Review Dancing Through the Seasons

Dancing Through THE SEASONS

Fall in love with this seasonally inspired dish of tender smoked duck breast and Cotechino sausage, accented with roasted pumpkin, local mushrooms, soft apples and braised chestnuts.

A side of pommes frites (that's fancy fries) with sherry garlic aioli is a simple pleasure worth the indulgence.

Ecco Buckhead’s hyper-seasonal dishes make for ever-changing offerings

STORY: Jennifer Bradley Franklin PHOTOS: Sara Hanna

Some of my fondest memories are of gliding around the dance floor, being led through the elegant one-two-three of the waltz or the crisp, drama-filled steps of the tango. What started as an elective ballroom dancing class in college turned into a full-fledged passion for me. Meals at Ecco in Buckhead have that same elegance and spontaneity.

Instead of a partner leading him to music, Executive Chef Drew Van Leuven allows himself—and his highly developed sense of creativity—to be driven by what’s in season. “Farmers grow vegetables throughout the year, all with a short timespan of perfect seasonality,” he says. “There aren't four seasons; there are actually around 16 [when it comes to produce].” He maintains strong relationships with regional growers, so he’ll know what’s coming into its peak of freshness, even if ingredient availability is short-lived, sometimes even a handful of days.

Case in point: Though there was a scant two-week interval between recent dinners, the menu was transformed. During my first visit, I fell in love with a starter of impossibly creamy burrata with peppery arugula, English peas, sweet-tart strawberries and pickled fennel, drizzled with peppercorn vinaigrette; grilled Spanish octopus, charred in all the right places and served with Castelvetrano olives and fried shallots; and a rather extraordinary grilled pork tenderloin with beet top risotto, crispy pancetta and golden beets. Though their memory had my mouth watering in advance of my second reservation, they’d been replaced with updated dishes according to micro-changes in what was available from local farmers.

During my second visit, I decided to stick to items that tend to be perennial Ecco favorites—the things that might incite a riot among regular guests if they were removed. No matter when you visit, the tangy goat cheese, fried to golden, drizzled with honey and flecked with cracked black pepper (a holdover from Fifth Group’s original location in Midtown), is a must-order. The pastas are made fresh, so you can’t go wrong with carb-loading here. A classic, the toothsome, just al dente pappardelle is tossed with silky pork, braised with garlic, basil and mild, sweet peppadew peppers. At lesser restaurants, a flatbread can feel like a safe or uninteresting choice. Here, the Allora arrived crisp and char-spotted from its brief stint in the ultra-hot, wood-fired oven and topped with ruby red San Marzano tomato sauce, still bubbling mozzarella, hot sopressata and pepperoni. That dish alone will keep me coming back; it’s casual, comforting, unpretentious and perfectly done.

If you’re looking for a way to exercise a bit of your own creativity, the culinary crew is known for its fresh bread and curing many of the meats on offer, so you’re always able to build a spectacular charcuterie board. Mortadella studded with pistachios, duck confit rillette and enough smoked sausages to make a meat-lover’s head spin come served with seasonal accoutrements such

Above: The Allora flatbread is an elevated version of a classic Neapolitan pizza. Left: Octopus and calamari are skewered and served with coal-roasted potatoes and putanesca. Right: Build your own charcuterie board from Ecco's delectable array of house-cured meats and imported cheeses.

Left: Carb load in style with housemade pappardelle tossed with silky braised pork. Right: This unlikely combination is a perennial Ecco favorite: goat cheese fried to golden, drizzled with floral honey and topped with cracked black pepper. Below: Peak-ofseason fruit comes baked inside puff pastry and served with house-made salted caramel gelato for a sweet end to your meal.

Executive Chef Drew Van Leuven allows himself—and his highly developed sense of creativity—to be driven by what’s in season.

as pickles and jam, the ideal counterpoint to house-made mozzarella or gorgonzola dolce imported from Italy. Whether a meat and cheese platter is your preferred start to the meal or the meal itself, it shouldn’t be missed. An always on-duty sommelier can help you choose a nice glass (or bottle) of wine from the largely European list to complement whatever you’ve ordered.

Another thing that stays consistent through every visit is the restaurant’s understated elegance that makes it easy to relax and enjoy yourself. The 12-foot-tall walnut door seems to signal that dining here is an event, something to be savored. The expansive dining room and bar fuse Old World gravitas with a streamlined, modern sensibility. Towering ceilings are made cozier with dropped wooden platforms, from which hang giant, softly glowing circular light fixtures. Sumptuous leather chairs and booths invite guests to stay a while. The bar and lounge area, which opens into a covered patio, is adorned with black and white photos that serve to give the space a sense of history, even though it’s only been here since 2018.

