Valentine’s Day 2013

Celebration of the Heart

Join us for a very special 6 course gourmet vegetarian feast!

Each course will explore two exotic foods of love:

Course One: Figs and Honey

Herbed cashew cheese, buckwheat walnut crostini, roasted figs, Manuka honey

Course Two: Almonds and Cardamom

Mache and upland cress salad, almond biscotti, marinated green mango, cardamom vinaigrette

Course Three: Ginger and Saffron

Ginger lentil dumplings in a saffron broth

Course Four: Ginseng and Guava

Ginseng and guava sorbet, candied lime

Course Five: Truffles and Asparagus

Ravioli stuffed with wild mushroom duxelle, shaved truffle, asparagus chive cream

Course Six: Chili and Chocolate

Vegan cacao truffles, chili chocolate sauce

$69/person, includes all food and a champagne cocktail!
Call for reservations 860-322-4212

$70/person + includes gratuity and tax

Starts at 7pm, Wednesday, January 23, 2013

Menu

Saturdays in January-

Spring Cleaning Series: Full Body Rejuvenation

Sat. January 5th, 10am-Noon: Week One Getting Started-basics of a plant based diet

Sat. January 12th, 10am-Noon: Week Two High Raw-learn nourishing and beautifying raw recipes and tips

Sat. January 19th, 10am-Noon: Week Three  Juicing for Health and Vitality

Sat. January 26th, 10am-Noon: Week Four  Maintain the Glow!   Strengthen and build your skills with more advanced recipes and techniques

All Open Admission.  $25/Person

Wednesdays in January

Wed. January 16th, 11am-1pm: Raw Italian Feast-lasagna, tiramisu, and caesar salad!

Reservation Only

Wed. January 30th, 11am-1pm:Whole Grains Made Easy-learn the basics of cooking with gluten free whole grains

Reservation Only.  $65/person

For reservation only classes, space will be held upon receipt of full payment, either in person or over the phone. Call 860-322-4212 to make a reservation.

All classes include recipes, tasty samples, food preparation demonstrations, and Q&A with instructor Chef Rachel Carr.

To purchase a class, stop by the restaurant or call 860-322-4212.  Admission can also be purchased at the door for open classes.

Saturday classes are held from 10am-Noon in the Six Main dining room.  Wednesday classes are usually held in the Six Main kitchen.

Join us for a festive evening featuring premium organic wines a unique 4 course menu of gourmet vegan specialties.

$50.00/person
$25.00/ person for wine pairing with each course

2 Seatings 6pm and 8pm
Call for Reservations 860-322-4212

Appetizer
Sweet Potato and Black Eyed Pea Pate, Meyer Lemon Gremolata
with sourdough toast points

Soup or Salad
Cream of Watercress
Watercress Blood Orange Salad

Entree
Farro Risotto with preserved lemon, Sea Palm and shaved fennel salad
Mushroom Wellington with root vegetable ragout, lemon infused oil

Dessert
Clementine Panna Cotta
Marbled Chocolate Orange Tart

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 5 HOLIDAY DESSERTS-FULL

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 12 HEALTHY AND HEARTY SOUP-FULL

SATURDAY, DECEMBER 15 ICE CREAM SOCIAL-RAW VEGAN ICE CREAM WORKSHOP (ADMISSION OPEN, $25 AT THE DOOR)

Elegantly prepared, nuanced preparations of vegetarian, vegan and raw food dishes are the expert domain of Six Main Restaurant in Chester, CT. Housed in the former Chester Savings Bank, a stately 100-year old landmark situated at the center of this quaint central Connecticut town, Six Main helps to usher in the slow momentum of “contemporary plant-based gourmet cuisine” into the state.  

Open since summer 2012, Six Main is the result of a serendipitous collaboration between owner Bill de Jonge and award-winning raw chef Rachel Carr. Looking for a chef who would hold the same passion for healthy food, de Jonge hired Carr who happened to find herself in the Northeast after many years on the West coast at the helm of the well known Los Angeles raw vegan outpost, Cru. Their partnership also led to the cultivation of de Jonge’s Old Lyme home, Upper Pond Farm, for produce specifically raised for the restaurant they were building.

