Red Ox Inn Take 2

I had the pleasure to visit Red Ox Inn again recently and got the chance to try a few new dishes from there.We went on an evening when it wasn't busy, but I still recommend reservations to make sure you get in at the time you want.

For those who have never been to Red Ox Inn, it's a cozy restaurant south of the city that sits about 30 people. They have amazing International cuisine there and are well known in the city for their consistently mouth-watering food and quality service. Our most recent experience there was absolutely no exception to this and in a few ways, was better than the first time! Read my first post on Red Ox Inn here.

We started our evening with two appetitzers, the Pork Belly and Smoked Salmon.

Smoked Salmon

Smoked Salmon with celery root remoulade, everything cracker, and cavier. Pretty presentation as well. Seeing that everything, except the cracker was raw, the appetitzer was fresh, fresh, fresh. Even though I love cooked or raw salmon, I am not a big smoked salmon nor salmon cavier fan mainly because of the strong fishy taste. This appy however, was so fresh and  nicely complimented by the celery route, cracker and pickle that all the flavors were well rounded. The smoked salmon/caviar ratio to the rest of the appy was also just right so there was no overwhelming fishy flavor to deal with.

Pork Belly

Our second appy was the Pork Belly with spring asparagus, peas and buttermilk vinaigrette. As the name implies, it's pork meat from the belly area - basically a very fatty piece of meat. I am not a fan of layered fats on meat. I'll enjoy salmon where the fat is spread throughout the filet or fatty marbled beef but I will peel off chicken skin, the fatty bits from Chinese BBQ pork and other similar fatty layers on other meats. I have come to understand and occassionally enjoy the aromas and deliciousness of the fat but I still cannot get over the texture and what your body does with it once you eat it. Had I seen the appy before ordering, I probably would've opted for something else. For some reason, it didn't register to me that Pork Belly was going to be a fatty aromatic slab of pork and fat. lol

But we dove in and my verdict is....it was delectable! I felt so guilty eating all of it though. The buttermilk vinaigrette had mint it in and reminded me of Happy Planet's Somerset Garden Pea Soup which was a very good thing. Happy Planet makes healthy calorie-conscious organic soups and so having the vinaigrette taste similar to the soup made me think the appy had this healthy component to it. Silly yes, but what's certain is the vinaigrette along with the veggies offset the fatty pork belly.  I am glad we ordered the smoke salmon which is a lighter fare and something heavier, for good contrast.

Tortelini

Third appetitizer- Tortelini is not actually an appetitizer at all. Our waitress who very observant and asked us at the start of dinner if we were there for a special occasion to which we said yes. She then surprised us with a third "appetitizer" and gave us each half a glass of white wine. Both on the house. The Tortelini with YukonGold Stuffed Pasta, pecorino, scallions, and procini is like my dream pasta dish. It was availabe as an entree offering but they sized down the portions here.

This Tortelini was incredible. I've tasted pasta dishes with sweet cream sauces before but none of them were memorable. The sweetness in the sauce came from the corn and the procini added an earthy flavor and lovely funghi texture which all melded very well with the pecorino. I didn't think I'd like this unconventional pairing of flavors. The night was only getting tastier and tastier.

Duck Breast

 There was definitely a lag between our appetitizers and main courses. I would say probably a good 45 mintues. I believe the lag was delibrate as our waitress knew we were there for a special occassion. We ordered the Duck Breast and it is lightly smoked duck breast (cooked just below medium unless requested otherwise), couscous, apples, Vadouvan. The duck was just as good as we remembered it the first time - juicy and tender. There are a few differences. Namely the no goat cheese but there are apples and interestingly, the menu says couscous but there was none and I got gnocchi instead. No matter, I enjoyed it just as much and might have prefered gnocchi over couscous.

Lamb

I am convinced Red Ox Inn can make me eat anything (edible). Our other entree was the Lamb - lamb rack, falafel, yoghurt and carrot puree. The falafel and yoghurt together really stood out for me. The shape of the falafel isn't in the form of a wrap. It was rectangular which made it easy to cut it into pieces. I didn't care for the rest of the garnish and vegetables but the meat on the lamb rack was falling off the bone. More tender juiciness! I'm not a fan of lamb but I will readily have this as my entree had they run out of everything else that night.

We do have a comment on the lamb though and that is there wasn't enough meat on the rack. I was not aware of this until we recapped all the food for this post and as a result, the portions were off balance compared to the vegetables, garnish and our Duck Breast entree.

Meyer Lemon Parfait

We just couldn't finish the last course with ONE dessert. That's right, we ordered TWO. And we were eager to hit the gym the following weekend after such indulgence. This is the Meyer Lemon Parfait - shortbread, grapefruit and white chocolate. The white chocolate are the two flat pieces on top of the dessert. The cylindrical shape is something like frozen lemon custard and the yellow oval shape to it's right is lemon sorbet. The frozen custard was underwhelming as there wasn't much flavor to it. I think that's the point but overall the dessert wasn't quite lemony enough.

The parfait fell flat for us. There was something missing in the flavor. I didn't recall what exactly was supposed to be in the dessert when we ordered it but now that I'm looking back I realized on the menu it says shortbread and there was no shortbread. I am willing to bet that the dessert would've tasted better with some doughy compliments as it's supposed to be a parfait!

Chocolate

Our evening couldn't have ended in a sweeter note than with the Chocolate - chocolate brownie, caramel ganache, chocolate mousse, brown butter praline. I would have this as my birthday cake every year if I could. I have yet to find the right word to describe what the Chocolate is. My best description for it at this point is that it's a perfectly balanced chocolate brownie and mousse dessert. There's enough cookie and crunchy to keep every spoonful interesting and the mousse is ever so smooth, rich yet not overly so with the brown butter praline. This little "cake" is every bit as rich as it is light that even after a full meal, you'd be able to have this. 

I am happy to conclude our second visit to Red Ox Inn was beyond pleasant. Kudos to our waitress for being professional, friendly, attentive and surprising us with some complimentary wine and tortelini. The food was delicious as we expected with a few minor hiccups. My only persistent comment is the Meyer Lemon Parfait that seemed to be missing the shortbread.

My favorites from the evening are the Tortelini, Duck Breat and Chocolate. Second to these would be the two appetizers - things that I normally wouldn't choose to eat that turned out to be so yummy. We will be back to turn more!