Jack’s Saybrook Steak (Closed)
cuisine: Steakhouse
entrées: $18.50 – $40
address: 286 Main Street, Old Saybrook
phone: (860) 395-1230
credit cards: Visa, MasterCard, American Express
4 1/2 Stars… Special
With little fanfare but growing legions of fans, Jack Flaws has established himself as one of the most respected chefs on Connecticut’s eastern shoreline. That shouldn’t really surprise anyone, since Flaws had already distinguished himself as executive chef of Max Downtown in Hartford, as executive chef of Prezzo in New Canaan and even as opening executive chef of Three Fish in Westerly, Rhode Island, a restaurant which I just adored.
Opting to be a big fish in a small pond, Flaws opened the very popular Jack’s American Bistro & Wine Bar in December 2004, putting out exceptional new American fare that would have been just as at home in Manhattan as Old Saybrook. Recently, recognizing that a great stretch of the eastern shoreline lacked a legitimate steakhouse, Flaws shuttered his restaurant for two weeks, making minor modifications to the interior and grander ones to the menu. He added a formidable lineup of chophouse classics while preserving several contemporary offerings from his earlier menu (resulting in essentially the same upscale steakhouse formula that has worked so well for Max Downtown over the years). No catastrophe, the apostrophe in the restaurant’s name was stylishly dropped—like Rebeccas in Greenwich—and “Jack’s” morphed into “Jacks Saybrook Steak.”
Proof that he’s something of a Jack of all trades, Flaws had earlier opened a seasonal hotdog stand in Old Saybrook called Jack’s at Harbor One (a.k.a. Dragon Dogs). Look for it to reopen on May 3rd. This Jack’s sells all manner of interesting frankfurters and condiments. Some of Flaws’ dogs are even homemade, including his trademarked original lobster hot dog. Small town life certainly seems to be agreeing with him.
On a recent visit, we found plenty about Jacks that agreed with us. No easy achievement, the restaurant manages to be cozy enough to be the quintessential neighborhood gathering spot yet attractive enough to accommodate romantic dinners or special occasions. And frankly, Flaws’ flawless food makes it a destination restaurant.
My companions and I felt like we had won the lottery when we were seated at the large round window table, which was probably capacious enough for six but absolutely luxurious for four. With my back to the window, I could watch through a portal as the comely hostess greeted and seated fresh arrivals. I could even catch glimpses of the bar area, which draws many happy visitors, a number of whom elect to dine at the long black granite bar, gazing upon walls festooned with classic Duckhorn prints. From my seat, I could also look out over the main dining room with its carnelian walls, two long rows of tables and L-shaped banquette in the corner. All of its tables were graciously appointed with comfortable red-and-white-striped chairs, white tablecloths and good quality flatware and stemware.
Some restaurant reviewers don’t comment much on wines, but I feel they can have a huge impact on a meal. Appropriate to a steakhouse or any fine restaurant, Jacks has a terrific international wine list ($28-$201). But unlike some standout steakhouses, whose wine lists may be inflated in physical dimension, cellar size, prestige wines and markups and seem designed for showoffs, Jacks’ user-friendly wine list seems designed for both confirmed, and budding, wine lovers. In addition to noteworthy classics, the wine list includes many vintages from boutique wineries and even varietals that may not be familiar to most customers. Exploration is encouraged, with all forty-six wines by the glass (that’s not a misprint) also available in flights ($15-$25). Wine dinners are regularly scheduled. Markups are reasonable, with a handful of interesting offerings priced under $30. The only thing I would tweak would be to add a few worthy Connecticut vintages.
There’s also an extensive list of seasonal, house and dessert cocktails ($8-$13), some with intriguing names like Dark and Dirty, Suffering Bastard and Corpse Reviver, plus innumerable variations on the mojito. Even the beer list (draft $4-$9, bottles $4-$7) is a cut above, with some eclectic selections some customers will never have heard of swelling the ranks of the usual swill. Not surprisingly, Jacks also hosts periodic beer dinners.
But lacking more pedestrian fare like fish and chips or barbecued ribs, Jacks serves food that I would prefer to pair with wine. We began with a 2005 Livon Tocai Friulano, Italy ($10/$38), and I was immediately transported back to the little town of Collio whence it originates, where I tasted some of the best white wines of my life. I continue to be mystified by the enduring popularity of Pinot Grigio (although the ones I tried in Collio were much better and steelier than those one normally encounters). Later, we progressed to a 2001 Rotllan Torra Reserva, Priorat, Spain ($12/$45), an intense Cabernet Sauvignon-Grenache-Carignan blend with a mocha finish. You won’t find either of these on your typical wine list, no more than you’d find them in your basic neighborhood liquor store.
