{"id":245691,"date":"2013-01-04T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2013-01-04T08:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sdnews.com\/3-d-dining\/"},"modified":"2013-01-04T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2013-01-04T08:00:00","slug":"3-d-dining","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/3-d-dining\/","title":{"rendered":"3-D dining"},"content":{"rendered":"

Barra D
\n3930 Fifth Ave. (Hillcrest)
\n619-299-3227
\nDinner prices: Starters, $6 to $12; entrees, $11 to $25; desserts, $8 to $15<\/em><\/p>\n

Por Frank Sabatini Jr. | Descripci\u00f3n del restaurant<\/p>\n

\"3-D
Fried chicken between cheese waffles (Photo by Frank Sabatini Jr.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The holiday sweets I encountered last month sucked. A tin of homemade cookies that my aunt sent were reduced to crumbs in the mailing process. A box of cocoa-dusted truffles I purchased for a party tasted like cheap fudge. And the apple pie our hosts served after Christmas dinner was store-bought.<\/p>\n

To make up for lost sugar, I headed to D Bar with a sweet-toothed companion in tow. Yes, the \u201cD\u201d stands for \u201cdesserts,\u201d but it also signifies \u201cdrinking\u201d from a full liquor inventory and \u201cdining\u201d from a menu of savories that live up to the magnificent confections conceived by acclaimed pastry wizard Keegan Gerhard and his wife, Lisa Bailey, also an accomplished pastry chef.<\/p>\n

By order of anyone who has dined at D Bar since it opened last year, save room for dessert, specifically the \u201ccake and shake,\u201d which features a wedge of three-layer chocolate cake made with sour cream and Madagascar chocolate frosting. The sour cream, says Keegan, tenderizes the crumb. Blatantly so, its melt-in-your-mouth texture bewitches upon first bite.<\/p>\n

Gerhard, who also emcees the \u201cFood Network Challenge\u201d TV shows, was twice named one of the top 10 pastry chefs by Chocolatier Magazine. His use of rich and silky chocolate continues across the dessert menu in \u201cfaux foster banana imposter\u201d involving chocolate cremeux piped between two Belgian waffles that are topped with the caramelized fruit. A seat at the spacious dessert bar (highly recommended) put us in direct eyeshot of the pastry team assembling the creation practically non-stop, with an occasional molten chocolate cake being yanked from the oven.<\/p>\n

Savories are cooked in a concealed kitchen at the rear of the D Bar\u2019s lofty interior, which also features a booze bar and table seating throughout the middle area. But no matter where you sit, full wait service for the entire menu is provided.<\/p>\n

Visiting for dinner, we began with a couple of appetizers that differed dramatically in terms of weight and refinement. The \u201cavos avos avos\u201d involved three treatments of avocado on the same plate: as fondue with goat cheese; raw and dressed with olive oil, salt and pepper; and a fried wedge encased in crispy filo strands. Exquisite.<\/p>\n

More substantial was a deep bowl of \u201ccrue fries\u201d that likely resembled in calories those heaping portions of carne asada fries I\u2019ve devoured after late-night bar crawls. These are deliciously flooded with cheese sauce, shaved Jack and cheddar, bacon and Ranch dressing. There is also garlic, Parmesan and chives at work. Your chances of accommodating dessert diminish greatly if you consume the fries solo.<\/p>\n

\"3-D
Avocado three ways (Photo by Frank Sabatini Jr.)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

From the entr\u00e9e section, my companion ordered short ribs that were braised in Coca Cola and served de-boned over buttery mushrooms and grits spiked with mascarpone cheese. The dish appealed to his Midwest roots. Unlike similar beef recipes I\u2019ve tried using cola; the caramel flavoring wasn\u2019t lost here. The residual sugar from the soda found a welcome host in the tender meat, titillating without tasting overly sweet.<\/p>\n

The \u201cSouthern fried Belgian\u201d is a newfangled version of chicken and waffles, constructed into manageable sandwich form. Honey mustard replaces the customary maple syrup while a dash of cheese goes into the waffles. Tradition is upheld, however, with superlative buttermilk batter encasing the chicken. Needless to say, half of the sandwich came home with me and proved equally filling the next day.<\/p>\n

Other entrees that appear worth a re-visit include spice-rubbed Porterhouse pork, spaghetti with Fontina-stuffed Kobe meatballs and scallops with risotto that is speckled with cocoa nibs.<\/p>\n

In addition to our \u201ccake and shake,\u201d we encroached on a fruity, non-chocolate dessert called \u201cspring break \u201998,\u201d inspired by a trip to Jamaica Gerhard made in his college days. Pineapple and rum naturally factored in, resulting in a thick ring of the fruit roasted in the liquor and complimented greatly by ginger-macadamia crumble and homemade coconut ice cream. It was our fast pass to the tropics on a painfully chilly night.<\/p>\n

With a glass of bubbly Moscato d\u2019Asti we kept parked alongside (or a tiramisu martini or chai-infused whiskey if you will), D Bar is a one-stop shop for culinary indulgence. Hang around the dessert bar long enough and you\u2019ll also learn a few valuable tricks pertaining to the art of pastry.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

D Bar 3930 Fifth Ave. (Hillcrest) 619-299-3227 Dinner prices: Starters, $6 to $12; entrees, $11 to $25; desserts, $8 to $15 By Frank Sabatini Jr. | Restaurant Review<\/p>","protected":false},"author":726,"featured_media":245692,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11555","_seopress_titles_title":"3-D dining","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11547,11551,11555],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-245691","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-features","category-news","category-uptown-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/245691","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/726"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=245691"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/245691\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/245692"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=245691"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=245691"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=245691"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}