Province is a fun spot with an inventive menu influenced from Central and South America and Spain. The decor is bold with bright pink walls and the actual building possesses the extremely rare gold-level LEED certification (U.S. Green Building Council's rating system for existing buildings by measuring performance to maximize operational efficiency while minimizing costs and environmental impacts). Additionally, Province prides itself on using local organic ingredients in a "farm to table" dining experience. Executive Chef Randy Zweiban of Nacional 27 takes a fairly new approach to modernizing Latin cuisine and succeeds with many dishes.
The best thing that my friend Allie and I ate during our dinner at Province was the Green Acres Farms Winter Squash Taquito off the "bites" section of the menu. We ordered everything in that category and enjoyed the Cuban Pork Bocadillo, but wished we had another taquito instead of the Peeky Toe Crab toast. The Fluke Ceviche with Red Grapefruit was one of the bigger disappointments of the night as it was flavorless and stringy in texture - not the "mouth feel" you hope for in a Ceviche dish. Luckily, we quickly forgot about the ceviche when the Tortilla Soup was served! This fun spin on a classic is awesome for a light lunch or a first course at dinner. The bottom of the bowl was filled with guacamole and roasted chicken and a spicy chicken broth was poured over the top for a little bit of a wow factor.
As it was restaurant week, two of the items we ordered are not mainstays on the menu. The Sherry and Mushroom Bisque was forgettable but the Braised Beef Short Rib with pancetta hash was certainly not! The Hawaiian Seared Tuna was really disappointing as it was flavorless, and missing the promised honey roasted root vegetables and caper vinaigrette! I blame our server who was not at the top of his game for sure. We capped off the meal with a sure thing: "Chocolate Three Ways" which was composed of a Chocolate Flan, Cocoa Sorbet, Chocolate Gooey Muffin and Dulce de Leche.
Lunch was much more of a turn on. Although we only shared two dishes, they were both fantastic. The Chicken and Apple salad delivered visually as well as in texture and flavor. Perfectly uniform matchsticks of tart apples tossed with roasted chicken, toasted almonds and candied olives. Additionally, we had (drum roll please!) the Pork Belly and Avocado Sandwich. Notwithstanding my glutton for pork belly, I am pretty sure my mother was fulfilled after eating this tummy-pleaser. Rich pork belly goodness is served with avocado on grilled country rosemary bread along side of a puckery red cabbage slaw which cut the fattiness of the sandwich perfectly.
My personal theme for 2009 is to keep my learning curve turned up and "reviewing" this restaurant was a great lesson. I understand what a bad write up can do to the heart and soul of a restaurant and the people working there (I have seen it first hand) and I will never allow myself to become a hater. However, a little bit of constructive criticism is what makes us better, isn't it?
I contemplated writing about this restaurant for weeks because I would have to stray from my strictly stay positive policy. After a not-so-great dinner during Restaurant Week, I decided that before writing it off forever I would follow in the footsteps of Phil Vettel and try it a few times to be fair. This proved to be a smart move because the following week my mother and I had an excellent lunch at Province (161 N. Jefferson).
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