new wrinkle--he washes the bourbon in duck fat. But it's the new creations I want to highlight, as in their breadth and depth they astound at every turn. Take the You Got Chocolate in My Peanut Butter, a nod to the old Reese's ad, but Reese's never tasted this good.

(Note these images are all on the fly iPhone photos--follow Piperis on Instagram to see them photographically pimped out.) This time it's Toki Japanese whisky that gets the wash treatment, but with peanut butter. The chocolate comes from Tempus Fugit créme de cacao and some chocolate shavings across that lush peanut butter foam that's so rich and flavorful you'd order it on its own. Despite that creamy top, Piperis asserts (rightfully), "It's not just a dessert cocktail--the most masculine man can drink it." Well, as long as he has some taste.

Then there's the Tryna Send It, which he calls one for the kids who work with him. At this point I felt truly old, but fair enough, I don't know snowboarders yell encouragement by screaming, "Send it!" Piperis wanted to make a "good Long Island Ice Tea," is how he put it, and that's a challenge, as the usual LI Iced Tea is simply "how many alcohols can we mix in one drink and make it sweet enough you want another?"

His drink still delivers a boozy punch, but does so with velvet-gloved elegance, starting with the garnish of candied ginger heavily-dusted with his own fermented spicy pineapple sambal--he warns me to mix it moderately into the drink, as it does have quite a kick. The drink is composed of pineapple juice, Casa Noble blanco tequlia, The Funk rum, and Singani 63, a Bolivian unaged brandy Piperis calls "real trendy." 

One of my personal favorites now on the list is the Captain Jack Sparrow, as I'm not trendy at all. I'd like to think of as more a Keith Richards than a Johnny Depp drink, myself, full of depth, unflashy skill, and surprisingly well-aged. It kicks off with Jack​ Daniels rye, off course, but earns its buccaneer bona fides in several ways, starting with Chairman’s Forgotten Cask rum (turns out Chairman's actually found a barrel and no one knew what production it was from). To tease out rye and rum flavors in some of their most varied directions there's Tempus Fugit banana liqueur and a roasted banana slice for garnish, and then a few shots of both blackstrap and tobacco bitters, the latter, oddly enough, not made with any tobacco but with bacon fat and coffee. (Beware, vegetarians!)

Piperis compares the drink in composition to a Boulevardier, but think a boulevard in Barbados, maybe. And no, it's not too banana in the slightest--it's a drink where all the parts add up to one lovely sum.

It's a fascinating companion to another more classically-conceived drink I don't have a photo for, Hayden on Holiday, named not just for the Basil Hayden in it but also a friend of Piperis who is always on vacation. (And given the season and our location, how do you not do a "holiday" named drink?) Definitely a drinker's drink (you know who you are) the namesake bourbon get the smoky punch of mezcal, too, plus Sfumato, an Amaro made from artichoke that's lighter and smoother than the better known Cynar. Add in some Cocchi Teatro Dopo and Thai bitters, and help people realize casks add coconut notes by drizzling coconut oil on the one big rock in the double highball glass, so the ice looks like it has a snowy cap, and the smell hits you as you go in for every sip. This is a deep drink, one worth much slow consideration.

If you want to go with what seems to be a very Santa Barbara drink, it's hard to pass on the Daughter of Man that, with its eucalyptus bitters and eucalyptus leaf tied alongside, Chryss joked, "Smells like a koala's butt." Having not been upclose with those Australian critters I can't say for sure, but the drink itself brings together Copper & Kings brandy, honey crisp apple, a black currant reduction with red wine, honey, and those bitters into a refreshing very unusual drink perfect for this time of year. Sweetish, without being sweet, fruity, but not too.

Then there's version 2.0 of last menu's In the Pines, this time featuring Death's Door Gin, a sure way into this gin-lover's heart. (1.0 had mezcal.) Of course the gin is pine-y to start but it gets extra pine power from Zirbenz, a stone pine liqueur from the Alps, plus an at the table dusting of pine pollen, fragrant as a field of Christmas trees, and supposedly an aphrodisiac to boot. Add some Cardamaro (Piperis likes those cardoon-artichoke Amaros) and Cocchi Torino and you have a drink deceptively smooth for all its gin.

Piperis sums it up this way, "It's an aggressive menu for this market but I'm just proud of it." And he should be, as it's playful, powerful, challenging, comforting, and most of all downright delicious.

Speaking of, Peter Cham, the executive chef, has the kitchen firing on all cylinders right now too. For example here's the most lovely of scallop dishes I've perhaps ever-eaten.

Perfectly seared to be nearly crunchy on the outside and just-cooked but cooked inside, the scallops sit atop a rich brown butter cauliflower puree. Then the plate is artfully strewn with romanesco, roasted to just the right toothsomeness, pickled kumquat, as vividly tasting as they look, crispy capers, and enough edible flowers to make you feel you're eating at a florist. Gorgeous plate of food. (And a great pairing with the Tryna Send It.)

