Photos by Alyssum Pohl

I had not planned to use this blog to talk about restaurants. Furthest thing from mymind, in fact.
Then again, like most open-minded people, I can be persuaded to change my mind, based on the evidence.
There is also the fact that cooking has become for me a grown man’s hobby, and I have grown the soul of a gourmet. I know really good food when I taste it.
I discovered high-quality dinner at Stars in Charleston, South Carolina, tonight, May 1. Mind you, I am from Chicago, where the culinary bar is set high. But Charleston has its own culinary tradition. I was out with a group of seven people affiliated with the NOAA Digital Coast Partnership the night before one of our semiannual meetings. Stars is set in downtown Charleston, at 495 King Street. It competes in the highly competitive seafood genre so popular in Charleston. But it deserves kudos, based on my experience.

First off, there is the rooftop bar, which on a nice night affords the opportunity to take in the local skyline, though not the seashore, which is too far away. That is a nice amenity, but hardly the coup de grace.
For that, you go downstairs and order dinner. A colleague and I had the unique dino kale salad, made with a particular breed of kale that has a scaly surface that resembles, supposedly, that of a dinosaur hide, but adds considerable texture to the ordinary acquired taste of kale. I personally acquired a taste for kale in childhood because my mother, using a recipe from her mother-in-law, always used kale as a side dish for holiday dishes on occasions like Thanksgiving and Christmas. It took a long time for me to learn that this was actually unusual, not typical, and later that much of the nation was acquiring a taste for kale only long after I became an adult. But this salad comes with smoked almonds, ricotto salata cheese, shaved brussel sprouts, and benne seed-garlic dressing that in combination lend an air of authenticity and authority I have never before encountered. This was, in essence, a whole new take on kale as the centerpiece of a salad. It puts ordinary lettuce to shame.
The specialty entrees also drive one’s imagination over the cliff. I ordered the Plancha seared diver scallops, which were very good, but another friend, sitting opposite me, could not fathom why I had not tried them while I kept digging into the wild mushroom and chard gratin, with chicken jus gastrique. The reason was that I actually liked the latter better than the former. There was absolutely nothing wrong with the scallops, mind you. They were succulent, done just right, but the gratin was so over-the-top tasty that it made the scallops pale in comparison. I don’t know whose creation it was, but as an experimental chef in my own home, I was envious of their chef’s ability to concoct such a delicious bowl of delight. I made sure that my last bite came from that delectable diversion, even though most people might have favored the scallops just because they were, after all, the featured centerpiece of the entrée. To me, that did not matter. The mushroom and chard side dish was addictive.
Once you’re on a roll like that, how can you stop? And why should you? I promised the waitress I would blog about the restaurant, so she brought me a take-home copy of the menu, but more importantly, she brought all of us dessert menus. So, unable to resist the temptation, succumbing to the devil’s intrigues, I ordered the Charleston mud fluff pie, which is more appetizing than it sounds—along with a cup of coffee to polish it off. And by then I had had enough. And so will you. These people are at their peak performance right now. Let’s hope they stay there for a while.
Jim Schwab