Saint Louis recently celebrated its Restaurant Week, a week where participating restaurants prepare a prix fixe menu at a set price (this year 25 dollars). The event organizers did a nice job of designing a website that made it easy to explore the various menus as well as reserve a spot via Open Table. In conjunction with Restaurant Week, the charitable organization "Operation Food Search" was running a campaign to add an "extra helping" to your check for a donation to its cause.
I had 28 restaurants to choose among, and I had only been to two or three previously, so the first task was making a selection. After scouring over each and every menu, I decided on Mosiac Modern Fusion (?) Tapas, which was generously offering a five-course menu instead of the customary three-course.
Mosaic has moved sometime in the last four years from where Tim had his first experience ("like a bar") to where it is currently, with an upscale lounge and separate dining room outfitted with high-back booths and tall windows for great Washington Avenue people watching.
The first course-the 'Amuse Bouche'-not really a course at all but a mini-tapa (tapita?) sort of adventure complete with truffle foam (huh?) and greenish something. It was just ok. Tim would have rather had a basket of bacon and I would have rather had something I could have copied to make at home, or better yet, identify. The second and third courses were soup and salad. Tim went traditional (safe) with baked potato soup and I ventured out with the watermelon/sriracha chilled soup. Now, if you know me well, you know I don't touch ANY melon, ever. However, it is not the taste but the texture and all puried up baby food style, this soup was a tasty, spicy concoction. We both had the arugula salad with a soft boiled egg to smoosh all over the place along with "speck" (just say bacon, for Christ's sake).
The main courses did leave a bit to be desired. Tim had 21-day dry aged sliced NY strip (meh) with fried manchego balls, which sound really awesome but tasted like fried dough. I had the king crab over foie gras (ha Chicago) and truffle emulsion, just because it sounded uber-expensive. Just sounded, not tasted.
Although we were ordering from the prix fixe menu and didn't venture into Mosaic's odd and somewhat limited tapas offerings, I have to make a comment here on its cuisine description, of which it is very proud, "modern fusion tapas." What the hell does that mean? The mere fact that you're using a Spanish word should imply Spanish food. Otherwise just say small plates. "Modern?" This allows Mosaic to use weird shit like foam and green stuff. And "Fusion"-I guess this is what allows to usage of the now colloquial "tapas." If we use manchego, we can call anything we want tapas. Hell, I'm calling tortilla chips tapas from now on. As long as they're a small portion and overpriced. Soapbox.
www.mosaictapas.com
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You had amusing douche for dinner?
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