We had the pleasure of attending Taste This at Alumni Hall yesterday evening. Most of Charlottesville’s finest restaurants showed up to strut their stuff, serve small dishes and give us a really good opportunity to choose some of the best food in the area. While cooking under Alumni Hall conditions meant limited kitchens, eating while standing and, overall, madness; the event was nonetheless a success. We pick our favorite dishes from the event and have a slideshow (it’s all after the break).
The only thing I’d wish I’d known was that Taste This was a dress up affair. I came in board shorts and a T-Shirt and was way under dressed. It’s cool though because I had a camera and everyone was scared of me.
Here are the restaurants that participated: Gearharts Chocolate, OXO Restaurant, Blue Light Grill, Maya, TEN, Kroger, West Main, Market Street Wineshop, The Ivy Inn, Wild Greens, Hamilton’s, Fossett’s at Keswick Hall, Zydeco, Downtown Grill, The Clifton Inn, Shebeen Pub, The Virginian • Brix Marketplace, Cassis, Sticks Kebob Shop, Bonefish Grill, Palladio, and Three.
We did not find all of them, but everything we had was tasty. Conferring with our ad hoc panel of food experts, here are our top dish choices from the event in no particular order:
Keswick’s Truffled Cream Crab Cakes - Keswick had meaty crab cakes topped with mushrooms and a sweet truffled soup/cream sauce. It was delicious. I love truffles. So did everyone else.
Cassis’ Fried Oysters - How can you go wrong with fried oysters? I like the heavy amount of fry on these oysters because it seals in the juice.
Bonefish Grill’s Tuna - The Peppered, Seared, Raw Tuna was so fatty and amazing; melting in your mouth helped too. The sauce had too much mayo, but you could wipe it off and enjoy really good fish.
Clifton Inn’s Lobster Pancake - Clifton’s Butter Sauteed Lobster Paired with Sweet Pancakes was so delicious. They were well hidden, but my opinion is this dish topped the pack. We don’t have a good picture, but you can see the hand in the background searing the lobster bits.
Palladio’s Rasberry Truffle - Chocolate shell, whipped cream and raspberry. These little boats exploded in your mouth. The textures were well matched and not overly sweet.
Did you go? What were your favorites?
Here is our slideshow:
Popularity: 62% [?]
Tagged as: awesome, Charlottesville, dining, eat, event, fancy, Food, meal, Non-Profit, taste this
picture of the dog “driving” the car at the end is priceless. Is he a cvillain too?
Alright, someone has to do it.
The tartare at Cassis was very salty and had too many capers. The truffled cream crab cakes from Keswick were my personal favorite.
I’d like to point out that the Keswick dish was incredible. The crabcake was placed in a tomato-truffle bisque (the chef said he used 10 lbs of black truffles–wowwww) topped with sautéed morels (omg) and microgreens. It was made of the best ingeredients and melted in your mouth. I was very impressed. Have eaten at Fossett’s and was underwhelemd, don’t remember anything like that on the menu, but maybe they have a new chef now. So I WILL give it another try.
Clifton Inn was a close second. The food wasn’t as decadent as Keswick’s but had the cutest presentation of all the other restaurants. The little shrimp with basil-wasabi? sauce perched on the mango purée in the plastic shot glass was delightful. The tiny little dessert (was it mascarpone mousse?) was perched in a tiny plastic box with two little black cherries and a teeny ladyfinger garnish. I felt so dainty and it tasted so good. Props to them.
My third fave was probably the Scallop lasagna from Brix. I pushed aside the pancetta (or prosciutto?) and it was all cheese, pasta, scallop and HEAVEN. Not fancy but comforting and indulgent. So gud.
Oh man, I wish Taste This was EVERY night.
On the tartare kick, Tuffy said he went to Zinc last night and the tartare was dee-lish.
