Editor: For further information regarding this press
release, please contact Marika Rose at 916.601-9737, amcr@comcast.net.
Living History, The
Firehouse
By Doug Herndon
Rating: * * * * (Highest possible)
You, feel like a railroad
tycoon just walking through the Firehouse's front door. Your clean white
shirt and dinner jacket starts to stretch across your belly like a
pin-striped Suit Custom cut for a guy 40 pounds lighter. You're about to pop
a gold vest button-but what the hell, it'll make a fat tip for the kid
waiting to light the cigar and take the overcoat you didn't actually bring.
Good god, this place is gorgeous.
Soft light rubs up against exposed brick
and glances off the gilded frames of monolithic mirrors and Victorian era
paintings, creating a mood that drips with boomtown decadence. Bare shoulders
and cuff links throw the light around a little more, giving you the distinct
impression that everyone here is out for a very special evening.
One of my favorite elements of a night at a
really ritzy joint is checking out the host stationed up front. Always a
memorable character, ours was swimming in gel and Armani and worked hard to
make us feel small from behind a smile as warm and cuddly as a baby boa
constrictor. He did, however, park us at the best table in the dining room, a
cavernous, yet somehow intimate space presided over by a gigantic portrait of
Phoebe Hearst. Seated at the back of the room, next
to a marble fireplace big enough to park a car in, my wife Day and I took a
moment to settle into the magnificence of it all.
Just about then, a kid I'd have mistaken
for a busser anywhere else made his way to the table, quickly and
consistently proving himself a smooth and efficient server. The food he
presented was equally deserving of praise.
We weren't surprised to find Day's salmon
cooked exactly as she had requested, a little more than the "lightly
grilled" description given on the menu. It was served beneath a pile of
fresh, diced tomatoes and a simple, but complementary saffron and white wine
sauce. The best thing on the plate was a corn and potato puck with a smooth,
grainy texture and flavor that fell somewhere between polenta and mashed
potatoes.
Because I literally could not resist the
description on the menu, I ordered a ridiculously decadent plate of fresh
lobster and prawns. Shelled and sautéed in a sauce of butter, white
wine, mushrooms and shallots, the dish made my eyes roll so far back in my
head that I nearly blacked out. It was all served with a few stalks of big,
fat asparagus and a squirt of mashed potatoes that had spent a little too
much time in the pastry bag used to create the decorative effect. Dessert was
just as silly: chocolate mousse served up in an edible chocolate tulip.
It's not like I never go to the Firehouse,
but for some reason it never comes to mind when people ask me about Sacramento's best
restaurants. Maybe a lifetime of field trips to Sutter's Fort and obligatory
visits to Old Sac with out-of-towners have filled me up with all the local
history I can stand,
But this is no musty, lifeless landmark in
the pages of the national historic registry,
The Firehouse is probably one of Sacramento's greatest
monuments to what was-painting a far livelier picture of boomtown life than
all the mannequins and headsets at Sutter's Fort ever could.
|