Sibling Rivalry

Last Friday night, Jason and I went to Sibling Rivalry for Restaurant Week. It should be duly noted that usually, I hate Restaurant Week - it's an excuse for good restaurants to turn a quick buck and put things like chicken Caesar salad on the prix fixe menu. I also think you never get the full effect of what eating that restaurant usually is because there are mobs of people, service is sloppy, you don't get to taste the chef's trademark style, and I come out feeling cheated and unsettled. But I suppose, overall, it's a win-win situation for everyone - diners get the fancy dining experience at a fraction of the price and restaurants get inflated sales for a week. We went to Sibling Rivalry fully expecting to order off the regular menu and not the prix fixe, Restaurant Week being the push I needed to finally make a reservation. Imagine my delight when we opened the menu to realize that the entire Sibling Rivalry menu was fair game. That's $33.09 for any appetizer, entree and dessert from here.

The concept of Sibling Rivalry is that it has two executive chefs: two brothers David and Bob Kinkead. From the restaurant's website, "Chefs David and Bob Kinkead created a 'dueling' menu that showcases their talents with different interpretations of seasonal ingredients." We ordered mostly from Chef David's side of the menu, although when I read up on both chefs it seems like Chef Bob is the more critically acclaimed chef.

This was the first appetizer, a Morroccan lamb brik with cumin, curried lamb jus and a pickled cucumber and lamb salad. Also, on the plate, a bit random, was some orange sections. Brik is a North African type of fried or baked pastry around some type of filling, usually made with phyllo dough. The lamb filling in this was really, really delicious - savory and spicy, with some raisins thrown in for sweetness. I found the cucumber salad and the orange slices unnecessary garnishes, and would have been satisfied with the lamb brik alone. My only complaint was that dish came out not as hot as it should have been. This would have been delicious if it was piping and had come straight from the fryer.

Ancho Chili steak tartare, with tomatillo salsa, pickled cabbage, a cheese pupusa and avocado and cilantro. The tartare on its own was good but the whole thing really came together when you combined a bite of the cheese pupasa and the tomatillo salsa with the tartare. I liked the dish a lot because I thought putting a Mexican twist to steak tartare was very creative. The cheese pupusa was my favorite part of the whole thing; it's made with masa de maíz, the corn flour usually used to make tortillas and stuffed with cheese but I couldn't figure out what kind of cheese it was.

Seared duck breast, over celery root puree, roasted vegetables and brussel sprouts. The duck was slightly overdone, even after I had asked for it to "err on the side of medium rare" but what I liked the most about this was the celery root puree. This was actually the first time that I had celery root and I loved it! I like the very aromatic and distinct flavor of celery, and it seems intensified in celery root, but also there's a really comforting texture about celery root puree, like mashed potatoes.

Seared jumbo Cape scallops, with Anaheim chile relleno, tomatillo relish, and salsa fresca. This was perhaps an ordering mistake on our part but the flavors of this dish were remarkably similar to the steak tartare. What was weird was that these two dishes were offered by a different Kinkead. Still, despite the repeat in flavor, I really like the scallops, which were cooked to perfection and the chile relleno. They coated the Anaheim chile with panko crumbs which gave it a great texture.

Caramel chocolate mousse cake with caramel crème anglaise and white chocolate mousse. This was by far the worst thing we had all night, trite in concept and strange tasting. I think they put star anise in it, which gave it this really bad aftertaste.

Bread pudding with vanilla ice cream and some kind of berry reduction underneath. This was better than the chocolate mousse but same deal - a chef's dessert, an easy play. Ho-hum.

Overall, I think Sibling Rivalry was good but nothing remarkable compared to other New American restaurants in its price range. I think our experience was also downgraded by the fact that it was Restaurant Week: the whole place was so loud we could barely hear each other, it took a long time for our food to arrive and everyone seemed harried and rushed. I think (hope) that dishes would have come out hot instead of lukewarm had the place not been a madhouse. Service was friendly but also a little overeager - our waiter proclaimed himself a "total foodie" but a quick check on Wikipedia showed he was wrong on a few accounts. I didn't find this as much of an issue as the fact that at some point he propped down and sat next to me in the booth during dinner.