If you have an upcoming special occasion or would like to treat your sweetheart to a perfect dining experience, there’s nowhere within hundreds of miles likely to achieve the culinary heights of Orchids at Palm Court. And if your bank account permits, why wait for a birthday, anniversary or to pop the question? Yes, you’ll spend a few bucks, but the experience and the memory of it may well justify the indulgence.
I’m hardly alone in loving this restaurant; beginning in 2014, Orchids has earned the coveted AAA five-diamond award for five straight years under executive chef Todd Kelly. To put that honor in perspective, consider that you’d have to go to Chicago or maybe Charleston, S.C. to find another five-diamond winner.
But chef Kelly left Orchids a year ago and food service at the Hilton Netherland is now under the direction of executive chef Maxime Kien, a native of southern France with deep experience at excellent restaurants from London to Las Vegas and New Orleans. The pressure to keep those five diamonds has to be immense.
“It’s definitely a big deal,” Kien says, “like Michelin stars in Europe.”
In some ways, getting the highest honor can be a curse as much as a blessing. In France, more than one chef has renounced a two- or three-star Michelin rating, saying they don’t want to play in that too-demanding and stressful league any more.
Kien says he welcomes the challenge and is having a wonderful time settling into the leadership of what he described as a very talented team, most of whom have been with Orchids for at least a few years. They include chef de cuisine Tommy Slovacek, sous chef Wesley Rogers and pastry supervisor Clare Mongenas, all of whom were promoted from previous positions at Orchids.
If I’m lucky, I’ll get to Orchids once or twice a year, and I’ve almost always had a stellar meal. In June, I dined there with friends to see whether that level of wonderfulness is still attainable. In a word: yes.
It was a weeknight and most tables went unoccupied, but that’s probably not uncommon for an establishment at this level, and in the traditionally slow restaurant season of mid-summer to boot. The sparse crowd didn’t keep the staff from providing truly impeccable service from the moment we arrived until the end of the evening.
If I had to select one feature of the meal that we all agreed was over-the-top spectacular, it would be all of the “freebies” that accompanied the dishes we actually ordered. That bounty started with a delectable amuse-bouche consisting of a savory panna cotta topped with a bit of local caviar and a sprinkling of herb salad. Between the appetizer and entrée came a small portion of the freshest pea soup you can imagine, enhanced by a shaving of black truffle. (One of my companions said later that little cup of perfection was her favorite thing of the whole meal.) A pre-dessert treat centering on not-too-sweet strawberry sorbet prepared us for the desserts we had ordered, but there was even more after that: petits-fours and a take-home granola bar. I suppose one might consider this an excessive amount of food — but in the best way possible.
As you would expect, the seasonally-attuned menu takes advantage of midsummer produce and combines those ingredients with top-quality seafood and meat from a variety of sources. Kien says he has enjoyed teaching his mostly young kitchen staff how to handle and prepare whole salmon, or a lamb saddle. During his months at the helm, he’s started to share his knowledge and show his team his vision, he says.
That vision produces dishes that are never overly complicated either in ingredient combinations or presentation. Case in point was the vichyssoise appetizer — a chilled potato-based soup that I haven’t encountered on a menu in decades but recall loving some versions back in the day. It was marvelous: a creamy purée without the tiniest of lumps, topped with a spoonful of local Big Fish Farms caviar, a sprinkling of fines herbes and melba toast croutons for the all-important crunchy contrast.
My friend Joyce, who often orders foie gras, was equally delighted by her appetizer of Hudson Valley terrine simply presented with pickled vegetables, onion marmalade and toast points. Others at our table skipped an appetizer ($16-$20) and went straight to the entrée course, but if I’m fortunate enough to return before the seasonal menu changes, I’d like to try the smoked sturgeon or salmon tartare — or another helping of the vichyssoise.
Our menu listed seven main course options ($40-$48), mostly meat based but including two seafood preparations. The roasted scallops with artichoke, olive mashed potatoes and Niçoise tapenade was a bit of a misfire due to an overload of saltiness, although the scallops themselves were tender and of exquisite quality.
Two of us had halibut with white asparagus and irresistible fresh morel mushrooms, another fine example of how Kien and his team can deliver a simple but memorable dish.
The gold star of the entrées we tried probably would go to Joyce’s pan-seared lamb loin accompanied by sautéed seasonal vegetables and Macaire potatoes — kind of a super-elevated version of potato pancakes or hash browns. The lamb was meltingly tender, precisely medium-rare, and once again simply sauced with an intensely flavorful lamb jus.
After all that — and glasses of wine selected by the wine steward to accompany our courses — it was hard to fully appreciate pre-dessert, dessert ($14) and the after-dessert treats.
Our server’s top recommendation was a strawberry pistachio custard with fromage blanc ice cream, and since I’m always up for pudding, custard or panna cotta type sweet treats, that was an easy pick. It was good but not stellar, although I probably had already reached my limit by then.
Nonetheless, I think Cincinnati can breathe a sigh of relief that the five-diamond bragging rights seem likely to continue under the new leadership at Orchids.
Hours: 5:30-9 p.m. Sunday-Thursday; 5:30-10 p.m. Friday and Saturday. Orchids at Palm Court, 35 W. Fifth St., Downtown, 513-421-9100, orchidsatpalmcourt.com.
This article appears in Jul 25 – Aug 1, 2018.