What a place. What a chef, what a vision.
The execution is all flawless, a cool room lit by minimalist lighting, music from a turntable where they only play real vinyl from the chef's complete collection. So cool, too cool, a genuine manifestation of a personality, a peek into a soul.
The menu puts it all out there, and it's a most fascinating read. Each list of ingredients sounds exciting, and despite the detailed descriptions, I can’t really guess what the end result will be.
Food is in the form of share-plates, and service is quite sensitive, as they pace your pickings to keep them from clashing.
We start with the Tuna Tartare, which is salted and sweetened and tanged by tomato dashi. A surround-sound chili oil punctuates those flavors, working in tandem with a playfully punchy pickled puntarelle.
Have you ever seen a Kanpachi more comely? Coffee oil and passionfruit come together for a most fragrant flavor, with notes of citrus and earth.
Proteins preceded the Sugar Snap Peas, wok char clinging to mala, balanced by a creamy peanut miso. It's a sauce so spectacular they could sell it in a jar and I would drink it.
Take more green bites between small Scotch Olives, these little flavor-bombs but umami anchovy and spicy lamb merguez, made for scooping up some thick, sour yogurt.
Maitake Mushrooms and Conehead Cabbage are meh in the middle, the seasoning too heavy on both.
Something about the cabbage doesn't hit - the sauce feels far too heavy, the pecorino a bit too weighty.
The chimichurri felt too loud for the more delicate mushrooms, and despite loving the buckwheat crunch, the mushroom just felt lost.
Roe, roe, roe your boat, the Lasagne comes bejeweled, as the dots of glimmer like the finest bijoux. Leeks are sweet, and the broccolini adds the earth. The balance is beautiful, and the roe with its rich flavors filling up the cream sauce makes this the single most memorable thing I've eaten in years. The chef gives me a casual shrug and tells me it's just lasagna with a Scandinavian spin, but I can't imagine what fever dream led to something so sophisticated and so original.
Even the Caesar salad has its own unique spin, sharply bitter bunches of little gems drizzled with nuts and cheese and nutty cheese.
Note: I got this one to go for the hubby - the plating is in a take-home box.
Our last main dish is crispy Beelers Pork Belly, cooked to perfection, with melt-in-your-mouth fat and a "green curry stuff" that supplants all the other stuff. It's not the most creative, just a meat and sauce but it is a most delightful nosh.
Desert is almost a digestif, so light is the strawberry goo. It surrounds the savory Semifreddo like a bubbly-wrap of sweet and tart.
Before I came to Darkroom, I was losing faith in fine dining. After yet another lackluster experience at a lauded LA hotspot, I was starting to lose faith in food. I so often found menus lacking in creativity, palatability, or both, and it seemed that the good stuff was not so creative and those who were creative forgot how to make it taste good.
But this single visit to Darkroom changed my mind. They treat every person like they matter and deliver a passionate, masterful menu that made me excited to eat for the first time in months. It seems this one dark place pulled me out of another, and I'm already making plans to return for another round.
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