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Ardor Easter

Dec05

Restaurant: Ardor [1, 2]

Location: 9040 Sunset Blvd, West Hollywood, CA 90069. (424) 310-1572

Date: April 9, 2023

Cuisine: Hotel Brunch

Rating: pretty interesting and tasty

We really miss the buffet at Tres and were very sad when it closed.

Ardor is tucked away inside West Hollywood’s Edition Hotel. The Ardor itself is helmed by none other than the renowned chef and restaurateur, John Fraser. Having kick-started his impressive culinary journey in Los Angeles, Fraser went on to refine his skills under the expert guidance of Thomas Keller at the prestigious French Laundry in Napa Valley. His quest for global culinary mastery then led him to Paris, where he further honed his craft at the esteemed Taillevent and Maison Blanche.

Upon his return to the United States, Fraser took up the mantle of executive chef at Compass in New York, where he was awarded a remarkable two stars by The New York Times. Recognized as one of only four young chefs to watch in America by Esquire magazine in 2006, Fraser continued to make waves in the culinary world with his former restaurants, Dovetail and Narcissa. These establishments garnered a plethora of accolades, including three stars from The New York Times, a highly sought-after Michelin star, and glowing reviews from various esteemed publications.

In 2008, Fraser’s exceptional talent was further acknowledged when he received the Star Chef’s New York Rising Star Award.

Cool interior.

The special Easter Brunch menu.

Skittles. Skittles infused tequila, spiced pear, agave, sparkling wine.

Flaming Peep. Bourbon, vanilla bean, chocolate and mole. Basically a really good Old Fashioned with a torched Peep on top.

Ardor arancini egg nest. Multiple different fried rice balls. Some were beets, some tomato and cheese, some pesto etc.

Milk Bread with roasted tomatoes.

The buffet was large and consisted of various stations. It begins here with salad options.

Little crudite cups.

Salad toppings.

Salad dressings.

Then the shellfish section including oysters on the halfshell.

Raw bar with two types of crab and shrimp.

Charcuterie.

Cheeses.

A fairly deluxe custom omelet bar.

Skewer station with charcoal grilled chicken, beef, and mushrooms.

A whole “bread and butter” station.

Then this wonderful Easter-themed and very creative pastry station with all sorts of cute little pastry creations.

The “chocolate soil” garden was particularly fun.

Weho Goddess. Dukkah Crusted Ahi, organic lettuce, fall pears, california avocado.

Pan Seared Banzino. Caper vinaigrette, shaved fennel, watercress.

Ardor Burger. Potato bun, aged cheddar, house spread, hand cut fries.

The Waffle Board. Farmer’s market fruit & berries, chapagne chantilly, salted caramel, chocolate ganache, raspberry-yuzu coulis, confetti. I failed to get my photo in before the kid’s grabbed half of it.

Overall, this was a very fun and creative brunch — and pretty delicious — given my diet I actually haven’t been this full in months!

For more dining reviews click here.

By: agavin
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Posted in: Food

Tagged as: Ardor, Buffet, Easter

Eating Jerusalem – Inbal Breakfast

Jul17

Restaurant: The Inbal Jerusalem

Location: Jabotinsky Street 3 Jerusalem 92145. 02-675-6666

Date: June 26 – July 1, 2019

Cuisine: Israeli Breakfast

Rating: solid buffet, although one could ask, “where’s the bacon?”

During the Jerusalem section of our trip we stayed in the Inbal, which was a lovely and newish medium sized hotel just outside of the old city.

The Temple Mount, Western Wall, and the Dome of the Rock — where the binding of Isaac is said to have occurred! Well, and several thousand other years of sacred happenings.

The Inbal’s main breakfast dining area is this sunny courtyard.

Gluten free station. The buffet lights always make everything warm and partially overexposed. Even fussing with it (briefly) in Lightroom I can’t quite resolve the two tone color (probably from the whiter natural light and the warm display lamps).

Pastries.

More pastries — like babka.

Pancake and waffle station.