Six Main celebrates plant-based cuisine–a spectrum of vegetarian, vegan and raw dishes–in an urbane yet unstuffy setting. The space itself retains shadows of its original bank architecture, including soaring ceilings, a bank clock, and a night deposit slot at the front corner of the building. The sparsely elegant space allows for elbow room and privacy, and a central bar and cocktail menu is in the works for next season.

For omnivores sensing categorization fatigue or a knee-jerk vegan aversion, this focus can and does seem secondary here. Both Carr and de Jonge are the first to eschew labels in favor of what the restaurant really embraces—elevated and vegetable-centric compositions that celebrate seasonality and the nuance of flavor in an elegant dining setting. The absence of animal protein is barely noticed. Conversely, for those whose culinary preferences are strict, whether voluntarily or genetically-dictated, this culinary focus can be freeing. Dishes are marked only if they have dairy (assuming the rest does not) and if dishes are gluten free. No need to ask for exceptions, but refreshingly, the menu states “substitutions are welcome.”

Dinner at Six Main often begins with a gremolata paired with several thick and pillowy slices of house-made whole wheat bread. Six Main’s version of this traditional Italian condiment is an emulsion of parsley, garlic, lemon zest and olive oil.  

Their recent summer menu was the epitome of fresh vegetables and light flavors, including six appetizers and three salads, and has recently skewed heartier for the winter. Cornmeal dusted crispy shitake mushrooms pan-fried in coconut oil were served with a citrus-laced marinara (vegan and gluten-free). A few new winter dishes include a Tempura Sweet Potato Roll composed of sushi nori, crispy sweet potato curls, avocado, organic gluten free tamri and the Savory Apple Kinchee Pancake, made with pressed sake pickles, shiitake mushrooms and cashew sour cream.

On my first visit during late summer, I tried the recommended warm maple-glazed string bean and spinach salad. Served with chevre, walnuts and cherry tomatoes, the collection of farm fresh vegetables paired with the creamy chevre and sweet glaze was a well-balanced and deceptively complex dish. The dearth of pristine string beans, warmed just enough to coax them out of their very recent plant-bound state, were crisp and refreshing. The winter menu boasts similiarly attentive presentations of vegetable-laden salads, focused on retaining the height of vegetable flavor.

Onto the selection of entrees, a chili glazed tofu and vegetables dish served with organic barley, is already a menu staple, migrating its vegetables with the seasons, recently served with an almond chili glaze, grilled bok choy and toasted cashews. Pasta dishes are earthy and substantial such as the summer Red Pepper Tagliatelle. Recent menu additions have replaced this with a Raw Pesto Zucchini Linguini and Raw Ravioli Romesco.

Desserts are the height of the restuarant’s culinary deception. A dark chocolate pot de creme with fig hazelnut compote and spiced cashew crème and a gelato sundae are welcome recent additions with a richness that transcends its vegan status.

The method behind this vegetable madness is Chef Rachel Carr, a St. Louis native who came to Connecticut by way of Los Angeles with a stop in New York City for college. A city synonymous with health-conscious dining and diners, she worked as the executive chef at L.A’s award-winning raw vegan Cru restaurant, which received the Michelin Guide’s Bib Gourmand distinction. After that experience, Carr moved back to the east coast eager to cast a wider net for her cooking, seeking a kitchen to develop dishes beyond the strict temperature constraints of raw “cooking” (raw restaurants such as Cru only need a pair of hot plates because food should not be raised over 115 degrees F), while still embracing the wholesome characteristics of a vegan, vegetarian and raw approaches.

She met her match with Bill de Jonge’s vision of creating an upscale healthy dining experience showcasing the organic produce from his Upper Pond Farm in Old Lyme. I got the chance to visit the farm in late summer just as squash blossoms were abundant and about to make it onto the menu. This beautiful plot of land on the Connecticut shoreline is inspiration and source for all of Six Main’s dishes. A visit here, connecting with both de Jonge and an inspired conversation with Carr convinced me that what they are doing is truly something special.

