Elite VIP Dinner @ Salt

Well, Raya, you were late writing your review, but not as late as me. Oops. Sorry, Aimee.
Anyway, the elite VIP dinner @ Salt was a great time. We started out on the patio/​garden and had some wine, and then moved indoors and were served family-​style.
There was an enormous amount of food to choose from, so nobody — not even me – could try it all. Among the things I tried were pork confit (yummy), chicken with rosemary (not my favorite, gotta be honest), risotto cake (some people thought it was bland, but I’m a fan of risotto and fried things, so I thought it was pretty good), fried green tomatoes (only the second time I’ve had this dish, and by far the best), green beans with corn (among the better green beans I’ve had), Southern style monkey bread (not sure what made it Southern style, but it was darn good), and, if I recall correctly, white chocolate-​pear bread pudding (also great).
People also raved about the salad, which I didn’t try, and the mussels-​with-​chorizo, which I also didn’t try because I don’t really like mussels.
Wes, the chef/​owner, formerly of The Shaved Duck before it changed from fancier food to fancy BBQ, took us on a tour of the restaurant. He has a nice space upstairs with a little theater and a room where he had some art on display, and a basement with lots of bottles of wine and a «boardroom» like room used for groups and such. One of the things he said that really stuck out in my mind was how he was hiring a farmer to help him grow fresh produce out back, which I thought was very cool.
Anyway. Thanks, Aimee, Wes, and the Salt staff for making a very special evening.

Being late to review, I will attempt to skip going over everything that was already mentioned.
Thank you to Aimee and Chef Wes for an incredible foodie experience! A magical night in a beautiful setting, with great company and amazing food.
I echo that the pork confit was the highlight of the menu, and this is coming from a gal who borderline hates pork! The family style serving was awesome except for the fact that I didn’t get to try the trout, which I will trust to be delicious. I also agree that risotto cakes were bland, but have the potential to be pretty darn delicious.
Oh yeah, and I am still dreaming about that monkey bread!

I was one of the lucky 20 to go to this Elite event. Also scoring was my son Chip K. Most of you know him as «The Famous Chip K». Very special night. Once again I had a great meal. Since it was served family style you really had to be alert to what you wanted to eat and what you needed to pass on. Was everything perfect? No. Was it special as stated before yes. Wes the Chef/​owner really wants his place to be world class and he is on his way. The pork and trout were as good as others have stated but the one thing that was a delight to me was his mixed green salad with balsamic vinegar. Very hard to serve a big bowl of greens and have it taste good with the dressing perfectly blended in. Nice job!
Aimee really puts on a great event and I am to thankful for all she has done for Unilocal.Thanks you so much!

If I could pick any seat in the house, it would be in the chair under «John Belushi w/​basketball» in the grotto-​like «boardroom» (see related photo). Some may describe this ceiling mural detail as a bacchanalian satyr dancing with a platter, but he’s John Belushi to me. This is a room characterized by machismo, and here John H. and his cabinet of advisers would make world-​transforming decisions, or, with enough wine, imagine that they could.
I may seem obsessed with one space, but I suspect other guests also relish the memory of a personal favorite. Perhaps it was the Egyptian Revival cabaret-​like room, or the upstairs foyer transformed into an art gallery, or even one of the stylish restrooms. A walk through the building with Chef-​Owner Wes was like a docent-​led museum tour.
Of course, amazing food was a major focus of our time together. I reviewed Salt after a visit this spring, and won’t try to update my food notes with the fall menu because others are doing that well. I’ll just encourage you to read reviews by my tablemates (and we all were tablemates, shoulder-​to-​shoulder), especially: Angela S., Cherie O., Colin F., Jeremy C., Kelly R., Kim K., and Robin C.
A night like this is first and foremost about the people. Each one of us eat at restaurants and post our impressions via Unilocal.How radically delicious to share a real rather than virtual table with people like Paul «Florida Is A State of Mind» K., Chip «Because ‘Chips’ Aren’t Just For Computers» K., Erin «Makes Grown Chefs Cry» G., Timothy «Guinness Is My Favorite Food Group» G., and Aimee «Next Time There Will Be A Lottery, So Please Don’t Be Sad» K. Special thanks to Aimee: from the welcome on the patio, to the toast at the table, to the words of thanks directed at Wes and staff, she managed the event with grace. To this Fellowship of Grassroots Food Critics, I give my five stars.