Nor are you likely to find as fine a tuna tartare ($10.50) as Jack’s in most new American restaurants. So many are insipid, but Jacks’ was a perfect round mold sitting on a ring of thin, skin-on cucumber slices surrounded by dots of wasabi aïoli, three toast points balanced atop. A ginger-lime marinade imparted vibrant flavor to the impeccably fresh, evenly chopped fish, while the wasabi was perfectly calibrated to add interest, not assassinate unsuspecting taste buds.
The term “carpetbagger” refers to a thick steak that has been stuffed with oysters, skewered shut and then grilled. Flaws’ carpetbaggers ($12.50) turn the original concept on its head, wrapping a raw Pickle Point oyster from Prince Edward Island in beef carpaccio, garnishing it with celery leaf, flavoring it with white truffle oil and serving it on the half shell. We loved the fantastic interplay of textures and flavors.
I’m not going out on much of a limb in guessing that Jacks’ roasted jumbo lump crab cake ($14.50) must be a big seller that generates a lot of return orders. First of all, the creation was a real eye-pleaser, a thick, beautifully bronzed disk resting on a pale lattice of Dijon mayonnaise that covered the plate, a lovely apple salad balancing on top of it. Defying gravity, chaos theory and a few other principles of physics, the cake held together well despite being composed of distinct pieces of crabmeat. The salad was made up of frisée, slices of Granny Smith apple, rings of purple onion and segments of green bean in a lovely emulsified herb vinaigrette.
Rhode Island calamari ($9.50)—and Connecticut’s eastern shoreline does tip a little in that direction—featured a nice pile of lightly breaded rings and tentacles kissed with garlic butter and enlivened with rings of hot cherry pepper. Lemon wedges and a nice housemade tartar sauce provided logistical support.
However, Jacks has its feet firmly planted in Connecticut, as its clam chowder ($5.50/$8.50) showed. Neither a Rhode Island nor a Manhattan version but the creamier New England-style most Nutmeggers prefer, Jacks’ chowder was rich in bacon and clam flavor.
Not that I’m the staunchest adherent of traditional food and wine pairings, but we had been charting a strictly nautical food path until then to maximize the pleasure of our Tocai. With Jack’s stuffed meatball ($11.50), we broke out our Spanish red. The meatball had the “right stuff,” all right, lightened not so much by breading but by combining ground veal, pork and beef, just the way meatballs were handled in my household. Riding a pile of mashed potato, the giant meatball was stuffed with Taleggio cheese and more mashed potato, the plate swimming in a nice veal demi-glace. I think most Americans have a soft spot in their hearts, and a warm place in their stomachs, for upgraded comfort foods.
Jacks offers a tempting lineup of salads, including variations on Greek ($9.50), Caesar ($9) and Cobb ($9.50) salads. The two we tried, however, were a Bibb lettuce salad ($9.50) with Granny Smith apple, Bosc pear, walnut and Gorgonzola in an herb vinaigrette, and a winter greens salad ($10.50) rounded out with candied walnut, dried cranberries (normally cherries) and crispy goat cheese truffles in a Merlot vinaigrette. Both salads were spectacularly fresh, the greens gently coated in vinaigrette, but the single most irresistible element was the meltingly delicious truffles, so named because of their appearance and not due to any truffle oil.
Scoops of tangerine sorbet served over cucumber slices proved a pleasing palate cleanser going into our main course. Here, we agonized quite a bit over what to order. We were reviewing a steakhouse, which required paying close attention to basic meat preparations, but we were so impressed with Flaws’ new American cooking that it was hard to resist any of his regular entrées.
Listen to what we passed up, for goodness sake. Reading about pan-seared Stonington jumbo sea scallops ($26.50) in a beurre noisette with spinach, diced tomato, capers and au gratin potato took me back to Three Fish, where I had the best scallop dish of my life. I overheard praise for Jacks’ grilled pork chop au poivre ($24.50) with spaghetti squash and a macaroni and cheese terrine. I could barely picture Peking-style Cornish game hen ($24.50) rolled in butternut squash crêpes with hoisin pan gravy and crispy onions, but it sounded adventurous. And how about honey-roasted swordfish ($29) in a Chardonnay mustard sauce with pancetta, handmade spaetzle, and tomato confit? Even Jacks’ vegetarian platter ($18.50), described as “grilled, steamed and sautéed, bursting with flavor and style,” aroused my curiosity, because Flaws isn’t given to hyperbole, having the chef chops to back up any claims he makes.
