Piperade Review

Piperade was excellent: one of top we've been to this year. The appetizers ("small plates") were the best; the entrees ("large plates") were more mixed (though some were quite good); the desserts were unusual and controversial. (Apologies on my lack of eloquent in the following; I've been writing a lot this week and am worded out.) Here's the low downon the appetizers: 

• Foie gras with squid. I wouldn't have believed it, but these actually worked quite well together.

• Cheese filled peppers. Really this was a very simple appetizer, but the cheese and peppers were good quality and were very complementary on taste.

• Prawns on a fancy risen pizza-like bread. Sadly, I can't describe this accurately (partially because it isn't listed on the online menu). The bread, similar to medium crust pizza bread, was quite good by itself -I tried it like that- and the indescribable sauce on the prawns was also good by itself, and everything together with the prawns worked excellently. This was my favorite.

• A selection of cheeses. Pretty decent though nothing special. Once again (like B44) the blue cheese was by far the best.

Then came entrees: 

• Braised rabbit (or was it duck?). This was the special they have on Thursdays. It tasted vaguely french and wasn't particularly good or distinctive. (Hence my short description.)

• Marinated lamb chops. Tossed with thin ribbons of onoins, this was excellent in both flavor and how well it was cooked. Even better was the meat and marrow right next to the bone, which I quietly finished by myself since it was so good I didn't want to share. :) These were also served with a very good item that seemed to a cross between a cheesy potato pancake and potatoes au gratin.

• Piperade. Despite its similarity to the name of the restaurant, this dish, which was really just eggs and ham in a tomato based soup, was not exciting at all.

• Steak. Simply put, they cooked and flavored the steak excellently.

Desserts were interesting and we had differing opinions on which we preferred. 

• Orange blossom beignets. Effectively a french (hole-less) donut. The center was supposed to be infused with an orange flavor but in reality the center was quite floury. (This isn't necessarily a bad thing.) In fact the contrast of a donut output with a very light bready inside was an unusual experiment and pretty decent. This came in second of the desserts on a few people's charts.

• Gateau with a mango sauce. A soft cake with a mild mango dipping sauce. Two of us preferred this. (Can you tell that doesn't include me? ;))

• Walnut and sheep's milk cheese gratin. Definitely an intruiging creamy and crunchy mix of milk and cheese and broken up walnuts. Two of us preferred this.

Along with dinner we had a red Basque wine. Sadly, I didn't pay enough attention at the time to what type of red it was, but it can tell you it was (and tasted like) a good quality red wine, but had nothing distinctive about it to demonstrate it was Basque in any way.

The elegant dining room was full but spacious and relatively quiet. The waiter had an accent we couldn't place.

Original Announcement

This Thursday we'll be trying Piperade, a Basque restaurant just off the embarcadero on the east side of the city, at 8:30pm.

http://www.piperade.com/

Please tell me if you are coming!

Comments from Other Attendees

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