Charlie Palmer’s Métrazur was an obvious Restaurant Week choice for my boyfriend and me: we’ve passed by it a million times inside Grand Central, we’re interested in Palmer’s restaurants in general, and I wanted the Sichuan spiced pork tenderloin on the Restaurant Week menu.

As far as atmosphere goes, not much beats Métrazur. Located on Grand Central’s East Balcony, it overlooks all of the chaos of commuters rushing to their trains, but the immense space overhead captures all of the noise and leaves the restaurant cozy and quiet. It was definitely unlike any other restaurant’s decor.

I made Kamran pose like this, just so you don’t think he often sits around in public with his mouth agape.

Crab and lobster cake, mango, shaved frisee and radish salad, brioche “Melba”, lemon butter nage

Crab is literally the only seafood that makes my mouth water, and this was one of the finer crab cakes I’ve had. The breading on the cake was thick and crunchy, as was the brioche. The nage (or broth) was super intense and basically overwhelmed all of the other flavors, but it was a lemony, buttery, and rich as all get-out. The cake was good enough on its own that it didn’t need the nage, but lemon and lobster go so well together.

Roasted butternut squash soup, pumpkin seeds, applewood smoked bacon, caramelized onions, créme fraiche

Hands down the best butternut squash soup I’ve had, but how could it not be with all of the bacon hiding on the bottom of the bowl? After one bite of this, I understood why everyone makes such a big deal about squash soup, and I was still thinking about it two courses later and wishing I could have more of it instead of my dessert. And I don’t not eat dessert.

Sichuan spiced pork tenderloin, gingered butternut squash puree, baby bok choy, maple soy glaze

When I ordered this, the waiter asked me how I wanted my pork cooked, and I said to him, “No one has ever asked me that in my life.” HOW DO I WANT MY PORK COOKED?! I WANT IT COOKED THROUGH, THAT’S HOW. I asked for medium well so it wouldn’t come out grey, but it came out completely pink, and I didn’t die, so I guess the chef knows best. There was definitely not any bok choy on my plate, and the squash puree was more texture than flavor, but the maple soy glaze was sweet and yum-MY. And the pork itself was spiced to perfection.

Lamb shank, sweet potato gratin, Brussels sprout leaves, black trumpets, red wine jus

Maybe you can’t tell from the photo, but this was a giant portion, especially for Restaurant Week. My boyfriend had to share part of it with me, and even then, he was packed full. Now, if you really love the sort of gamey taste of lamb, this was not the shank for you, but if you love a slow-cooked beef roast, this was the best lamb shank you’ve ever had. My boyfriend found one big pocket of lambiness, but the rest of it was delightfully mild enough to showcase the other flavors on the plate.

Bittersweet chocolate torte, passion fruit, candied orange, clubber cream

The best things about this for me were the smear of super-sweet passion fruit and the whipped cream (whatever “clubber” means). The torte itself was creamy, slippery chocolate with a crispy cookie crust, and it was nice, but it was another in a long line of desserts meant for non-gluttons.

Key lime pie, tropical fruit compote, chocolate nibs crisp, Italian meringue

This was a light, refreshing finish to a rich, heavy dinner. I don’t usually care for light and refreshing and am a huge chocolate person, but this was the superior dessert. The pie was very well done, with a nice key lime custard and a crunchy shell. The crisp tasted like sesame seeds to me, oddly, but maybe my palate was still recovering from the passion fruit in my dessert. I did really like this pie in the end, but I didn’t feel like the same care that had been put into that crazy-delicious soup was evident.

Aside from our completely indifferent and slow server, we were extremely happy that we finally tried Métrazur and that the food exceeded our expectations. I’d go back for the atmosphere and the squash soup any time, and with their every day $44 prix fixe menu that includes a bottle of wine, I can.

Evidently finally seeing my review of our first dinner at wd~50 made my boyfriend crave some foams and powders, so before we left for Christmas vacation in our respective home states, we made a reservation to return. The only time we could get on Saturday night, even with a few weeks notice, was 6 p.m. Which means that despite the terrible economy, New Yorkers are still lining up to pay $200 each for dinner.

We were oddly seated in the same exact table as last time, which happens to have a straight view into the kitchen, where we saw chef/owner Wylie Dufresne talking to Chef de Cuisine Jon Bignelli (who we recently saw on an episode of “Chopped” on the Food Network) all night. We started off with a couple of their inventive cocktails to give me the courage to eat the many fish courses (CAVIAR?!) that were coming our way, and then we ate:

Red snapper, pickled taro, wakame (seaweed), dandelion coulis

All of these things on their own–meh. All of these things together in one bite–harmony.

Everything bagel ice cream, smoked salmon threads, crispy cream cheese

That’s right–the second dish was ice cream. Perfectly flavored and made to look like a tiny everything bagel. The salmon had the consistency of a Brillo pad, but I didn’t find that to be entirely unpleasurable. The crunchy cream cheese shard really excited me but was sadly entirely lacking in flavor. Next time, I’m asking for a warm cream cheese drizzle over my bagel.

Foie gras with passion fruit center, chinese celery

We just loved the way the passion fruit spilled out like an egg yolk. This was so rich it was almost hard to eat, which is exactly how I like my food. The passion fruit overpowered everything else, which was good for someone like me who isn’t completely sold on organ meats but probably bad for a foie gras connoisseur.