Same with the trout, again showing off Cham's skill with brown butter, this time made with toasted hazelnuts. That's buried in broccoli florets, more toasted hazelnuts, and the most eye-catching of greens. And along with the brown butter, it sits atop green goddess dressing that will make you think young you might have been onto something liking even the blandish bottled versions of it (I'm remembering you, Seven Seas), and warm multigrains to give the dish yet more crunch. Eat it with an In the Pines and you'll feel like you're out fishing on a tranquil Eastern Sierra stream.

Pico Perfection

Just wanted to make sure you all knew that Pico is nearing perfection. The comfortable yet classy former Los Alamos General Store was excellent when it opened, but keeps finding ways to get better and better, and not the least of that was a redesign of the space. Originally it was set up to look like you still were entering a general store, with the main room featuring cute country housewares for sale, but now the bar is on the right side of the room and looking more like a bar, there are tables in the room--up and down the two levels--it's as if some feng shui master whipped everything into rightful shape.

Chef Drew Terp has had enough time to figure out what works, what grows, what smokes in Los Alamos, and you'll get all the best of that on your plate. Like the ingenious scallop starter above, one scallop, sliced, infused with about as much smoke as the mollusk can hold and not just be vapor, then caressed (it has to be some lovingtender gesture like that) with a hit of lime, tarragon, and that pomegranate seed like a button of flavorful crunch. (The salad ain't bad neither.)

Then there's the secretly simple wild mushroom consomme, a dish name that fails marketing 101--some hypester would no doubt dub it with a moniker like Mad Mushroom Mania! For it packs a vavoominess of shroominess in what looks like mere broth, and then there are tiny pearl onions soft as tears that are all onion without any sting. In this scrumptious bath are several perfect tortelloni you will want to cut with with your fork to make them last over several bites and the pasta will give pleasingly before it breaks as its very fresh and then inside you'll find a ricotta stuffing that no doubt is housemade ricotta, moist enough to delight yet something substantial enough to taste.

There's more, there's always more...ah that grilled pork secreto, part of the shoulder of a mangalista pig, a cut that comes fanned out on the plate like duck breast, pink in the center, grilled crusty goodness at the edges, and all pork flavor (and more of that smoke). And a new dessert, a pot de creme de la creme, as I'd like to call it. Better yet, call Pico for reservations.

Up the Downey's Showcase

So that's a bad iPhone photo of a very good dish, round one at Downey's recent Celebration of Summer dinner.The rest of the meal was magnificent too--this is Downey's after all--and I'll jump to dessert in a bit, but right now I'd like to linger with this scallop. Yep, just one, but round as a Kennedy dollar (remember those?), and perfectly cooked--this is Downey's after all--translucent but done in the center and completely, evenly seared tan on the outside, but then cleverly sliced across its middle to make two perfect discs and divvy up that delicious sear into more bites. You will bite small, as you want it to last, as you want to taste, as you want to get a bit of the watercress, exactly dressed so each leaf is moist not dripping, and perhaps a sliver of endive too. The sprinkling of pine nuts, and how do they get each one toasted so similarly?, adds something crunchier plus that lovely, wispy forest floor flavor. And then there are the peaches--what a summer for peaches it's been here in Santa Barbara, and these, semi-dried, fight back a bit more with their chewiness, and therefore last more. Wash all that down with some Dragonette rose and you could go home after one dish sated with the essence of edible summer.

Let's then skip ahead to dessert, and the joy that is Persian mulberries. I've had some mulberries that seem, well, muddled--a bit more about the taste of the land than bursting fruity goodness. That's not the case with any John Downey ever serves, though. Here's they are made into an ice cream that's part of the world's most elegant ice cream sandwich, with the cookie part an almond dacquoise, surprisingly firm yet flaky and pleasingly crunchy. More crushed almonds are toasted around the circumference of this puck-a-licious blast of not-too-sweetness. I want another.

Top of the Scallops

Not to go on and on about a place, but we've been totally taken with Pace food + drink, and this plate last night embodied all the restaurant does well. Those scallops are perfectly cooked, and anyone who has ever tried that at home knows how tricky that is. Sure, they have to cook fast, but you can sear them so quickly you end up with scallop sashimi in the middle. Not these. Instead they have that nice surface crisp but then are actually cooked, too, but not a bit over. They play very well with the shiitakes sliced over the top, the mushrooms' earthiness meeting the scallops' sea. The sauce is sake based, and that gives another kind of sweet, but more importantly another kind of off-sweet sweet (so unlike, say, vanilla, which however pleasant inevitably pushes a dish towards dessert).

The rest of the plate works well, too, the saffron rice bringing back childhood memories of, and this is going to sounds like a bad thing but it isn't, Rice-a-Roni, but sans the MSG, and buttered, not margarined. (I am a child of the '70s, I can't help it. At least the rice isn't stuffed into a Cornish hen.) And then the care of cooking that met the scallops also was brought to bear on the asparagus, just at the point where it's soft and not a bit stringy, and really taking on the almost-down-to-caramel onions and the red pepper flavors. Perhaps there's a bit of broth at work there, too, making sure the side dish isn't just a sideshow.

Wash it all down with a Cismontane Citizen, a California Common lager that is anything but common (thanks for re-inventing this old style, guys), and you have a perfect dinner, so much so we blew off buying stuff at the Farmers' Market as what could we do at home to compare?