Pasta|Bar, Austin
This was a fun restaurant!
I had some difficulty to find the restaurant since there is no sign or I might miss the sign. I believed the restaurant tried to contact me, but I was on international roaming so probably missed or never got the call. The site is a bar at the front and the open kitchen restaurant at the back. We were offered drinks while waiting for our reservation in the bar.
The main restaurant is a relatively small room offering maximum 10-12 seats. I was pleased they printed our names on cards for all seats; they did some “homework” for sure. It is also a cosy restaurant with a small kitchen, and the chef is actually talking to us. I am always a quiet customer and prefer not talking too much. The chef did notice that and spent more time on entertaining other customers.
Seat
My favourite dishes all included pasta. The first one is pasta with truffle. Though the flavour is as expected, it is well-executed, and the presentation is cute. It does not try to show off offering way too much truffle. The light seasoning allows the customer to taste all the ingredients and the pasta itself.
Pasta with Truffle
The next dish was salmon with pasta as the base. I thought it would be too creamy, but it is not, and in fact I like it. The salmon is not fully cooked, which added a bit texture, and some bacon drizzles and the pasta at the base give extra layers too. All the ingredients are sounded very “breakfast”, but it is also part of the reason I like this dish: using the samplest things and playing and balancing the flavour.
Salmon
One of the main courses is Wagyu beef with, of course, pasta. This is a dish I would rework slightly. I enjoy the pasta part, as they are slightly firm hence adds more texture. However, I personally feel that the fat on the edge is slightly too much. They could render the fat a bit more just on the edge or cut them out.
Wagyu beef
In all, I really enjoyed this place. All the presentation is entertaining: the chef and cooks give a small show in front of customers before each dish. Also, I did not need to worry about the tip as the service charge was directly included in the bill; I am always anxious about the percentage when travelling to USA. One thing I should mention is that they offer two fixed time serves in the evening, which is obviously for better profit. This means that I had to be there and leave in relatively fixed times, and they give relatively short time to finish each dish and short gap between dishes too. Yet I will not complain too much on this and highly recommend this place.
🐼 Score: 4/5
