After seven fruitful years, Cress Restaurant’s Hari and Jenneffer Pulapaka felt the collective itch to change things up at their highly lauded DeLand restaurant. This past Saturday, that itch was proverbially scratched when the Pulapakas launched the restaurant’s new “dual” concept of “Taste Cress” and “Counter Cress” – partly to enhance the dining experience for guests, and partly to alleviate the stresses of restaurant management on themselves.
Taste Cress, a chef’s table experience of sorts, offers guests the choice of three courses ($35, or $50 with wine), five courses ($55/$75 with wine) or chef’s tasting menus ($60/$80 with wine). Dishes and wine pairings are served by both Pulapakas (Hari as chef and Jenneffer as sommelier), as well as talented sous-chef Derek Peters.
Counter Cress, catering to diners without reservations, offers up a menu of Cress favorites from the past seven years.
On Saturday night, we opted for the chef’s tasting and left things in the very capable hands of Pulapaka and Peters. I’d recommend you do the same; it proved to be an unquestionable dining highlight of our year. Our meal commenced with an amuse-bouche of cream of grilled bok choy and broccoli, corn pico de gallo and basil, followed by these five courses with wine pairings:
To make for a more personal dining experience, the number of seats for Taste Cress has been limited to 20-25. Reservations can be made here.
Cress is open Thursday-Saturday at 5:30 p.m., with a new Sunday brunch starting next Sunday from 11 a.m.-2 p.m.
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This article appears in Aug 26 – Sep 1, 2015.
