Susur Lee's Lee Restaurant had an opening for three around 6pm, perfect timing for our needs. I was giddy with excitement.
This is the "back" room of the restaurant, where the front part is the lounge, and I didn't get a shot when we got there and later it was too dark. We were seated in the far corner next to the window, which ended up being pretty nice because the restaurant filled up around us and we didn't feel crowded.
Here is what their bar looks like lit up at night. It's pretty stunning.
I like the pure Chinese touch of the menu, even if I can't read any of it.
The special drink of the night was the burnt orange manhattan. Of course, I had to get it. It was made with a list of ingredients longer than should be in a manhattan, and it was a tad sweet, but it was very smooth. The anchor was knob creek bourbon.
One of my co-workers needed to get on a call so while we were waiting on him to determine what we were going to order, we got these edamame to start. The menu labels them as being served with a mustard sea salt. They were pretty tasty.
This is the Mexican goat cheese tart: handmade puff pastry, black olive, tomato, red pepper, eggplant, jalapeno, tomatillo. My boss loves goat cheese -- and anything with it in it -- so how could we not get this goat cheese tart? It was definitely different, but good.
This is what my slice of the tart looked like. It's not a great picture, but you can kind of see how it was layered together.
This is the Singaporean-style slaw. They do a serious selling job on this slaw/salad. Our initial server commented on it and then when we were ordering, our server (the one who took over) also commented on it. Apparently, 98% of their guests order this salad and it has been on the menu for over 10 years.
You can also order it with salmon or tuna sashimi. I bet that would be awesome. But I was there with kind of boring-eating co-workers, so I didn't even suggest it.
We didn't plan to get it, but with all the selling... eventually, I just thought, now when am I really going to come back to try it? So we got it.
This picture doesn't capture the height of the presentation. it comes probably eight inches off the plate and as they mix it to serve, they talk about the 19 ingredients, including crispy fried taro strips, pickled things, and edible flowers. The only other thing I remember is the dressing is ume-based so it's at once sweet and sour.
They mix it at the table so that it retains its crispness and also probably so they can be sure that people don't eat just the top and then say it sucks. I have to admit, this was a pretty rockin' slaw. The balance was great and it was a great counterpoint to some of the heavier things we had for dinner.
This is the Shanghai shrimp & scallop stir-fry noodles: spicy xo sauce, summer vegetables. This was a pretty impressive dish. The taste was familiar, as one might expect. Using udon was pretty surprising to me since it can get mushy and it tends to soak up everything so dishes with them that are not broth-based often end up being dry.
But in this dish, the noodles were delicious with just a touch of bite and the seafood was cooked beautifully. Despite all those chiles on top, this wasn't a spicy dish.
This was my serving, so you can see what it all looked like together. The scallops were halved through the core (maybe even thirded) and they were perfectly cooked.
This was the caramelized black cod: Cantonese preserves, miso mustard, dim sum turnip cake. This was one of my choices, and probably the one that I was the most disappointed with. Overall, it was okay, but the flavors don't stand out in my memory.
The lau bahk gau underneath was too mushy and I thought the taste was a little weird.
Anyway, here was my serving.
Our last dish was the Peking and char siu duck: Beijing duck garnish, steamed pancake, foie gras pate. This was also one of my selections, and one that I was pretty excited about. As it turns out, no one really ate it, whether it was because they didn't like it or they were full, so I ate nearly all of it.
From the top tray, first there were steamed pancakes, then a hoisin/soy sauce, and then crispy fried tofu skin that added a nice crunch.
From the lower tray, there was both duck confit and sliced duck breast. Then pickled beets (that I eventually found to be too vinegary), scallions and cucumbers, a mango chutney, and foie gras.
The idea was to take an unfold a pancake, then smear on some of the foie gras, then pile in all the stuff. I ate probably six to eight of these. They were really damn good.
I have to admit though, that even for a foie lover like me, that the foie was a bit excessive. This dish would have been stellar even without it.
So did I enjoy my dinner? I sure did. It was awesome. I do wish I could go back to try new things. And one of our co-workers doesn't eat pork so that somewhat limited what I thought we should order.
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