Tchoup Chop is an Asian Pacific restaurant from US celebratory chef Emeril Lagasse situated in the Royal Pacific Resort at Universal Orlando. The name is a nod to New Orleans' famous Tchoupitoulas Street, where Emeril's flagship restaurant is located.
The menu reads well with creative dishes. We ordered from the a la carte and a set menu, the portions were on the large size, which we now expected in the US but yet managed to over order again!
A starter of seared ahi tuna poke nachos was huge with piles of wonton chips, guacamole and Hawaiian chilli pepper alioli. This was a great snack with meaty chunks of tuna.
The signature starter was the Tchoup Chop crunchy shrimp with hot and sour chilli glaze. Three big hunks of fried shrimp with a tangy sauce.
One dish we could of done without if we knew how big the portions were was the surf & turf maki, blue crab, cucumber, Hibachi skirt steak, Asian chimichurri and white truffle oil. Whilst sounding great we didn’t think it worked as a dish with the steak being too tough served as sushi and being a tad dry overall.
Our mains were the most interesting. Kona coffee spice pork tenderloin, shishito pepper, corn bread, spaghetti squash, cherry agro dolce and apple cider ginger butter. This was inspiring and the mixture of flavours worked surprisingly well.
Less successful was the baked seafood cobbler, edamame mushroom ragout and truffle scented lemon herb streusel. Whilst very fragrant it became a chore to eat towards the end as the streusel became clay like when mixed with the ragout.
A dessert of baked Hawaii in a jar, coconut cake, vanilla ice cream, meringue and caramelised pineapple was a very end to the meal.
Overall some interesting concepts with some hit and misses, but bold enough to experiment.
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