As the restaurant has spent a little time in the neighborhood, it has learned from its customers. “The diners started asking for spicier dishes. It happened so much that I changed the way I cook. Now most of the meals meet their tastes,” said Casey Tang, chef at Pod. My night out at the restaurant showed he was taking what he had learned about Williamsburg residents to heart.
Appetizers
The first dish was steamed mussels and clams in a lemongrass broth. Usual fare in restaurants nowadays. However, there was a surprise lurking in there—curry. Upon my first sample, a nice bite greeted the back of my throat. The shellfish were fleshy and tasty, not rubbery like I’ve experienced at other places. Fried oysters followed up the mussels, battered in Asian rice flour mix. The thick-but-not-heavy-in-your -mouth batter had a good taste. The dipping sauce contained coconut and wasabi that produced a nice citrusy-tangy sensation in my mouth.
Salad
A Portobello mushroom salad with mixed greens, Parmesan crisps, beets, and cherry tomatoes was next. The dish was a volcano rising from the plate with an apex of red onion slices spilling over like lava. The mushroom strips had a good texture and tasted like meat in my mouth. The Parmesan crisps were strong and very sharp for what I’d expected from such a thin, airy wafer. But eaten with the salad, it served as a perfect underpinning to the vinaigrette dressing. Unfortunately, there was a tad too much dressing that sometimes overwhelmed the dish. In this case, less is more. But otherwise, the tastes were fresh and crisp. (I’m a meat and potatoes man usually, and probably would have never ordered this dish on my own. I had—unbelievably—never had Portobello mushrooms before. I will be correcting that mistake in the future.)
Seafood
A seafood bowl full of lobster meat, udon noodles, vegetables, and broth came next. The green and red pepper slices, green okra, pink and white lobster meat, white noodles, and red-tinted broth presented a beautiful palette. Again, a surprise was lurking in the broth. Tang had slipped curry in and it had infiltrated the fish and noodles as well. It was not overpowering, as it possibly could have been. I could feel it on my tongue and the back of my throat, but not in my nose. The tender lobster meat contrasted nicely with the noodles’ texture. “This is a seafood lover’s dream,” my companion remarked. Indeed.
Fish
A sesame-crusted salmon filet set upon a black rice cake resting on a bed of snow pea shoots was a welcome surprise. The fish was flaky inside its crispy sesame coat. The combination of the flavors came as a surprise, as I could taste both individually and then together as I ate. The pea shoots were fleshy and green and hearty. The rice cake was thick and provided a good carbohydrate for a fish dish were potatoes or white rice might have been plain, boring, or expected. In fact, that is what attracted me to the dish. Instead of the usual same-old salmon filet, Tang had given the fish new and different clothes to wear.
Meat
The last main course was the grilled sirloin with garlic mashed potatoes and spinach. The meat was slightly charred for that brief-but-great charcoal taste in my mouth. Then I discovered the luscious inside. Marinated in a shallot wine sauce, the meat dissolved nicely as I ate, leaving a perfect aftertaste. The potatoes were not as garlicky as I might have liked them (I’m a garlic nut), but they did have little chunks inside like my mom used to make them. That made me glad they hadn’t been pre-processed and whipped mercilessly. As a point, this was the only dish we had (besides the salad) where the spices were not overt, and it served as a well-timed mellowing-out point for my mouth.
Dessert
At the end of the meal, this intrepid reviewer and his companion had to suffer through a delectable chocolate soufflé with a scoop of vanilla bean ice cream resting on crusted meringue. As my partner put it, “It’s a brownie outside of rich chocolate with liquid heaven inside.” Enough said. I also tasted the strawberry tart, which had a light apricot glaze across the top. The fresh fruit and smart taste of the creamy middle made me very, very happy. Both dishes were a perfect way to end the meal—fresh, rich, and sweet.
Afterword
Pod has found a great chef in Tan, who has worked previously at both Sequoia and Guastavino’s. The presentation was perfect and enticing on all the dishes without going overboard. A diner is able to find the perfect hamburger here or a unique Asian-influenced dish. Tang told me he borrowed from Italian, French, Asian (mainly Malaysia—which is an eclectic mix of culture and tastes itself), and American to create his dishes. He was happy to come to Williamsburg to cook because he felt he had more freedom to experiment with the food.
The dishes we ate that night were presented in a new light and grabbed our attention immediately with their spicy tastes. Over the few months Pod has been in Williamsburg, their menu has been changing as diners’ preferences are discovered and as Tang become more familiar with the new freedom he has found out in the ‘burg. It tastes like they are headed in the right direction.