April RC – Shōjō

RC had a baby! Congrats to Denise and Mitch, and a big welcome to Capri Olivia Lawson who was born on March 26, 2013.

Sunny Capri!

And this month we headed to Chinatown, but not your typical Boston Chinatown restaurant. Great pick Mark!

The cocktails are handcrafted (they make the infused liquors), unique, and delicious. My drink of choice was the Purple Heart (blueberry infused vodka, St. Germain, lemon). They also play old kung fun movies on a tv behind the bar.

We started with small plates…many of them, possibly almost everything on the menu:

• Tempura housemade pickles with whole grain mustard aioli
• Warm glass noodle salad with toasted peanuts, chicken, lime chili vinaigrette
• Suckling pig bao with smoked bbq sauce, homemade kimchi
• BBQ pork rib with sweet chili glaze, frisee fennel salad,
• Szechuan pork stuffed calamari with soy-ginger tomato sauce
• Duck fat hand-cut fries with sriracha aioli
• Salt and pepper calamari with gremolata, roasted pepper aioli
• XO fresh corn with soy, housemade XO sauce

My favorites were the warm glass noodle salad, the calamari, and the ribs. Yum. I was super excited for the corn, but wasn’t a big fan. We were hoping to try the Damn! Damn!! Noodles!!!, but they are only on the lunch menu.

Warm glass noodle salad

Salt and pepper calamari

After all of the small plates, I wasn’t even that hungry for an entree, but I still managed to enjoy the pulled pork ravioli. I was definitely a member of the clean plate club…delish! My fellow RC’ers ordered the steak frites (with kimchi butter and lemongrass-infused demi-glaze), the pistachio crusted tuna steak (with wasabi risotto, honey-soy glaze, and pumpkin croutons), and the pan-seared salmon (with dashi glaze, crisp Japanese eggplant, and miso mustard). I believe the Japanese eggplant was substituted out for spinach by someone who is anti-eggplant.

Char siu pulled pork ravioli with house smoked bacon, Chinese celery, and shaved Pecorino

The only dessert on the menu was something called “chocolate sesame balls”. Lucky for us they had a special 4:20 dessert, a brownie with toasted hemp seeds, Ben and Jerry’s half-baked ice cream, and whipped cream.

4:20 dessert

The damage
$63 each

The rundown
Shōjō
9A Tyler Street, Boston