Foodie on Duty Eats a Real Meal

The last time I wrote about Restaurant Week, I was eating in Brooklyn. But this week, when that loving moniker reappeared, it had switched its location to Manhattan. Nevertheless, my appetite was whet, so a coworker of mine placed a call and set up reservations at Maze, Gordon Ramsey’s restaurant at The London Hotel.

What I like about Restaurant Week is that the diner usually gets treated to an extraordinary meal at an affordable price. For $27, restaurant goers get their choice of 3 courses – which is a steal for a celebrity chef-owned restaurant. Reservations, as it turned out, were high in demand, for there was an $85 penalty fee for each person who didn’t show up. I had thought that Williamsburg’s Zenkichi was pretty serious stuff, but Maze turned out to be on a whole other level.

Located in Midtown West, Maze is not exactly the type of restaurant you would want to enter wearing a heavy Northside backpack and a pair of beat up sneakers – which is why I should have thought twice before lugging my Brooklyn attire through the front door. Small embarrassments aside, I was able to appreciate the clean modern lines and airy, sunny ambiance provided by the restaurant space. Our tables were topped with silver vessels filled with lightly salted, crackly bread, lubricated with fresh butter.

For my first course, I ordered the seared yellow fin tuna. The raw, red tuna had been seared, sliced into thick rectangles and served over a bed of crisp watermelon niblets and Thai basil seeds. It was lightly dressed in a toasted sesame vinaigrette flavored with the thinnest shreds of basil. It tasted as beautifully fresh and delicate as it looked upon its plate.

For the next course, I got two small fillets of branzino that were laid over olive and tomato sofrito. The searing had created a crisp crust while the inner white flesh was relatively moist. It was just a smidge overcooked on the edges, but was a very good example of a properly cooked fillet of fish. On the side were a couple pieces of broccoflower bathed in oily pan drippings that tasted a bit like Cheez-its. The toasty cheese drippings were so delicious I kept dipping my bread into them so that I could taste every last drop. Overall, the main entrée was well-balanced—it wasn’t too heavy or too light.

My coworker had opted for a plate of pea-green risotto flavored with green onion. It was pretty heavy on the cream and cheese, which gave it a fatty flavor. We both agreed that it was delicious, but we also agreed that it was way too rich to serve as an actual entrée. Perhaps it would have been better suited as an appetizer. After the first few bites, it was as though we were eating a rice-y cheese sauce. It was much too rich to eat on its own.

For dessert, I got the Valrhona chocolate soufflé. Outside was a puffed up, delicate crust lightly powdered in confectioner’s sugar. On the inside was molten chocolate and a thick, drippy, butterscotch-flavored caramel sauce. On the side, I was served a small, perfect ball of salted almond ice cream. The salted, toasted flavors of almonds ensured that the soufflé and its sweet, saucy innards never became tooth-achingly sweet.

All in all, I was pretty impressed with the food at Maze and would probably be tempted to return for an extra fancy lunch, were there a extra fancy occasion to celebrate. Next time, however, I’ll be sure to leave the sneakers at home.