Foiereo and a Cosmo Sidecar

Sidecar SLO

There comes a time in every woman’s life when she just needs to take the plunge, and by plunge I mean seeing something on a menu that absolutely terrifies you by the description and creates such hesitation that you literally need to be pushed into ordering it by supportive or absolutely out of their minds, friends. This happened to me the other night at Sidecar in SLO. A new hip restaurant and speakeasy style bar that recently opened in town. Michael Reyes is the Executive Chef and has added quite the unique and fantastical spin to the menu. It’s ever changing, farm to table cuisine in what he describes as a “Rustic French Italian” cooking style.

Sidecar Cosmo made with pomegranate syrup

I started the evening with a Cosmo, made with Blue Ice vodka, Cointreau, lime, and my favorite ingredient, pomegranate syrup. I love the Cosmo at Sidecar because of its pomegranate complexity, as opposed to the standard cranberry juice. It gives it a tart bite with a quick sweet chaser. I’m personally not a cranberry juice fan so this Cosmo has quickly become one of my favorites.

What was this dish that created such consternation and nervousness you ask? Well it’s called a Foiereo and was described on the menu as a “Foie gras filled Oreo” served with a “vanilla, ascalano olive oil milkshake” on the side. My initial impression based on the description was they’d taken an Oreo cookie (with the Oreo logo stamped on it) scooped out the double stuff and replaced it with Foie gras and an oily olive flavored milkshake. Well I was sort of right but not in a bad way. When it arrived at the table there was such a hubbub over it partly because it was served to us personally by Chef Michael himself.  Normally it’s served with 2 servings of cookies but since it was the very last one there was only one cookie.

Foiereo and Truffle oil Milkshake

Chef Michael told me the milk used to make the milkshake came from Strauss Farms creamery and the vanilla ice cream was made at Sidecar using a blend of custard and cream. Now here is where it got interesting…when I tasted it, it was thick, rich and creamy smooth, the texture was exactly what you’d want a milkshake to be. It was in no way greasy or oily, but it did taste an awful lot like truffles.  After bringing it to Chef’s attention we realized he’d accidentally replaced the olive oil with truffle oil, but actually and surprisingly it was rather tasty even though I couldn’t finish it all.

Now for the main event, the cookie. The cookie was made from reformed ground up Oreos (like the Oreo crust of a mud pie but thicker) and filled with Foie gras in the middle of the cookie instead of the cream we are all familiar with. With the first bite I found it was salty with a sweet follow up. The texture of the Foie gras, was velvety and buttery with the cookie being hard and crumbly so it gave a great mouth feel. And you know? I really enjoyed it! The over all experience did teach me something very important… sometimes peer pressure is a good thing! And you can plan on hearing more about our adventures and upcoming meals at Sidecar because we plan on visiting often.

I like to drink martinis. Two at the most. Three I’m under the table, four I’m under the host.
Dorothy Parker

Cheers!

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