ML - Michigan Avenue

2012 - Issue 4 - Summer

Michigan Avenue - Niche Media - Michigan Avenue magazine is a luxury lifestyle magazine centered around Chicago’s finest people, events, fashion, health & beauty, fine dining & more!

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so many dinners (so little time...) The wine "cellar" is in full view as guests enter the restaurant. Roasted Maine lobster with asparagus and gratin of ziti at Sixteen is as pleasing to the eye as it is to the palate. CHEF'S TASTING MENU AMUSE BOUCHE APPLE YUZU FOAM WITH RADISH SALAD SANGRIA POACHED FOIE GRAS WHITE ASPARAGUS PANNA COTTA, ALMOND BRIOCHE AND CITRON EMULSION MINTED ENGLISH PEA SOUP SWEET ONION FOAM WITH FOUR STORY HILLS FARM RABBIT CONFIT friends and foes FILET OF DOVER SOLE WARM CARROT AND GINGER NAGE WITH OSETRA CAVIAR, PRESERVED LEMON AND PETITE SPRING VEGETABLES OR SPRING LAMB MÉLANGE OF SPRING ONIONS, FAVA BEANS, FIDDLEHEAD FERNS AND FRESH GREEN ALMONDS WITH A CORIANDER LEMON CLOUD FRESH CORIANDER SCENTED LOIN OF LA SURENA TARRAGON ROASTED BEETS, PISTACHIO SABLÉ ALMOND CAKE LEMON BERRY CHANTILLY, CHOCOLATE GANACHE GIANDUJA CHOCOLATE CREMEUX NUTELLA POWDER PEANUT BUTTER FEUILLETINE CRUNCH COCOA NIB ICE CREAM Thomas Lents PETIT FOURS COFFEE OR TEA TASTING MENU - ONE HUNDRED FIFTEEN SOMMELIER WINE SELECTION - FIFTY FIVE EXECUTIVE CHEF THOMAS LENTS APRIL 2012 continued from page 80 entered the kitchen in the famed glistening tower and started making changes—and upping the ante. While many Chicago res- taurants in the last few years have shied away from expensive tasting menus and white tablecloths, Sixteen is heading in the opposite direction. With a nod to detail and attention to ser- vice, Sixteen, along with Lents's new menu featuring gorgeous dishes including a crudo of diver scallop accompanied by osetra caviar and roasted Maine lobster with green and white asparagus and gratin of ziti with truffle sabayon and a light asparagus jus is not only making it acceptable to eat for- mally again, it's inviting you to the table. With this notion of a new version of a mod- ern restaurant, Lents suggests it's about the attention to detail, a sense of warmth and comfort, and a focus on the best possible ingredients you can source that deem the term "fine dining" somewhat meaningless. "There needs to be a great restau- rant that is different that brings out more of the ingredient-driven elements," Lents said. "It won't happen overnight. It is a journey. It's a progression, like any dining experience. You go in and work every day to change something to make it better. You wake up in two years, and a lot of things are better." Fortunately for Lents, early reviews point to strong improvements already. MA 82 michiganavemag.com For dinner, Sixteen offers a tasting menu, as well as à la carte options. Lents moved to Chicago from Las Vegas, where he was the chef de cuisine at Joël Robuchon at the MGM Grand. He isn't the only Chicago chef to work at that property. In fact, Lents worked alongside some top players in this city's culinary scene: Anthony Martin, executive chef at Tru; Matthew Kirkley, executive chef at L20; and Ryan LaRoche, executive chef at NoMI Kitchen. So does Lents feel extra pressure as the new guy in town? "I look at those guys and know they're in town and know what they expect, and it drives me to make my restaurant better," Lents said. "We're all driven internally as well, but knowing they're out there makes it that much more fun." members only Lents belongs to an elite club of chefs in the country who are able to get certain products, like foie gras from Rouge, one of the largest and most respected foie producers in France, which also has a farm in Quebec. Where most US foie gras producers cold-eviscerate the foie, Rouge has a process of hot evisceration of the liver just after the duck is slaughtered for only 1 percent of its product. Of that, 5 percent is considered premium and reserved for the best restaurants like Daniel and Joël Robuchon, and, of course, Sixteen. photography by katrina wittkamp

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