Red Door

While I had been to Red Door before, it was for a special beer dinner and we ate in the private dining room in the back.  I had never eaten at Red Door for a regular dinner so I thought I would try it out.  I had been to the address previously in its previous incarnation as Duchamp which I really liked.  I also liked the beer dinner that I had attended and I had heard good things about it, including the fact that they have a great courtyard for outdoor dining in the summertime and they do a good brunch, but I will have to find this out at a later date.  As you might expect, with a name like Red Door, the entrance is a big red door.  The dining room however is not red.  It is, in fact very rustic and uses a lot of wood.  There is a hardwood floor and a long wood bar opposite the entrance.  Other than the bar, which uses gray steel bar stools for seating, there is a banquette with a high wooden back to match with the floor and tables.  The walls behind the bar and behind the banquette, as well as the ceiling, are light green, which, I think is what they were in Duchamp.  There is also some antique brick as the wall to the courtyard entrance.  Light is supplied from a window at the front of the bar and hanging lights over the bar and the banquette tables.  Because I was by myself and it is kind of a small space, I decided to sit at the bar and leave a table open for prospective diners.  I decided to start with some Fried Cheese Curds which were served with a Spicy Aioli.  I like cheese curds and do try them frequently, but these were different.  Obviously they were fried and cheesy, but many were unusually shaped and they were some of the lightest cheese curds that I have had.  It was like eating cheese flavored clouds.  The spicy aioli was also very nice.  It was a great texture, not too thick to dip the curds or too thin to stick to them and it had a nice spicy garlic flavor that reminded me of Sriracha which went well with the cheese curds.

My next course, which was also sort of an appetizer really reminded me of Peru.  It was Red Quinoa, which was what reminded me of Peru as it's a staple there, served with Brussels Sprouts and Mushrooms and more Spicy Aioli.  It was crisp, crunchy and very fresh tasting.  While I liked the quinoa and the Brussels sprouts, what really made this dish were the mushrooms, which added the nice savory and earthy flavors that mushrooms bring.  While the vegetables would have been fine as they were, the aioli added some spice and acted as a sauce to tie things together.

For my entree, I went with a Bulgogi Barbecue Short Rib which was served with Housemade Kimchi.  The short rib was tender, although not fall off the bone tender.  While they were tender enough to tear off the bone, I preferred to be a little more civilized and used a knife and fork.  The Bulgogi stuck to the pork and had a nice spicy sweet-sour flavor that you might expect from a barbecue sauce that uses soy sauce, chili paste, ginger and sugar.  The kimchi was funky and spicy and had a nice crispness to it.  It was a good dish that fused American Midwestern and Korean cuisines.

I would normally get dessert after a nice meal out, but Red Door has a  limited dessert menu, they normally serve pie from Bang Bang Pie Shop, but on the night that I went, they had run out and hadn't gotten a delivery.  I left a little disappointed without pie.  While I was disappointed about dessert, I did like the food that I did get and when I return, I will make alternate plans to get dessert elsewhere if I can't get it there.