 The brie cheese brulee, served during the cheese course at Blooming Garden’s cheese bar. / Courtesy of SG Dinehill |
By Han Sang-hee
Popular Italian restaurant Blooming Garden opened its latest branch near Cheonggye Stream in Seoul early this month ― a “cheese bar.”
One may wonder if there really is such a demand for cheese in the middle of a newly-built fancy restaurant, but before making any judgment, have a seat.
As soon as you walk into the restaurant, the cheese bar catches the eye ― the seats face the chefs, who prepare cheese dishes to order.
The specialty is the ``cheese course’’ (35,000 won), which is comprised of dishes made with the restaurant’s cheeses and is only available at the bar.
For starters, the chef whipped up simple stuzzichini dishes with mushrooms and celery root, which was nutty with a sweet kick, and pancetta with honey mascarpone.
The mascarpone, an Italian triple-cream cheese made from a special type of sour cream that is also the main ingredient for tiramisu, was light, soft and sweet ― everyone on the table scraped it up to the last bit.
The primo piatto, or the first main course, was one of Blooming Garden’s specialties ― short pasta with four types of cheese and herbs. The pasta was clean and simple, with a creamy cheese sauce that did not overpower the dish.
One of the delights of eating at the bar, aside from the delicious food, was watching the chefs prepare the dishes. They would walk inside and out, sometimes bringing big chunks of cheese and others picking them out from a plastic container in the fridge. Since the chefs are right in front of the customers preparing the dish, the latter can ask and learn more about the cheeses, let alone the dishes, making the experience an educational one as well. The cheese bar currently uses 10 types of cheese, including manchego and burrata.
As the chef prepared the secondo piato, a party of three businessmen ordered the assorted cheese plate (25,000 won), which naturally caught the eyes of others. Unlike other ordinary cheese plates where one gets a few slices of basic cheese and perhaps some slices of jamon or biscuits, the bar’s cheese plate was impressive with five to six types of cheese, chosen by the chef depending on the fruit prepared for the night.
The secondo piatto was a choice between grilled salmon or a New York Cut with Foie Gras, which did not include any cheese items, but still lived up to the bar’s, and restaurant’s, expectations. The desert, cheese marble cake with ice cream and espresso, was a clean and sweet finish, with the vanilla ice cream melting away with the rich and tasteful cheese cake and bitter espresso.
The overall experience was a delight, not only considering the relatively affordable price and highly esteemed reputation of the restaurant, but also the variety of flavors customers get to experience with a single type of food. From sweet, salty to bitter and tangy, the cheese bar offers a little bit of everything, and that may just be perfect for one night.
The Cheonggye Stream branch of Blooming Garden is located inside the Center 1 building near exit 4 of Euljiro 1-ga station on subway line 2. For more information, visit www.bloomingarden.co.kr or call (02) 6030-8962.
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