I’m sure Jacks’ is a dartboard menu. Put it up on a wall, close your eyes, throw a couple of darts at it, order whatever you hit, and you’re sure to be happy. We certainly fared well with the choices we made. Sesame-crusted tuna ($26) showcased pretty purple medium-rare slices of seared tuna crusted in black and white sesame seeds. The tuna was mounted on a raft of crispy, flute-shaped, vegetable spring rolls, baby bok choy and housemade (but not lethal) kimchee, which drifted in a sea of hoisin-sweet chili sauce.
Another great success was pretty, fanned-out slices of Maple Leaf Farms duck breast ($26.50) in a brown sugar sauce with a medley of butternut squash, bright green sautéed Brussels sprout leaves and vanilla-roasted bacon. We were also partial to a rack of Colorado lamb special ($34), which featured one grand twin rib chop bursting with flavor served with empanada-like crispy eggplant-and-feta-cheese ravioli, artichoke heart (nothing canned here, of course), oven-roasted tomato and an olive vinaigrette.
We hoped we weren’t giving short shrift to Jacks’ chophouse classics, which in addition to an impressive array of steaks included things like beer can-roasted chicken ($16), roasted Colorado rack of lamb ($32) and veal rib chop ($38). From a traditional lineup that included a Kansas City strip steak ($35), steak au poivre ($28), filet mignon ($34), aged New York strip steak ($28), a porterhouse for two ($68), a 22-ounce T-bone ($37) and bone-in rib-eye ($40), we settled on the Delmonico steak ($30), of which I’m not normally a great fan.
Silly me! My God, it was one of the great steaks of my lifetime, and I haven’t been able to get it out of my mind since. Sometimes I feel like I lack the vocabulary to do full justice to steaks. Jacks states that “all of our steaks are 100% Black Angus natural fed beef aged for 4 weeks for desired flavor and tenderness.” This judicious cut was perfectly seared, the interplay of meat and fat just sensational. The steak was juicy, rich and, despite the quantity of food we’d had, never heavy. It just seemed to suck down, a defining characteristic of the best food and wine.
“Why is it that I ended up with only one-quarter of this steak?” one of my companions carped.
“Because all four of us have knives,” I answered jokingly. Well, sort of.
We dipped our bread in the remaining meat juices, leaving no trace of this grand cut of beef. But perhaps the greatest compliment I can pay the steak is that we never even considered asking for one of Jacks’ sauces, which included béarnaise, brandy peppercorn, veal demi-glace, mustard horseradish, balsamic shallot jus, foie gras butter and herb butter, despite my complete confidence that every one was exceptional. As might be expected of a steakhouse, Jacks also offers sides ($7), from which grilled vegetables, bacon-spiked spinach, caramelized onions, Gorgonzola tater tots, goat cheese potato au gratin, marshmallow sweet potato and grilled macaroni and cheese sounded especially tempting.
But it was a good thing that we saved a little space for dessert. A mango and apple tarte Tatin ($9) was served with strawberry anglaise, basil syrup and crème fraîche-poppy seed ice cream. Delicious! Jacks’ signature dessert, a warm chocolate truffle cake ($9)—tall, round and surprisingly light—was finished with chocolate sauce, caramel sauce and vanilla ice cream. We greatly enjoyed a cheese platter ($6 per cheese) with English Stilton, Fiore Sardo, Bethmale, Humboldt Fog and St. Simeon, the cheeses accompanied by strawberry, green apple, candied walnut and crackers. Perhaps our favorite dessert, though, was vanilla beignets ($8) coated in cinnamon sugar and served with chocolate sauce and cappuccino foam. Remember—upscale comfort food! Appropriate with such delights was a big, foamy, Milky Way cappuccino ($7) that we couldn’t resist ordering.
Flaws is not only a big fish in the small eastern shoreline pond but a big fish in the much larger Connecticut pond. And Jacks is not only a great steakhouse but a great all-around restaurant that assumes its place among the state’s best.