Monarch ... It's More Than a Butterfly or a Sovereign

Courtesy of one last restaurant.com gift certificate and just in time for our 10th wedding anniversary, Jay and I found ourselves with a dinner reservation at Monarch, a trendy little "see-and-be-seen" kind of place on the outer fringes of Clayton. We've noticed lately that all the establishments we've dined at like to promote their affiliation with "local growers of organic and environmentally friendly produce" ... unfortunately when confronted with such highfalutin pre-menu language Jay and I tend to snicker and roll our eyes a lot. Please don't try so hard to impress us before we've had a chance to even look at your food offerings.

Monarch has a more formal dining room, which is where Jay and I dined, but they also have a bar where patrons can order from a more "relaxed" menu, if that makes any sense. Apparently the bar is the place to be if you are young, enjoy networking, and have delusions of grandeur. Since Jay and I are nothing if not crotchety loners, the hushed, dim dining room was obviously the place for us. I actually felt a little conspicuous when we first sat down at our table, undoubtedly a combination of my dress not fitting well (note to self ... please lose weight, pronto!) and a lot of rather elderly, grumpy looking guests scattered about the room. I very nearly didn't take any pictures at all but Jay encouraged me to shrug off my self-consciousness ... the flash isn't that bright, after all, and your friendies will never forgive you if you don't post food porn.

Monarch does offer a four-course tasting menu, but everyone at the table has to participate and two of the four courses being offered just didn't sound appealing to me or my intestinal tract, so Jay and I ordered ala carte. One thing that we both thought was cool about their tasting menu was that along with the standard wine pairing with each course it also included an option to pair each course with a specialty cocktail.

Damn!

I wish the tasting menu had been more appetizing because a food and cocktail pairing would have been awesome! I think I will file this idea away for future reference and try it at home one weekend with my lovey and some friends.

To start the evening off we were presented with a happy mouth gift from the chef: Gazpacho with Calamari.

Excuse me, but someone drowned a squid in my soup.


The gazpacho was actually very good - cool and salty with a few small tomato bits bobbing lazily in the bowl. It was most definitely not cold salsa, which I swear is what the Spain booth served us at the Food & Wine Festival back in 2004. As for the calamari ... it seemed like a generous portion for an amuse bouche, but I do not eat squid and asked Jay to get all those tentacles out of my bowl before I blew tomato chunks across the dining room floor.

After all the wine - some of it not very good - we had the night before at Soulard's I was not in the mood for more grape juice, so I spent a lot of time perusing Monarch's cocktail listing ... all eight of them. I kid you not, there were only eight drinks listed on their cocktail menu. I finally asked our server if the bartender could make me a pomegranate martini and she responded with a less than encouraging, "Well, if they can't, I'm sure they'll come up with something good."

Don't try to con Bendy ... Stinktown isn't so backwards that you can't find PAMA at the grocery store. Give me some ice, a cocktail shaker, and some vodka and I'll show that barely bearded baby behind the bar how to make a girly martini!

My eventual drink was something called Xanadu, and while it was a tad more citrusy than I am accustomed to in a pomegranate martini, it was still quite good. When it was first delivered to the table it was chock full of ice chips and I liked how they kept the drink cool for a long time while gently diluting some of the alcohol, which was very strong. I was also very grateful that the delivery of this drink was not accompanied by the soundtrack from Xanadu.

Excuse me, but now someone's drowned an orange in my drink.


I started the evening off with a Peeky Toe Crab Salad for my appetizer. Oh my, this was just delicious! A very large crab cake resting in a small puddle of tomato / vinegar dressing and garnished with arugula and "local" greens ... the taste of sweet, delicate crab mixed with tart vinegar-tomato was wonderful.

Peek-a-boo ... I'm gonna eat you!


Jay ordered Oyster Chowder to begin his meal. The chow-dah had lots of potato chunks along with slippery, slimy oyster bits, bacon, snow peas, and horrible 'shrooms in a creamy, dreamy broth. He liked this very much and that, my friends, is all you've got to go on because not only do I not eat squid, I don't eat oysters, either. I have a fundamental problem eating anything that looks like someone in the kitchen had a bad cold and sneezed in the soup.

Chowin' on the Chow-dah!


Do you guys know just how badly I wanted to order the scallops for dinner? But after the prior night's scallop disaster there was no way I was going to roll the Stinktown Seafood dice again so I chose the Strip Steak with Creamy Potatoes and Vegetable Goulash - hold the icky 'shrooms!

Ummm, did you just slaughter the cow in the back lot?


When I ordered this dish I requested my steak medium - it was delivered much more rare than I am accustomed to eating my meat and I considered sending it back. However, I decided that I should give it a try first and I'm very glad I did so ... it was tender and flavorful and just delicious. And those potatoes? They were so whipped and creamy they looked like pancake batter poured on a griddle. I could have eaten an entire bowl of those potatoes for dinner and followed it with another for dessert, they were that good.

Jay ordered the Red Wine Braised Beef Short Ribs with Glazed Baby Vegetables and Ramp Green Grits. This was a fine, fine selection with rib meat so tender that Jay didn't need to use his knife at all. I'm not sure about the green grits ... they tasted alright but why serve them any color other than grit? It's a puzzlement.

Mmmmm, ribs-a-plenty!


We took a long and careful gander at Monarch's dessert menu, but we weren't overly impressed. They did, however, offer a 3-or-5 cheese plate of dairy delights and so we opted for the five cheeses (would you expect any less?) and washed them down with a lovely glass of Dow's 20-year Tawny Port. My only beef is that the cheeses weren't listed on the menu and no list was given to us with the plate, so neither one of us has any idea at this point what the cheeses were. They were good ... nothing really knocked us on our asses ... but they were decent and obviously utterly forgettable.

Cheese, bread, and booze ... I could live on it for the rest of my life!


Way back in April when I made this reservation I must have told them we were celebrating out anniversary because our server re-appeared with a wee giftie for us: a slice of chocolate-caramel celebration cake. Had this item been on the dessert menu we might have ordered it - it was thick and rich and decadent ... a damn tasty and lovely little offering from the staff. Just look at all the chocolate shavings on that cake ... YUM!

It's free and it's chocolate!

So, how did I feel about this meal? Truth be told, I was, and still am, a little ambivalent about Monarch. Their food was very good but I really think that their menu is a little too limited and tries a little too hard to impress. Overall the service was good - water and bread were always refilled - but I would have liked a little more help finding drink and entree choices that were appealing to me. Our server didn't offer any recommendations to either Jay or me while we were trying to decide what to order. While Jay and I wouldn't tell anyone not to dine at Monarch, it's a long drive from our house and didn't make enough of an impression for us to feel like we need to pay them a return visit anytime soon. If I had to recommend one nice restaurant in St. Louis to my friendies at this point I think it would still be Harvest. Now there's a comfortable, accessible restaurant with a seasonal menu that offers a fair number of dining options, one of which just happens to include foie gras!