He’s Bringing Pasta Back
Forget bread. You want pasta to mop the sauce from Chef Danny Grant’s charcoal-roasted seafood tower.
Charcoal-Roasted Seafood Tower: Wild Blue Prawns, Kumamoto Oysters, Maine Sea Scallops, Manilla Clams, Wild Dover Sole, and Alaskan King Crab with a Pasta Back
Before opening Maple & Ash, Chef Danny Grant did months of R&D to figure out the details that make the steakhouse format so successful, and he ate a lot of chilled shellfish while doing it. “The crab was always soggy—you could wring water out of it,” says Grant. “I thought, ‘Hey, let’s roast ours in a wood-fired oven.’” From that denouement came one of Maple & Ash’s most ordered dishes, the fire roasted seafood tower in “semi-pro” ($145) and “baller” ($180) iterations. It’s also the centerpiece of Grant’s “I Don’t Give a Fuck” tasting menu (if luxury makes you squeamish, buyer beware). Like going to a Justin Timberlake concert when Beyoncé walks out for the encore, there’s an off-menu option for the tower that Grant sends out to tables who are “having way too much fun.” Introducing the “Pasta Back.”
Grant cooks blue prawns, Kumamoto oysters, Maine sea scallops, Manilla clams, wild Dover sole, and Alaskan king crab in a 600ºF Josper oven for approximately two minutes.
The manilla clams pop and release their liquid, which becomes the base of a garlicy-butter sauce finished with chile oil, parsley, Maldon salt, and lemon.
The best-in-class seafood is kept warm at the table by a candle.
Once guests are nearly done, the tableside Pasta Back commences. Blanched conchiglie pasta (made with a just-denser-than-standard dough) is tossed with the seafood remnants, their juices, chives, and more butter. Why sop with bread when you can use pasta?
As for wine? Bottles of white Burgundy all around. Absolutely.
