Haymarket mixes global flair, local fare

Specials have included boar and antelope

Dec. 28, 2007

Urban Redevelopment was Jay Johnson's favorite course at UW-Madison.

That's lucky for us. He and fellow restaurateur Doug Kruschke could have opened Haymarket Grill anywhere in Wisconsin. But they chose Eau Claire because they believe in the city's downtown renaissance.

Their motto is 'Think globally. Dine locally.' After sharing half a dozen meals there, we can parse what this means for the kitchen.

Local: Though the menu descriptions don't often say so, Haymarket is devoted to using locally and regionally produced meats, fish, vegetables and cheeses whenever possible.

Global: The dishes made from these ingredients may be inspired by any of the world's cuisines.

Haymarket's menu has a list of steaks, chops and simple seafood dishes that would do a Wisconsin supper club proud. And a second, more inventive list that changes according to season, availability and the kitchen's sense of adventure.

Between last August and last week, we tried Antelope Sausage Kebabs (appetizer, $8), Coconut Tilapia in Curry Cream ($17), Grilled Quail with Harissa (a North African hot-pepper paste, $18), Potato Gnocchi in Walnut-Sage Butter ($16), Grilled Wild Boar Medallions ($25) and Emu Steak ($17). At lunch, we sampled a Portabella Reuben Sandwich and a Walnut Burger, each $7.95.

Less unusual orders included crawfish cakes (appetizer, $9), gourmet mac and cheese ($9), prime rib ($20), planked salmon ($20), salmon linguine ($16), a New York strip ($26) and a stuffed chicken breast ($19).

The Coconut Tilapia, grill-charred without and succulent within, came strewn with shredded sweet coconut and surrounded by a spicy yellow curry sauce made thick and smooth and mild with heavy cream.

Potato Gnocchi headlined a carnival of vegetarian delights. Tossed with walnut chunks in sage-and-brown sugar butter, they were served cradled in a carefully baked, silken-textured acorn squash surrounded by wild rice with fresh herbs, mushrooms and baby greens.

The mac and cheese dish featured al dente penne pasta coated with a melt of cream and four punchy cheeses, mixed with minced fresh basil leaves and broiled into salty, brown-topped chewiness. Simple and extraordinary.

The house-made Walnut Burger, available only at lunch, uses Cheddar cheese to bind finely ground walnuts and spices into a rich, tasty masterpiece: crisp-grilled outside, soft and moist within, full of the walnut's sweet, clean taste. Order it with fruit or a tartly dressed salad.

A pan-roasted stuffed chicken breast had chewy-crisp brown skin and an inspired stuffing of Camembert, avocado, prosciutto, garlic and fresh baby greens that merged into a delicious textured goo with a slight bitter-lettuce edge and marvelous toothsome bits of dark-caramelized cheese.

A bison tenderloin special ($26), medium-rare as ordered, was juicy and tender in its wrap of lean, crisp bacon. Like many entrées here, this came with a fine sauté of fresh vegetables and good roasted red-skin potatoes. (The mashed potatoes are another excellent choice.)

A planked salmon filet with creamy-soft flesh arrived trailing the gorgeous gingery scent of cedar ($20). And a glorious mix of zucchini, garlic, moist salmon chunks and linguine — all beautifully cooked — came tossed with lemon-caper butter and tiny tomato dice, $16. Audrey liked it so much, she nearly refused to share.

All restaurants are complicated works in progress, of course, and those with kitchens that love to try out new dishes and unusual ingredients, like Haymarket Grill, are especially so. During our visits, consistency was occasionally a problem.

The salmon linguine is a case in point. Audrey's was wonderful, but the same dish ordered earlier the same night by a friend at another table was not. The dish was dry — undersauced — and the pasta was mushy.

In the same way, a potato-leek soup-of-the-day was creamy-smooth and flavorful one night, but lumpy and lackluster the next.

The kitchen also sometimes had trouble cooking meats to temperature. A prime rib, a New York strip and a special of Beef Medallions ($21), ordered medium-rare on different nights, each arrived with dull-red centers that were too cold and quivery. A thick emu 'Fan Steak' ordered cooked 'as the chef prefers' arrived dauntingly rare and too tough to enjoy.

(Restaurant reviewers don't typically send back such glitches; regular customers should!)

Haymarket excels with salads, serving crisp organic greens and high-quality vegetables, cheeses and meats in interesting combinations and at proper temperatures. Try the superb smoked pheasant dinner salad, $13. But do join us in pleading for vinaigrettes without balsamic vinegar, which is too dominant, dark and sweet for green salads.

Our favorite current dessert is the crème brulée, a light vanilla custard with an impressively thick caramel cap. Ours came with several wonderful caramel-dipped banana nuggets.

Haymarket Grill, just nine months old, is already an important part of the culinary and cultural life in Eau Claire and the Chippewa Valley. It's a place where local and global — the familiar, the new and the exotic — make friends.

Main Course, the Leader-Telegram's restaurant review column, runs the fourth Sunday of the month. Diners' Notebook, a sampling of favorite restaurant offerings, runs the second Tuesday of the month.