Oh the butter! Alo’s insanely rich sweet butter. The stuff of which Michelin stars are made. It comes in a little plastic container. Were I a better person I would have transferred the butter to a small but expensive china dish. But this being takeout at home,we rip into the butter, spreading it way too thickly on the trademark Alo warm Parker House roll. To be eaten with the raw salmon swimming in charred sweet/hot poblano relish.
The nice white bag had a menu card, with easy-to-follow instructions to heat, lid off at 275°F. OK, we can do that. But must one haul out fancy dishes and decant every item onto bone china? Clearly Michelin-starred takeout requires that respect. But what happens in my house stays in my house. We ate it all straight from the containers it came in. Even though we had to pick it up at the uncivilized hour of 5:15 because, when Alobar got its Michelin Star a few months ago, all bets were off about reserving — even to pick up dinner!
Starting to wonder where is the suave good-looking waiter explicating the taxonomy of every dish for us, whisking away dirty plates and constantly filling my wine glass. For example, the Alobar wedge salad. What’s Maytag blue cheese? Apparently little balls of blue atop iceberg wedge with chunks of pedigreed bacon and sweet oven-roasted tomatoes.
Then we pulled out the shrimps from the oven: slightly over- cooked shrimps with big oil- soaked crispy sourdough croutons and brown mushroom caps in garlicky parsley butter. Workmanlike. I’ve had similarly underwhelming food in too many Michelin one-stars in Paris.
We paid $65 per person plus tax, tip and extras, for a total of $211.85 for takeout dinner for two. You get their fixed price menu. No subs.Was it worth it?
I did not have to order the $12 fries. But I’ve got my feelings about fries. A good French fry, to me, is like first love: mind- blowing, compelling. Irresistible. These takeout fries travel tolerably well; their accompanying aîoli is rich and tasty. I barely mind their inevitably encroaching sogginess.
Next course is confit duck pappardelle with black kale and chili-garlic oil. Rich duck sauce is salty. Gorgeous al dente pappardelle. Lovely black kale. Tender duck. Does the sum of the parts add up to an impressive whole? Not quite.
I want to love this dinner. As a devoted fan of chef Patrick Krissand all things Alo, I yearn for this dinner to be fabulous. I fondly recall a takeout dinner from Alo at the height of the pandemic.It was quite spectacular.
But all restaurants were desperate then. Not so much now.
I didn’t have to order the $18 add-on dessert. Could not resist. Mille feuille! The most classic of French desserts. More important to the French cooking lexicon than soufflés and charlottes. Mille feuille is, figuratively, a thousand leaves of crispy puff pastry layered with whipped cream and other delectables. I’ve eaten this raspberry mille feuille pre- pandemic at Alobar and been seduced by its sensual creamy crispness. At home? Not quite as crisp — inevitably — but still magnificent. Whipped cream, pastry cream, raspberry coulis and raspberry cream, layered with mostly still-crisp pastry.
Was Alobar takeout good enough? Compared to what? Most takeout sucks.It was better.