Several notable vegetarian, vegan and raw cafe’s exist in the state–Catch a Healthy Habit in Fairfield, Bloodroot in Bridgeport, Claire’s Corner Copia in New Haven and GZen in Branford – yet few if any have elevated it to quite this level.

So what’s next for Six Main? Since opening, they have branched out to cooking classes, special prix-fix menus and Sunday brunch. They are also currently building out their bar area and a special cocktail menu. Their farm is also a place where much attention is given, and as they wrap up the fall harvest, they are also making the plans for next year’s crops that will make inform the cadence of their 2013 menus.

If you live on the Connecticut shoreline, this is a must-visit. If you live in or near our home in Fairfield County, it is a worthwhile day trip to visit this special Connecticut town and meet Rachel Carr’s singular dishes up close and personal.

Six Main is located at 6 Main Street in Chester, CT. They are open for dinner, daily. 860.322.4212 or sixmain.com

Link to Original Article

Rachel Carr speaks modestly about her considerable talents, which turn things like walnuts and avocado into other things like chorizo and ice cream. She smiles broadly when I suggest that her skill, making great-tasting vegan and raw food, might be more difficult than “real” cooking — after all, making everything from scratch takes on a whole new meaning when you make your own sour cream. “You just put stuff in the blender,” she says. Right.

Lisa Wiltse for The New York Times

A raw chorizo tostada with a flax and tomato shell, walnut-pepita “chorizo,” guacamole and cashew “crema.”

Ms. Carr is the chef and owner of Six Main, a new, mostly vegan and raw food restaurant that opened in June in the elegantly renovated 1902 Chester Savings Bank building. Before then, Ms. Carr was the executive chef at the award-winning Cru Restaurant in Los Angeles for six years, after which she ran the kitchen at SunCafé, a raw food restaurant in Studio City there. The blender in question is the high-speed Vitamix, darling of raw-food chefs because it’s powerful enough to pulverize nuts and grains into creamy substances like the silky herbed cashew cheese in Ms. Carr’s exceptional raw jicama ravioli.

But it would be a mistake to reduce Ms. Carr’s artistry to sleight of hand or mimicry. The forms are familiar — entrees on the often-changing menu also include a raw-food tostada and linguine, and vegan potpie, mole enchilada and beet burger. But her cuisine is unique, distinctive and exciting, eliciting rounds of “utterly delicious” and “pretty fabulous” from my dining companions throughout the meal.
Sometimes Ms. Carr’s renditions almost seem to have an edge on the originals. Whisper-thin, jicama ravioli wrappers contrasted appealingly with the creamy filling, and their fresh, delicate sweetness was delightful with the lively, tart and tangy sun-dried tomato-hazelnut Romesco sauce.

Zucchini linguine, a staple on raw menus across the country, was dressed with a pumpkinseed pesto that fairly exploded with the bright taste of basil. A sprinkling of pepita Parmesan, a combination of pumpkinseeds, walnuts, nutritional yeast and sea salt (“We joke around and call it ‘rawmesan,’ ” Ms. Carr says) tasted uncannily like its namesake.

The success of Ms. Carr’s cuisine is due in part to the excellent quality of the organic ingredients harvested from Upper Pond Farm in Old Lyme. The farm is owned by Bill de Jonge, who also owns the Chester building and is the principal investor in the restaurant.

In flavor and freshness, the greens were far better than the usual mesclun mix. (“We like to serve a lot of greens,” Ms. Carr says, because they contribute texture and lighten the meal.) Cherry tomatoes and thin-sliced raw beets on the garden salad were incredibly sweet. Accompanying the smoky beet burger were earthy, roasted rosemary potatoes with a marvelous buttery texture. Caramelized winter squash, served with chili-glazed tofu, filled the mouth with warm, subtle sweetness. Sweet-tart green juice, combining apple, kale, celery and lemon, demonstrated that one can enjoy this trendy health beverage on the merits of taste alone.