Scrambled egg ravioli, charred avocado, kindai kampachi

I somehow expected the egg cube to be cold, but the firm outside shell held a warm, almost custard-like eggy inside. Egg and avocado, it turns out, are wonderful bedmates.

Cold fried chicken, buttermilk ricotta, Tabasco and honey, American sturgeon caviar

Why is there caviar in my comfort food?! I didn’t think it necessarily added anything, and the dish sure didn’t need anything. The chicken appeared to be a terrine of dark and white meat, and the buttermilk ricotta was studded with the crispiest chicken skin.

Langoustine, licorice-style red pepper, black sesame, shiso

We both loved the way this tasted like it was poached in butter, but we agreed that it need some spice. The carpet of black sesame really made the dish.

Beef consommé and Bearnaise gnocchi

The menu simply said “beef and Bearnaise”, so I was looking forward to a hunk of flesh and some sauce to dip it in, but things are never that simple at wd~50. Despite the initial weirdness, this turned out to be the favourite savory dish for both of us.

Lamb loin, black garlic romesco, dried soybeans, basil

Dried soybeans should be in every dish. The crunch of them was so perfect with the melt-in-your-mouth lamb.

Spruce yogurt, shattered vanilla-mango ice cream, vanilla bean olive oil, mango

Yogurt that tastes like the forest? Yes, please! The spruce taste was so delicate–not nauseatingly pine-y, as we were expecting–that we needed to taste the yogurt on its own to catch it. I could’ve definitely gone for more of it, but I’m glad it didn’t slap me in the face.

Hazelnut tart, coconut, chocolate, chicory foam

Chicory is about as bitter as it comes on its own, but spread on top of the mousse-filled chocolate skin, it provided a great balance to all of the sweetness. And the salt on top! To think there was a time before salted chocolate. This was definitely my favourite dessert of the night.

Caramelized brioche, apricot seed shards, buttercream, lemon thyme sorbet

This was delicious, but the Degustation caramelized brioche has ruined me for all other caramelized brioches. Sorry, Wylie.

Cocoa packets, chocolate-shortbread-covered milk ice cream

The idea of milk ice cream is hilarious to us. So, um, you basically mean ice cream without any added flavorings, right? Thought so. It’s too bad that the cookie overpowered the ice cream, because I’d love to see what that tastes like. The classic chocolate packets–like Fruit Roll-Ups made out of chocolate–were actually better than we remembered them, even after I spilled half of the crunchy chocolate crumbs inside all over my lap.

The thing we think is funny about wd~50 is that the plate in front of you is generally full of familiar flavors, yet you know that the food on it went through several transformations involving plenty of chemicals. You have to ask yourself at some point, “Is it worth it?” I can understand why people who aren’t into novelty would make fun of this sort of food–expensive, tiny, laborious–but I just love the sort of deconstructionism of it. Beef consommé and Bearnaise gnocchi look and feel nothing like a steak with Bearnaise sauce, but they taste nearly identical, and you have to appreciate the craft that goes into that.

It kind of bothers me, actually, thinking that someone couldn’t like this meal. Once you get past the fact that nothing you’re eating looks like its original form, you have to admit that everything tastes great, and taste is obviously the most important attribute. When it comes to molecular gastronomy, I guess, an open mind is a prerequisite to an open mouth.

It was more than a year ago that I announced my impending trip to wd~50 on my personal blog and got a load of comments from my mostly-Ohioan readership that mostly talked about how ridiculously small and not-at-all-like-real-food the dish in the picture I posted was. I was skeptical, too, to be honest, but it turned out that the meal was fantastic–really, really fantastic–surprising, playful, and memorable.

It must have overwhelmed me so much, though, that I failed to write about it, and my boyfriend has been bothering me about it ever since. Now that we have a January reservation to try the current tasting menu, I figured I owed it to him to at least post my photos from the evening. Here’s all I can remember from September 13th, 2008:

I started out the night with a peanut butter and jelly cocktail that was more peanut than peanut butter, but the bold flavor really prepared me for what was to come. We ordered one appetizer, two entrees, and the three-course dessert tasting menu, but the waiter brought us the five-course dessert tasting on the house. (Which makes this review entirely biased, naturally.)

Fried quail, banana tartar, peppercress

Sweetbreads, peanut, beet-pomegranate sauce, pickled sweet potato

Wagyu flat iron, coffee gnocchi, coconut, cipollini, sylvetta

Something foamy and possibly celery-y that I can’t recall

Grapefruit curd, pine nut, meringue, nasturtium ice cream

Jasmine custard, black tea, banana

Toasted coconut cake, carob, smoked cashew, brown butter sorbet

Yuzu ice cream, marcona almond, chocolate packets

The service was great, and the waiter didn’t mind repeating the word nasturtium for me about a hundred times until my boyfriend said he’d explain later. Like everyone else, we were impressed that chef Wylie Dufresne was actually in the kitchen, although my boyfriend happened to be directly in his line of sight and felt a little uncomfortable with the way Wylie was making eyes at him all night.

The decor was dark and simple, which made for a lovely contrast with the bright and complex food being served. Plus, there seemed to be a spotlight pointed directly at each table, which is why you basically never see a bad wd~50 photo.

I understand that looking at the menu alone, the dishes are a little intimidating, and the flavor combinations aren’t immediately complimentary (sweetbreads and beets?!). After my first meal there, though, I’m convinced that Wylie can do no wrong, and I’m excited to eat more ridiculous food (and less ridiculous ones, like the caramel apple) next month when we try the new tasting menu.