Hmm.. the dress-up thing kind of sucks. I was hoping the first time I heard of this that it’d be more of an outdoor festival type thing, like Taste of DC ..
this is the kind of event i live for. i am so jealous!
@4 - -averra a-verra good. I was most impressed. And an elegant presentation.
Last night was my second Zinc experience. The first time a few months ago was gawdawful, but both entrees last night and the tartare were spot on.
Thanks to all that attended this event. Just as clarification, Kyle, you couldn’t find the Virginian, west Main and Three because they didn’t show up. Bad Form.
The Lobster Pancake at the Clifton was my favorite, and I thought the Tartare was just right.
@8: Their menus suck anyways. I went into Three one time, sat down, read the menu, and got back up and left. It looked like Blue Light inside but they had hot dogs on the menu. For realsy? The menu at West Main featured Mac n Cheese last time I was there. And it ain’t no White Cabot cheddar and truffle oil Mac n Cheese neither.
‘nanigans doesn’t miss a beat. That’s 3 plugs for X Lounge already today. You are the queen of restaurant/bar publicity.
/not that there’s anything wrong with that
‘Twas not on purpose!
But really, people, how about that X LOUNGE? woot woot woot
shen… you should convince X Lounge to give drink specials to anyone who comes in a Space Party T Shirt.
/$2 drafts would be good.
Hmm, I dunno if that’s legal according to ABC laws and all.
How does Charlottesville Drinking Club do it legally?
@15: Shh…we don’t ask certain questions about great things.
@14 I thought we’d get a chance to show ‘em off. We should do it for tubing then.
/ABC doesn’t have to know what’s in my floating cooler.
@15: Dunno, but whatever they’re doing, it’s awesome.
Clifton’s food was spot on. Everything was clean and perfectly cooked. That lobster pancake dish was amazing… but i liked the dessert just as much. I also liked Sticks… you can’t go wrong with their Kibbeh.
@9 west main mac & cheese used to come with 2 sides & now it doesn’t come with any & is the same price.
/please prevent me from ever going there again.
@8 Victor, neither West Main, The Virginian, or Three signed up for this event. I think they got confused since we always do the Taste of Charlottesville event in the Fall.
@9 My tongue in cheek sensibilities are lost on many. The “modern” tied to the not-so-modern is something that is done often in the northeast. The same logic applies to the video games…modern, but without the pretense. Although, I did end up taking off the dog.
@9 West Main will hopefully never use truffle oil in that capacity. Definitely not my goal for the place.
@20 It does actually still come with 2 sides. I’m not sure what happened there.
@21 interesting, because my friend had a long conversation with the waiter about it. she missed her broccoli.
Orzo Mac & Cheese = Best in Town
23: or zo you have been led to believe.
/actually haven’t tried it… will do so now.
@20: So dinner at West Main the day you get back to town? Done.
@22 Holy shit. I am actually revamping two menus right now and I was looking at the wrong WM release. You are right…no sides with the Mac and Cheese.
the cheese stands alone?
Who moved my cheese, goddammit?!?!
the cheese in russia, moves itself. dear parlie. dear parlie, the cheese.
/shen got me drunkie tonight, sorry.
@26 Andy… why not rename it Schrödinger’s Mac’n'Cheese and claim that the sides do exist but because of a conflict between the observed macroscopic and predicted microscopic states, they are not actually on your plate… but they are according to quantum physics.
/I predict you could double your price as well.
@29: Haha! And now I know who you are.
@21: And shenanigans, once again, brings another lurker into the light. Thanks for your input Andy.
@30: You’re making my head hurt
@23 Orzo’s onion rings best in town!
The Box has awesome onion rings.
That is a tough tie. I love Orzo’s onion rings.. i love The Box’s onion rings.. ROUNDUP!!?!?!?!?
@34 only if you include the riverside for some townie flavor. Where else serves the rings of gold?
@25 trying to make me not come back?
@35 big jim’s were good. real onion rings, not that crispy little snooty fried onion stuff.