Egg station.

Omelet bar.

Cured fish.

Veggies and cheese.

More cheese.

Cereal.

Salads.

More salds.

And more salads.

Fruits and nuts.

Halvah station. Yes, there is actually a halvah station. For those that don’t know, this is a sweet mix of sugar and sesame paste.

Fruits.

And more fruits.

Drinks.

Breads.

Espresso and smoothy bar.

This was an extensive breakfast buffet with high quality ingredients. Like most hotels in Jerusalem, the Inbal is Kosher so the buffet was dairy and absent of all meat. As I was trying to avoid (the yummy looking) carbs this made things a touch tougher, leaning me hard into the cheeses, eggs, and (a bit too salty) cured fish. Still, there was so much selection I ate way too much. Everything was very fresh.

They do operate on Saturday under quite peculiar sabbath rules that I don’t fully understand. The “make your own omelet” station and other things involving live cooking vanished, but dishes were still hot and being constantly replaced. Certain devices like the toaster oven were shut and covered. Still the employees are still “working” so go figure.

Overall, very solid effort.

Click here to see more Eating Israel posts.

By: agavin
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Posted in: Food

Tagged as: Breakfast, breakfast buffet, Buffet, Eating Israel, Eating Jerusalem, Inbal Hotel, Jerusalem

Florida Beach Mega Sushi Buffet

Dec21

Restaurant: Santo’s Modern American Buffet & Sushi

Location: 3400 N. Federal Hwy, Original location in Coral Springs, FL, Boca Raton, FL 33431. +1 561-923-9378

Date: November 2, 2018

Cuisine:Modern American Buffet & Sushi

Rating: Excellent neighborhood Italian

Recently I went to Del Rey Beach Florida for the wedding of my oldest friend, Brent — which was awesome.

As part of the Florida fun we went to this interesting AYCE (All You Can Eat) sushi buffet. Since it’s so “different” than the usual sushi I blog about, I thought to write it up just for S&G.

Santo’s covers a lot of ground.

It’s very clean and has a pretty up-to-date pseudo corporate decor.

Somehow they even had a 750ml Junmai sake for like $20 — it was a touch rougher than I’m used to.

I pretty much ignored the American meat, fries, etc section of the buffet. This is presumably for the land lubbers.

Various fried things which I also ignored.

I sampled a couple of these hot items like the guilty pleasure ponzu popcorn shrimp.

Fruit? Forget about it.

Salads. Same.

Now we’re talking. The sashimi. It wasn’t the most exciting fish in the world, and some were fairly heavily sauced, but I was surprised to find they weren’t fishy. It was certainly “fine.”

Now we get into the “real” sushi. Somehow I missed photoing most of the nigiri.

You can kind of see it here on the left — bear in mind these are lousy iPhone panos. There were 10-15 various nigiri and I even enjoyed the eel.

Then TONS of rolls. Kind of a bit overdone but some were tasty and a sauce station at the end with spicy mayo, eel sauce etc.

The desserts. Needed a separate stomach for these.

One of my (many) plates. You can see some of the fairly sloppy nigiri.

And another.

This was a fun night, and while it will win no awards for most authentic or sublime sushi, I was actually surprised how decent it was — perhaps a little less Japanese but slightly better fish quality than at the revolving sushi I occasionally go to. Interesting how the Japanese sushi bar has intersected with Florida “middle America” culture and morphed into this. And it’s like $27 even at full dinner freight! A search of Boca Raton restaurants turns up numerous competing sushi buffets — who knew it was such a popular style down there?

For more dining reviews click here.

By: agavin
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Posted in: Food

Tagged as: Buffet, Florida, Santo's, Sushi, wedding

Wynn Breakfast Buffet

Sep27

Restaurant: Wynn Breakfast Buffet

Location: 3131 Las Vegas Blvd. South, Las Vegas, NV 89109. (702) 770-7000

Date: September 24, 2011

Cuisine: Breakfast Buffet

Rating: Quantity over quality

What would a Foodie Club trip to Vegas be without at least one buffet. Being as we were staying at the Wynn Encore, and the Wynn buffet should theoretically be one of the nicer ones in town (and it was comped) off we went. This is the weekend brunch.

