RED PEARL KITCHEN : A Melrose Jewel Worth Exploring

by Shirley Firestone

Where the Alex restaurant and Maison G used to sit.
you will now find The Red Pearl Kitchen, an “instant-hit” Asian restaurant with food that defies the area. It’s decorated like an ancient story told in contemporary and symbolic three-dimensional art with an impassioned fervor about the food. The medley of flavors. textures and aromas is a unique combination of hot, sour, salty and sweet, with a mastery of herbs and spices borrowed from many Asian cultures. And I found the highest level of professional service in a dining room expensively decorated with a devotion to pleasure, better described as hedonistic and sexy. Even the kitchen is a focal point, completely seen from the dining room covered with a beautiful see-through decorated screen guarded by tall Chinese dolls.

I was surprised to find Red Pearl completely filled on a Monday evening, from the dining room to the hopping bar scene, exquisite lounge, and the party on the enclosed patio. The patio features two communal tables that could seat about 30, with an entire wall shelved with Chinese dolls. I believe that alter stepping the magical entrance,first timers are completely overwhelmed with the dazzling interior designed by Max Schlutz and .Ginger Thomas. Along with silk lampshades, fabulous lanterns overhead, huge oval mirrors - and dark furniture, there are candles all over the place, (enough to make a monastery proud). And right in the middle of the dining room is a humongous bowl under a one-of-a-kind designed lantern made from authentic colorful kimonos. In addition to the comfortable banquette there are free-standing tables and chairs, as well as orange booths and red leather sofas.

The lounge is accessible through a circular entrance. with hand-carved lacquered day beds, antique Chinese drums, Buddhas. upside-down parasols hanging from the ceiling, and televisions. When your eyes adjust to the darkness you will see a pool table.

I guess it’s time to get to the amazing food with Tim Goodell at the helm, voted as one of Food & Wine’s best new chefs of 2000. His inventive appetizers include extraordinary dishes such as spicy tuna served on tempura eggplant. also strawberry-cinnamon ribs, along with entrees of Kobe beef and papaya and spicy, drunk man rice noodles.

We began our meal with an appetizer of steamed shrimp dumplings and miso-glazed salmon on skewers, followed with a hot pot, which is soup that you serve yourself with your own ladle. It was prepared with duck, yellow curry, and udon noodles. They have about seven other varieties, including short ribs and pumpkin, even Kobe beef, and rice noodles. We also had chicken mango. followed by wok-fired sweet and sour lychee pork, along with ginger-scallion sea scallops, and about eight other selections. We devoured the spicy black bean calamari and enjoyed a great tasting platter of roasted chili with Yunnan yams for our vegetable. There were other interesting choices, such as the spicy garlic eggplant, and shao hsing mushrooms. The most amazing thing is that the food was so reasonably priced, from $7 to $11, with the exception of the wok- tired items, priced from $14 to $17, and $19 for the ginger scallops.

 These new zesty flavors give the palate something new to think about.

Our desserts were grand and scrumptious to the taste, such as the chocolate soufflé glace, with coconut crème and almond ice cream. However there were many. including a Vietnamese coffee sundae; vanilla and kaffir tapioca, with pineapple lychee sorbet. or banana fritters, puddings and so on: all priced from $6 to $8.

Specialty cocktails gave us a chance to “Kill Bill”, made with watermelon vodka, cranberry, cantaloupe, plus watermelon liqueur. Its a list to make you smile while checking out the tremendous wine list of sherry, sparkling, white, red, and in-between wines, along with sake. The imports are from Israel. France, Australia, Germany, Italy, South Africa, Japan, and Spain.
They have a late bar menu priced from $7 to $14. mostly under $10 for chicken-ginger potstickers; steamed BBQ pork b

uns; shrimp dumplings; and a variety of spring rolls, in addition to chicken wings.