Cooking Competition

Roulad of chicken with pea puree and honey roasted walnuts-made by Aaron

Taster of Boursin cheese and peach glazed chicken-made by Adin

Peach napoleon with grapefruit sorbet and cream cheese icing- made by Adin

Flambeed cherry tatine with vanilla ice cream- made by Aaron

Saturday Night Dinner

Poached egg with candied bacon jam and bacon foam

Pan roasted pork tenderloin with carrot puree, cauliflower puree, and blanched brussles sprouts

Deconstructed smore's cake with chocolate ice cream

Afternoon snack

Shrimp and saffron risotto balls with a lemon-garlic aioli


Apple tart tatine with butterscotch and buttermilk ice cream


Goat cheese cake with honey roasted figs and pears with a granola tuile

New Years Eve Dinner

Carrot-ginger soup with a carrot salad and ginger syrup


Bitter green salad with blood orange, pistachios, and goat cheese filled dates


Prime rib roast with yorkshire pudding, farro and black rice with squash, and horseradish aioli


Different Textures of citrus: Lemon shooter, orange gelee and froth, and grapefruit granite


Chocolate truffle tart with a salted caramel ice cream

What a great New Years Eve dinner. My 8 year old brother made the textures of citrus!!! Can you believe that and 8 year old made that dish! Wow what a meal. Happy 2011!!

Q's Reastaurant

Roasted beet and arugula salad with goat cheese, almonds, and an orange drssing


Grilled asparagus with crisp polenta, mushroom vinaigrette, gorganzola and proscuitto


Crab crepe with fennel, leek, celery, orange and saffron


Pan roasted albacore with fedelini pasta and "scampi" broth


Gold potato gnocchi with butternut squash, mushrooms, sage, sun-dried tomato and a Parmesan emulsion


Smoked long's farm pork loin with caramelized apples, sweet potatoes, onions and red chili honey


Lemon brulee tart with blueberry-ginger sorbet and speckled lemon syrup


Chocolate mousse napoleon with banana ice cream, nutella sauce, and caramelized bananas


Fourless chocolate cake with grand marnier glaze, orange sorbet, and candied orange

Q's is a restaurant in The Hotel Boulderado. In Boulder we are having the First bite of Boulder, which is an event where a lot of the really fine restaurants in Boulder let you have a three-course meal for 23 dollars. I jumped to this opportunity and took my family. We started the meal with a Beet and arugula salad. In my opinion the salad did not have enough beets in it. There were enough beets for five perfect bites. The sweetness of the beets was cut beautifully by the pepperiness of the arugula and the goat cheese added a great creamy and rich element to the dish, which made it shine. The almonds added a great punch of texture and the orange dressing was a great hint acidity. Next was the grilled asparagus with crisp polenta. This dish was really good. Asparagus has this great funky flavor and melded very well with the earthy mushrooms and pungent cheese. Adding the hint of salty pork to the dish elevated it to a whole new level. And the polenta was piping hot, crisp on the outside, creamy on the inside fantastic. Next was the crab crepe with orange. The paper-thin crepe was over flowing with delicious meaty crab and had a ton of flavor. My one criticism is that it was a little too sweet. I mean crab, fennel, orange those are all things that are very sweet and leeks do not have an oniony enough flavor to counter the sweetness. Our next offering was a pan-roasted albacore with a "scampi" broth. This dish was very nice. The fish was perfectly cooked and was on a bed of homemade fedelini pasta. The pasta was fabulous it just melted in your mouth. But for me the broth and the capers and the tomatoes made the dish a little to acidic. Next was the gold potato gnocchi. The dish was warming and would be fantastic on a cold winter day sitting by a fire. The smoked pork loin was fantastic. It was like a fine dinning BBQ sandwich. One thing I would have done different was not having the sweet potatoes and onions. Just the pork, apples and honey would have done it for me. Now into dessert we started with a lemon brulee tart. The tarts crust was very flaky and extremely tender. The lemon curd was silky a delicious and the crust of burnt sugar on top was great. The sorbet was good but did not have enough ginger flavors. Next was the chocolate mousse napoleon. The chocolate mousse was creamy and wonderful and was in between two crisp layers of phyllo. The ice cream was very nice and had great banana flavor but it could have used a little cinnamon or cardamom to give it a nice twist. The final offering was a flourless chocolate cake. I love the paring of orange and chocolate and grand marnier is always a good thing. The cake was surprisingly light but the glaze on the plate was solidified and not coming off the plate. Over all it was a great meal.

