Faustina
454 E. 300 South, Salt Lake City ; 801-746-4441
(see
map)
Sophisticated space popular with neighborhood locals specializes in an eclectic menu.
| Overall |
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| Food |
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| Mood |
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| Service |
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| Kid-friendly |
NO |
| Noise |
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Cuisine: American, Eclectic
Price: $$$
Hours: M-F, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.; M-Th, 4:30-9 p.m.; F-S, 4:30-10 p.m.; Su, 5-9 p.m.
Liquor: Full Service
Corkage: $ 7
Reservations: Accepted
Accepts:    
Website: http://www.faustinaslc.com
Recommended Dishes: Lamb chops, tenderloin medallions, Sonoma chicken salad.
February 23, 2011
Faustina has flash, but lacks flavor
By Vanessa Chang
I really wanted to like Faustina. I’m a huge fan of chef Billy Sotelo who recently became the executive chef for the LaSalle Restaurant Group, which operates Faustina, Oasis Café and Carver’s Steaks and Chops.
When Sotelo was at Fresco Italian Café, he elevated food to a new level with eggy strands of fresh pasta, seasonal produce and a stunning cheesecake made with soft Italian robiola cheese.
I’m also a fan of the Faustina concept: a cool, sleek and sophisticated space that caters to the commuting work force during lunch and neighborhood locals at dinner.
I also appreciate Faustina’s level of service. Hosts and servers are young, eager, and make the dining experience relatively smooth.
But after a few visits, I can’t say that I like Faustina completely — no matter how much I want to.
The main culprit is the food. It’s less obvious at lunch when the prices are lower and the menu is a bit more concise with grilled panini.
Dinner is different: Highly anticipated, and yet disappointing. It’s not that anything is outright bad. The king crab appetizer ($12), bundled in a single butter lettuce leaf and surrounded by gazpacho was decent. But there was no imprint of the salty sea breezes that really good crab evokes. The tomatoes, too, looked Crayola-perfect, but didn’t pop with the same Technicolor flavor in my mouth.
It’s a consistent symptom of Faustina’s otherwise delightfully conceived menu. There’s an impressive presentation — sometimes, as in the case of a potato tower of shrimp ($10), bordering on pretentious — but not enough follow through.
Braised short ribs with polenta ($10) seemed a perfect starter for a winter’s night. But the meat was dense and lacked flavor, as did the polenta. The cheddar-topped lasagna ($18) tasted as odd as it sounded. The melted layer of cheese was almost impenetrable to the fork and it looked like a throwback to the ’90s — with balsamic drizzles galore. Cheese also served as a crust over scallops ($22), and this time, the asiago overpowered the sweet subtle scallops.
The Sonoma chicken salad ($6, $13), like other items on the menu, are favorites from the pre-Sotelo days. It remains as sweet and candy-like as the first time I tried it in 2007. Ditto for the acorn squash ravioli ($16), where the sweetness went beyond the ochre-hued filling into the thin sauce.
It was an unworthy prelude to a stunning platter of lamb chops ($23), and the decent tenderloin medallions ($25) in their simple beefy glory and served with asparagus.
Another standby from Faustina’s original menu is the blueberry dessert soufflé ($7). The violet hue turns some diners off, but soufflés are hard to come by, which made it worth trying again. The presentation with its dense, almost unquivering egg white custard made me think a stabilizer was used for the sake of serving to the masses.
But in the dead of winter, the bright blueberry flavor makes up for the cosmetic surgery. The dish is striking, especially when the server pierces it, drizzles it with honey-lavender sauce, and then leaves the extra sauce on the table. The liquid is infused with dried lavender flowers and, for some, smacks of hand soap. For others, it’s a dreamy reminder of warmer seasons when Faustina’s patio — complete with dramatic sail-like canopies — is open.
I look forward to soaking in the sun. Hopefully, by then, Faustina’s menu will offer more to like.
Tribune's rating system
Overall rating
1 star Good
2 stars Very good
3 stars Excellent
4 stars Extraordinary
Entree price
$ Entree under $10
$$ $10-$18
$$$ $18-$25
$$$$ Above $25
Restaurant Noise
1 bell Quiet (under 65 decibles)
2 bells Can talk easily (65-70)
3 bells Talking somewhat difficult (70-75)
4 bells Raised voices (75-80)
A bomb Too noisy for normal conversation (80+)
The Tribune covers the cost of all meals at reviewed restaurants. Star ratings are based on a minimum of two visits. Ratings are updated continually based on at least one revisit. There is no connection between reviews and advertising.
May 3, 2006
Lobster pie perfection at Faustina: Restaurant succeeds with simplicity
By Mary Brown Malouf
It arrived from on high like a big gold harvest moon, Faustina's sublime lobster pot pie ($26.95) delivered from above by our server. A full 9 inches across (I measured), the pastry that sealed the top and draped down the sides of the bowl was baked to a perfectly uniform flakiness, the color of lager beer, of caramel cream, of made-for-TV biscuits. The crust shattered at the touch of a fork and fell into a brilliant, custard-thick, saffron-tinged sauce studded with whole claws of lobster meat, slices of purple potato and limp loops of orange rind. Suddenly it was just me and my pie; nothing else mattered.
