Sunday, August 03, 2008

Daily highlight #70: late as always - Restaurant: Pura Vida

As always I am three weeks late in reporting this brunch. If you are a faithful Atlanta blog reader, you already know that everyone else, such as the consistently on the pulse Blissful Glutton, had already talked about the excellence of this menu. So why am I jumping on the bandwagon? Well, call me silly, but I was just so tickled by this hilarious dish, I couldn't help but share the photo with you.

When the menu said fried ripe plantains in the plural, we expected slices or chunks. No, we got a whole caramelized plantain oozing goat cheese foam. E and I looked at each other and laughed. Even more amusing, when we finally cut into the plantain, it squirted warm cajeta (sort of Mexican caramel) everywhere. We laughed some more, but at the end of it all, enjoyed everything working together.

I am sure you can conjure up the exceptional combination of a ripe plantain that is slowly caramelized with the sticky molasses flavors of a dark caramel. What's surprising was the slight tartness of the goat cheese foam, a great counterpoint to the sweetness of the other elements. I highly recommend that you try this dish, just watch out for the squirting innards.

Also great were the slightly sweetened duck sausages. Neither too greasy nor too tough, the patties had just enough duckiness to tone down the sweetness and create delicious bites that do not tire out the palate.

Pura Vida
656 N. Highland Ave.
Atlanta, GA 30306
404-870-9797

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

You missed a day... ;-)

Anonymous said...

I can't wait to try their brunch menu! The plantain actually looks scrumptious! I wanted to ask if you had been to Cafe 101? I tried to find your review of it and could not. Is there a way to contact you other than posting??
Thanks and keep posting great food....I thoroughly enjoy reading your blog.

Eat, Drink, Man.. said...

Being male, your description of the plantain dish sounds very off-putting to me. Hilarious though...

Their brunch does sound great.

Cathy said...

I have not tried cafe 101. To be honest, I don't eat out at Atlanta Chinese restaurants very often. Other than Tasty China, which is really a pretty good take on my hometown Sichuan cuisine, I have been pretty disappointed with the other choices.

If I find anything else I like, I'd be sure to share here. I'd also appreciate any tips you may have. I write a monthly piece for Atlanta Cuisine and have an email at cding@atlantacuisine.com

Yes, I did miss a day in posting. My part of the town suffered a major power failure that lasted five hours on Saturday night. I fell asleep in the dark. :)