The room is pretty enough (by Vegas standards). The buffet is fairly reasonable at $32 on the weekend, $10 extra for all you can drink cheap champagne (we skipped).

Just part of the main service hall. This buffet goes for serious quantity and variety, at the expense of quality. Not that it’s bad, but it isn’t superlative either.

Fruit.

Salad.

Cesar salad.

More fruit.

Soups.

Meats.

Bagels.

Cheeses.

Salmon in pastry.

Fish dishes.

Fish cakes and potatoes.

Heat lamp pizza, four types.

Pancakes, waffles etc.

Sauces for above.

Pastas.

Eggs and good old fashioned pig products.

Pulled Pork sliders. Actually pretty good.

Veggies.

Prime rib, super fatty bacon, etc.

Sketchy mexican dishes.

Toppings for nachos.

Cerviche. Had me frightened.

Eggs with chorizo.

More mexican.

Chung King Chinese.

Now this is different. Congee. For those that don’t know, congee is a typical Chinese (and other Asian) rice gruel (like oatmeal) that you spice up with toppings. They didn’t have grubs, but they did have 1,000 year old egg. In China, I often saw grubs.

A few bits of dim sum. The center pork thingys were okay.

Cereal.

Veggies.

Lox and toppings bar.

Shrimp. Not the best shelled shrimp in the world, but edible.

Various cold salads.

The usual assortment of mediocre sushi rolls.

A made to order omelet bar.

Now dessert fared a little better. Maybe because cakes are more forgiving of sitting around.

I’ll let the pictures do the talking here.

Candied apples and chocolate covered marshmallows.

Gelato. That was interesting. It wasn’t up to Italian Gelato standards, but wasn’t awful either.

Chocolate covered marshmallows.

More cakes.

Cakes. The Dulce de Leche was pretty good.

Cookies and cupcakes.

More goodies.

Fruit. Eww!

Pastries.

More.

And even more.

Cinnamon buns and coffee cakes.

Fat is flavor — my plate.

And a dessert sampling.

Overall this buffet suffered greatly from too muchness or quantity over quality. The LA based Tres buffet is an example of trying to do much more with many less dishes. Here, dabbling into every conceivable type of cuisine (Mexican, Italian, Chinese, Japanese, etc.). So much that nothing could be well done. They should have just concentrated on classic brunch food perhaps. Who knows. But a lot of the stuff had that scary sitting around in chaffers factor. Yes, I’m a snob. Still, I was able to find some perfectly edible items. It just wasn’t great. The desserts were pretty decent though.

For more Vegas dining reviews click here.

By: agavin
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Posted in: Food

Tagged as: Bagel, Breakfast, Brunch, Buffet, Dessert, Las Vegas, Nevada, Restaurant, Restaurant Review, Vegas, Wynn, Wynn Las Vegas

Eating Milano Marittima – Palace Hotel Breakfast

Jun19

Restaurant: Palace Hotel

Location: Cervia / Milano Marittima, Italy

Date: June 9-11, 2011

Cuisine: Italian

Rating: Great hotel breakfast

ANY CHARACTER HERE

The Palace Hotel in Cervia fits into an interesting class of European hotel. It’s a beach resort, and elegant, but hosted in a building from the 1960s or 70s that has been newly restored. This is not the kind of old school Belle Epoque place like say Le Metropole in Beaulieu-sur-Mer. But it is very nice and well run.

Breakfast is outside on the beach/pool patio.

Another view. The Adriatic beach is right behind that hedge.

This breakfast puts the typical one at the Hotel Real Fini to shame, but it follows the same basic format of large cold breakfast buffet and a few hot items. Here are the jams and spreads!

And more of them, plus teas and a few other odds and ends.

Then cereals.

Juices and additives for yogurt or cereal.