The frequent changes at Ecco are a double-edged sword: They make for an exciting experience every time you visit, rather like my joy at being led around the dance floor, unsure what step my partner will choose next, but it can be disappointing if one of your favorites isn’t available. There's an easy fix: If you fall in love with a dish, visit again quickly because this inventive and intuitive kitchen team will continue to dance to the music of the seasons, creating ever-new dishes to delight their guests. n

ECCO BUCKHEAD

404.347.9558 ecco-atlanta.com, @ecco.atl

Prices: small plates: $9-$18; flatbreads: $15-$21; pasta and mains: $19-$36; sides: $7-$12; desserts: $6-$9. Recommended: Allora flatbread, fried goat cheese, agnolotti, pappardelle with braised pork, wood-grilled pork tenderloin, seasonal fruit tart. Bottom line: Meticulously crafted and highly seasonal interpretation of Italian and Spanish cuisine, served in a cozy atmosphere that marries Old World grace with contemporary vibes.

Whiskey & Chocolate

AN ALCHEMY OF AROMATICS AND FLAVOR

STORY: Angela Hansberger

Buckhead’s ASW offers a selection of chocolates and whiskey to fuel your tasting at home.

It’s well known that wine and cheese are standard bedfellows, but whiskey and chocolate can have quite a courtship as well. Both can bring forth an intense tasting experience on their own. Together, a sort of alchemy happens, transforming them both.

Whiskey is a perfect pairing for chocolate, with the drink’s inherent sweetness and ability to cut through fat. Its high alcohol content enhances aromatics in chocolate, while the fat content of chocolate tempers strong alcohol flavors. Chocolate and whiskey stored in oak barrels even share similar chemistry, both having compounds such as tannins, vanillin and lactones that dominate the aromas in whiskey.

There are two ways to taste chocolate and whiskey: pairing it with similar flavors to bring out similarities or tasting for contrast. While matching similar flavors can reveal deeper essences and characteristics within both, “discordant pairings assault the palate with contrasting flavors,” said Spirits Brand

Educator Kaleb Cribb, who works with

Atlanta area bartenders and restaurants. The disparity “shocks the palate and makes flavors brighter,” he says.

To begin, get to know your whiskey. Swirl it in your glass to check its “legs.” The faster it moves, the lighter bodied it is. Hold it up to the light and note its color. Nose the whiskey. That is, keep your lips parted and breathe in through your nose to take in aromas. Take a sip and let the whiskey roll around in your mouth for a few seconds. Get acclimated. Then focus on flavors, noting the sweet, the spice, the bitter.

When tasting chocolate, take into consideration the cacao content. This is the number of cocoa solids, cocoa butter and milk (in any form) incorporated in your piece of chocolate. As cacao content increases, the taste is more chocolatey and less sweet. The remaining percentage consists of all the other ingredients (sugar, vanilla, fruit, nuts, salt or other flavorings).

Now get to know your chocolate. Take in the scents. Let a piece settle on the middle of your tongue. Chew a little, then hit it with a little bit of whiskey while it’s still on your tongue. As you swallow, discover the evolution of flavor as the two substances interact.

Milk chocolate has a smooth balance of sweet and rich. Its cocoa content is generally low, between 1050%, but generally coming in around 40%. It’s a great match for bourbons with a bit of spice. For example, on the palate of Old Forester 100, you’ll find baking spices, caramel and milk chocolate. It’s a seamless match.

Pair milk chocolate or dark with a rye whiskey, and the spice in the rye explodes on the palate. High West’s Rendezvous Rye has notes of oak, cocoa nibs, caramel, allspice and cinnamon that come out when sipped with chocolate. ASW’s Resurgens Rye is floral on the nose, with a little spice and grassiness on the palate. Introduce chocolate, and not only do brilliant spice flavors like cardamom jump out, but it enhances a lot of the chocolate notes from malted rye in the whiskey. Fruity and lighter Scotches such as Speysides also match perfectly with the creaminess of milk chocolate. Pull out the Macallan.

There is no legal definition for dark chocolate, but this category is usually 50-90% cocoa, with most coming in about 70%. This is where whisky comes to play. “The general rule is the smokier or peatier the Scotch, the darker the chocolate,” says Cribb. French Broad Chocolate’s Sea Salt is 75% cacao and is the perfect partner for Talisker Storm, made by the shore on the Isle of Skye. It brings out the fruit notes of the chocolate while simultaneously giving a coastal hit with peat. The warm and peaty aromas of Laphroaig are also an elegant match, bringing forward underlying smoky notes.

Softer and fruitier Scotches pair well with flavored chocolates, especially those with hints of oranges and berries. When pairing a chocolate with nuts, look towards an oak-forward whiskey such as George Dickel Bottled in Bond, with complementary flavors of chocolate, vanilla, caramel and cinnamon on the palate. The flavors of smoke and wood from Scotch disappear into the richness of chocolate, whether bitter or creamy, revealing secondary flavors of both. “It creates something better than the sum of the parts,” says Cribb. n

ASW 404.962.8702 aswdistillery.com @aswdistillery