Aimee, can we do this every week??!
I was in San Antonio for a conference when I got the invite for this and was one of the lucky few who logged in at 12 noon for a RSVP. Best decision ever. You know it’s going to be an experience if everyone you know, foodie or not, is talking about Salt, including my college-​age brother.
We met on the garden patio at first to have wine and introductions. I got there a little bit late, but still managed to have some chardonnay that had my head swimming. After a little while, we moved inside where Chef Wes Johnson explained his restaurant concept of utilizing local resources and his hopes for the future, including garden beds on site hopefully to be used for next year. I had perused the menu online prior to this, but nothing I had read prepared me for the family-​style dinner that followed along with the impeccable and personable service. Chef Wes was awesome in explaining all of the dishes: what they were, how they were made, the brainstorm behind each one. And since most of them are not on the current menu, it made for a very memorable experience indeed!
Angela and I sat next to each other, and we both agreed that the pork confit was the best dish ever. It was sultry, soft, and just saturated with flavor. I think it was the first thing I finished because I spent the rest of the night hoping another plate would re-​appear.
I also loved the salad greens with figs; you could totally tell that they were so fresh. It was a hit, along with the corn and green beans, which came from a farm in nearby Illinois. Fabulous.
Chef Wes comes from the West Coast, but he said he doesn’t eat shellfish. Yet that didn’t stop him from producing this incredible dish of mussels with chorizo and also another dish of seared trout. If I had to choose my next favorites, these would be the ones. And who said you couldn’t get great seafood in STL?
The other plates were well in keeping to his concept of home comfort food, locally resourced: cheesy potatoes, fried green tomatoes, chicken infused with rosemary, and risotto cakes. Sometime midway through eating, dessert appeared in the forms of monkeybread, white chocolate pear bread pudding that Stephanie S. would have been totally all over, and watermelon with syrup. They topped it off with a glass of champagne.
But the best part was yet to come. We got to tour the entire place, which was simply amazing in itself, since the restaurant was closed. I’m a sucker for history, architecture, and space functionality, which Chef Wes is also apparently fond of. I like how they are trying to trace back the history of the mansion, and he was telling us how last week, a guest, during dinner, told him that his grandmother had been born in the house. Super cool. The upstairs is multi-​purpose, consisting of an open space which Chef Wes is using as a local artist gallery currently along with an Egyptian-​themed room with stage. The best were the washrooms though. If Timothy G. wants to live downstairs, I want to live in the ladies’ bathroom. You could throw a party in there; it was so big! We toured the regular kitchen, which was amazing in itself, and then the cold kitchen in the basement. There’s a 1200 bottle cellar down there along with a conference-​like/​party room, complete with a history mural of the building on the ceiling. Really neat.
It was my first Elite event (although not my first Unilocal event), and it was a wonderful time. I love how everyone was just so enthusiastic about everything, and there were a lot of interesting conversations to be had. Thanks, Aimee and Chef Wes, for planning such a great night! I am definitely going to grab my friends and come back!

Not since Louis Prima missed out on the timpano at the Paradise has a feast of food of this magnitude been offered up.
Seriously, this is why Salt received the «Best New Restaurant» per the Riverfront Times.(really, read it here:
)
We first met up outside in the garden for some pre-​dinner wine. Red or white? Why thank you. Introductions were made with many fellow Elites that I’ve only had the honor of sending compliments.
Once we moved in, the food took over (plus rapid refills of wine and waters). Pork, risotto cakes, fried green tomatoes, bleu cheese potatoes, awesome chicken, mussels, or as King Mongkut once said, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. But in a crazy good way. Be jealous.
I have a vague memory of bread pudding and monkey bread (much to my dismay, this did not involve monkeys, but was nevertheless delicious).
A concluding tour by the chef (including the amazing downstairs, I want to live down there as some sort of foodie Morlock).
Kudos to Wes Johnson and his staff at Salt, to Aimee for setting this up, and to all my fellow Elites, who provided awesome company.

Any night where I have to pinch myself to believe I’m lucky enough to be a part of it is a five star night.
This was my first Elite event, and what a great note to start things off on. Salt, Wes Johnson and his friendly, attentive staff really delivered tonight.
The food: the standout dish was absolutely the pork. I also loved the goat cheese potatoes, the chorizo stuffed mussels and the Alabama girl in me was impressed by their spicy take on fried tomatoes. My dad would have gone crazy for those. The white chocolate pear bread pudding was also noteworthy.
The atmosphere: I absolutely adore this building, the way it is set back off a busy street, the white christmas lights outside. The interior is even more beautiful. You feel like a guest in someone’s home. It’s very cozy and elegant. I was blown away by the beautiful basement cellar room, and I was very entertained by the upstairs.
The event: I couldn’t have asked for a better «first» event. Aimee did a spectacular job putting the event together and checked in frequently to make sure we were enjoying the night. I had a great time meeting the other Unilocalers and think it’s a really neat thing that a group of strangers can come together and feel like old friends by time the night is done.
Wes was a fantastic host. He answered all of our questions and you can feel his passion for what he’s got going there. You just really want him to succeed. And Salt will. I can’t wait to make a dinner reservation and show it off to a friend.

I have been to SALT before and this time definitely takes the cake or monkey bread I guess whatever you prefer.
I want to first say how honored I feel to have been a part of this evening. Aimee did a great job as always and Wes and his crew were incredible.
I feel like the seating arrangements were like our plates ended up a little cramped but I didn’t mind. I really enjoy meeting new people and tonight was no different great food and excellent conversation.
Tonight’s meal was served family style and Wes told us that allot of what he served us was not on the menu, so I felt like we were trying something that could become a hit one day and I could say «yeah been there done that».
I think the best part of the food experience was the pork shoulder. It was just so sweet and savory and everything you could imagine it should be. I really think I have never tasted a better pork dish ever.
I liked the corn and local grown green beans. The fish was so tender and juicy I think it was trout? The salad was amazing it reminded me of spring time with how fresh and light the Balsamic dressing was.
The clams were very tasty and a little stronger than I am used to but hey I have only had them one other time so I am no judge. The fried green tomatoes were not my favorite but I think I am just not cut out for them, I am a tomato lover though so I am willing to give them another try sometime.
I think the coolest part of the evening was the tour. The building has been renovated so well and has so much class and elegance to it that makes you really just want to study everything. The room in the basement with the mural on the ceiling was incredible. I felt like it had a eerie sense of the soul of the building, take that for whatever you will.
The wine was great I had about three glasses and was feeling good by the time the champagne toast came around.
Overall I would say this was on par with the Truffles Elite dinner but it was missing one thing. The peaches but for what it lacked in peachy goodness it made up for with Monkey Bread.