BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION

CELEBRATION – JARDINIERE, SAN FRANCISCO

 Because we are bad parents, we were not around when it was Sarah’s birthday at the end of last month.  In an effort to atone, we took her out to dinner last night at Jardiniere in San Francisco. 

Jardiniere, San Francisco

The Jardiniere is an upscale restaurant located near Davies Symphony Hall.  Downstairs is some seating and a circular bar.  The balcony seating overlooks the bar area.  It is nicely furnished and has an intimate feel.

Here are the selections we chose last night:

Sarah had duck confit on top of a salad of marinated le puy lentils and heirloom oranges as a first course. This was followed by a loin of cervena venison with black trumpet mushrooms and a sauce au poivre with glazed baby spring vegetables, smoked bacon and creamed nettles.  I can only tell you that Sarah was way too stuffed for dessert.  She made me promise not to review her meal since she is doing a review at Braisin’ Hussy (entry date 4/10/06.)

John started with the braised Colorado lamb and shelling bean soup with Swiss chard and basil.  He said it was very good with the lamb not dried out at all.  He followed this dish with red wine braised beef shortribs with horseradish potato purée and herb salad.  I had this main course as well.  The shortribs were cooked perfectly.  They were moist and  meltingly delicious.  I thought the portion was way, way too big but John managed to finish his and mine too.  Our biggest complaint was that the potato puree melted into the sauce.  The potatoes were just too thin to stand up to the red wine sauce.  They acted more as a sauce thickener.  I was really looking forward to the horseradish mashed potato portion of this dish and I think the whole thing could have been improved by having rustic mashed potatoes instead of puree, more of the potatoes and lessof the shortribs.

My first course was Maine diver scallops with sautéed mushrooms,smoked bacon, Italian parsley and toasted almonds.  You know if you’ve read any of my reviews that getting the scallops right is a big thing we me.  No overcooking!  These were cooked perfectly.  Yum!  But the rest of the dish was really salty.  I like things well seasoned so I would imagine that this amount of salt would be way over the top for most people.

Rating - 

Sarah – B+

Mary –  B+  

John – A-