Foraged

Baltimore's restaurant scene has definitely upgraded since I moved away. Coming home, I've found a few real gems in this city. The best one so far has been Foraged. 

Foraged emphasizes local food prepared in the best possible way, with creative techniques and thoughtful ingredients. I have been wanting to try the place for months, but life just kept happening. We were finally able to get away for a spell this week and were able to visit!

The first thing you notice upon entering is that the space is quite small. The tables are mostly of two, and are quite close together. 

The menu is also small, but well thought and everything prepared carefully.

We started with some of their sourdough focaccia, served with whipped butter and radishes. The bread was so fresh, salty, and pungent with sourdough flavor. It's the kind of bread that I, as an amateur baker, dream of making. 

We also had the leaf lettuce salad, with radishes, goat cheese, and the most wonderful lemon vinaigrette dressing. The salad was fresh and perfect with its simplicity. 

It was our anniversary, so we decided to live it up and get their most sumptuous main dishes -- the duck breast and grassfed sirloin. Honestly, even if you aren't celebrating any particular thing, celebrate that you are eating in this fantastic place. 

The duck breast was served medium rare, with a bean ragu and dots of lardon and celery root. The vegetable portion of this dish was just as stunning as the meat, and the duck was fabulous. 

The grassfed steak was presented on a bed of braised cabbage -- an unusual choice, but that's what makes this restaurant special. The use of surprising ingredients combined with a skilled kitchen and professional waitstaff makes this place a real find in a world filled with so much ennui and ingredient snobbery.

The steak was so juicy -- cooked to a perfect medium rare. The flavors of the hominy polenta with the braised cabbage created a perfect dish and changed the normal steak and starch dinner to something distinctive. 

Of course, I had to try their desserts! The dessert I chose was a plated brownie ice cream sandwich with homemade vanilla ice cream and preserved cherry. Now, normally, I can't stand cherry stuff, particularly those pickled cherries with which shops love to ruin perfectly good sundaes. However, this preserved cherry was a perfect little tart flavor to balance against the chocolate. 

This sandwich was like the birthday treats of our childhood. Served with homemade whipped cream and chocolate shavings, it was evocative of both times past, but also grown up and sophisticated. 

The apple cake with brown butter caramel and homemade whipped cream tasted like fall homecoming church potluck in West Virginia. In fact, I think this dessert should be re-named West Virginia in October, as the apple cake flavor with butter reminded me so much of eating apple cakes made by my grandmother. Again, I don't know that any potluck would come close to the skill and flavor of this cake, but it was incredible to have it tied to a memory. 

At the end of every meal, you get cookies! Buttery, soft miniature chocolate chip cookies served in an oyster shell make you want to come back just to get more!