A dish has the power to do that, if you love food. It's like when a music connoisseur says he is "swept away" or "lost" in listening to a symphony.
Most of the food I tasted at Faustina was good and more than one dish reached that pot pie peak.
Driving east on 300 South, we almost missed Faustina. I recommend you don't.
Faustina's short side faces the street, making its drive-up appeal subtle. The long side of the building faces a patio, cleverly landscaped to shield diners from excessive traffic noise and arranged into several small, intimate areas. Altogether, it is a pleasantly serene change from the urban cattle pens that attempt to pass for al fresco.
Inside, the serenity continues. At least, it did when I dined there, on early weeknights. On crowded weekends, I can imagine that the noise level exceeds my experience, but unlike other places with minimalist décors, Faustina has some softness to soak up the sound -- tables are draped in white cloths, the big horseshoe-shaped booths are upholstered. A half-wall divides the dining room, again breaking up the space into cozier settings.
My dining companions and I were settled into a spacious booth and had finished a remarkable salad ($4.99) before the pie's appearance. A plate of beautiful lettuces, from pale butter to deep red oak leaf that were lightly but completely sheathed in a roasted onion-sherry vinaigrette and topped with crisped red and gold beets, is the house salad at Faustina and I have not had a better one in a long time. The chef, Jared Young, seems to have a knack for knowing what to leave out as well as what to put in his food -- there were no woody tomatoes, overmature cucumbers, canned mandarin oranges or clumsy onion slices, just perfect leaves with a small salty garnish.
That fine salad accompanies the list of pasta and pizza entrees. (Yes, the new flatbread is still called "pizza" ($15.50) here and they are the kinds of upper-crust pies Wolfgang Puck made famous in the '80s (pesto chicken and artichoke hearts with goat cheese.) This workhorse section of the menu includes risotto -- I was disappointed with mine, a tomato-soupy bowl of underseasoned, overcooked rice ($18) topped with two slices of fresh Italian mozzarella -- and is offered, with a few additions and deletions, on the lounge menu from 2:30 to 5 p.m. and 9 to 10 p.m. Many of the dishes on this list are also available at lunch.
The dinner menu recently has changed; the deep-dish lasagna ($16.50) is a new addition. The carnival-colored tower of pasta was layered with thin-sliced grilled zucchini, roasted onion, spinach, ground beef, Italian sausage and salame bound together with ricotta and topped with a bright orange square of unexpected melted cheddar cheese. The serving was bordered with a balsamic vinegar reduction marbled with red bell pepper purée. Everything was so thinly sliced and judiciously proportioned that, in a forkful, the ingredients melded together into a single complex flavor. It was lovely.
Siding or saucing entrees with fruit is a balancing act many chefs are trying right now -- unfortunately, many times it means the sweet overwhelms the meat. Faustina pulls it off: Huckleberry sauce on roasted tenderloin ($24.95) depended on its native berry tartness to set off the richness of the beef. (This sauce would be great on venison.) The sour cherry reduction on five thin lamb medallions ($22.50) just segued into the sweetness of the meat, though rosemary threatened to overwhelm everything. The cut of lamb was unrecognizable but the thinness of the medallions made it a moot point that I requested medium-rare; when a piece of meat is a quarter-inch thick, your only preference is cooked or not. Pork loin medallions were slightly underseared but still juicy and just this side of pink in the middle; classic red cabbage was sweet and sour and the touted juniper berry dusting was undetectable.
Faustina did have some weaknesses, however. Shrimp bisque was not technically a bisque -- at least I didn't detect any cream -- and it lacked flavor. Complimentary rosemary "focaccia" bread was 2 inches tall and as soft and puffy as Bisquick biscuits. The wine list is unremarkable by the glass, a little better by the bottle. Prices seemed excessive for such pedestrian bottles. (Since when has Beringer white zinfandel been an "interesting white"?)
Regardless, there also are many more dishes I want to try on Faustina's menu -- house-made squash-stuffed ravioli with chopped hazelnuts and butter, salmon Wellington and three-cheese macaroni to name a few.
In order to have the maximum dessert experience, we ordered the dessert bento box ($15.50). It held two vodka glasses of mousse, one white and one dark chocolate; molten chocolate cake; and white chocolate crème brûlée, the whole garnished with a chrysanthemum floating in a glass bowl. Then we took our server's recommendation and tried the Faustina "Wrap," a warmed after-dinner snifter of brandy and Kahlua. And then, dinner was a wrap.
Tribune's rating system
Overall rating
1 star Good
2 stars Very good
3 stars Excellent
4 stars Extraordinary
Entree price
$ Entree under $10
$$ $10-$18
$$$ $18-$25
$$$$ Above $25
Restaurant Noise
1 bell Quiet (under 65 decibles)
2 bells Can talk easily (65-70)
3 bells Talking somewhat difficult (70-75)
4 bells Raised voices (75-80)
A bomb Too noisy for normal conversation (80+)
The Tribune covers the cost of all meals at reviewed restaurants. Star ratings are based on a minimum of two visits. Ratings are updated continually based on at least one revisit. There is no connection between reviews and advertising.
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