Schwa is currently my favorite restaurant in the world. Stunning, extremely inventive yet nearly always successful food, 12-course meal, quality of a 3-star Michelin restaurant, at 1/3 the price.
Or to put it more succinctly: Uni (sea urchin roe) ice cream cone, Cauliflower chocolate soup, Jellyfish pad thai, Parsnip custard with candied sweetbreads…nuff said.
There are some “downsides”: BYOB, hole in the wall across the street from a palm-tree-festooned rim shop, no wait staff (the chefs serve the food), the music gets loud and veers toward hip-hop as the evening wears on, it’s impossible to get a reservation because they don’t pick up the phone and their voice mailbox is frequently full, but I’ve had success calling around 11-12 in the morning.
Of course, these are not really downsides, they are facts of life that make dining at Schwa a unique experience. Last time I went I picked up a few good bottles at the Cellar Rat, an indie wine shop a few blocks away…ask the owner for Schwa-oriented recommendations (Alsatian Pinot Gris and Belgian beer are two confirmed matches for the Schwa palate).
Here’s an e-mail I wrote about my last experience there:
This blog posting describes a meal that’s almost the same as the one Amal, Ijlal, and I had at Schwa last night:
http://skyfullofbacon.com/blog/?p=168
For Andreas and Rose’s info: The only differences are (1) the amuse — instead of grapefruit sorbet, we had a little anchovy served with a drizzle of menthol, (2) instead of the jellyfish pad thai, we had little pasta pockets filled with curried cauliflower (I think) topped with cocoa nib served in a cocoa nib consomme, and (3) instead of the pork belly dish, we had chicken liver (as written on the menu), but the other components of the dish are exactly the same.
Interestingly, I agree almost entirely with the blog poster’s assessment of the dishes. My favorite dish, hands down, was the same as his: the chicken liver dish (his was pork belly, but the dish is essentially the same), and my second favorite was the parsnip custard with candied sweetbreads. (We had this dish when we went last year, too, but I was too drunk then to properly appreciate it…I made sure that didn’t happen this time.)
The marriage of flavors and textures in the chicken liver dish (unctuous creamy liver, crunchy rutabaga pearls, mustard, beer foam, bitter greens, peanut brittle), which Carlson paired correctly with the Belgian beer we brought, was nearly orgasmic for me. Rose doesn’t like rutabaga, but maybe I could convince her to try it with peanut brittle.
The parsnip custard with caramel and passionfruit sauces was just divine — I think we should try making something like this at home — and the sweet take on “sweetbreads” was simply ingenious. Maybe that’s why they’re called sweetbreads!
The cauliflower curry pasta dish was another of my favorites: the pasta was a little al dente for my taste, but the cocoa nibs and cocoa nib consomme were wonderful. I said afterward that I need to get Rose to put chocolate in her cauliflower curry.
The quail egg ravioli was wonderful as always — actually, I liked it even better this time than before. And I loved the amuse, which truly amused: it brilliantly brought both a palate cleanser (mouthwash, essentially) and appetizer (intense fish flavor) together into one bite. Who knew that such superficially antithetical flavors could be synthesized into such a harmonious union? Aha, but that of course is the theme of all my research!
I agree with the blog poster that the lobster-persimmon dish (although
*beautifully* presented) was something of a misfire, and I too started to enjoy it much more once I focused on some subset of the components instead of the whole, which didn’t gel for me. I thought the duck-chocolate-pumpkin combination was pretty tasty, but not terribly original (it essentially tasted like duck in an unspicy mole sauce), and I agree I would have liked a bit more of it.I would group the rest of the dishes into the category of delicious, but not incredible. Some of the early ones (e.g. the beet risotto — another great idea, btw, to try at home) were undeniably tasty, but the most magical thing about them was how well they paired with the excellent Alsatian Pinot Gris I picked up at a nearby independent wine store.
All in all, Carlson and company are still in top form. Amal and Ijlal said they want to go back again before they leave Chicago — I don’t blame them.
And here’s a really interesting article about the chef Michael Carlson and the nervous breakdown he suffered a couple years ago (in between my first and second visits to Schwa).
Price Range: Expensive (approx. $130 USD w/o wine, BYOB)
Rating: A+
