Roy's: Downtown L-Lei
So, the moment had finally arrived that Cakegrrl and I were to enjoy a free meal at Roy's Downtown. That's free as in pro bono, gratis, zilch...you get the picture, because I took the pictures. We arrived with a shower of muted fanfare, our table was ready and being held despite the throngs of business people who just poured out of their skyscrapers itching for a couple of Mai-Tais and some Pacific Rim grub.
That was very thoughtful, we nodded, but decided to have a quick drink at the bar to build our appetites. One Kona Fire-Rock Pale Ale and a vanilla Stoley-Diet Coke with a cherry later, we were escorted to our expansive four top to start our banquet. It was thoughtful for them to give us a four-top since we, like most foodwriters in this city and others, would be whipping out our digital Elphs and snapping all angles of the food, closeups, with and without flash, fast ISO speeds and ten thousand shaky and underexposed pictures that would be deleted upon viewing.
If you've noticed lately, the quality of my pictures has declined. This is not because I've lost my skill -as if I ever had any- its that I've been eating at places that insist on using less and less candelas to light their restaurants. Maybe its the energy crisis, or maybe it casts a romantic mica glow, but it does have a depleting effect on the quality of snapshots.
So, what to get from our fair and generous benefactor? Well, first, to avoid wrecking the continuity of the food discussion, I'll take some elements out of chronological order...mostly to get them out of the way. We met with the managing partner Matt Dochin and Executive Chef Curtis Mar, at different times. Matt was young, laid back, and obviously had a passion for Roy's cuisine. He was from Hawaii, and had worked in a few Roy's establishments before coming out here to open the Downtown location. Curtis was also young and passionate, but didn't take himself too seriously, he obviously had fun coming up with his own mixes and interpretations of Hawaiian fusion. He also confirmed that about 1/3 of the seafood sold at this Roy's was purchased from Santa Monica Seafood. It all gets back to Santa Monica Seafood (re: the Water Grill and every other Seafood restaurant in LA visible to the naked eye).
The key thing to remember is that these are individual partnerships, so they are required to carry Roy's Signature dishes (designated by a stylish R next to the menu item), but they are free to introduce as many of their own creations free from the bonds of Mr. Yamaguchi's directives. Trust me, Mar's dishes were top notch, but Yamaguchi didn't get where he is today by making mediocre food. His signature dishes rock.
My first experience at Roy's, now that I'm on a self-indulgent caveat, was on the Big Island. Light and airy, the lunches we had were bold, different, heavy on tropical and local ingredients and unforgettable. The Roy's on the mainland tend to be different, more cosmopolitan.
You won't find an overwhelming tropical decor, you'll find small elements, but mostly you'll find modern and comfortable surroundings that fit very well in an urban environment.
But why belabor the point? You want to hear about the food. We got a few representative appetizers.
Oh, and I'm doing this from memory, so if her account differs from mine...hers is more accurate.
We started with some nigirizushi, Tai (Japanese Pacific Snapper) and my favorite dessert, Unagi.
Snapper I have always found to be rubbery, like a shoe insert, and chewy, like rubber. This met my expectations. The flavor was fresh but it suffered from the textural challenges of snapper.
Now this was a generous portion of buttery, sweet eeel. With three e's. This was the largest nigirizushi of eel I've ever had, topping some eel and rice bowls I've had at Mitsuwa. The unagi sauce was sweet, dense and complex, and the texture was perfect. What a great dessert (what? Don't you save your eel for dessert?).
Onto some more serious appetizers. I ordered the Oysters Rockefeller with Lup Cheong
and Uni Bearnaise.
They look inviting and colorful, and didn't have a half bad flavor, although I can't say it was my favorite combination. The brine of the oysters definitely played off the creamy sweetness and slight sour drizze of the condiments. Not bad, but I prefer traditional Rockefeller.
Cakegrrl got the most disappointing dish of the night, which should have been the most anticipated. Lobster potstickers which tasted neither like pot, stickers, nor lobster. The whole mess was obscured by a sickly sweet coating of, sickly sweet stuff. The coating was absorbed entirely through the potstickers rendering everything the same flavor. Simple Syrup. I couldn't discern one unique flavor in the whole cacophony, certainly not lobster.
Ok, so there was one misfired dish, can't win 'em all, I don't expect everything to be perfect. Hell, even Keller's lamb dish blew up in our face, so there ya go.
