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The Fondue Burger, made from ground brisket and short rib with frisée, speck and cornichon on a house sesame bun (Photo by Alexis Courtney)
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Interior of Brenner Pass (Photo by Alexis Courtney)
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Marinated artichokes with lardo, hazelnuts, sage and vin cotto (Photo by Alexis Courtney)
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Gianduja tart with salted caramel, dark chocolate ganache and hazelnut dragée (Photo by Alexis Courtney)
Is it any good?
That’s the question that everyone who cares about restaurants in this food-mad city has been asking ever since Brenner Pass — the hotly anticipated restaurant from James Beard-nominated chef Brittanny Anderson, who turned a tiny 28-seater named Metzger into a cult phenomenon — opened in a spacious, window-wrapped space early last summer in Scott’s Addition.
Turns out it’s the wrong question to be asking.
Because right now I’m wondering if this isn’t the best, most exciting restaurant in all of Richmond.
I can already hear some of you protesting — it’s too soon to make such a weighty pronouncement; the place hasn’t even been open half a year; give it some time.
Others of you, inundated for more than a year with hype about the Alpine theme and the brilliance of the much-laureled chef, are bound to approach any slathering on of praise with intense skepticism, if not outright hostility.
To all of you slow-your-rollers, I say this: Take a bite of Anderson’s paccheri Bolognese bianco.
At a glance, it’s a simple-looking pasta dish, with tender tubes of homemade pasta coated in a tight, clinging pork ragu. But what makes it glorious is something you can’t see — namely, the element Anderson and her staff refer to as “liquid gold,” a pork stock that has been reduced down, over hours, until it's a thick and highly concentrated syrup that anoints every dish it touches. There isn’t a pork chop in this city, not a barbecued rib, that has more porky flavor than this unassuming bowl of pasta.
Or take a bite of her burger. There are loads of great ones out there, sure. But none greater. It isn’t just that Anderson forms hers not from chuck, but from ground brisket and short rib. It’s that she bastes this patty with scraps of smoked, rendered sirloin, then coats it with a sharp, oozing cheese sauce. The result? A burger with the intense, beefy taste of a properly dry-aged steak.
Speaking of which, Anderson butchers her own steaks, hanging the carcasses for days in a meat locker she had installed on the premises. She butchers all her own meats. And fish. If you want to know why the porterhouse of veal has so much savor, or why the arctic char is so juicy, that’s why.
Hipster chefs are prone to referring to this obsessively fanatical attention to detail as “badass,” as if doing things the right way, the honest way, were a daring act of invention. It’s not new; in fact, it’s actually really, really old.
Anderson, to her credit, understands this. For a young chef, she has a profound reverence for the old ways. Witness her textbook-faithful version of fondue, rich with Emmenthal and Gruyère and tangy with white wine, a reminder of what has been lost as comfort food has become ascendant infine dining, the deep, layered flavors that great foundational cooking can deliver.
What separates Brenner Pass from the pack is exactly this sort of devotion to the so-called little things. The little things that, as Anderson knows, add up to one big thing.
Is it necessary to supplement an already wonderful preparation of (lovingly) hand-chopped steak tartare with tiny, eye-dropper bottles of housemade hot sauce and Worcestershire? No, but the dish is that much better for it. Also, that much more fun — the ultimate in customizable cuisine.
At a time when high-end restaurants are content to save their money come dessert and offer sorbets and ice creams, Anderson has tasked her pastry chef — yes, she actually has one: the supremely talented Olivia Wilson — with producing the intricate, laborious, high-degree-of-difficulty sweets that define Old World baking. If only just for a bite of her gianduja tart or dulcey soufflé and a cup of coffee, it would be worth booking a table.
The same could also be said for any of Beverage Director James Kohler’s masterly cocktails.
If you want to know why Anderson was so dogged in her pursuit of him, going so far as to extend Kohler a stake in ownership, take a sip of the Stay Gold or the Snow Bunny, which, like nearly every drink on his creative menu, go down so smooth you almost don’t realize how sophisticated and balanced they are.
But it goes well beyond that. With Kohler and Wilson (another co-owner) on hand to ensure an exciting start and finish, Anderson has greatly expanded the dynamic range of her restaurant. Some places nail the middle act; some, the opening act. Very few places can mount a performance that thrills all the way through.
Brenner Pass is not perfect; no restaurant is. The lighting in the hallway-like room flanking the bar isn’t flattering, and the high stools aren’t comfortable. The space, sprawling and open and with fashionably unfinished floors, is more industrial than warm. Which isn’t a big deal if dinner for two costs $70. When the tab goes into three digits, however, it’s right to expect more: more coziness; more character; more pampering. It helps that the young, energetic servers are so well-drilled and so infectious in their enthusiasm for the place and its mission.
And really, how could they not be?
Metzger is a scruffy bar band that happened to strike it big; Brenner Pass was big before it opened — the worst kind of big; the unproven kind. It could have labored under the strain of expectations. It could have tried too hard. It could have been precious and over-refined, and shown, at every turn, the anxiety of a chef and a team feeling the need to prove their fine-dining pretensions.
That it is none of these things, that it is a joyous and exciting place to eat and drink, that it ups the bar for dining out in this city, is no small triumph.
4 1/2 out of 5 stars
3200 Rockbridge St., Suite 100
804-658-9868
Hours: Dinner Tuesday to Thursday: 5 to 10 p.m.; Friday to Saturday: 5 to 11 p.m.; Bar Tuesday to Thursday: 5 p.m. to midnight; Friday to Saturday: 5 p.m. to 2 a.m.; Sunday brunch: 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Prices: Dinner $6 to $45.Brunch $6 to $24.
