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Restaurant review
Savoring Savant
At the one-year mark, David Miller's Clearwater restaurant sticks with what works: exquisite tastes.
By CHRIS SHERMAN
Published October 5, 2006
CLEARWATER I could go on about the skill and ingredients that go into the $75 seven-course dinners at Savant, but consider just one thing, acorn squash soup. Let's call it bisque in the high-end spirit. This hard winter squash is a familiar sight in produce sections, an easy taste of Thanksgiving and rather fashionable of late. In David Miller's kitchen, golden flesh of organic acorn squash is transformed to a near pudding, yellow and thick as cheese fondue, with hints of nutmeg and curry. It's so rich that if you left after the soup course, you'd still feel guilty - and sated. That's Savant in a soup bowl, showcasing one chef's dedication to flavor from fine ingredients and smart technique. And if $75 for seven courses is too much, the exquisite tastes are also available at much lower prices at lunch - salmon glazed with ice wine, sea bass with ramps, or wild mushroom pappardelle. This is the personal fusion of Miller, who combines the intimacy of the Six Tables prix fixe concept (he worked in the Gulfport location) and an appetite for field-fresh ingredients and exotic spices whetted in a resort kitchen on St. Kitts. Another thing: Miller's such a devoted chocolatier, he calls Savant a chocolate-driven restaurant. That means black truffles and morels on the plates as well as St. Lucia cocoa, coffee, rum and kaffir lime from the tropics. Plus wedding cakes, and artisan truffles and pralines in all shades of chocolate. Miller started out a year ago with reservation-only gourmet dinners in a small space in a Clearwater strip center where most folks come for hearty cheesesteaks and lusty tacos. When I had the full-course dinner in the early days, it seemed a valiant effort to tweak the small table/grand meal/limited seatings concept. With only four customers, and Miller darting from kitchen to table to a PowerPoint tour of the Caribbean, it was fragile. Yet as Savant celebrates its first birthday this week, Miller has a growing following, a crew of three sous chefs, plus a wait staff. The dinner concept hasn't changed; it's still a degustation menu with a fondness for fish and game. And the slide show continues, love it or not. Recently, entree choices included tenderloin of boar, black quail and local soft-shell crab with the likes of risotto croquettes and fig almond tart. The biggest change has been the addition of lunch, a more casual and affordable taste of Savant's cooking and Miller's thinking. Dropping $20 for several midday courses sounds indulgent, yet it's a bargain sampler of modern cuisine. You still get a stunning lagniappe to start, such as a big-eye tuna shooter with cilantro and spice scallop on the side. The chef will happily explain how and why he uses tile fish in the old tropical trick of banana leaf or adds the perfume of truffle shavings and the bite of kaffir lime. With sticky black rice and carrot mango syrup, that's a well-spent ($14) midday meal. Or try the richest salad and the most elegant hush puppies, creamy croquettes made of a risotto of fresh corn, plus eyebrow-pencil asparagus. At another lunch, pork had the same asparagus in place of snow peas, but the pork was moist, rich and trimmed with Brinley's, St. Kitts' surprising coffee rum. Even frugal diners should splurge elsewhere, too; the crab cakes livened up with serrano peppers and West Indian tamarind are a triumph. If you pass up poached pear, braised peaches in a peach basket or sorbet from Michigan blackberries, it's your fault. Throughout, dining is unhurried and service is thoughtful. The only flaw I experienced was on one occasion when the server missed our first-course order. Still, dining at Savant at noon is hardly lunch. It's a fine first taste of what the best contemporary chefs can do and a tempting preview of Savant's full feast. Chris Sherman dines anonymously and unannounced. The St. Petersburg Times pays for all expenses. A restaurant's advertising has nothing to do with selection for a review or the assessment of its quality. Sherman can be reached at (727) 893-8585 or sherman@sptimes.com SAVANT 2551 Drew St., Campus Walk Plaza, Clearwater, 727 421-9975 www.savantfinedining.com Hours: Lunch, 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., Monday through Friday; dinner by reservation only, 6:30 to 9 p.m., Monday through Saturday. (This Saturday, Savant will host a free anniversary party and will not serve dinner.) Reservations: Accepted at lunch, required for dinner. Details: Credit cards; wine served.Prices: Lunch entrees, $7 to $14; dinner, $75.Features: Prix fixe dinner, cooking classes, wine dinners.
[Last modified October 4, 2006, 12:44:12]
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