RICHARD FRISBIE :: Dinner With Chef Kevin McCarthy

the view of a scarred Whiteface Mt. from nearly every vantage at Lake Placid Lodge

Lake Placid Lodge is a brand-new expanded version of the original lodge that burned down a few years back. Everything is made to look old, or to evoke a feeling of age, but the new construction allowed all the modern amenities to be seamlessly incorporated. It is a handsome, functional and very user-friendly collection of buildings.

We stayed in the room called Racquette, one of six suites made from what was nine rooms in a three-story building adjacent to the main lodge. In all, there are 30 residences that can accommodate from one to eight people each. Here, children over twelve and well-behaved dogs are welcome. It is very family friendly, but we were there for the food.

the view of Whiteface Mt. from out diner table

After being seated for dinner, the waitress told us that Chef Kevin (McCarthy) would cook for us. Was there anything we wanted? I replied "we will eat whatever Chef Kevin wishes to prepare!" (I love to do that!) We wisely left the wine pairings to the excellent sommelier, Christian Lacombe, whose wine cellar I'd explored earlier. It is amazing! At 3500 bottles he feels it is about one third completed. (The fire completely destroyed the original cellar, too.) The meal proceeded with my companion (EWL) and I being served different dishes for some of the seven courses, accompanied by almost as many wines. WOW!

We were served a first course of cream soup. Mine was corn with tarragon, very good, but we both preferred the cauliflower EWL was served. Christian poured a dry, fruity smooth 2005 New York Riesling from Heron Hill in the Finger Lakes. I love Finger lakes Rieslings! It worked with the cream soups and the next course too. For that, EWL had one jumbo shrimp served in a pea couli. I had a pan seared divers scallop on leeks in what my mother would say "are you sure that's done?" bit of perfection. I loved that the chef cooked, or, rather, didn't overcook our food.

Next was a steelhead trout so red I thought, at first, that it was salmon. Christian brought a French wine, a Sancerre, slightly dryer but similar to the Riesling, which was strong enough to hold its own with the trout on the tender asparagus tips. The flavors were so elegantly subtle that the asparagus, as mild as it was, was the strongest. We were really having food and wine pairings that made my tastebuds work overtime. I was in heaven!

Christian signaled a change in the menu with a Landmark 2007 Chardonnay. I didn't know what to expect to find in the covered dish to match this full-bodied fruity flavor, we'd already had two fish courses.

Imagine my surprise to find sweetbreads swimming in a buttery cream of chanterelles. There was an excess of silky-smooth and rich comforting flavors and aromas coming from the white knotted gland on the caramel-colored fungi. I could have eaten only this course and been satisfied, but I knew it was a transition dish, and heavier food was coming, so I didn't ask for more.

We were seated outside on the deck overlooking the lake. As twilight set in and the clouds crossed Whiteface Mt. in the distance, we paused in our feast to take pictures. The light was as delicate and sensuous as the flavors of our dinner. Nightfall brought the arrival of a substantial red wine, a Twenty Bench Cabernet Sauvignon with its full dark fruity flavor over a bit of oak, smooth, begging to be drunk. We returned to dining as a mystery and quite inferior wine was served along with perfectly rare beef pieces, tender on a bed of summer cucurbits.

It seems Christian was playing with us, pouring that red after we'd agreed that the Finger Lakes didn't generally produce red wines to match the quality of their award-winning whites. It proved his point perfectly. We happily went back to the Twenty Bench, it worked wonders with the red meat.

By this time the restaurant was getting busy so the chef had to cease this game we were enjoying. A final course, dessert, arrived to our regret, until we tasted it, that is. How the simple ingredients of the individual apple-blueberry crisps topped with a dollop of vanilla ice cream could combine to such perfection I don't know. It was as if the whole series of dishes rose to this pinnacle, and left us poised, almost sated, at the end of the meal. Christian saved the best for last, serving a creamy smooth Long Island Cabernet Port, 2003 Pindar, to ease us from the euphoria of dinner into the gentle night beyond. Our dinner by Chef Kevin had ended.

Lake Placid Lodge
144 Lodge Way Lake Placid, NY 12946
(877) 523-2700
Lodging $950 (plus tax) includes breakfast
Dinner $239.00 (plus tax and gratuities)

Richard Frisbie, FOOD Correspondent:

RICHARD FRISBIE is published twice a month to Gather Essentials: Food. It is a food junkie's take on growing, raising, preparing and - above all else - eating food. Together we?ll explore the trends, addictions, equipment and regional specialties that make up the sometimes mundane and sometimes sublime cooking and dining experience. You can keep up with my other postings and Gather activity by joining my Gather network -- I look forward to hearing from you.

You can read all of my articles  http://rfrisbie.gather.com/ or find them with those of the other Food Correspondents, plus celebrity chef content and plenty of other Foodies at  http://foodtalk.gather.com

BIO - Richard Frisbie writes culinary travel articles, is a columnist for his local newspapers, and is a regular contributor to the many Hudson Valley, Catskill Mountain and other regional New York publications. Online, he writes frequent articles for EDGE Publications, GoNomad and Travel Lady, as well as Gather.

JOIN MY GROUPS:

Everything About New York State http://aboutnewyork.gather.com/
Travel/Food/Wine BOOK Reviews http://tfwbookreviews.gather.com/

Food Videos Forum http://foodvideos.gather.com/
Join to see some of the kitchens and techniques you read about here at Gather

BLOG - http://www.bloglines.com/blog/rfrisbie

Where some of my Gather work and other things, primarily about New York State, appears.

BOOKSTORE - Specializing in New York State books since 1959 http://www.hopefarm.com