kyo-ya Saturday early evening, dinner at Kyo-ya. I read about Kyo-ya here and had to go, but decided I could only go on a special occasion -- "lucky" for me, A. has moved away and so for his first return trip, we went and splurged on the Kaiseki dinner. An $80 menu that is worth every penny. First course, Zensai. On the japanese menu I can make out the characters that in Mandarin are chien tsai which I suppose translates to first course/appetizer. This came in a little laquered box, served on a tray that was our place setting for the remainder of the meal. But once I opened the box, I was stunned. It was an array of tiny things that were so pretty to look at I didn't want to eat it. A small round lime, hollowed out and filled with miso marinated ikura (salmon roe, I think). Two pinwheels of red and white fish cake wrapped around a soft cheese. A marinated pickled sardine wrapped in paper thin layers of daikon and carrot, resting atop a slice of lime. Two chunks of herring roe sprinkled with bonito flakes. A little kite-looking thing on a toothpick with japanese characters and a little bit of some evergreen were placed in the box. The most gorgeous slice of fish cake I have ever seen, in the shape of a bell with a pink handle and a branch of cherry blossoms on the bell. The flavors were incredibly luscious -- the miso in the ikura was intense and only made the oily-ness richer and fuller. Yum. Second course, Sashimi. This was a plate with five small slices of halibut, served with a ponzu dipping sauce. A small pile of diced scallions and a small pile of something pink that I couldn't discern were on the plate and meant to garnish the sauce. A few springs of a tiny flower nestled between some of the fish slices. Each slice of sashimi started with the sweet and sour taste of the ponzu and the crunch and slight spice of the garnishes, and, as you chewed on the fish, slowly gave way to a delicious fleshy salty fish. It was amazing and stunning. Third course. A combination of Uni and Miso on top of a fillet of red snapper. The uni and miso had been mushed up and plasted on top of the fish before broiling. Mmm. A bit of pickled vegetables. Mmm. Fourth course. Tempura. Shiso Leaf, Nori, Lobster. The menu says red ginger but I don't remember any tempura ginger. It must have been on the side. The lobster was in the form of two small fish balls. The tempura shiso and nori were a surprise and were actually quite tasty, and the tempura batter was surprisingly substantial. A green tea flavored flaky salt was provided to sprinkle over the tempura, which the waitress told us was the traditional way that japanese eat tempura, although she would bring us some dipping sauce if we preferred, which we didn't. Fifth course. Beef wrapped papaya with our special sweet and sour sauce. By this point I was starting to feel pretty satisfied with the quantity of food. The papaya was tender and rich, although I wasn't convinced the texture matched well with that of the beef. The meat was served on top of sprouts, and a small salad of thinly julienned daikon and carrot. Their "special sweet and sour sauce" was quite tasty. Sixth Course. Ochazuke. Broiled Musubi in a Delicate Fish Broth. This was a little rice patty, broiled, placed in a broth with a little mound of wasabi on top. I smushed it up and stirred the wasabi in. Dessert. Mizugashi. Refreshing Japanese Jell-o with an Assortment of Sweet Beans. A clear gelatin, slightly sweet but mostly just tasted clear, and beans of all colors inside. Quite strange, it was topped with some little crunchy candies the size of nerds, some were chocolate and some were something else. They were hard and round and we spent some time chasing them around the plate with our forks. Little slices of orange fruit jellies, you know, just like the sunkist kind. Silly looking, I wasn't sure if it was intentional, but it was a good light dessert to cap off the evening. We had some really good sake to go with it, whose names I won't remember and the next time I go to a restaurant I still won't know what to order. I just remember that the first one we got had this description: "Simply the best." So of course we had to order it! I'm a couple hundred dollars poorer but oh, that was so worth it. We're going again and we'll try out the sashimi menu, which is astoundingly expensive to my inexperienced eyes, with four slices of sashimi running about $20. We got there early in the evening but ate for 2 1/2 or 3 hours, and at no time did the place really fill up. Maybe it's more of a lunch place, it's definitely an expense account kind of place. Very, very quiet for a restaurant on a saturday night.

