This Afro-Caribbean stunner might spark a comeback for Fairfax - BERITAJA

“Wait, these are plantains?”

My meal guests adjacent astatine a wedge of pastelón. We’re halfway done a caller meal astatine Lucia, a year-old Afro-Caribbean edifice successful Fairfax, and the full array is dumbfounded.

The ray sheets of plantain person a acquainted sweetness, but they’re arsenic bladed and al dente arsenic pasta. In betwixt them are interchanging layers of Wagyu sofrito, humming pinch annatto’s earthy, peppery bitterness, and Pecorino béchamel. A mildly acidic herb condiment keeps the crockery successful the saccharine spot of heavenly rich | but ne'er overwhelming. It tastes for illustration the benignant of point you’d want to make for personification you’re falling successful emotion with.

The pastelón astatine Lucia is made pinch sheets of plantain noodles.

Chef Cleophus “Ophus” Hethington grew up successful southbound Florida eating pastelón, a crockery made by layering plantains pinch crushed nutrient cooked pinch peppers and onions, and tons of cheese. The emotion for this plantain lasagna-casserole is prolific, pinch some Puerto Ricans and Dominicans claiming ownership.

Hethington swaps the sliced plantain for his ain pasta, made chiefly pinch puréed plantains, immoderate tapioca starch and a small spot of all-purpose flour. A Caribbean grandma mightiness raise an eyebrow, but erstwhile you descend a fork into each layer, a cosmopolitan comfortableness and familiarity registers.

Lucia sits connected a agelong of Fairfax Avenue historically known arsenic a Jewish taste hub. In the 2000s, the thoroughfare transformed into a nexus of younker culture, pinch streetwear shops and restaurants for illustration Animal. This is the Fairfax Avenue that Lucia proprietor Sam Jordan fell successful emotion pinch erstwhile he moved to Los Angeles a decade ago. Then the COVID-19 pandemic hit, and he watched arsenic storefronts shuttered.

With his first solo venture, Jordan hopes Lucia is astatine the halfway of what he calls the “big Fairfax Avenue comeback.” The beforehand doorway opens to 1 of the about breathtaking rooms successful the city. Glowing,18-foot thenar sculptures building complete the bar. Multiple seating areas boast plush seating successful lukewarm jewel tones of emerald and chartreuse. The about prized seats are the elevated, semicircular booths tucked into clam-shell shaped alcoves that place the main eating room.

When the edifice first opened, Adrian Forte was down the paper of coconut fried chicken, bluefin tuna tartare and a $225 caviar service. Earlier this year, Jordan brought successful Hethington, a Navy seasoned whose travels done the Caribbean and appreciation of Black foodways matched his own.

The eating room astatine Lucia features plush seating and semicircular, elevated booths that connection a position of the restaurant.

Hethington cooked astatine restaurants each complete the U.S., successful Italy and Brazil. In Atlanta, he started a pop-up bid called Ebi, meaning family and hunger successful Yoruba, drafting from his travels done Africa and the Americas. In 2020, he started his ain herb institution called Triangular Trade, named for the sadistic waste and acquisition strategy that brought European equipment and guns to Africa successful speech for enslaved Africans, who were forcibly transported to the Americas, and the enslaved labour that produced the sugar, fabric and baccy shipped to Europe for sale. For Hethington, Black foodways person ever been cardinal to the stories he tells connected the plate.

There’s a pleasurable cadence to the paper that originates pinch the “plantain expressions.” A heap of aureate maduros beryllium successful a cleanable circle of plantain mole that coats the bottommost of the plate. Over the top, overlapping ribbons of plantain chips. You swipe a spot done the heavy mole, musky pinch smoked plantains and fiery pinch the herb of habanero and chipotle.

The Wagyu patties thin much Panamanian than Jamaican successful presentation, shaped for illustration plump half moons pinch scalloped edges. The flaky pastry is filled pinch beef cheeks that person been rubbed successful herb paste, cured successful salt, chiles and spices for 24 hours, past cooked coq-au-vin style successful a braising liquid that’s much than half reddish wine. The process renders the cheeks truthful tender, they’re practically spreadable.

Raw presentations for illustration albacore crudo aliases nuggets of stone shrimp successful fruit-infused coconut h2o accompanied by a fistful of cassava chips deficiency the finesse and punch recovered elsewhere connected the menu, but they make for good snacks while sipping from a goblet of gin and tonic spiked pinch culantro shrub, aliases an okra martini, savory pinch lemongrass and thyme and crowned pinch a pickled okra garnish.

Most of the paper turnover occurs successful the “nuff nuff” section, wherever you mightiness find an Oil Down, the nationalist crockery of Grenada, re-imagined pinch chunks of saccharine lobster and prawns, squares of fried dasheen alongside starchy breadfruit and arugula cooked down until it mimics spinach. If Hethington could root the preferred barramundi, look for the green-fig-leaves food roast. The food is rubbed successful a Caribbean type of yuzu kosho, punchy pinch culantro, greenish peppercorns and sour orange. Wrapped successful a banana leafage and near to barren earlier cooking, the food takes connected a firm, luxurious texture that melts into a excavation of reddish capsicum coconut broth.

Chef Cleophus “Ophus” Hethington successful the eating room astatine Lucia.

The okra martini astatine Lucia features a pickled okra garnish.

If diners are looking for naughty chicken, they’ll request to look elsewhere. Hethington didn’t want to cannibalize his paper pinch the dish, alternatively compromising pinch a naughty lamb shank, and a full Chinese Trini chicken, an homage to the celebrated takeout nutrient successful Trinidad.

The shank is simply a behemoth chunk of meat, marinated successful about a pantry’s worthy of spices including achromatic cardamon, cinnamon, allspice, marjoram and cocoa powder. It’s braised for hours until wobbly and tender capable to trim pinch a feather. Underneath is simply a mash of saccharine potatoes, goat food and brownish food you’d beryllium fortunate to find connected immoderate vacation table.

When the Chinese Trini chickenhearted arrives, it will require each of your attention. The sounds of the superb DJ parked successful the mediate of the eating room will autumn distant (in the people of a azygous service, “The Thong Song,” “Hypnotize,” “Say My Name” and each different notable deed from the precocious ‘90s to early 2000s seemed to beryllium connected the playlist), and you will laser attraction connected licking each past spot of the heavy brown, ginger and chile-infused chickenhearted glaze disconnected your fingers.

Lucia’s strongest dessert is the pastelitos, a return connected the Cuban pastries Hethington ate for meal arsenic a kid successful Miami. The giant, flaky turnovers ooze pinch a swirling operation of saccharine guava paste and cheese.

At immoderate constituent during the meal, perchance aft your 2nd okra martini softens the edges of the day, you get the consciousness that you’re experiencing a portion of history successful existent time. Lucia feels for illustration a existent destination, poised to thief usher successful the awesome revitalization of 1 of the top streets successful the city.

A dispersed of celebrated dishes astatine Lucia, including the naughty lamb shank, pastelón, green-fig-leaves food roast and patties.