Another long lunch: La Terraza del Casino, Madrid

One of our main goals in Madrid (indeed, throughout our Spain trip) was to eat as many interesting things as we could.

So even though we'd already lined up lunch at El Club Allard, it seemed wasteful not to check out a second Michelin-starred restaurant, La Terraza del Casino.

Ferran Adrià is "gastronomic advisor" at La Terraza and the chef, Paco Roncero, is one of his proteges. We'll probably never get the chance to eat an Adrià dish, but we figured this might give us an idea of what it's like.

La Terraza is in the Casino de Madrid, founded in the 1830s to be a meeting place for nobility. So, yeah, no slots.

But really pretty.



While the Casino itself is frescoes and sculptures and gold-leaf, La Terraza takes a different direction in interior decor; '80s disco, maybe?



Don't get me wrong — it was cool, in an "I've never been in a place like this" kind of way. But compared to El Club Allard, it felt ... forced, almost. As though it was trying too hard to show how unconventional it was, which made it seem inauthentic.

Still, it set the tone.



The guy in the background was one of the many waitstaff who served us. His first action was to offer us a Bloody Mary, which began with Ketel One and fresh tomato mix and ended with ...



... liquid nitrogen. See the dry ice clouding the table?

The result was a zingy sorbet, bright with flavor and a nice kick of alcohol.



Next up, salad and toothpaste.



Okay, it's actually a fabulous olive oil butter.



Only the presence of the hovering waitstaff prevented me from squeezing the entire tube into my mouth. (I probably wouldn't have been the first, but still. Not ladylike.)

Next, a pine-nut marshmallow on a spoon, and a little cake of sesame and miso. The flavors of the latter overwhelmed the delicateness of the former, but individually both were quite lovely.



Then came what were basically hazelnut truffles, which were fine, though a little sweet for so early in the order. But they were served on a wire mesh platter, which, you know, craaazy.



And then came "parma pasión," which was passion fruit with shaved Parmesan on top. Really. But also on mesh platter, woooo!



Sorry, do I seem whelmed? It's just that by this point in our lunch at El Club Allard, we'd been surprised by edible messages, inhaled tomatillo smoke and eaten fish over candlelight. And now I was supposed to get excited by an overabundance of cheese on a sliver of fruit?

Okay, the next course was better: razor-clam niguri with black and white sesame. Things were looking up.



And then the first genuinely brilliant, emotionally satisfying dish.



Not the Gorgonzola mochi, though that was an interesting combination of texture and flavor. No, the awesome is in the background: a single young strawberry. Grilled.

I don't know why it had never occurred to me to grill strawberries before. This was warm, soft, bursting with vibrant flavor. It made me stop and really take note of the moment.

Was this going to be the high point of the meal? The next dish now stood in comparison. The cake of cod cheeks with black olive tempura was perfectly fine.



But it wasn't a strawberry.

And thus ended the "Snacks" section of the meal; Act One, if you will. Act Two, "Tapiplatos," was a parade of small plates that covered more of a meats-and-veggies field.

To start, a trio: oyster, a sliver of lychee gelatin, and a spoon of ... well, the menu says the third ingredient in this dish is borage. But my memory (and The Boy believes this to be true also), is that the spoon contains a (very delicious) sort of ham stock.



In other words, yes: Hot Ham Water.



For this dish, we were given instructions: Eat the oyster first, then the jelly, then the HHW. So we did. But the order seemed odd; the delicate flavor of the lychee was masked by the proteins on either side. Unless the lychee was intended as a palate-cleanser (in which case, it wasn't very effective).

Okay, next was something that shouldn't have worked, but did: white asparagus in a warm mayonnaise with grapefruit. No, really.



Maybe it was because the basis of the dish was classic, and had just been goosed enough to be clever. The sauce was rich but not heavy, and the citrus gave it a brightness and prevented it from being one-note predictable.

And then, finally, something beautiful.



These were little bundles of squid and the most amazing onion confit with ink. The onions were sweet and salty at the same time, and melted in the mouth.



Next, langoustine wrapped in quinoa — an interesting take on maki — in a light garlic-honey sauce.



This was a dish that worked as a whole; all the flavors were delicate, and balanced so that none overwhelmed the others.