While Ms. Carr’s raw food is light and vibrant, her vegan dishes are remarkable for their rich flavor. The sauce on the cabbage-wrapped mole enchilada could compete in this regard with any meat sauce; the balance of sweet and spicy in the dish was exquisite. Apples and pickled vegetables made for delicious kimchi pancakes.

“I like things to be gluten-free unless there’s a reason they shouldn’t be,” says Ms. Carr, who relies on Bob’s Red Mill Gluten Free All Purpose Flour for the excellent pizza (with Gruyère cheese, one of the few animal products on the menu), the crumbly, melt-in-the-mouth apple tart pastry, and sauces. But since gluten-free doughs tend to fall apart, the warm table bread is made with whole wheat flour instead.
I’m not wild about everything here. Ms. Carr uses coconut oil for cooking and in raw desserts; it overpowered the vegetables in the butternut squash and mushroom potpie and competed with the lime in the silky smooth key lime pie. The winter squash gnocchi were chewy and, with the exception of a surprisingly appealing, very minty, mint chip kale ice cream, the ice creams could have had more flavor.

But Ms. Carr’s skill is incontrovertible. She has managed to create a plant-based cuisine that is homey and elegant, satisfying, clean and beautiful without being fussy. And for sheer wizardry, one can only marvel at her flaxseed tostada topped with walnut-pepita “chorizo,” cumin-sunflower seed “frijols” and cashew “crema.”

Six Main Restaurant
6 Main Street
Chester
(860) 322-4212
sixmain.com

DON’T MISS

THE SPACE High-ceilinged 50-seat dining room in a restored bank building. Pale, cool gray-blue walls lend a relaxed and feminine air. Comfort abounds: chairs are soft and upholstered and tables are polished wood. There is one communal table. Outdoor seating for eight in season.

THE CROWD A mixed, often stylish, crowd of all ages.

THE BAR No sit-down bar. Small international wine list with many bottles between $30 and $40. Selection of beers and house cocktails. Also offered: nonalcoholic beverages like delicious green juice and aromatic basil lemonade.

THE BILL Prices are very reasonable. Salads and appetizers, $4 to $13; entrees: $14 to $20; three-course prix fixe menu with one wine pairing offered Monday through Wednesday, $25. Sunday brunch, $8 to $16. All credit cards accepted.

WHAT WE LIKED Warm lentil salad, house salad, New England chopped salad, savory apple kimchi pancake, pear and caramelized onion pizza, tempura sweet potato roll, white bean and kale soup; beet burger, mole enchilada, chili-glazed tofu and autumn vegetables, raw ravioli Romesco, raw pesto zucchini linguine, raw walnut-pepita chorizo tostada; pumpkin cheesecake, chocolate ganache tart, key lime pie, apple tart.

IF YOU GO Dinner: Sunday through Thursday, 5 to 9 p.m.; Friday and Saturday, 5 to 10 p.m. Sunday brunch, 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Reservations recommended. Limited parking in lot in back of restaurant, or on street. Call or check Web site for raw food and vegan cooking classes taught by Chef Rachel Carr.

RATINGS Don’t Miss, Worth It, O.K., Don’t Bother.

A version of this review appeared in print on November 18, 2012, on page CT12 of the New York edition with the headline: Artistry at Work In a Vegan Menu.

Link to New York Times Article

Southern Style Thanksgiving-down home vegan cooking with a healthy makeover!

fluffy corn bread, black-eyed pea croquettes with sage gravy, whipped garlic sweet potatoes, wilted collards, bourbon spiked vanilla ice cream with a chocolate hazelnut torte

RESERVATION ONLY, LIMITED SPACE, ADMISSION $65

Magic Carpet Ride – exotic Eastern delicacies translated into raw vegan cuisine!

lentil dahl, cauliflower samosas, cucumber raita, mango chutney, cardamom ice cream

CLASS ADMISSION OPEN, $25 AT THE DOOR

EXTRA TRADITIONAL VEGAN THANKSGIVING CLASS NOW AVAILABLE!

Thursday November 8th, 11am-1pm