L'Atelier [2]

Tuna tartare with orange and crispy potato "leafs"


Lobster ravioli


Salami carpaccio with capers and baby greens


Mussels in a lobster-tomato fumet


Living bibb and mozzarella salad with a balsamic reduction


Intermezzo: Mango sorbet


Pan-roasted snapper with caramelized onions, fingerling potato coins, and artichoke-picholine olive "barigoule"


Roasted lamb chops with chickpea fritter, caramelized onions, roasted red peppers and lamb jus


Opera cake: Joconde layers with chocolate ganache and coffee buttercream


Cheese plate: Fourme d'Ambert and Quadrello di Bufala with candied walnuts, blackberries, aged balsamic, chestnut honey and toast points

Hey L'Atelier, It's me again and I'm ready for some food. Give me the tasting menu. How would I like my lamb, medium rare please. After my last experiance at L'Atelier, I wanted more. After cooking a large dinner for 20 people I decided it was time to give myself a treat, and what better way than to go to L'Atelier. I sat down and began to look over the menu, lets see, Ribeye, foie gras, veal, hey a tasting menu, lets do that. The first item of this extraordinary meal was an all time french classic, tuna tartare. Chef Radek took tuna tartare to whole new level. The tarter itself was laced with capers and onions and herbs. Then on the plate there was the orange, daikon, herb oil, curry oil, diced jalapeno the crispy potato. There were so many little things going on but they all complemented each other, they worked in perfect harmony. The buttery tuna, the sweet orange and the crispy potato all were a perfect contrast in flavors and textures that created one perfect bite. Our next item was a lobster ravioli. Now this lobster ravioli was nothing like the one I had at my last visit to L'Atelier, this one was in a light, acidic sauce and was much better. The acidity from the sauce was perfect with the rich, sweet, meaty lobster and carrots that were stuffed into the paper-thin pasta shell. Next we enjoyed a fantastic carpaccio of salami. I love charcuterie and salumi so this was great. The salami was very fatty and salty and was great with the earthy sprouts. The perfect was to get some salami some sprouts and some of the tomato garnish all on a toast point, amazing. Next was mussels in a lobster-tomato fumet. the mussels themselves were perfectly cooked but the really good part was sopping up all that sauce with lots of bread. Next was a fantastic salad of bibb lettuce and mozzarella cheese. There were three main parts to this dish:
1. the lettuce
2. the cheese
3. the tomato garnish
Seems pretty simple but it was amazing. The vegetables were so fresh you could taste the life in them. The cheese was house made and was the best cheese I have ever had in my life. Mozzarella normally does not have a lot of flavor but this one did. It was very tender and salty, ugh it was so good. The lettuce was dressed with a champagne vinaigrette and the whole thing was drizzled with some reduced balsamic. Next was the intermezzo, a small palate cleanser of mango sorbet. I also had lychee sorbet but it had melted by the time I got around to taking the picture. Now time for the main courses. The first one was snapper. A beautiful bowl was presented to me with a lovly piece of fish over some great looking vegetables. The fish was perfectly cooked. It was very moist and tender and the top was very crisp. The vegetables on the bottom were amazing as well. They were prepared in the style of a barigoule. A traditional barigoule is cooked with white whine, but Chef Radek cooks it with a light tomato broth. Every vegetable was cooked perfectly and the olives added a great blast of sourness. Next was the lamb, lamb chops to be exact. The lamb was beautifully cooked. I asked for it medium rare and they gave me medium rare. It was served with a chickpea fritter and a lamb jus. The chickpea fritter was very good. It was as if dahl and hummus hooked up in a deep fryer and had a baby. The jus was meaty and rich and pared well with the other components. Now its time for dessert, but not just any dessert, and opera cake. The cake was moist and rich but was light at the same time. The cake was joconde, joconde is a french almond sponge cake. The almond added a punch of earthiness to a very rich cake. The chocolate ganache gave the richness and the coffee buttercream rounded every thing out. On the plate there were swirls of creme anglaise and strawberry coulis. Just a side not: I could drink an entire bottle of that coulis it is so good. Next was the cheese. I am sorry I did not get a very good picture of the cheese. It was hard to edit properly. The photo may be bad but the cheese was not. The cheese was great. Every little accompaniment on the plate worked great with the different cheeses. Thank you again L'Atelier for on of the best meals of my life!!!

Breakfast

Pan-seared trout with gnocchi and a poached egg