The Boy, of course, can't do crustaceans, so he got a plate of peas instead.



Then came the beef course. And the first and only appearance of foam.



The meat was Wagyu, insanely tender, with a light teriyaki glaze that brought out the flavor nicely. Sadly, the menu description does not mention the unnaturally green foam, and I have no recollection of what it was. Not memorable enough to outshine the beef, anyway.

Next, more fish (because serving proteins out of order is craaaazy!). This time, rodaballo a la Gallega, a very nice piece of turbot cooked in a traditional style.



The blobulous entity to the right was described to us as being either (I forget) a winkle or a cockle. My limited knowledge of such things is that both are meatier, more mussel-like, rather than the translucent orbs here. So are these a Mediterranean variety? Or juveniles?

All I know is that they exploded saltily in the mouth (oh stop it), like one big gelatinous piece of caviar. And I'd like some more, please.

And then some fowl, because we hadn't yet.



This was pichon con gelee-cru de manzana al Casis — potentially pigeon but also possibly some other type of small bird — with balls of apple in cassis. At least, I assume that's what they were. Who knows, with this craaazy molecular gastronomy stuff?

Anyway, it was good.



Thus ended the tapiplatos; next came a sorbet — mandarin, in this case — to cleanse the palate.



Not shown: The repeat performance with the liquid nitrogen to turn the fresh juice into frozen. Well, it was cute the first time around.

And on to dessert. First, a very lovely strawberry soup with pepper ice cream:



And then a bonbon of chocolate, ice cream, and nuts:



But wait, there's more!







Pink strawberry meringues; gianduja chocolates; passionfruit jellies; and donuts covered in white chocolate and filled with Baileys.

This last plate really summed up the whole experience for me. It was well executed, pleasingly presented, and not particularly unusual.

Yes, there were moments in this meal that stood out — the strawberry, the onion confit; the Wagyu beef — but you'll notice they were the simple elements done well.

Maybe it isn't fair to compare it to lunch at El Club Allard. That was a different experience, at the hands of a chef with a different philosophy. And yet I'd hoped for more from someone who had worked with Adrià, for whom the emotional response to a dish is a core component of its enjoyment.

At la Terraza del Casino, the level of technical excellence is extremely high. In terms of skill and knowledge, the chef and his staff are masterful. But there were really few surprises, and nothing that moved me in the same way as several of the plates at Allard.

If I ever get the chance to eat a three-hour lunch in Madrid again, I know where I'm going.

Three-hour lunch at El Club Allard, Madrid

We went to Spain last month. What, I didn't mention?

It was a fabulous trip: a week in Madrid, renting an apartment off Plaza del Sol; day trips to Cordoba and Valencia; a weekend in Barcelona.

We didn't do too much planning, with two exceptions: We made lunch reservations at two Madrid two-Michelin-star restaurants.

This is the story of one of those lunches.

El Club Allard sits almost halfway between a park with a statue of Don Quixote and a park with an ancient Egyptian temple. The location may not have been deliberate, but it is somehow appropriate for a restaurant that manages to combine notes of mystery, fantasy, humor, imagination and creativity.

We had a 1:30 reservation, which for Madrid is early; for a while, we were the only people in the place.

Here's the lobby:



The dining room is modern-elegant and neutral, with just enough gold to provide warmth and richness.



At our table was a simple message:



And then one of the servers came over with a bowl of light, fluffy peanut cream, and instructions to use the card — made from rice paper — as a scoop.

So we did.



And that's when we realized that this was going to be an unusual experience.

Chef Diego Guerrero came out to talk to us. He was exactly how I want a chef to look: tousled hair, butcher's apron, Chuck Taylors, and an expression that combines enthusiasm, honesty, and fueled-on-espresso energy.

He asked which menu we'd like (there are three options: Encuentro, Seducción, and Revolución, with increasing numbers of dishes), checked for allergies, and scooted back into the kitchen. He did this with every table.

Then the sommelier came over, and we asked him to choose wines that would go with our food. Not knowing what lay ahead, this seemed a smarter strategy than guessing. The fact that he started us with a cava from the Costa Brava — and that it was really good — made us realize this was a wise idea.

And then it began. I hope you're sitting down. And not currently hungry.

