Kettle Black Kitchen is a cozy little restaurant on Monroe Street that serves French-inspired American cuisine.
I started my meal with the pate de campagne ($10), and you should, too. The pate has the right amount of richness and is delicious on its own. Yet, the pate is complemented nicely by everything on the plate, including the cornichons and whole grain mustard.
Moving onto the main dishes, the first one I tried was the grilled flat iron steak ($28), which was excellent. It’s juicy and tender with a strong grilled flavor, which served as a good contrast with the accompanying fried slices of sweet potato medallions.
A little bit of crushed red pepper adds a pleasant surprise heat to the maple-braised bone-in pork shank ($27), which was absolutely delicious. If I wasn’t in public, I probably would have gnawed on the bone.
Also an ace in my book was the butter-basted Atlantic salmon, which was some of the best salmon I’ve had in recent memory. It was fresh and flaky with delightfully crispy skin. The dish included braised radicchio and bok choy, both of which allowed the salmon to shine.
The roasted cornish hen ($24) was fine, just a little dry. Unfortunately, the beer-thyme gravy on top had an odd sweetness that did not work well with poultry. After I scraped off the sauce, the hen was more enjoyable along with the flavorful rice pilaf, which was loaded with veggies and spices.
Kettle Black Kitchen serves dinner Wednesday through Sunday. Since the space is small, you should consider making reservations.
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See more photos in our Kettle Black Kitchen Flickr album.
