The Bazaar: Gastronomic Pleasure Palace [CLOSED]

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Side-by-side, we received olives ($10) both traditional, pitted, sliced and stuffed with sweet piquillo peppers and briny anchovy…

…and modern, with a spherified “olive” that hovered in olive oil and burst in my mouth. Despite the novelty of the spherified olive, my favorite was old-school.

My American caviar cone ($9) was practically translucent, featuring a wafer-thin cone slathered with dill cream cheese and topped with bursting salmon roe.

The Organized Caesar ($8) would have been much better if the ingredients were integrated. As it was, some romaine cylinders were piled with grated Parmesan and other romaine was topped with sous vide quail egg. The entire row of alternating components was sprinkled with airy crisps that were supposed to mimic croutons. Overall, the salad just didn’t work.

Brussels sprouts ($8) salad was seemingly simple, but delivered a burst of acidity thanks to lemon purée, sliced green grapes and intensely flavored lemon air.

Crunchy jicama purses contained ($9) creamy guacamole, crispy corn chips and what sure seemed like granules of sea salt.

Ottoman carrot, pine nut and apricot fritters ($7) were inspired, like sweet, more supple falafel embedded on chunky pistachio sauce.

Oven roasted cippolini onions ($8) were outstanding, caramelized until candy sweet and topped with Clementine segments, then plated with sweet yellow passion fruit oil and sweet-acidic Pedro Ximenex vinaigrette.

“Just shrimp cocktail” ($12) “Yeah right” featured pristine shrimp speared with a squeezable vial of tangy cocktail juice and dusted with dill, sesame seeds and aromatic flower petals.

Here’s a close-up of the shrimp cocktail.

Seared black Mission figs were nearly candy sweet on their own, but paired with silky-salty Jamón Ibérico Fermin ($12) and drizzled in sweet Pedro Ximenez reduction, they became almost otherworldly.

Achingly tender braised veal cheeks ($12) were cooked sous vide and served with California orange segments. Sometimes they use Clementines, depending on availability.