Pricey Imports
At Adour, the food doesn't always live up to the out-of-town pedigree

By Tom Sietsema
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, December 14, 2008

It's tough to be a chef in a luxury restaurant right now. Even among consumers with fat paychecks and big bank accounts, there's not much appetite for white truffle dinners or $300 bottles of Burgundy. Indeed, when colleagues are being laid off, stock portfolios are plummeting and budgets are being slashed, it looks gauche to be ordering high on the hog. And when a lot of us think about going out to eat, it's the little guys, not the well-financed imports, we want to support.

Julien Jouhannaud has his work cut out for him. Surely by now you've heard about the 29-year-old talent and his world-famous boss, Alain Ducasse, the Frenchman with an armful of Michelin stars in his portfolio and restaurants scattered around the globe. Ducasse, in partnership with the newly renovated St. Regis hotel, installed Jouhannaud, a protege who last worked in Singapore, in the kitchen of Adour at the St. Regis. Its launch in September was yet another feather in the city's restaurant cap -- Wolfgang Puck and Eric Ripert having already sent acolytes here -- and arguably the biggest dining headline of the year.

I have good news and a few lumps of coal to deliver. Adour, which takes its name from a river in southwest France and boasts a well-received sibling in New York, is a handsome place to spend a few hours. One of its best dishes, an entree of olive oil-poached cod, costs $25, a relative bargain at dinner. The wine list, put together by Ramon Narvaez, late of Marcel's in the West End, yields a drinker's dream. Sensitive to both quality and value, the sommelier has assembled labels that embrace France, including some of its lesser-known appellations, but also promote the United States. And it's possible in this rich enclave to find something exciting for less than $40 a bottle.

The bad news? Some of the young chef's dishes are restrained to the point of austerity, and others lack the close attention their good ingredients deserve. You'll taste what I mean early on. Like many chefs, Jouhannaud sends out a little nosh to whet guests' appetites. But those treats that I've sampled -- ordinary squash soup, cold brandade (a pureed salt cod) -- have been unimpressive.

Yet there's nothing about Adour's hamachi appetizer to pick apart but the raw fish itself. It's a gorgeous pink round of thick-cut fish that picks up flavor from its cucumber-vinegar marinade and a light application of olive oil, lime and Espelette (dried red pepper) on the surface. Radish curls set off the top; a perfect L of apple mustard decorates the plate. Priced like an entree at $19, the raw fish dish could serve as a light main course.

Just as lush is a salad of chilled lobster medallions arranged with ribbons of shaved vegetables. Anointed with a mushroom vinaigrette, the assembly is an edible bouquet.

Some dishes stimulate the eye more than the tongue. Adour's Vegetable Composition, for instance, captures every diner's attention when it comes to the table. "It looks like a little city!" a colleague gushes, and she's right: The carrots, beets and assorted green vegetables (the mix changes with the seasons) are erected on their plate as if they were miniature skyscrapers. Never has a salad looked more like a metropolis. Yet the urban garden tastes faint.

The biggest disappointment among the openers is the ricotta gnocchi. Big and dull, the dumplings are dressed with a pane of crisp prosciutto and sauteed lettuce, the last element something of a fad among chefs these days.

Unlike with the first courses, meat makes the best impression among the entrees. One plate brings together lusty short ribs and beef tenderloin. "Sweetbreads are a good test" of a kitchen, a discerning French guest announces when she spots them on Adour's menu. They are, and the organ meat served here is textbook-perfect: puffy and custardy and framed in buttery chanterelles. Crisp bars of roseate Muscovy duck breast would be my favorite main course, save for the thin and watery polenta served to its side in a little black casserole. (Side dishes, including the porridgelike quinoa with Adour's rack of lamb, tend to detract from, rather than flatter, the centerpieces.)

In comparison, fish dishes reveal more sinkers. Steamed halibut is woefully dry, set against a background of green asparagus and green beans that emphasizes its starkness. Scallops are damp and without much flavor, dragged down further by a too-sweet drift of white vegetable puree on their plate.

But I relish the simple sophistication of that $25 cod, made regal here with extra-virgin olive oil and a swirl of silken roasted peppers. It's an entree I first tasted at Adour in New York and was pleased to meet up with again, closer to home.

My favorite desserts are French classics. Pastry chef Fabrice Bendano sends out an impressive green apple souffle that summons an orchard in every bite and a tender baba au rhum that gets its kick from a little pitcher of Armagnac on the side. Split at the table, the warm yeast cake is further lavished with tufts of fresh whipped cream. No matter how much you've eaten, the gratis sweets presented on a plate at meal's end tempt you to polish them off. The macaroons and house-made chocolates are of the style sold in Paris's top patisseries.

Ducasse isn't the only name that gets dropped here. David Rockwell, the acclaimed New York architect and designer, was brought in to rethink the space, at one time the home of the grand Lespinasse. Wisely, Rockwell kept the baronial ceiling. Otherwise, Adour leaves the past in the dust. White leather chairs tuck into white tables, three plush alcoves create intimacy for their lucky occupants, and the front and back of the room plug the restaurant's wine theme with glass walls of wine, the bottles lying on their sides in temperature-controlled splendor. Speaking of which, wines here are opened and previewed away from the tablein semi-open decanting stations. It's a new breed of luxury restaurant, free of excessive pomp, circumstance and rules. Narvaez allows guests to try the majority of his inventory by the glass (just divide Adour's bottle price by four).

One nit: It takes so long to walk from your table to the bathroom, situated past the lobby in the depths of the hotel, that you'll miss out on not only a dining partner's joke, but also the punch line and the joke after that. I've been tempted to sprinkle baguette crumbs on the path to make sure I return to my companions.

The staff is correct, cordial and engaging. When I choose tap water over the bottled variety, my server responds with a smile and a nod. "Chateau Potomac!" Filling most of the seats: the kind of men and women you typically spot in the pages of the city's glossy social magazines (and a lot of mature yet unlined faces).

Adour looks and feels like a special place to eat. Thoughtful touches -- warm gougeres to start, movable armrests on the banquettes -- demonstrate a desire to pamper. And if you order right, Adour can live up to the drumroll that preceded it. But I've always left the gilded setting hungry for more from the kitchen -- more finesse in some cases, more flavor in others -- and prouder of the homegrown stars who already light up the scene.