I Like Food: Dinner in a Dome

Wednesday night, I had dinner in a dome...

It was called Sensorium & it was a pop-up restaurant specializing in Gastronomy at Yards Park in DC. They have 2 seatings at 6 & 9 everyday until May 1st. Thanks to SUCKY DC METRO we missed the beginning because we were trapped on a train 2 stops away for 10 minutes & then forced off our car & had to wait for the next train. But, they were totally nice about us being 10 minutes late. (I HATE BEING LAAAATE!) 

Course One:

Kir Royale Grape with Magic Crystals from Outer Space (The magic crystals were Pop Rocks)

Course Two:

Cloud Salad... Fennel salad. I've never had fennel on purpose!

Course three:

Ricotta gnocchi with sage brown butter sauce. The gnocchi was so LIGHT & yummy. On the cooking competition shows with which I am so obsessed people are always cautious about making gnocchi for fear it may come out too heavy.

Course four:

Beet Gazpacho with goat cheese. I HATE BEETS! Seriously it's on the top of my list of foods I don't like along with capers, grapefruit & pine nuts (and 3 of the 4 were on the menu). I enjoyed it! especially with the goat cheese & I was also told by our table mate that eating a lot of beets will turn your #1 red... ILK! ANyway, the performance that came along with this course featured the words "cool & savory" prominently & that is JUST what this was!

Course five:

Chicken with chervil sauce & blood orange foam. I HAD FOAM, Y'ALL! After years of watching them make foams on the Food Network, I HAD FOAM! YAAAAAAAAAY! The foam overpowered the chervil, but I preferred the chervil sauce. I need to find some chervil soon!

Course six:

Deep fried tomato, zucchini, and potato gratin. That deep fried tomato was EVERYTHING! and the balsamic reduction was the perfect accompaniment.

Course seven:

Pork belly with ramps & "brave little potatoes". This was by far my fave course up to that point & I later found out it was also the chefs fave. The presentation was SO creative:

That tomato sauce in the potato was ALL THAT! I wanted MORE! By the way, I placed the porkbelly "cushion" on the table & used the table as the "plate"

Course eight:

Seafood and polenta with olive & capers. This seemed to be the least popular dish at our table.The fish appeared to be swordfish because it was so firm & there was a mussel. I don't dig capers, they remind me of sad, salty peas who have had all their life sucked out of them. :-(

Course nine:

Squash blossom with onion marmalade. The squash blossoms  were stuffed with a SPICY onion marmalade and then battered & deep fried.I was soooo excited to finally try one because this again was one of the things that I only see people eating on the food competition shows I watch.

Isn't it BEAUTIMOUS!?! You see that drizzle? It's a grapefruit gastrique! And if you've been following along, you'll know that grapefruit is ON MY LIST! But, I ate it anyway. It wasn't bad.

Course ten:

Oxtail ragout on a bed of risotto. Most of the courses I don't have pics for because I ate them up so fast! Trust me when I tell you that thang was GOOT! The risotto cake was definitely different. I wasn't expecting it to be cripsy, but the chef liked to fry & I appreciated that!

Course eleven:

Lemon pudding pop. They froze it at our table using a liquid nitrogen contraption.

I had reached foodie HEAVEN! Especially since there was an up close magic trick. I was ASTOUNDED! I'm not easily impressed by magic, but I WAS ASTOUNDED!!

Course 12:

Ricotta doughnuts with cayenne chocolate sauce, saffron cream, and mixed berry mousse. The cayenne chocolate sauce was PERFECTION, but my fave was the saffron cream. It went PERFECTLY with the deliciousness that was the ricotta doughnuts.

The song that went along with this number was sooooo cute. They even encouraged the diners to dance & dance we did. It was soooo romantical!

We thought the dinner was over & we were extremely satisfied. They introduced the cast & the chef. I was so busy applaudeing. Here's a picture I found of the chef, Byron Brown: 

The most amazing part of the night was the magic bean. We were told something about eating the bean & sweet & sour... I was confused, but amazed by the dish it was brought out in. It was shaped like a flying saucer & appeared to have a piece of glass on top of the magic bean, but when I went to tap the glass, my finger went right through the center. The inside of the dish both top & bottom were mirrored so that it had a hologram effect. The magic bean changed my life... that's all I'm going to say.

As I wrap this up, I am watching Marcel's Quantum Kitchen & looking forward to my next Foodie adventure. Chef Byron called us "foodie pioneers" and I was SUPER excited to finally really be considered a foodie by someone other than my friends that "like" my food posts on FB!  If you're interested in going, I hear you MAY be able to get a discount by going to a certain website, but I don't know if the code still works. I first heard about this from Urbandaddy, I think. But I wasn't sure if I could live with myself paying $100+ for a meal on a whim like that. However, when I saw the Groupon, I JUMPED ON IT!

So there it is, folks, I'm officially a foodie pioneer. And in case you didn't know Yards Park is BEAUTIFUL! and it's open at night... It's ultra romantic & was the perfect place to end the night.