Perhaps the most important drink order of my life

“A martini rouge with an orange twist, please.”

Red vermouth on the rocks. Simple, sweet, French– a quenching apéritif to whet my palate before an extraordinary meal at Le Bernardin. 

No ID requested, which meant no awkward moment of dumb smiling while waiting for a brief judgment call on your honesty.   The service at Le Bernardin is so sharp, if asked, they would probably have guessed (correctly) that I was exactly 21 years and two months old on that very day.  From the drinks to the food to the service, Le Bernardin is a perfected and beyond refined establishment.

Besides its globally renowned culinary excellence, I chose to spend my 21^st birthday meal at LB because I have a serious foodie crush on chef Eric Ripert.  Tall and tan with glowing and perfectly groomed silver hair– if his looks don’t grab you, surely his thick and remarkably romantic French accent will.  So when my drink order arrived it was no wonder that in accompaniment to the martini rouge, tears of climactic foodie joy came spilling out of my eyes when I was handed that night’s menu with Eric’s own signature and a personal birthday note to moi!  The Mick Jagger of the culinary arts had touched the very menu that I was now tenaciously grasping and will later frame and hang on my kitchen wall.  I had a moment of bliss before the meal even came, but subsequently wiped away my salty tears as I had a feeling that Eric’s food would already be perfectly seasoned.

The amuse-bouche amused my bouche– lobster salad with potato crisps as thin as silk.  The creamy lobster opened the palate while the sea salty chips left it begging for something more.  I had the Marinated Hamachi Vietnamese-Style with Nuoc Mam Vinaigrette for a first course, which had the brilliant accessory of a rye bread toast.  The rye equalized the acid of the vinaigrette, making this pair the epitome of flavor marriage.  The hamachi was wrapped like a spring roll in soft, glassy rice paper.  Raw baby basil sat atop this transparent blanket that was so fresh and delicate that I fantasized surfing Kayak.com for a flight to Hanoi.

Next on this shaping-up-to-be-the-best-birthday-dinner-ever, I had the Escolar: Grilled White Tuna with Chayote and Mint Mousseline with Crispy Lotus and Shrimp Sambal Sauce.  If cashmere were a food, this is what it would be like; the tuna melted apart like two pads of warm butter when I sunk my fork’s teeth into its hearty meat.  Like every course, the sauce was hand poured by the waiter, tableside, giving each diner’s nose an indulgent hint to the olfactory glands like a movie trailer for a two-thumbs-up film. Slithering between the hunks of flaky white meat ran a peanuty sauce so tantalizing that I must quote the master poet, Jimi Hendrix to describe this “ribbon of euphoria.”  The lotus chips provided an essential salty note and snappy texture variance to the tender fish and juicy chayote slices. 

For the main event– the meal’s zenith– I gorged on the surf and turf: Escolar and Seared Kobe Beef; Sea Bean Salad and Eggplant Fries; Pesto and Red Wine Sauce.  Thick slices of the beef’s tenderloin were so tender they were almost the texture of homemade gnocchi.  Their hearty and peppery flavor matched the superiority of their texture so well that I could finally understand the reward and absurdity of a well-massaged and sake-satisfied cow.  Small cylinders of fried dollops of eggplant puree acted like a salty, buttery spread when slathered atop the beef and gentle escolar. 

Another surprise appeared at the end of the meal in the from of a tropical, birthday dessert– passion fruit pannacotta with mango sorbet, and mai oui, a slender, white birthday candle.  With a wish to one day come back to Le Bernardin and hopefully shake hands with the hunky Ripert, I blew out the flame, slipped a sliver of the milky pannacotta into my mouth, sieved a thimble-full amount of port through my teeth, and thanked god for the number 21.