Review: Sel de la Terre

 Sel de la Terre (255 State Street, next to Legal Seafoods at the
 Aquarium) is the brainchild of legendary L'Espalier chef Frank
 McClelland, a chef who until now has preferred to work quietly but
 efficiently at his own restaurant. Installing one of his sous chefs (of
 6 years experience) as the head chef, and lending his own wine buyer to
 the restaurant, McClelland has fashioned one of the most exciting new
 restaurant openings we've ever had.

 Sel de la Terre is ostensibly a Provencal restaurant, and while the menu
 does seem to focus on the food of southeastern France, influences from
 elsewhere creep in. It might be more accurate to say that the food is
 country-bistro French, with an emphasis on Provence. The decor, however,
 suggests southern France only in its use of earth tones; it's a very
 comfortable room, formal without "feeling" formal, and they do tend to
 keep in dark.

 The bar area has two approaches and extremely comfortable seating;
 service at the bar was good but perhaps a touch inefficient, though the
 opportunity to try three different kinds of pastis (the signature drink
 of Provence) is hard to beat. A good list of wines by the glass are
 available, though they're taking a bit of a risk in that none of them
 are typical by-the-glass fare.

 I cannot recommend the food highly enough. Everything that came from the
 kitchen was perfect or very nearly so, imbued with just the right amount
 of flavor without being overpowering, flawlessly cooked, and presented
 in a less fussy fashion than is the Boston restaurant norm (as would
 befit a "bistro" atmosphere). The bread basket has a rainbow-like range
 of sliced country breads, served with some pungent but well-chilled
 butter, but accompaniments can also be ordered; a tomato "confit" with
 balsamic vinegar and an extremely peppery young Provencal olive oil was
 a delicious match, and we made our way through the first basket before
 our first courses arrived.

 Small tarts, with olives, tomatoes, anchovies, and herbs, and drizzled
 with balsamic vinegar, were like little saucers of Provence, while an
 intense yet traditional game pate was served with a few cornichons and a
 little coarse-grain mustard.

 Unfortunately, our group also chose narrowly when it came to main
 courses, and so we only tried two: a duck breast with explosively fresh
 mushrooms and the perfect, crispy crust, and an inventive veal
 preparation with a creamy herbed polenta. It was hard to resist stopping
 conversation and devouring the food. It is also possible to order sides
 separately, and this we did; perfectly sauteed spinach with parmesan
 will make even Joanie happy with its silky greenness, and the pommes
 frites (served in a little cone) were well seasoned and easily the best
 fries I've ever had in Boston. They made Aquitaine's fries, previously
 the standard for "real" French fries, look mediocre.

 The cheese course is small (something to remember when ordering), but
 well-selected with some lesser-known cheeses from around France.

 Desserts are from a pastry chef who used to work at the French Laundry
 in Napa Valley, a restaurant often lauded as the best in the country. So
 we had high expectations, and we were not disappointed. Lavender
 pot-au-creme was the aroma of Provence in edible, creamy form, while a
 chocolate "bete noir" was the expected ultra-dense rush of rich
 chocolate (though with a better, more cake-like texture than these
 things usually have), covered with Port-soaked cherries and a creme
 anglaise with little flecks of espresso beans flavoring it.

 Unfortunately, we left before I had the opportunity to try the coffee.
 Next time.

 The wine list is absolutely excellent, mostly French but including a few
 choices from the United States, Germany, and Italy, and not only
 extremely well-priced but priced in a range to encourage
 experimentation. I would encourage people to get adventurous with this
 list, because I saw only three or four stinkers, and there are some
 extremely undervalued wines from obscure corners of France. We had a '97
 Bott-Geyl Riesling "Grafenreben de Zellenberg," an Alsatian white from a
 very ripe year that exhibits a lot of upfront fruitiness right now, but
 is also laced with intriguing mineral notes, and a '95 Peyrassol
 Cotes-de-Provence red (there was a special cuvee name that escapes me at
 the moment) that was sharp and tangy and rough-hewn in the fashion of
 great Provencal wine, and really set off the food. For dessert we had a
 half bottle of Monbazillac, which was smooth and delightful but perhaps
 a bit faint-hearted for the intense desserts (I'd suggest the Banyuls or
 the Muscat-Rivesaltes to other diners).

