To re-establish itself as a great place to eat as well as to socialize, after extensive taste testing, The Charleston is launching a new menu for the New Year including these items listed below. For each of these items, the story of its inspiration, preparation and presentation is presented as follows. The menu was prepared by Chef Jet Tila’s team including Chef de Cuisine Elyse Lain.
(For the items please see the slide show)
A tuna burger with carrot sesame slaw and ginger kimchi aioli is a take on classic tuna burger with better fresher seasonable ingredients that lets the ingredients shine for themselves. . The sashimi grade wild caught tuna steak is sourced from Santa Monica Seafood, and the micro wasabi from Melissa Farms.
The tuna is pan seared in a little oil with sea salt. The carrot slaw is made of both fresh and pickled carrots. The pickled carrots add a little acidity. The classic aioli includes the fermented juice from kimchi along with ginger added to the spread to blend Eastern and Western flavors. The plating is straight forward and simple to emphasize the strong bold unadulterated flavors. This dish is debuting in 2013.
Spicy Corn Dogs are near and dear to chef de cuisine Elyse Lain’s heart.her first job was working as “the corn dog girl” at Disneyland in Anaheim . The “dog” ia a three peppered sausage sourced from Maestro Sausage in Vernon, CA, a third generation LA region institution
The sausage smoked by vendor, is finished in Charleston’s kitchen then stuck on stick and coated with course ground corn meal that has added spices and sweeteners. The corn meal coating is a variation of ingredients used to make corn bread. The item is slowly dipped and turned in the deep fryer to get the proper coating. The plating presents a straight forward twist on this iconic state fair food with a yellow mustard and Heinz ketchup homage to the corn dog stand. This item was recently added to the menu.
Mussels with white wine butter sauce combines clean flavors from sustainable ingredients with fresh in season farm produce. Main ingredients aren’t masked, and the dish itself is inspired by travels to Southern France as well as the cuisine of luxury cruise ships. The mussels are sourced from Santa Monica Seafood. The julienne vegetables are cooked in a white wine butter sauce that is then used to steam the mussels. The plating again emphasizes the straight forward back to basics approach to the cuisine. This item is debuting in 2013.
Also recently added to the menu is a slow braised short rib taco with shredded Brussels sprouts and finished with Korean salsa. Again, the plating reflects the straight forward boldness of this item like the other “basic to basic” items recently added or soon be added to The Charleston menu. All these items are shown in the slide shown and representative of The Charleston reestablishing it self as a culinary destination in the New Year 2013.