Josie

The last outting with Dumpling Man's friends was at Osteria Mozza. How do you follow up that?!?! EXACTLY! There's no follow up to Osteria Mozza. Nothing even comes close. Josie had the unfortunate luck of being our next spot for dinner. Not that I was ever really comparing Josie's to Mozza. It's totally different cuisine, but man did the reviews really mislead me. Josie was no bueno, only because we expected so much more.

From the outside, you wouldn't expect fine dining cuisine. Upon entering inside, you see all the stuffy old white people with their grown children in tow and then you know that only fine cuisine must be served here. There is something classic and comforting about the decor, sorry I didn't get a good picture.

I am disappointed with the quality of the pictures. The lighting was poor and I had to do some editing afterwards to lighten up the picture and they just look grainy =(




One of Dumpling Man's friends have the tendency to run late. So in our hungry wait, we ordered some truffle fries. At first they just taste like some quality fries, good crunch, hot, lightly salted, but deeper down in the basket the fries really have this great umami truffle essence. They were delicious and definitely special.


The amuse bouche of mushroom and gruyere quiche. This was also a nice start to our evening's meal. The crust was flakey and buttery. The gruyere was not overpowering. I was left wanting another slice.





This is when the meal started going south. I shared an appetizer of Skewered Seppie with Beluga Lentils,Merguez sausage, braised fennel and mustard seed-infused oil. This was probably the most disappointing dish of the night. The seppie, which are essentially cuttlefish, were fine, but everything else.... The lentils were unevenly cooked. Some bites were just dry and hard. There wasn't anything interesting in the flavoring. Occasionally I caught a bit of the sausage but that also was dry and greasy at the same time, go figure. The only bit of juice were in the occasional cherry tomatoes, which were perfectly ripe.


The corn soup was the special soup of the day. It was deliciously hearty with a great fresh corn taste. Those little floating hunks of goodness are pieces of cornbread which were moist and sweet and maybe a little too sweet considering how sweet the corn was already. Texturely, it went well, soaking up all the soupiness. Do not be fooled by the big wide bowl, for it was as shallow as a kiddy pond. For $18 this was quite pricey.



Venison with fresh plums. It was the last order of venison left! I thought I'd like venison since I enjoy gamey meats like lamb and boar, but there was something about the venison that didn't quite agree with me. I did enjoy the combination with plums. It was something different and you could taste the sweet ripeness of the plums.


I ordered the lamb chops with sugar snap peas. Theres nothing more unpleasant than overcooked veggies. While not all the peas were overcooked, some were and this was distracting. The flavors overall were not very interesting in this dish.


At least the meal ended on a sweet note. We ordered the peach crisp. It was a flakey buttery crust bowl with fresh sweet peaches and sugar golden topping with cream soft vanilla ice cream. It was dreamy.



I was expecting a bit more from Josie, something more similar to the quality of Jiraffe. Maybe I just ordered wrong, because some dishes were good. Overall, I was slightly disappointed. I don't think I'll be coming back. Not at least until I try the other places on the westside like Gjelina and Joe's.


Josie
2424 Pico Blvd
Santa Monica, CA 90405





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