 All this would be have been a perfect dining experience had it not been
 for the service. The hostess was pleasant, but after that things were a
 disaster, only improving a bit at the end of the meal. We sat, and we
 waited. We're not the kind of people who wish to dine quickly -- rather,
 the opposite -- but the long wait with no acknowledgment at all was a
 little strange. Finally, after nearly ten minutes, a waiter arrived to
 take our water order (sparkling or still). They serve Badoit water, an
 infinitely superior drink to the rancid Evian served most places, and we
 were a bit excited by that. But we _also_ wanted to order some drinks;
 this seemed to be completely out of the question until I physically
 restrained the guy by sliding my chair backwards so he couldn't leave.
 It took three repetitions of every drink order before he got them right,
 and in the end he _still_ didn't get them all right, bringing a
 different kind of martini than the one my wife requested.

 Still, everyone can screw up once, and the restaurant _is_ young. So we
 examined the menus and the wine list, and soon enough our waiter
 returned to take our order. He asked about food, went over it a second
 time to make sure, and disappeared just as I was about to order the
 wine. I figured that a designated wine steward was going to take the
 wine order. No such luck, of course. In fact, despite subtle signals
 (holding the wine list vertically while looking at the waiter) and more
 overt signals (occasionally waving the list in the air at the waiter),
 there was no indication that our wine order was ever going to be taken.
 Meanwhile, we had finished the bread basket, and wanted some more. So
 now, two of us were trying to signal a waiter. No luck.

 _Finally_, our waiter returned (I was actually rising from the table to
 stand in front of him again, which appeared to be necessary) to take the
 wine order. I asked for both bottles at the same time, a standard
 request and not one I've ever had trouble with. We also asked for more
 bread. But 5 minutes went by, and no wine. Then 10 minutes. And
 _then_...our first courses arrived. But still no wine.

 Hoping to yet avoid a scene, we sat still without touching our food and
 looked at our waiter. He looked back. I raised my wine glass. He nodded,
 and disappeared. We started eating. We were half done before we realized
 that there was still no sign of our waiter (or our wine). We stopped
 again, and waited. And waited. And waited. At this point, though the
 restaurant was full of staff, none were walking near our table and none
 were looking in our direction. So I got up again. At this point, our
 waiter emerged from the back, looked at me, and nodded again. He went to
 retrieve the head chef, who apparently has the only key to the wine
 lockers (odd, in my opinion). After over 5 minutes of searching (the
 olilve tarts were getting cold by this point), he located both wines and
 brought them to the table, at which point he proceeded to pour the white
 into the same glass one of our dining companions had used for her
 aperitif.

 Still no bread.

 When the main courses arrived, our waiter had somehow come to his senses
 and brought new glasses for the red, which he handled correctly. But
 when our side dishes (the spinach and the fries) arrived, I asked one of
 the staff (a waitress, this time) for some mayonnaise.

 Now, this is not an unreasonable request. In France and Belgium, this is
 what would be served with pommes frites. Any French restaurant should be
 able to deal with this request, and indeed Aquitaine suggested it when
 they brought our order. But in this case, the waitress looked at me as
 if I had asked for a live lemur to be brought to the table. She actually
 rolled her eyes at me.

 The mayo never, ever arrived.

 It's not that the fries needed it, necessarily. They were excellent on
 their own, due to the seasoning. But still, even a "I'm sorry, sir, we
 don't have any" or "I'm sorry, sir, but the chef has requested that we
 serve the frites unaccompanied" would have been perfectly acceptable.

 Service dramatically improved after that, and thankfully so -- our main
 waiter rescued his tip with his performance at the end of the meal. But
 I was absolutely shocked at what preceded it. I'm used to awful service
 in Boston these days, given the shortage of trained waitstaff, but this
 was truly horrid.

 Unpleasantness aside...prices at this restaurant are extremely fair: $8
 for all appetizers, $21 for all entrees, and I forget the dessert price.
 And there's a tremendous boulangerie attached where one can purchase
 baked goods to take home.

 I _will_ go back, because this food is too good to miss. But in a sense,
 this restaurant reminds me of the early days of Olives, when Todd's wife
 Olivia was still working the front of the house. The food was
 unbelievable, but you had to deal with the world's worst service to get
 it. I wouldn't say that anyone other than my mayo-hating waitress was in
 Olivia's category, but there are obviously some severe kinks to work
 out.

 By contrast, the previous evening we dined at Marcuccio's, still one of
 my favorite restaurants in Boston. Service was incredible, despite a
 long series of fairly difficult requests (related to the wine) from our
 table. Why this can't be the standard elsewhere, I don't know.

 Thor