Counsel’s Table: Attention to details at Takashi

By Russell B. Selman
Katten Muchin Rosenman • Restaurant Critic

In the summer of 1975, I had hit a wall when looking for a job in New York. Door after door had slammed in my face. So, jobless and despondent, I decided to put my liberal arts degree to work and determined it was time to become a Communist. I would take my due by violent means and correct the error of my unmet needs. I was not to be denied!

Upon returning home to suburbia that evening, I announced my personal discovery of the historical dialectic to my mother. She met my vast disappointment with her sweet gaze and served up a dinner of filet mignon that permanently ended my revolutionary march on the New York Stock Exchange. Literally, completely, and permanently. I became another casualty of how the sensory immediacy of a nice dinner overwhelms the inequities of society.

Oh — poor me, even years later I still love a nice, warm dinner and I have an utter commitment to my own well-being. And, while nothing very important is really changed by a good meal, a delicious surprise certainly makes life more pleasant. (And, in a pinch, can stop a person from a life as a Bolshevik.)

I relived this family secret recently when dining at Takashi. Located in a little Bucktown house, Takashi suggests a very luxe life emerging from the perfection of remarkably flavorful miniature foods. At Takashi, you must pay attention to the little details (and small portions) or you can miss the singular point; that being the sensual oneness of a perfectly constructed flavor.

I will admit that I was very impatient, at first, with the Takashi menu. Confronted by a half-dozen each of “cold small plates” and “hot small plates,” I was annoyed. Why must another restaurant do this egg-carton like array that resembles my sock drawer of mismatched wool - with which I never knew what to do (every year or so, I throw them all away)? Takashi has made me reconsider my disdain for the “small plate” dining world by focusing the flavor so that everything on the plate matches.

The choicest small plate option is the very elegant sliced yellowtail with monk fish liver. Simply a perfect flavor that uses a tosasu dressing to add a lemony echo to an immaculately clean yellowtail - slightly darkened and enriched by the monk fish. Even at a -20 wind chill, this flavor makes it seem possible to Chicago diners that there will be an early spring. On this dish alone, Takashi proves itself. Q.E.D.

Again and again, the plate sizes are as “small” as billed, but each seems like a jewel box holding very nice gifts. The scallops with gnocchi at first made me wonder if I could tell “which was which,” but left me satisfied. Both were very worthy complements, along with a sauce that married together the flavors, and even the texture - one went “pop,” the other “wept,” and each was delicious.

I did get a little tense when I moved on to the “large” plate selections. As with people, sometimes the cute kids become ugly, big adults, and I worried that the scaled-up plate size would prove a disappointment. Takashi conditions his small contextual presence well by intense focus on presentation. The “chicken in clay pot” is an intricate watch-like mechanism with mushrooms, eggplant, and okra parts all spinning in time. Tick, tock, and it’s wonderful.

It is only when Takashi prepares a single “thing” like a steak that the single “thing” trips up the presentation by being static and big. The steak has a wasabi crust and is good, but lacks the elegant movement of the other big plate choices. No harm, but not as interesting.

So, while I said above that nothing is really changed by a wonderful meal, I really do not believe my own cynicism. While my mom is now gone, her care is a continuing inspiration of better things to come and the lasting value of concern for the little details of life.

Pleadings:
Takashi
1952 N. Damen Ave., (773) 772-6170

Court costs:
Appetizers $10; entrees $20 - $30

Verdict:
4 Gavels