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Image 1: www.shoshaunhergatt.com Chef: Shaun Hergatt
Tasting Menu (8-course): $125
Open for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Saturday dinner only. Closed on Sunday and Monday.
Image 2: Located on the 2nd level of The Setai, a short walk from Wall Street, this stylist restaurant is home to the Australian Chef Shaun Hergatt.
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Bar area at the entrance
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Lounge area
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Passing through walls of wine...
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...and into the dining room.
Image 7: They welcomed us with beautiful canapés: Rabe panna cotta; goat cheese sandwich; salmon on a crunchy potato ball topped with caviar and dill; and blue cheese puff!
Image 8: Next the amuse bouche of white asparagus velouté containing smoke Sturgeon and trout roe. Hmmm, it was extremely salty that we had trouble finishing it!
Image 9: Then, a healthy salad to start off the meal. Fresh green asparagus and white asparagus accompanied by a unique white asparagus ice cream enclosed in a heart of palm. Fresh, very fresh, even the ice cream! This course was all about freshness!
Image 10: A creamy quenelle of Hudson Valley foie gras resting on a strip of poached rhubarb. Definitely not my favorite foie gras as it had too strong an offal flavour!
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Excellent warm pistachio brioche to go with the foie gras though.
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A tall cute seashell bowl!
Image 13: It was a slow poached hen's egg with Santa Barbara Sea Urchin foam. Aromatic, but again, extremely salty!
Image 14: Sitting on a thin layer of poached celery were filets of Japanese Escolar served with Thai basil froth and decorated with two strips of basil seeds on the side. It had a light smokiness carrying throughout the dish.
Image 15: Maine lobster with saffron sauce and ginger cream garnished with a crispy baby fennel. Superb combination of stimulating flavours from saffron and ginger, just enough strength to complement the meaty lobster. Great course!
Image 16: Pan fried halibut with a carefully arranged layer of zucchini with zucchini tempura.
Image 17: As for our main course, Colorado lamb loin with riberry juice on the right, a deep-fried sweetbread on top, and a sous-vide lamb belly. Riberry is an Australian fruit similar to cranberry. It's nice to see Chef Hergatt incorporates ingredients from his home.
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Mashed potato accompanied the lamb but we were quite full already.
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A quick break before the dessert. Love this wall of wines!
Image 20: A strawberry pre-dessert: layers consisting of strawberry purée, strawberry cream, strawberry ice, and fresh strawberry.
Image 21: Le Disque as our main dessert. A warm melting Araguani chocolate cake and apricot coulis topped by a thyme ice cream with a curl garnish. This 72% Venezuela Valrhona chocolate was powerful; and the refreshing thyme and the fruity apricot did a nice job of cutting through the richness. Excellent dessert!
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Finally, the petits-fours trolly.
Image 23: And more hidden treats!
Image 25: Too bad that we only had room to try two truffles: Coconut cream and Sea salt caramel.
Image 26: We also tried various macarons of unusual flavours: coffee-hazulnut, chocolate-orange, yuzu-raspberry, and coconut-lime!
Image 27: Good location, elegant dining room, faultless service, reasonable price. Slightly disappointed at the first course, but we were very satisfied with the rest of the meal.
