Seven Lamps

Excited to see new talent popping back up in lackluster Buckhead. Two new restaurants come to mind... Cook Hall which opened in the old Market space in the W Hotel was decent and pleasantly surprised by their grubbage. And this place, Seven Lamps, in a quiet corner spot in the Shops Around Lenox seems promising with Drew Van Leuvan at the helm. I expect nothing but the best eats from him, his street credit depends on it. The bar manager came from Southern Art - So expect above average cocktails as well. Interior is warm and cozy with an open kitchen and a small bar around. This place has all the right ingredients to kick some serious ass.

So start kicking, yo...

Amuse bouche. C'mon, they just freebies. Radishes in different forms. Cute.

TORTELLINI STUFFED WITH BRAISED CHESTNUT & MASCARPONE, vanilla macaroon, apple leather.
This was a very nice dish, probably the best dish of the night. Full of flavor and just tasty to eat... Plate after plate of it. Props to the line cook who pulled this off. We're off to a good start. Let's keep it going, yes?

LOBSTER RAMEN BROTH, fried pork, butternut squash, borlotti beans, egg.
Sounded great on paper but it turned out to be a stinging paper cut instead. Noodles not included. This is no ramen, not even close. Just call it a Lobster Broth but here's the kicker - There was no hint of lobster essence, come to think of it had no flavor at all. I assume the broth base came from the Lobster Bun (we'll get to that later). It was just an ugly soup with shit floating all around in it, kinda like a unstrained stock. If I didn't know any better, it coulda been a bowl of rusty toilet water with leftover bits. Oliver Twist laughs at this bowl of gruel. Still can't figure out that firm-boiled half egg and it's purpose.

Oh dear, I sense we're heading off a cliff...

BUTTERED LOBSTER BUN celery aioli, steamed brioche.
I lurv me a good lobster roll/bun, but in this town they are a crap shoot, they mostly suck a really hard schlong. Asked the server how big this was, he said "about 3 bites" and up sold us to get 2 to make sure everyone had a good taste of this. The "bun" was like a lump of raw naan dough pressed in a George Foreman grill that was unplugged. They said the chef likes it "yeasty and doughy". Whatchu talkin' about Willis? My friend said it reminded him of a "wet diaper". I concur but it was more like an old man's full wet diaper. This bun was absolutely horrid and inedibly. It looked like what a fly would regurgitate. The lobster meat on the other hand was decent, tender, lightly dressed but not very flavorful. I would even take Optimist's lobster roll over this... Well, let's not get too bat shit crazy here. Just keep it simple and classic with a nice buttery toasted bun and try not to get all advant-garde about a receipt that is already pretty much perfect. But this town somehow keeps fucking it up with the exception of one place which is located in the ghetto of all places.

BAKED PECORINO TOSCANO CHEESE cedar, chanterelle mushrooms, pickled pearls, truffle honey.
Is this a joke? Why is this single serving of cheese that seemed like it was previously wrapped in plastic sitting on a block of wood with a ton of mushrooms and pearl onions on top? The superstar is the cheese or am I wrong? The hair thin slice of pecorino basically glued itself to the wood plank from the application of heat and any attempts to lift it off included a few slivers of splinters for garnish. Besides this mess of an idea, the shrooms where tasty but the pearl onions were basically raw and barely pickled. Truffle honey... C'mon, it's almost 2013.

POTATO ZEPPOLE warm potato crème, green onions.
What a waste of money and pouch space. Fried dough with a tiny squirt of this tasteless spooge that barely identified as potato...creme. Sounded like such a fun little dish but it fell flat hard.

Can it get worse? Let's wait for the next dish...

CANNELLONI braised octopus, spanish chorizo, spicy escarole, tomato, horseradish.
Nice looking dish. A decent tasting dish that could be so much more if it included the star ingredients. Not a piece of octopus to be found. Fail. Chorizo turned out to be bacon bits. Double fail.

After sampling a handful of dishes, with only one clear winner of the night (is this menu too large to handle for a place this size?)... Do we dare take another risk and order more off the menu since we were still extremely hungry? I think the server realized this visit was a failure overall since we decided to cut our losses and head somewhere we knew would deliver the goods. He offered a dessert on the house. We declined. He offered a future app on the house. A respectable move, bro, but soon forgotten. The drink menu put me to sleep, so ask for a classic cocktail instead. If you can't think of one, there's always Hitachino if it's in stock. I didn't get why they wanted every server to learn how to make drinks, I understand their thinking in this but an efficient resto is when everyone knows their position in the hierarchy. We sat there forever to get 2 cocktails, 1 jerk ginger beer and a tea.

This first impression left me depressed. The chef himself wasn't even present at his own brand spanking new resto... You would think a chef/owner would be there open til close everyday for at least 6 months to make sure everything is spot on until the team gets their groove on. This seems to be a trend with Atlanta chefs/owners these days.

I am not writing them off yet, they seem genuinely passionate about what they're doing... Just keep working on it and deliver it next time. I hope... Or not.

3400 Around Lenox Road, No. 217
Atlanta, GA 30326
404-467-8950
http://www.sevenlampsatl.com/