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How are these dinners different from your standard dining experience? While tasting dinners vary greatly from restaurant to restaurant, there are some usual features. First, the menu and price is typically pre-set, with optional wine or drink pairings for an additional fee. Second, the number of courses served is greater than a typical meal - we’ve seen as many as 21 in one sitting. It is often that these dinners are in a test kitchen or open kitchen environment, so you can see how the dishes are made and ask questions. Third, they are equally about the education behind products and process, as they are about actually eating the food. If the dinner is not in or near the kitchen, then there is normally a brief tableside explanation by the chef as to how the course was prepared. This is an amazing opportunity to see first hand the passion top chefs put into each dish. Finally, many say that tasting dinners allow them to try foods they would not normally order. (I was particularly squeamish to the idea of steak tar-tar until a tasting dinner, now it’s a favorite!) Today opportunities to dine kitchen-side are much more prevalent across the US and in the Tampa Bay area. We dined at St Petersburg’s FarmTable Kitchen and are excited to walk you through the experience. American red snapper atop sticky rice, a ginger garlic yuzu vinaigrette, and nori emulsion. THE EXPERIENCE James Beard Award winner Michael Mina has proven that there is no extreme to thinking outside the box on a very daily level. His inspired work at FarmTable Kitchen can be ������������������������������������������������������������ ability to present three chef’s table experiences per week. The dinner evolved over time, with the roots of the practice stemming from a wine bar with a tasting menu. Now it is reminiscent of Mina’s San Francisco pop-up style test kitchen, pushing chefs (and chefs to be) to their boundaries and to learn through ���������������������������������������������������������������������������� dining aspect of this, combined with the more relaxed involvement-based environment that makes this a special occasion. The night of our reservation, eight attendees met downstairs at the source of all ingredients for the dinner, Locale Market. We were warmly greeted by Marketing Coordinator Rodrigo Mendez, with glasses of bubbles and a tour of the market. It was there that we learned much of the history of the market, ���������������������������������������������������������������� Kitchen’s daily dinners. We were also shown the area where picturesque ���������������������������������������������������������������������������� We were led up to a private room on the edge of the dining area with a single communal table, known as The Chef’s Table. The hanging barn doors were closed and the food preparation and presentation began. As soon as our group of strangers were seated and on our own, conversation amongst us all began immediately. It was a jolly crowd of ���������������������������������������������������������������������� date; two charming visitors from Melbourne, Australia; a food writer and his (most eligible bachelorette) friend. Each course was skillfully crafted by a different in-house chef tasked to make a seasonal dish using nothing but ingredients available in the downstairs market. Most dishes were prepared outside of the room and brought in, however �������������������������������������������������������������������� was quite the presentation. Chef Adam Beckett taught us how to �������������������������������������������������������������������� American red snapper while Chef Sonia Alvarez formed it into a beautiful “deconstructed” sushi roll. The snapper was atop sticky rice, a ginger garlic yuzu vinaigrette, and nori emulsion. We opted for the drink pairings (we couldn’t resist knowing there are two sommeliers on staff), and were presented with perfectly complementary chilled Japanese sake. Next we were served what could be named “the fairy tale of salads” because of its playful and whimsical SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2016 localsDISH 19


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