Chicago chef Dale Levitski is moving to Nashville and will open a restaurant in the historic theater building in Melrose.
Levitski shot to fame as a runner-up on season three of Top Chef and parlayed that success into Sprout, a well-received 35-seat new-American-style restaurant in the Windy City. More recently, Levitski opened Frog 'n Snail, but both closed last fall after he left to take a hiatus.
Bites talked briefly with Levitski last week as he was weighing Nashville and a few other cities. He liked his experience and wondered if his style would fly here.
In a statement today, Levitski confirmed the move.
“I am thrilled to be joining one of the hottest food scenes in the country,” said Levitski. “While Chicago will always be my beloved hometown, what really excites me about Nashville is the energy and support for the culinary scene. More specifically, the team behind this project, the space in which it will grow, and the high quality of service are all in line with my goals, and I know it’s going to be a fantastic result.”
Colin Reed, partner/owner in the as yet unnamed project, was very high on Levitski's ability.
“Levitski will instantly elevate and add to the Nashville dining scene, which continues to enjoy the national spotlight,” said Reed. “It was very quickly evident that he was the ideal talent for this project. When he began discussing his vision for the food, it was as if he had a script of conversations we’d had internally.”
While chef at Sprout, Levitski was semifinalist for a 2011 James Beard award in the ultra-competitive Great Lakes region. He and his restaurants have received numerous honors.
Bites had a few chances to eat there in 2010 and 2011 and loved it. Levitski married technical excellence with creative dishes for a pretty unique experience. Tribune critic Phil Vittel gave it three stars.
Just listing a single dish's components takes almost as much space as the preamble to the Constitution. "My goal," Levitski joked to me, "is to give you carpal tunnel."He treats his menu engraver more kindly. Every single dish, desserts included, is described by a single word. "Bitters rabbit chocolate" isn't an Easter confection; it's a three-course dinner.
"Rabbit," however, turns out to be pan-seared loin pieces draped over Levitski's ethereal truffled gnocchi, along with peas, asparagus, hazelnuts and dribbles of lemon-scented jus. "Artichoke" is a light, clean, breath-of-spring salad with tatsoi (a cabbage-y Asian green), hearts of palm and watermelon radish. "Beef" does, in fact, contain beef, but it's a thin, carpaccio-like ribbon encircling a smoked-trout salad (the true star of the dish, sez me), a surf-and-turf for the 21st century.
And then there is the veal loin, a sensational, crispy-skinned loin stuffed with a forcemeat of veal sausage and porcini mushrooms. Next to the thick-sliced veal are planks of crisped polenta, huckleberry-braised cippolini onions and a slightly tart sauce of veal stock and braising liquid. For a cutting-edge chef, Levitski enjoys a good meat-and-starch dish.
Desserts are equally whimsical. There's a textural thrill ride in the corn and black-truffle bread pudding, with sweet-corn gelato, popcorn and caramel-dipped corn kernels. Syrup-poached rhubarb and strawberries with sugar-dusted beignets and marcona-almond gelato is like gussied-up county-fair fare. My favorite might be the deconstructed lemon tart, which features scoops of lemon curd and whipped cream atop overlapping pieces of tart-cherry pound cake. Wisps of cardamom and pink peppercorn add a touch of the exotic.
While it's a little old, this
2009 profile of Levitskifrom when he began at Sprout is well worth reading.