Next came the entrees, which I can say without fear of rebuttal were fantastic. I ordered the fish combo, a Yamaguchi Signature, comprised of macadamia encrusted mahimahi and a lemongrass coated shutomi (swordfish) with Thai peanut sauce.
Of the two, I liked the mahi, mostly for sentimental reasons. I had so much good macadamia coated, fillet, crusted, seasoned, stuffed fish on the Big Island, I developed an expensive and nasty addition that I have to feed or I'll collapse with seizures. Or perhaps its the extreme fat content of the macadamias that did it. The sauce was rich, but not overpowering, the mahi was flaky and had just enough macadamia to enhance it with sweet, buttery, nutty flavor.
Swordfish is swordfish, and no matter how you dress it up, it is a tough fish that has the texture of overcooked chicken breast. There's no way around that. I was willing to forgive this piece because it was so flavorful. Topped with a slaw and touched ever so slightly with the peanut sauce, it had a delicate flavor. It was reinforced by a katsu banana. Yeah, I didn't know what it was until I ate some, and it was good. Nothing beats fried banana except maybe a katsu Twinkee.
Her's was better, and I curse her because I was going to order the Lau Lau. 1st dish, seared sea scallop dynamite. 2nd dish, Misoyaki butterfish, and in bowl #3, Korobuta Pork. Oops, transpose the middle dish with the one on the right, now they're in the correct order, butterfish on the end...looking like tenderloin. See? I told you my pictures suck. First, if I may be crass, I wanted to take this pork home and have sex with it. Braised for hours, then intensely smoked for 45 mintues and bathed in a mild green Thai curry sauce, this was some of the best pork I ever wanted to have sex with. I was blabbering so much about the pork, just to shut me up they gave me my own bowl.
The scallop dynamite wasn't like traditional mayonaiss-ey dynamite. It was lightly coated with cream and a mild sauce, so the scallop flavor could shine through. They were also hearty and filling with a bright sweetness exhibited in finer scallops.
Wish I had a closeup of the butterfish, but take what you can get. Butterfish lives up to its name, melting like the Nazi's face at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark. I know I've used that joke before, but if you're looking for Nazi face melting softness, butterfish is your ticket. As a side note, if you get a chance, try butterfish sashimi. This was cooked rare, lending it a soft texture that absorbed the seasoning while keeping a respectful distance from overbearing flavor. The butterfish shined through, to our delight.
I could go on about the butterfish, but I was starting to get weary and a bit full. No, I was pretty damn full when the dual torment of chocolate souffle and bento box was paraded in front of us. I knew I would only be able to nibble though tiny portions of this, so I dove into the souffle first.
It was like a a thick brownie with melted running chocolate flooding out, perched on a tart raspberry reduction that punched a sour counterbalance to the sweetness of the chocolate.
The bento box had a myriad of fruity combinations. Glazed fresh fruit. Vanilla bean ice cream with an undercurrent of chocolate, palmtree cookie perched on top. Tarts, creampuffs, some kind of sour sauce in the middle...none of which I ate. I was too full. But it all looked good.
Here, see?
To sum up, the appetizers were a nice effort, even if the lobster potstickers were a little misguided. The entrees were hearty, surprising, and rushing with flavor. The desserts, from what I gather, looked delicious. I would definitely recommend trying some sashimi and take a shot at one or two of the appetizers, I'm sure the rest are good, but the oysters might not be for everyone. I'm very familiar with Roy's Signature dishes, and you can't go wrong, but the non-traditional entrees looked inviting and ecclectic.
Roy's is located downtown at 800 Figuroa, so parking is a mess, and valet is a ripoff, but what else are you going to do? Walk? I don't think so.
Again, this was a free meal, so you are entitled to say I'm full of crap, but I always present my honest opinions of the food and drink I consume, so you'll just have to trust me on this one. I would say the average cost for a meal with drinks would run about $150 for two people.
That was very thoughtful, we nodded, but decided to have a quick drink at the bar to build our appetites. One Kona Fire-Rock Pale Ale and a vanilla Stoley-Diet Coke with a cherry later, we were escorted to our expansive four top to start our banquet. It was thoughtful for them to give us a four-top since we, like most foodwriters in this city and others, would be whipping out our digital Elphs and snapping all angles of the food, closeups, with and without flash, fast ISO speeds and ten thousand shaky and underexposed pictures that would be deleted upon viewing.
