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Dinner at Church and State |
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Written by Daniel Hienzsch
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Friday, 18 September 2009 |
 New food? I'm all ears!
Occasionally, you have to throw caution and healthy food to the wind (and with healthy food, preferrably downwind if possible) and embrace things that are cooked in duck fat. Take a look around you and, if only for a moment, reject the Volvic, Perrier, San Pellihoweveryouspellit bottled vitae and drink straight tap water, while everyone contributes a favored wine to the table... particularly if the corkage is only $15.
The email from Jay was as follows...
Let us know when you are available for another guys dinner outing. I need to
take you guys to a place where the pig ears are crispier than french fries, and
the flatbread is served with epoisses and poached duck tongues. Also, activate
your lipitor now....
And thus was hatched a trip to Church and State, the fourth dinner in a series that has included Fogo de Chao, Animal (The Restaurant), and a Carnitas blow out at my apartment. Church and State is a French Bistro style restaurant in one of the shittier neighborhoods in Los Angeles. The waiter did mention a certain quantities of stabbings that had occured within one or two blocks of the restaurant. I was unfamiliar with a lot of the dishes on the menu, but there was one in particular that I was really looking forward to.
 He's a Pinstripe Wizard
Once departed from the mass market tailor, it was off to the restaurant for the 8 oclock meeting time. When you get onto Alameda from Interstate 10, you know you're no longer in anything even approaching high society; it's produce warehouses and restaurant purveyors as far as the eye can see. Then you turn onto Industrial and it gets even worse. It looks like "Old Detroit" from Robocop, except for the verrrrry tail end of Industrial with it's T intersection at Matteo. That one block at the end is where Church and State is, as well as $1,000,000 lofts in the "Biscuit Company" building next to it, evidence that The Papal Line of Gentrification runs strong in this neighborhood. At one end of the block, $17 foie gras, at the other end, coyotes are letting American's newest immigrants out of beat up minivans. However, I'm not in this to make statements on social equality, I'm in this to make statements in support of good eating.
 Le Menu
Now seated, we each received a paper menu that also served as a sort of placemat, and a little plate was set on the table with what was like a cheesy puff pastry that was quite tasty. I have no idea what it's called though. We had a pretty good idea of what we wanted, but we asked the waiter for his suggestions. The waiter, a cool Persian guy from Long Island named Danny, suggested the charcuterie, the Flammkuchen [Tarte Flambee] (I'm just gonna go ahead and eject the idea of trying to maintain a semblance of accented typsetting) and the Marrow. We decided on all of those with the exception of the Charcuterie, opting for the crispy pig ears instead. The Flammkuchen was the one dish I was particularly interested in.
 Flammkuchen!
This was swiftly follwed by the crispy pig's ear. They came as little golden triangle wedges in an origami folded cloth napkin, with a little ramekin of bernaise sauce. The taste is as though someone managed to deep fry the smell of cooking bacon. For something that is obviously cooked in grease, the flavor and texture was surprisingly light. It was so good that as soon as Waiter Danny returned, I ordered up another round. Fantastic stuff. I thought about getting another Flammkuchen, but that would have been a hefty dose of cheese.
 Bread and Marrow
We each scooped some out and spread it on the crispy country bread provided, but honestly, all I tasted, was bread. This was my big experiment for the meal and it fell totally flat. From what Jay told me, this was entirely a unique screw up on the restaurants part and that the dish is usually incredibly well seasoned and very flavorful. I trust Jay, it's probably worth a second try at some point.
Next to arrive were the spare ribs. This was particularly recommended by Waiter Danny, as the process for preparing the ribs requires three days of marinading, braising, seasoning, etc. Anything taking that long is worth a try. It showed, the flavor was very round, very rich, with a nice thick sauce / glaze on it. Nicely though, it didn't overpower the flavor of the rib itself, letting it taste very... uh... beefy. It was a little odd that we got the spare ribs and Confit, as we always seem to be focused so heavily on swine. Regardless, the meat was absolutely butter soft and each of us got at least two big bites from the serving, not bad for four guys.
 Confit avec Frites
The pork chops were fantastic! Smokey, salty, thick. Fantastic flavor, cooked to absolutely perfection. And the little slices of lardon that were in the sauce... I wanted to order a plate full of just that: sauce and lardon. As we started on the pork chops, the La Crema hit the bottom of the bottle and Jay brought how his bottle of 2008 Tapiz Malbec. Definitely the heartiest wine of the three, without a doubt. Bold flavor that without having the food there, I might have found a bit tongue crushing, but man it went well with the smoked and grilled pork. Fantastic.
After the entrees, we downshifted for a bit, finishing the wine and chatting amiably about various topics, getting refills of water before finally settling on desert: pot de chocolat and crepes with raspberries and home made chocolate ice cream. The Pot of Chocolate was exactly that, a pot of something chocolatey that was... heavier than a mousse, but lighter than a pudding. Very tasty though, especially when sprinkled gently with the sea salt available on each table. The crepes were equally as astounding, and I think I noticed something that looked, for the life of me, like albino raspberries on there, that I saw and though "well, that will be unripe and sour as hell" but actually was incredibly sweet and flavorful. I have no idea what it was that I ate, but I liked it.
Editorial Update: Good friend Jimbo writes to inform me that "they were probably golden raspberries, which you can get at any good farmers market in season. Another possibility are cloudberries, but those are harder to find than a *********-free ***** at Burning Man." Providing even more background, Friend Drew writes "Cloudberries are imaginary, like fairies and Eskimos."
To finish up, I had an espresso that was possibly the worst I've ever had. Don't know what was wrong with it, but good lord it tasted burned and sour. Blech. But really, at that point it was a punctuation error in an otherwise glorious bit of gastronomic prose.
In total, I don't know what Jay and Xav paid for their wine, but my La Crema was about $20. The bill, split four ways, with tip and corkage included, came out to $60 each. So, for me, all in: $80. That's a helluvan expensive price for an everyday meal, but that's not what this was. This was the food equivalent of going to see the symphony, and $80 was the admission price for four hours of exploring new treats and getting old favorites.
Thanks to Xav, Fernando and Jay for the fantastic company and lively conversation, and to Jay specifically for his encyclopaedic knowledge of Los Angeles eating establishments, and invites that have never once disappointed!
 Pork Chops - Done
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Apologies for the quality of the photography. All I had on me was a camera phone.
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Last Updated ( Saturday, 19 September 2009 )
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