A trip to Watershed

It has been a long time since we went to Watershed. Since before the kitchen changed hands -- we actually were in Watershed the night we learned that it would be changing hands. We thought it needed some time to work out the kinks and get used to a new chef. And we were glad we did.

We showed up without a reservation on a weekend night. We hung out at the bar for probably 10 minutes and then were shown to our table. Most of the place was full so we probably just lucked out.

To start, we went with the crispy pork belly which were luscious braised pork belly cut into soldiers and crisped up. Then add a dijon mustard/sorghum syrup, top with creamy coleslaw and place in butter lettuce leaves. Devour. Eat more. Wish you had more. These were so good. They ended up being the best thing we had all night.

We also got the Sapelo Island clams because well, I like clams. They were good with a delicious broth (white wine, garlic, leeks, bacon) that we dunked the crusty bread into. I have said this before: I don't know why they put big pieces of bacon into everything. I thought there was a bit too much smoky bacon.

For mains, we split two. One was the special, a deconstructed jambalaya. Stared with a delicious crawfish creole, top with pieces of individually prepared seafood like shrimp, fried oysters, grilled andouille sausage. This was a good dish and a great way to showcase the seafood. My only complaint? The oysters weren't seasoned before they were fried, but dab em with the creole and they were great.

The other main was the seared sea scallops. They come cornmeal crusted with pork belly, a sunchoke puree, and a black garlic jus. This was a very solid dish. I was also surprised that eating the dinosaur kale with the black garlic jus tasted just like gai lan with oyster sauce. That part was surreal.

For dessert, we tried the coconut cake and the chocolate terrine. The former was weird. I wasn't too thrilled about the texture. The latter was good, but the espresso terrine at Empire State South is better. We also tried to two dessert wines, a Kracher beernauslese (delicious as always) and an Australian tokajy which was pretty gross. Always stick with Hungardian Tokaji!