Barbara's Birthday at the Palace Restaurant

Friday July 10

It must have been a while - since 2006, in fact - since we've been to the Palace Restaurant at the Cincinnatian Hotel, since we can't find it on the blog. But it's a place we like a lot - well-prepared food in a sophisticated atmosphere, with a good jazz trio in the background, and it gives us a chance to dress up a bit.
Our amuse-bouche was a "shooter" of cold melon soup with a droozle of some spicy red pepper oil, absorbed while we waited for our Pinot Noir to be opened (Cloudline, from the Willamette Valley, Oregon, 2006).
Then we progressed to starters: yellowfin tuna two ways (seared and tartare - the seared looked like the little beefsteaks at Cucafera), with little piles of fennel with green herb squirt and piquillo peppers with red pepper squirt, and a teeny hard boiled quail egg; and the other was beef tenderloin tartare like a disc of well-seasoned hash, with a sunny side up quail egg and crispy capers on top, brioche "soldiers" to dip the eggyolk in, and sriracha aioli alongside.
Our first main was crispy-crusted roasted barramundi (just like Australia!) with tasty poached celery, sunchokes, and red pearl onions, on a beautiful marbled puddle of sauce soubise and black truffle vinaigrette; and incidentally, some slivers of truffle on top. And the second was a trio of pork, namely three thick little slices of hazelnut crusted tenderloin, a caul-fat-wrapped package of tender, savory slow roasted shoulder, and a slice of braised applewood smoked pork belly with garbanzo bean purée, frissée, and bacon jus.
Since it was a birthday, we HAD to have dessert. One was a pistachio financier: a toasted slice of cake filled with warm crème brulée, topped with sweet and sour cherries and morello cherry sorbet. And of course, Barbara had to have something lemon, namely a disassembled "meringue parfait" - a thin line of citrus “biscuit” with a line of lemon cream and then thin shards of meringue on top, spotted with dots of lemon curd and a ball of perfect lemon sorbet on the side. And at the end, a nice platter of little sweets: a wodge of candied quince jam, a tiny "oreo," a peanut butter cup truffle, and a couple of delicious chocolates.