Chicago’s Most Coveted Reservation: Next

Monday, July 11th, 2011 - 4:08 pm - Travel Articles

Chef Grant Achatz has made quite a name for himself, dazzling the culinary world with his theatrical creations at Alinea, hailed by many critics as the best restaurant in the country (read our review of Alinea here). It was therefore with no small measure of excitement that Chicago greeted the news that Achatz planned to open a second restaurant: Next.

This new venture, set in a formerly gritty warehouse district west of the Loop, didn’t follow in Alinea’s futuristic footsteps. Instead, Achatz chooses an inspiration for a set menu, serves the menu for three months and then moves on to an entirely new culinary theme. His first theme, “Paris, 1906 – Escoffier at the Ritz,” drove the media into a minor frenzy. Reservations became extremely difficult to secure — the website of this 16-table restaurant received 1,000,000 hits in one eight-day period, according to its Facebook page.

The Escoffier menu may have been reactionary, but the reservation system is unquestionably progressive. Instead of making reservations, one purchases tickets from the website, as if for an opera (or, more accurately, a blockbuster rock concert). These non-refundable tickets include the price of the meal, tax, gratuities and, if one so chooses, wine pairings.

Even those lucky enough to obtain tickets won’t be able to experience “Paris, 1906,” a menu based on recipes in Auguste Escoffier’s monumental “Le Guide Culinaire,” the bedrock of French haute cuisine. A Thai-inspired menu started July 8. But a description of our recent experience with “Paris, 1906” can at least provide an idea of what to expect:

Well-chosen wine pairings. Selections ranged from the decadent, such as the Récoltant-Manipulant Vincent Carré Brut NV Champagne, to the deliciously obscure, such as an oxidized, sherry-like 2005 Domaine de Montbourgeau from the Jura.

With the upcoming Thai menu, the beverage pairings will include beer, wine, spirits and punches, but a reserve pairing will reportedly be available for those interested primarily in wine.

Lush cuisine and gorgeous presentations. The first course of “Hors d’Oeuvres” was a trove of jewel-like bites arrayed on a silver charger, including a seemingly hard-boiled quail egg with an incomprehensibly liquid yolk, topped with a sliver of anchovy and bits of tarragon and chervil (a clever canapé rendering of the classic Sauce Gribiche).

The “Sole Daumont” looked like a giant crème brûlée crowned with a crayfish head, but the saffron-infused cream sauce and meltingly delicate sole roulade tasted superb.

The “Caneton Rouennais à la Presse” recipe requires an antique duck press, the likes of which we have seen only in the kitchens of the Hofburg in Vienna. Procuring a press paid off — the duck and its Cognac-spiked sauce were magnificently flavorful.

Precision service with bone-dry humor. A number of servers worked our table and, as at Alinea, they each exhibited a strong knowledge of the food or wine they presented. We also noticed that the staff controls every aspect of the restaurant, including the movements of patrons. It was impossible to leave the table without an escort. A dining companion started walking toward the restroom, when a server intercepted him from behind. “May I help you? Are you looking for the restroom?”

Our dining companion turned around, and said, half-jokingly, “You appeared as if from nowhere.”

“Yes,” the server replied pensively, “I am like a ninja. I’ll take you to it.” None of us who attempted to sneak off to powder our noses could escape the restroom ninja.

After we finished the last of the “Mignardises,” a server offered us a kitchen tour (a clever way to prevent diners from lingering). Inside the strikingly quiet kitchen, the expeditor showed us our ticket, which recorded — to the half-minute — how long we took to finish each course and how long we waited to receive the next one. The precision was startling.

We thoroughly enjoyed our experience at Next, which lives up to its reputation as one of this country’s great restaurants. But we wish the staff would come up with a system that makes obtaining reservations more a stroke of luck, rather than a miracle.

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