Have a few Fruits.

Champagne, more spreads, lox, cheeses.

Close up of the cheeses, mostly local.

Some meats, like salami and prosciutto. Note that they have the same spam-like spreads!

Then the regular breads and self-use toaster.

Now we really get our sugar going with the huge sweet pastry table. A lot of these are local too.

And the other side! This selection changed a little every day. There were all sorts of nut, chocolate, creme, and fruit tarts.

Finally there is the hot station. With omelets or eggs made to order, pancakes, and some various hot sausages. Plus you can order fresh squeezed juices and coffee done any way (cappuccino etc). All of this is included with the room! And this is actually just typical of a good larger Italian hotel too.

Click here to see more Eating Italy posts.

By: agavin
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Posted in: Food

Tagged as: Breakfast, Brunch, Buffet, Cervia, eating-italy, Eggs, Food, Hotel, Italian cuisine, Italy, Milano Marittima, Palace Hotel, pastry, Restaurant, Restaurant Review, side dishes, vegetarian

Eating Modena – Real Fini Breakfast

Jun12

Restaurant: Hotel Real Fini Via Emilia

Location: Modena, Italy

Date: June 5-8, 2011

Cuisine: Breakfast Buffet

Rating: Typical Italian Hotel Breakfast

ANY CHARACTER HERE

Italian hotels almost always include breakfast. The Real Fini in Modena’s is extremely typical of mid range hotels.

Cappuccino is always available, and unlike in the states is free and not $8. Plus, they know how to make a decent one at nearly any place in Italy.

There are very few hot items, just some scrambled eggs and a meat or two (sausage or ham). But there are lots of typical dry northern Italian cakes and cereal.

A couple fruits.

Yogurts, meats, cheeses. Often regional.

More bread products and jams. There’s always nutella, which makes anything better.

Biscuits and yogurt.

And this unusual selection of different “tinned” meats.

Like this Pate di prosciutto. Better than spam!

And a couple juices.

Click here to see more Eating Italy posts.

By: agavin
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Posted in: Food

Tagged as: Breakfast, Buffet, cakes, cappuccino, coffee, eating-italy, Eggs, ham, Hotel, Italian cuisine, Italy, Modena, pate, Travel and Tourism

Riviera Country Club – Gluttony with a View

Nov21

Restaurant: Riviera Country Club Sunday Brunch

Location: 1250 Capri Drive Pacific Palisades, California 90272. Ph: 310 454-6591

Date: Nov 21, 2010

Cuisine: American

Some member friends of ours graciously invited us to join them for some Sunday gluttony at the Riviera Country Club. Someone at the table must be a member to eat here as is typical with most clubs

The day was gorgeous too, the “rain” (LA has these little midnight drizzles we call rain) had washed the air clean and left us with a brilliant clear day. The old club house is gorgeous.

They have a rather extensive buffet brunch. Some good raw bar fare. Not the frozen stuff. Oh and Larry David was eating there too.

The extensive smoked fish section.

More smoked fish.

The obligatory introduction of “sushi” into nearly every buffet.

Beats, chicken, bay shrimp and avocado, and more.

Seared Tuna saldad, heirloom tomato caprese.

Terrines, meats, and cheeses.

Salad bar.

Round one of three — my plate.

The “warm section,” included eggs benedict, four types of sausage and bacon properly crisped.

Omelet bar of course.

The meats. Turkey because of the season, prime rib. I can’t handle carved meats this early in the morning.

The fresh waffle/pancake bar. The homemade glazed walnuts were killer.

My plate — round two. Notice the evidence of my preference for syrup on breakfast meats. This plate was not recommended by my cardiologist. Sweet + salty + fatty = Yum!

Half the deserts. Waffles were just a warm up.

More.

And the view right out the windows (the ocean is at the far end). A brief stroll burned off 0.05% of the calories. This was a very good traditional brunch. The quality level was extremely high. Like a snake, I will need no other sustenance for at least 24 hours!

By: agavin
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Posted in: Food