We close out our chat with Chef Strang by eating our way through his menu. Before we get into the food, if you have suggestions or requests for chefs to be on our Chef Chat, drop a line in the comments and we'll do what we can.
First off, we had his crepe stuffed with chili-pepper shrimp with onions and goat cheese. This enchilada-looking roll was covered in a Southern Comfort and orange beurre blanc infused with a balsamic reduction. Fried basil and sprinkles of spicy Spanish paprika topped it off.
Chef Strang calls this his comfort crepe because it has a nice citrusy flavor coupled with a sweet beurre blanc. There is a nice contrast of the red chili flakes and the buttery buerre blanc that goes well with the pungency of the onions and shrimp.
Next up was his prosciutto-wrapped scallop on top of hash browns. The hash browns were potato hash cooked with Gorgonzola, truffle oil, and saffron. This tasty tower was surrounded by a fresh fruit vinaigrette and balsamic reduction. The fresh fruit used to make the vinaigrette included grapes, strawberries and watermelon.
Chef Strang only serves dry-packed U-10 scallops from Maine. According to the chef, these scallops have no water added so they don't shrink and they sear beautifully.
Because wrapping anything in prosciutto is always the start of a good dish, we continued with a prosciutto-wrapped chicken medallion. However, the chicken was not alone. Wrapped in with the chicken was a healthy hunk of game hen pate butter. This threesome of poultry, pork and pate was served over cornbread and jalapeno waffles and drizzled with a red wine reduction.
Finally, we finished it off with Chef Strang's bacon brownie. Fresh-made caramel served as the moat around this tower of bacon. On top of the brownie infused with bacon bits was a silky chocolate ganache made with bacon fat instead of butter. On top of the ganache sat a scoop of vanilla ice cream. and on top of that were two strips of crispy bacon dusted with powdered sugar.
Because there was no more room on top, a dollop of homemade whipped cream was served on the side.
