The Write Ingredients

Another restaurant to drool over.

I met a friend today at Saffron, the new restaurant that's taken over the first floor at 123 North Third Street. The space was most recently home to Jazzmines, with a series of semi-successful restaurants before that. When I first graduated from college and started hanging out in Minneapolis' warehouse district, I remember stopping in for a cup of coffee and caramel roll and watching the Simpson's for a few minutes. My, how times have changed. This time I hope the restaurant sticks around. (Read a recent review.)

The restaurant is named after the mystical spice, Saffron, and it was a shame to see we were one of only five or six tables over the lunch hour. I hope they're busier for dinner, or I'll have to start going there more
often.

I started with the recommend mint ice tea, which probably could have used more mint, but apparently I didn't mind because the server brought me more than one refill.

Shortly after we sat down, we were brought a basket of pita bread, a good crusty bread and homemade hummus. I'm not usually a hummus fan, but there was really no way I was going to miss this delicacy. It was smooth, with just a hint of garlic and did not, in any way, remind of that night, over 10 years ago, where I ate more than my share of Hummus from a Greek deli in Georgetown at 3:30 in the morning. No, this was much better, and stayed down.



My friend and I were both very interested in the soup of the day, a Piquillo pepper puree served with a crostini slathered in goat cheese, but we both had reservations. She's a vegetarian, I avoid heavy cream. I was the fortunate one that day, because yes, it had a touch of meat broth, but was free of any dairy. And boy was I glad. When the bowl arrived, the soup was a bright red, with the promised crostini floating beneath a pile of luscious goat cheese. Friend took a bite (despite the meat broth) and described it as "piquillo peppers stuffed with feta but in liquid form." I couldn't have agreed more.



Not that she was too jealous, because in front of her was a beautiful Fatoush Salad, full of romaine, cherry tomatoes, cucumbers, pita crisps and covered in a sumac-lemon vinaigrette. It was both light and rich at the same time.



The entrée, though, was what will bring me back there. We both ordered the Salmon "Tagine." Beyond being beautiful, it was full of flavor and layers of hidden goodies. The menu says it contains " saffron, peppers, olives, fennel and Yukon gold potatoes." The potatoes were thinly sliced and layered, there was a touch of preserved lemon on the top and the olives (even with pits) were unlike any I have tasted in my life. They had the distinct olive flavor with none of the unpleasant bitterness that can come with it. Nope, nothing briny here, folks, just pure olive flavor.



The service was very good, even though there was only the one server working. He was extremely knowledgeable and identified the elements of each dish as he delivered it. He offered us dessert, which neither of us would have been able to handle. Saffron is not an inexpensive restaurant, but that's the beauty of hitting these grand, new places for lunch. There's rarely wine on the table, and the lunch portions are smaller and cost less.

That doesn't mean I'm not dieing to go back there, however, and the next time I hope to see both the dessert menu and the wine list.