First, what was described as "game truffle with foie and mushroom." Which doesn't go halfway to capturing the awesomeness. The truffle had the texture of a good chocolate version, slightly chewy and dense, but with a dark, meaty quality. The foie was chilled and shaved, so that it literally melted on the tongue.

Oh, and it looked like this:



And was served like this:



The bottom section of the bowl was filled with tomatillo smoke; lifting the bowl released the vapors and added another sensory level to the dish.

Oh, not enough for you? How about the mini Babybell, actually filled with creamy Gorgonzola?





Or the dish set up like an aromatherapy-oil candle, except that a sukiyaki broth provided the essential fragrance, and the lid was made of seaweed and topped with a perfect mouthful of halibut?





You either eat the tapa, fish, and soup separately, or allow the lid to slide into the broth.



Next was the scallop empanadilla with black garlic sauce, another lovely Asian-Spanish combination (and so freaking pretty).



At this point, we switched to wine #2, a Viognier from Toledo. No, I'd never heard of such a thing either. It was lighter than the Viogniers I'm used to, and nicer for it.

Next course: boil-in-the-bag veggies. Sort of.





These were English peas, white asparagus, and smoked salmon, all in a light, fresh broth. Were it actually possible to capture spring and serve it up boil-in-the-bag style, this is how it would be done.



Next up: bacon and egg sandwich.



Okay, not exactly.

This was huevo con pan y pancetca sobra crema ligera de patata. Which still just means "egg with bread and pancetta over a light potato cream sauce," but that still isn't in the neighborhood of describing it.

The pancetta was so thin, it was transparent. The bread was rich but light. And the egg ...



Bow-chicka-wow-wow ...

Then we moved on to the fish course. Roasted sea bass with stock made from the fish itself; the traditional white garlic soup ajo blanco, but made with black garlic; a pu-her tea broth of cinnamon and lime; and a garnish of citrus caviar, aka finger lime, an Australian rainforest fruit that's just starting to see cultivation in the US.



The combination of citrus and earthy broth and flawless fish was balanced perfectly.

And then to our meat entree: hare taco, the meat cooked so slowly, and so full of flavor; three drops of fabulous guacamole; and a "false" jalapeño, which was actually a red-dyed carrot, turned into a pepper shape.



While I'm more of a small-plate-eater in general, and I'm happy to eat a few small mouthfuls of something incredible than a full-size serving of anything, this was one dish I'd love to have had super-sized. Or at least just a heaping helping of hare.

And then to dessert. First, following our Mexican dish, a tequila shot.



The shot glass was iced fruit, the sorbet was lemon, the base was macerated strawberries. To be honest, I don't remember whether the tequila was attached to the first, second, or third of these, but it really doesn't matter.

Have I mentioned the silverware? For most of the meal, it was silver, but with dessert we switched to gold.



The next dish made me burst into, if not tears, at least soft sniffles.



The mousse was a tangy yogurt. The seaweed was bread and butter, dyed green and toasted. The mussel shell was white chocolate, delicately painted with silver powder. The coral was white chocolate with (I assume) freeze-dried strawberry.



All that was missing was a teeny tiny pineapple house.

And then we came — sadly — to the final dessert.

An egg.



But of course it wouldn't really be an egg, would it?



Of course not. Chocolate shell, painstakingly painted with metal powders; a coconut custard (tembleque) "white"; and a mango "yolk."



It was a lovely example of taking something simple and making it over in a new image, playing with sensory expectations but making sure the new result had its own internal logic.

And a lovely way to end a three-hour lunch.

When we were finished, chef Guerrero came out again to ask whether we'd enjoyed it. I got a little overwhelmed, and told him, in my broken Spanish, that I was probably going to start cancer treatment again soon (what, I didn't mention?), that I would lose my tastebuds, and that the memory of this meal would support me in the darkest hours. I may have sobbed a little.

(I know, way more demonstrative than usual, but I couldn't help myself.)

Anyway, he smiled, and took both my hands in his, and I think he understood.

There are a million good places to eat in Madrid, and more than a few Michelin-starred restaurants. But if you have three hours to spare for lunch, you really, really should go to El Club Allard.

And I almost forgot to mention the final mini-fryer of olive oil and white chocolate snackettes: