A Fork in the Road: Husk (Charleston, SC)

One of the most envied reservations in town and we were lucky enough to get one on a Monday night.  Located in downtown Charleston mansion, Husk is very inviting from the moment you walk in the door.  An enormous and extensive chalkboard with the day's ingredients, and their location,  hangs above the hostess stand.  Chef Sean Brock prides his restaurant with having fresh, Southern ingredients every single day.  Complete with soft lighting and a long, narrowed dining room, simple table settings with glass jars of what else? Husks.

We each began with appetizers and I must say it was, unfortunately, the only most gratifying part of the dining experience.  

A beautiful assembly of spring colors in the Greechie Boy lettuces, roasted beets and spring berries with Asher blue cheese and wild blackberry vinaigrette salad.

Capers Inlet blade oysters with cucumber buttermilk and spring onion mignonette.  Thin, almost razor-like, oysters in a light buttermilk-vinegar mignonette topped with a sprig of dill.

Husk's staple appetizer of Southern fried chicken skins with a hot honey and garlic sauce. 

Fried green tomatoes with TN cheddar pimento cheese and shaved country ham.  This plate could have been a meal itself.  A nice, creamy pimento cheese, but the tomatoes could have used a dash of salt in the cornmeal.

I am at a loss when nothing pops out at me from the menu.  How disappointing.  I went out on a limb (my limb) and ordered the cornmeal fried NC softshell crabs, spring courgettes and onions, FL sweet corn with Husk tomato gravy.  The elements of the dish were all versatile and tasted well separately, but I couldn't seem to integrate them. 

However, the union of Adam Musick's VA Heritage pork with smoky peas and butter beans, rapini, Charleston Gold rice and collard liquor (or the liquid left from boiling collard greens) complemented one another soundly.  Husk's menu has a heavy pork presence and pork is what you want to order.  The sugary top of the pork added yet another dimension to the smoky, bitter, creamy dish.

Please do yourself a favor and order a side skillet of Smoky Benton's bacon cornbread.  That you won't regret.

Txikito

The owners of Tia Pol and El Quinto Pino now give you their take on Basque tapas with another establishment in Chelsea.

Piperrak (Blistered peppers with sea salt) - a take on shoshito peppers with a heavily granulated sea salt almost uncrusting the peppers

Arraultza (Sofrito, palacios chorizo, quail egg)

Pochas (Navarran white beans, Buchot mussels, white wine, parsley) and undoubtedly the winner of the evening!

The almost everyday 'special' of slow-roasted suckling pig with Chimichurri. The crispy skin is delicious.