A few weeks ago I went to Otto, one of Mario Batali's restaurants in New York (Washington Square? My geography is not good), apparently on the "cheaper" end of his scale, which I take to mean "really expensive, but not really fucking expensive". It's meant to be a pizzeria-type restaurant, but really expensive. The menu is laid out with a pizza section, a pasta section, and then several sections of antipasti-type dishes. We chose to start with proscuitto, warm olives, and octopus with celery, followed by a pasta dish I can't remember now (some sort of bolognese?) and their pepperoni pizza which has a few different meats on it. The octopus was by far the best thing we ate. The proscuitto was disappointing - $9 a plate meant we got four slices of proscuitto that was only okay. The olives were decent but not amazing. Pasta and pizza was also acceptable but not overwhelming. The highlight of the meal, and the reason I would go back, were the gelato desserts. I can't remember all the details of each dessert, only that they were heavenly. My dessert was an olive oil gelato topped with a swirl of olive oil, a sprinkle of salt, and a couple other flavors including something fruity. A.'s was some obscure-liquor flavored gelato and the only thing I remember is that it had blood orange on it. P. got a simple affogato which was particularly good. So if you ever go -- go light on the food and heavy on the dessert. If I went again, I'd probably get some of the small antipasti and maybe a cheese plate and then go straight to the gelato. The cheese plate looked exciting, P. had gotten it before and it comes with three different sauces.

nadeau from the boston phoenix (not the most reliable source, since i believe he also adored the nightingale in the south end) raved about steve johnson's newest venture, the rendezvous. it apparently opened in november; it's in central sq; and it "offers Western Mediterranean inspired cuisine". johnson was the chef/co-owner of the blue room. enough with the facts, andy, patty, and i checked it out a week or so ago, and had some good eats. andy and i were disappointed the garlic soup wasn't on that evening, but we both started with the "Celery root salad w/apple, goat cheese, pomegranate & green peppercorn vinaigrette". a bit dry, but enjoyable. andy had the "Moroccan-style lamb tagine w/dates, almonds and flagelolets" which he quite liked; patty also liked her escarole salad and "Potato gnocchi w/braised oxtail". i had the "Homemade cannelloni w/cavalo nero, foraged mushrooms, ricotta & sage". as with my salad, i found the cannelloni, while nicely prepared and thought out, to be just a tad bit underpresent, by which i mean that it wasn't bland, but the level of emphatic, savory tastiness was lower than it should've been. maybe a bit more vinaigrette in the case of the former and a bit more salt for the latter would have rectified this. the desserts turned out to be the highlight. much as i like creme brulee, i'm fairly bored of the various flavors in different restaurants (in their case vanilla), so we opted instead for "Apple crostada w/red grapes & honey-lavender ice cream" and "Warm chocolate-hazelnut cake w/cinnamon cream". the latter was particularly memorable. it seems hard to find noteworthy desserts in general, but both of these were palpable hits. in cambridge's (particularly central square's) otherwise mostly food-barren landscape, rendezvous is a nice addition. service was acceptable; decor (it was a burger king before) is a bit undefined and hopefully transitional: it's too spartan to be as homey as its lighting and color would seem to want to suggest. in any case, will def. will be going back; we'll have to see how it shapes up over time.

a couple of crossposts from mailing lists: winnie's december mix, like her others, are full of what i presume are the latest indie bands that i should know. in a lot of ways i feel that now that indie pop has been around for so long so many people are doing the same thing rather than moving forward, and it's becoming easier and easier to reference bands' sounds (e.g. the of montreal track sounds totally like a belle and sebastian ripoff to me). harpsichord, glockenspiel, violin, trumpet, and harmonica seem to be requisite instruments nowadays. as i've said before, i'm on the edge of being able to still enjoy this stuff, but i do still enjoy it, particularly the more wistful tracks (like the jose gonzalez and the national tracks from last time). this time the blissfully moody tracks i loved are the books, gravenhurst, okkervil river, and the rosebuds. each of these had little production details i loved, like the "whoo whoos" in the latter track; and the books' has a bass guitar-centric sound (very pinback style) and bitty beats that i just love. i also liked the kings of convenience track quite a lot. this and the okkervil river track strongly reminded me of matt pond PA who i should listen to more of. i agree that the kathleen edwards track sticks out in the same way the imogen heap track stuck out last mix -- a bit too mainstream sounding. i also thought the baby shambles was a bit too much of a clash ripoff, but maybe that's just me. but it's a good mix, esp. since i've been out of the indie music loop so much lately. i like ang lee's direction, and in brokeback mountain he didn't disappoint. the vibe is much like crouching tiger, w/ gorgeous, hugely expansive scenery providing a backdrop to an intimate story. like that movie, this one also has a beautiful balance of sparse, spaciousness with explosions of energy, an aesthetic that i really, really love. the story could've easily been banal, but it was beautifully restrained, helped hugely by good performances all around and 2 particularly impressive performances by heath ledger (who i knew nothing of and who i just found out is australian) and michelle williams (who i also know nothing about although apparently she was in dawson's creek). all in all a solid 9 out of 10.