John and I tried out Bistro 1860 last night. I was sort of breaking my own rule here by visiting a just-opened restaurant too early, before they get their feet under them. This was their first Saturday night service.
We made a reservation for 2 by phone mid-afternoon. Lori was very professional and although she told me they were pretty booked up she managed to snag us a 2-top in the middle room (after asking me if that was okay). I told her I used to work at L&N and was looking forward to checking out the renovated space.
I always loved dining at L&N before, during and after working there; I was always comfortable with the decor the way it was, but the interior has been very nicely transformed. The colors are bright but not too bright, very amenable to dining. The exposed brick walls have (thankfully) been preserved. Prices are very reasonable.
Here is a link to their menu.Most dishes on the menu have a small-medium-large choice or at least a small-large choice. We ordered one app in "small" - a duck confit dish and one in "medium" - a pork belly dish. Lori (I think the same Lori I made the res with) took our order, and let us know the "small" version would be a "bite", so we quickly changed the confit to "medium" size.
We put in our entree orders at the same time we ordered appetizers. I went for the ribeye, frites, poached egg; John opted for the short ribs with sweet potato puree and bacon braised greens.
Service was understandably slow but exceedingly professional at every turn. I noticed that servers other than our own made eye contact, smiled, said "welcome" as we were shown to our table. Our order was taken in a timely manner and drinks were served in a reasonable time, but when 40 minutes had passed after we were seated with no food yet on the table, we asked for bread. Four fresh slices of Blue Dog baguette were brought to us with room temperature butter (I hate cold butter, so that was awesome).
Appetizers appeared soon after. The duck confit strudel was a triumph and visually stunning: puff pastry wrapped around duck and Capriole Farms goat cheese with a sauce of sherry and cream, with tendrils of fried onion for garnish. John's pork belly appetizer was delicious, but we both agreed Dallas McGarity does it better at Marketplace - however, it came with a sweet corn chevre pudding we could have eaten an entire bowl of. Entrees followed with perfect timing, not too long after our app plates were cleared.
My ribeye arrived sliced and done perfectly to the temp at which it was ordered. It came with Japanese mushrooms, frites and a lovely poached egg (not liquid inside but still acceptably soft). I asked for mayo for the frites, but they don't serve mayo (although they did offer to whip some up from scratch! but we didn't want to put them to the trouble). John loved his short ribs and they came with sweet potato puree which was lovely - and we both loved the bacon braised greens.
Dessert was offered, but we were stuffed, so we skipped it this time. Chef Michael Crouch was out and about in the dining room, asking the tables around us how their meal was and offering suggestions. There's a great beer list; since I don't drink wine I can't speak for the wine list but with the Cruvinet up and running I can only assume the wines offered are more than up to snuff. With tip, I believe we came in a hair over $100, that's with two cocktails and two HG beers. We did not take the time to check out the Camel Lounge, the newly renovated bar space upstairs where offices used to be.
Kudos to Chef Crouch and the rest of the crew; we'll be back!
