Thursday, August 16, 2012

SALADY

My Chick Food Supper Club met last night at ChaChah, a Nashville original restaurant founded by culinary extraordinaire and Top Chef Contestant Arnold Myint. We were women on a mission: to try Patti Myint's famous House Salad. Patti, Arnold's Mom, used to serve this salad at International Market which is her restaurant across the street, where Arnold learned the trade. Now he owns three restaurants in town, and ChaChah is the only place to get this legendary, off-the-menu tastebud explosion.

Leslie nominated this one for our our next adventure after our last Supper Club meeting. You have to have reservations for this for at least 4 people and the whole table has to be in on it. We chose beef and shrimp for our meat selections, she reserved our spot and we were in.

Once everyone had washed her hands, we sat down to admire the bountiful spread before us. I don't think I have ever eaten a more colorful supper:




We were all pretty excited that Patti herself was there to guide us on our journey, and obliged our requests for a photo op or two:



She gave us our marching orders and stood watch while we dived in. The instructions are to get one of everything and ONLY one of everything. One tiny piece of carrot, one single peanut, one sliver of pickled garlic, one tiny wedge of lime, one leaf of basil and on and on. I was impressed that some of the ingredients are grown on-site. You top it with the meat of your choice (never two meats at the same time) and some of the delicious sweet chili sauce. The hard part, however, is not the assembly, which was pretty hilarious in and of itself: "Oops, I got two peanuts!" "Can you pass the lemongrass?" "Who dropped a lime in the mango?" The HARD part is getting the entire thing in your mouth at once. But that's the whole point! That's why all the ingredients are so small. Patti cheered us on: "Keep going! Eat the whole thing! Eat it all in one bite!" Once it all hits your mouth, it's a flavor explosion like no other. I like the way this writer explained it: "The crunch of the peanut needs the give of the cellophane noodle. The sweetness of the pineapple needs the sting of the garlic. The warmth of the meat sets off the coolness of the mint. Each bite is a compact anthology of flavors, textures and temperatures."

Here's an up-close peek at exactly what we were working with:


Patti encouraged us to eat, eat, eat, and when we were full, "go run up the hill and come back." No one decided to take her up on that offer, but we did stuff ourselves with bite after bite. When we asked Patti where she came up with this dish, her reply: "My family likes vegetables!"


We were pretty pleased with ourselves and toasted to our fun night. This one will be hard to top.

4 comments:

  1. That looks amazing!! What a neat experience!

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  2. This is such a great idea! So, I've been a blog stalker for a while. I relocated to Nashville recently and I'm seriously considering inviting myself to your supper club. Want to invite a perfectly normal almost-30 working mom to join?

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  3. Looks delish & beautiful!

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Oh goody!

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