We had another excellent dinner at Laurel & Sage Saturday night. They are located in the spot where Top Chef contestant Ariane Duarte used to have her award winning restaurant called CulinAriane, and are a very worthy successor. Chef Shawn is the owner, & his lovely wife Jenny works the front of the house. The restaurant is named after their two adorable daughters.
They started us off with a refreshing Amuse Bouche of carrot ginger soup, and their amazing poblano pepper and swiss popovers with lavender honey butter.
We shared a very nice special appetizer of crispy pan seared quail medallions, with Russian potato salad, that contained beets (for the pink coloring), and apple (for crunchiness), and had a quail egg on top. There was also some very flavorful steamed spinach & greens. It was in a delicious whole grain mustard jus & brown butter.
For entrees, Mrs. P had the outstanding pan seared jumbo black sea bass fillet, over baby bok choy, & forbidden black rice, in a green curry coconut sauce. This was a new addition to the menu & is definitely a keeper!
I had a special of Venison flank steak, grilled medium rare, with grainy mustard jus, celery root, potatoes au gratin, watercress, in a foie gras demi glace.
This can be a very expensive restaurant (with some entrees as high as $48.00!), and can get quite noisy when it is packed (we dine at 5, so we don’t have that issue), but Chef Shawn is very talented and creative. He creates a lot of dishes that you normally don’t see at any other restaurant in NJ. His sauces are very light and not overpowering. This is definitely worth the trip up North. It is also located in a quiet neighborhood with plenty of street parking. It is away from the noisy main stretch of Bloomfield Avenue in Montclair.
Thanks Johnny. No, I haven’t tried Axis deer.
After having the quail, I decided to order some at D’artagnan while they still had their freezer sale. I ordered the semi boneless quail and the French jumbo quail. Mrs. P has never made quail before, but I’m sure she will figure it out, after looking at a few recipes😉
We had our first soft shell crab of the season at Laurel & Sage Chef Shawn does an excellent presentation of very lightly battered crab with hot tamale, corn mango salsa, and corn pudding. It is very light & crispy.
Quail with fresh green salad, quail eggs, & a nice vinaigrette dressing.
I had an excellent new addition to the menu of Duck pad Thai, with tamarind, tofu, peanuts, & rice noodles. I had Chef Shawn make it extra spicy with Sriracha & red pepper flakes. It contained a whole duck breast. You can add on the duck or shrimp for an additional $4.00. It was well worth it. It had a really nice kick to it.
We had another outstanding dinner at Laurel and Sage.
We started off with the very refreshing local roasted baby beet salad (with at least 4 different types of beets), local greens, goat cheese, spiced pecans, smoky candied bacon, in a banyuls vinaigrette. We finally had this salad even though it’s been on the menu for over 3 years. I didn’t realize there were so many different types of beets. There was even a rainbow colored one.
We also tried a new preparation of the quail (with shaved foie gras, quail eggs, and endive, in a mustard jus.
This time for an entree I had the pad Thai with shrimp. Last month I had it with duck. It was just as good. I had Chef Shawn make it extra spicy.
We had another outstanding dinner at Laurel & Sage.
I had the most amazing squid ink linguine with scallops, lobster, shrimp, tomato concasse, turmeric, bouillabaisse. I could take a bath in that sauce😋
We also had a couple of excellent appetizers; mini portion of black kale & sprouts salad with pancetta, pepitas, medjool dates, ricotta salata, grapefruit, with a pomegranate vinaigrette. We also shared a crispy warm perail papillon wheel with lingonberry jam,soft toasted roll, almonds, cucumber-dill salad. y
We had another fantastic dinner at Laurel & Sage Saturday night. Besides the usual dishes we shared a charred pear salad with soft sheeps cheese, hazelnuts, gougers, and champagne vinaigrette.
For an entree I had crispy stuffed Airline chicken breast with chicken sage sausage, mushroom faro pilaf, whole grain mustard, and natural jus.
We had another fabulous dinner at Laurel & Sage Saturday night.
We started off with some awesome foie gras dumplings with a foie gras demi glace, and topped with acidic relish.
For entrees I had the venison flank steak with celery root potato gratin, and sautéed field greens.
Mrs. P had ginger soy lacquered chilean sea bass with hon shimeji ceviche, lobster dumplings, in a kombu mushroom consommé.
Yet another excellent dinner at Laurel and Sage.
We started off with a crispy blackened swordfish maki roll with papaya, jalapeno, with a trio of dipping sauces.
We also tried a new appetizer of grilled calamari and pancetta with white beans, and a gemolata drizzle.
For an entree I had an awesome special of double cut pork chop with grilled pineapple, asparagus, Brussels sprouts, crispy bacon, potatoes, in a pineapple dijon glacé. This had cj’s name on it Mrs. P had the awesome squid ink linguine with seafood (pictures are in previous posts). Everything went very well with Domaine De L’Harmas Chateauneuf Du Pape.
Another great looking dish! That pork chop is definitely speaking my language!
I’ve never seen a swordfish roll. I love swordfish too…one of my top fish species. I wonder why more people don’t do this…maybe the price. Swords aren’t cheap now
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Mrs. P had the awesome squid ink linguine with seafood (pictures are in previous posts). Everything went very well with Domaine De L’Harmas Chateauneuf Du Pape.
