Momofuku Ko

I did it. I survived the three-hour marathon meal at Momofuku Ko. They served a challenging sixteen courses, culminating at about course number thirteen in a Long Island duck sausage-stuffed duck breast served with a small cylinder of rice, grilled green onion, and a sprinking of pomegranate seeds. They scored the fact in a beautiful pattern at the beginning of the meal, and basted it with hot peanut oil directly in front of us throughout the meal. It made me forget that I was already stuffed.

Before that, we had their famous melt-in-your mouth shaved foie gras over lychee, riesling jelly and brittle. And before that, a puffed egg in bacon dashi broth served with a light, fluffy, to-die-for bacon and cream cheese-stuffed "bagel." Other highlights included a refreshing oyster topped with caviar, chives and lime, and a rich rye bread soup with eel and confit of cherry tomatoes.

I was pretty much in a coma by the end of the meal, but conscious enough to appreciate a few aspects of the desserts, including a sweet cream ice cream that perfectly balanced a carrot puree, and an earl gray chocolate sauce poured over an earl grey tea cake and some other sort of ice cream.

The creativity level and execution here rivals that of a Thomas Keller kitchen, except with a much more Asian bent in both ambience and cuisine, particularly Japanese. Somewhere around the third or fourth course, I had an "aha!" moment, as in, "aha, I now understand all the hype."

Although everything was beautiful, they have a no picture policy, so all I have is this picture of their front door, which seems deliberately low profile, even hidden or unwelcoming. Our meal, however, was warm and undeniably delicious. Indeed, we were welcomed and seated right away despite being nearly a half hour late (the D train was much slower than we anticipated).