If you've noticed lately, the quality of my pictures has declined. This is not because I've lost my skill -as if I ever had any- its that I've been eating at places that insist on using less and less candelas to light their restaurants. Maybe its the energy crisis, or maybe it casts a romantic mica glow, but it does have a depleting effect on the quality of snapshots.
So, what to get from our fair and generous benefactor? Well, first, to avoid wrecking the continuity of the food discussion, I'll take some elements out of chronological order...mostly to get them out of the way. We met with the managing partner Matt Dochin and Executive Chef Curtis Mar, at different times. Matt was young, laid back, and obviously had a passion for Roy's cuisine. He was from Hawaii, and had worked in a few Roy's establishments before coming out here to open the Downtown location. Curtis was also young and passionate, but didn't take himself too seriously, he obviously had fun coming up with his own mixes and interpretations of Hawaiian fusion. He also confirmed that about 1/3 of the seafood sold at this Roy's was purchased from Santa Monica Seafood. It all gets back to Santa Monica Seafood (re: the Water Grill and every other Seafood restaurant in LA visible to the naked eye).
The key thing to remember is that these are individual partnerships, so they are required to carry Roy's Signature dishes (designated by a stylish R next to the menu item), but they are free to introduce as many of their own creations free from the bonds of Mr. Yamaguchi's directives. Trust me, Mar's dishes were top notch, but Yamaguchi didn't get where he is today by making mediocre food. His signature dishes rock.
My first experience at Roy's, now that I'm on a self-indulgent caveat, was on the Big Island. Light and airy, the lunches we had were bold, different, heavy on tropical and local ingredients and unforgettable. The Roy's on the mainland tend to be different, more cosmopolitan.
You won't find an overwhelming tropical decor, you'll find small elements, but mostly you'll find modern and comfortable surroundings that fit very well in an urban environment.
But why belabor the point? You want to hear about the food. We got a few representative appetizers.
Oh, and I'm doing this from memory, so if her account differs from mine...hers is more accurate.
We started with some nigirizushi, Tai (Japanese Pacific Snapper) and my favorite dessert, Unagi.
Snapper I have always found to be rubbery, like a shoe insert, and chewy, like rubber. This met my expectations. The flavor was fresh but it suffered from the textural challenges of snapper.
Now this was a generous portion of buttery, sweet eeel. With three e's. This was the largest nigirizushi of eel I've ever had, topping some eel and rice bowls I've had at Mitsuwa. The unagi sauce was sweet, dense and complex, and the texture was perfect. What a great dessert (what? Don't you save your eel for dessert?).
Onto some more serious appetizers. I ordered the Oysters Rockefeller with Lup Cheong
and Uni Bearnaise.
They look inviting and colorful, and didn't have a half bad flavor, although I can't say it was my favorite combination. The brine of the oysters definitely played off the creamy sweetness and slight sour drizze of the condiments. Not bad, but I prefer traditional Rockefeller.
Cakegrrl got the most disappointing dish of the night, which should have been the most anticipated. Lobster potstickers which tasted neither like pot, stickers, nor lobster. The whole mess was obscured by a sickly sweet coating of, sickly sweet stuff. The coating was absorbed entirely through the potstickers rendering everything the same flavor. Simple Syrup. I couldn't discern one unique flavor in the whole cacophony, certainly not lobster.
Ok, so there was one misfired dish, can't win 'em all, I don't expect everything to be perfect. Hell, even Keller's lamb dish blew up in our face, so there ya go.
Next came the entrees, which I can say without fear of rebuttal were fantastic. I ordered the fish combo, a Yamaguchi Signature, comprised of macadamia encrusted mahimahi and a lemongrass coated shutomi (swordfish) with Thai peanut sauce.
Of the two, I liked the mahi, mostly for sentimental reasons. I had so much good macadamia coated, fillet, crusted, seasoned, stuffed fish on the Big Island, I developed an expensive and nasty addition that I have to feed or I'll collapse with seizures. Or perhaps its the extreme fat content of the macadamias that did it. The sauce was rich, but not overpowering, the mahi was flaky and had just enough macadamia to enhance it with sweet, buttery, nutty flavor.
Swordfish is swordfish, and no matter how you dress it up, it is a tough fish that has the texture of overcooked chicken breast. There's no way around that. I was willing to forgive this piece because it was so flavorful. Topped with a slaw and touched ever so slightly with the peanut sauce, it had a delicate flavor. It was reinforced by a katsu banana. Yeah, I didn't know what it was until I ate some, and it was good. Nothing beats fried banana except maybe a katsu Twinkee.
Her's was better, and I curse her because I was going to order the Lau Lau. 1st dish, seared sea scallop dynamite. 2nd dish, Misoyaki butterfish, and in bowl #3, Korobuta Pork. Oops, transpose the middle dish with the one on the right, now they're in the correct order, butterfish on the end...looking like tenderloin. See? I told you my pictures suck. First, if I may be crass, I wanted to take this pork home and have sex with it. Braised for hours, then intensely smoked for 45 mintues and bathed in a mild green Thai curry sauce, this was some of the best pork I ever wanted to have sex with. I was blabbering so much about the pork, just to shut me up they gave me my own bowl.
The scallop dynamite wasn't like traditional mayonaiss-ey dynamite. It was lightly coated with cream and a mild sauce, so the scallop flavor could shine through. They were also hearty and filling with a bright sweetness exhibited in finer scallops.
Wish I had a closeup of the butterfish, but take what you can get. Butterfish lives up to its name, melting like the Nazi's face at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark. I know I've used that joke before, but if you're looking for Nazi face melting softness, butterfish is your ticket. As a side note, if you get a chance, try butterfish sashimi. This was cooked rare, lending it a soft texture that absorbed the seasoning while keeping a respectful distance from overbearing flavor. The butterfish shined through, to our delight.
I could go on about the butterfish, but I was starting to get weary and a bit full. No, I was pretty damn full when the dual torment of chocolate souffle and bento box was paraded in front of us. I knew I would only be able to nibble though tiny portions of this, so I dove into the souffle first.
It was like a a thick brownie with melted running chocolate flooding out, perched on a tart raspberry reduction that punched a sour counterbalance to the sweetness of the chocolate.
The bento box had a myriad of fruity combinations. Glazed fresh fruit. Vanilla bean ice cream with an undercurrent of chocolate, palmtree cookie perched on top. Tarts, creampuffs, some kind of sour sauce in the middle...none of which I ate. I was too full. But it all looked good.
Here, see?
To sum up, the appetizers were a nice effort, even if the lobster potstickers were a little misguided. The entrees were hearty, surprising, and rushing with flavor. The desserts, from what I gather, looked delicious. I would definitely recommend trying some sashimi and take a shot at one or two of the appetizers, I'm sure the rest are good, but the oysters might not be for everyone. I'm very familiar with Roy's Signature dishes, and you can't go wrong, but the non-traditional entrees looked inviting and ecclectic.
Roy's is located downtown at 800 Figuroa, so parking is a mess, and valet is a ripoff, but what else are you going to do? Walk? I don't think so.
Again, this was a free meal, so you are entitled to say I'm full of crap, but I always present my honest opinions of the food and drink I consume, so you'll just have to trust me on this one. I would say the average cost for a meal with drinks would run about $150 for two people.
3 Comments:
I am impressed at how I managed to incorrectly identify my sushi appetizer and confuse the parts of your meal. Why? Oh I know now, because you ATE all the mahi mahi before I got another bite of it. I actually think I swore aloud at you upon the revalation. Thanks for a more accurate portrayal of the meal. I took notes and managed to still be factually incorrect ALL throughout my review. I forgot about the extra PORK they gave you. That was kind of hilarious. I felt like a sucker over the potstickers, but ah well, at least they were a gift.
By
cakegrrl, at 9:21 PM
Ah ah ah, I think I cut off a corner of mahi for you. Didn't I? Or was that the Goodyear Swordfish? Compared to other rain-diffusing radials, the swordfish tasted pretty swell. You forgot about the extra pork because of the bacchanal of food swirling around our table. I barely remember the symphony of flavors, hoping you'd publish yours first so I could jolt my memory.
By
Steve Wasser, at 9:32 PM
Yes, I got to try the mahi, but the rest of it seemed to evaporate into thin air before I managed to snag another bite. One thing I also forgot to mention was the miniature footballs of sourdough and ramekin of butter we were both given before we even ordered an appetizer. If they didn't kill us with kindness, they were going to with food I suppose.
By
cakegrrl, at 9:58 PM
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