Chicago Eats - Moto Restaurant

Molecular gastronomy is neat! And it's lots of fun to experience. I recently went to moto for the 15 course menu, and I was completely entranced by the entire menu, and enjoyed the experience immensely. This was definitely in my top 3 restaurant experiences ever, and it blew away the 8 course Grand Menu I had earlier this month at Charlie Trotter's.

Disclaimer: I forgot most of the names of the items on each dish. I couldn't even remember what our server said right after he told us about each course.

Course 1: Spring Roll

What a beautiful plate; the menu was printed on an edible spring roll wrapper, and the idea was to take the tofu (on the right) and everything on the plate and throw it into the wrapper and make your own spring roll. I didn't get the memo because I wasn't paying attention at first, but I was quick to rectify. Getting to play with your food is always awesome!

Course 2: Dim Sum

Dumpling, inside out sushi, geoduck

Chilled green tea

This one was a bit of a letdown for all besides the delicious geoduck. They did use liquid nitrogen to chill the green tea and the steam made it look like the dim sum would be hot, but it was actually cold. Nice little trick.

Course 3: Crudites

There's a lot on this that I don't remember. The crispy thing to the right was an overboiled pasta noodle that was quickly fried and flavored with ranch powder, the green liquid was broccoli, there was a bit of deviled egg and some various other things that I couldn't remember. I liked this dish, but the puffed noodle tasted a bit stale.

Course 4: Reconstructed Corn

One of my favorite courses of the night! To the right was the reconstructed corn; basically, kernels of corn were pulled off and cooked and then placed around the "cob" of butter flavored ice cream. It wasn't really a creamy type of ice cream, but something that was quickly freeze-dried but it was amazing. The the left was the "popcorn" shrimp with some uni, cheesecake, and a chip. I didn't really understand the left side of the menu, but it was decent. It was far outshadowed by the reconstructed corn, though.

Course 5: Gazpacho and Grape

Dehydrated grapes (look like raisins) alongside carbonated grapes with smoked duck in the middle surrounded by a great creamy gazpacho sauce of moto's own variety. The carbonated grapes were a surprise and SO. MUCH. FUN. to eat! Apparently you can carbonate your own grapes using a whipped cream dispenser and CO2 cartridges or even blowing up a balloon with some grapes inside and putting them in the fridge for a few days. An experiment that I'd like to try soon. The smoked duck was smokey and flavorful, and made me want more.

Course 6: Zen Garden

We were supposed to be able to play with this, but things were sorta sticky. There's some cocoa covered cheese in there and there was some sort of fruit jam below that you can't really see. Fairly benign in terms of flavor, but definitely a creative and playful dish.

Course 7: Kentucky Fried Pasta

Similar to Next's Chicken Noodle Soup, this dish used a similar concept and Cantu used chicken to form the noodle (wrapped around the fork) with a biscuit and fried chicken skin crisp. The noodle was great and tasted like a normal noodle flavored with chicken stock; I'm amazed that it was actually made from chicken! The fork has thyme thrown into the center to impart some of its flavor and aroma to the dish as you eat off of  it. Clever.

Course 8: Forest Foraging

The wood log was glued to the plate so I wasn't tricked into eating it. Lots of different types of mushrooms, and that's a quail egg on top of a "nest" of mushrooms. Awesome dish from a visual perspective, and I really liked all of the morsels of deliciousness that were scattered about. This was also very reminiscent of the Childhood menu at Next.

Course 9: Cassoulet

Supposedly a play on the French cassoulet. There were layers of various flavors in the thing that looks like a bush (carrot, potato?, duck?). The butter/toast in the center was great with the first bite, but a bit too rich and heavy for me.

Course 10:  Tongue and Cheek

The last savory course: from the top left, clockwise: wagyu ribeye beef, beef cheek on top of a crisped onion (think funyun), and beef tongue. The tongue and cheek were amazing and it literally melted in your mouth, the wagyu ribeye was a bit disappointing. In fact, I don't think I've ever been very happy with any wagyu beef in the past, but I digress.

Course 11: Coffee Service

The first dessert course of the night; a layer of espresso, some coconut sugar cubes, and some sort of a custard underneath the espresso layer. Wasn't really my favorite dessert.

Course 12: Egg Drop Soup

A quick before shot

That's not actually an egg yolk; it was mango suspended in a yolk like form that actually broke like a normal egg yolk would when pierced. This amazed and delighted me. It was eggsactly what I hoped it would be.

Course 13: Marshmallow and Apple

Apple infused marshmallows with some wafers and sorbet. I liked the big fish bowls, and the marshmallow was pretty good and tasted like apples.

Course 14: Chocolate and Truffle

Good truffled ice cream, chocolate cake was a bit dry. At this point I'm falling asleep.

Course 15: Acme Bomb

The fire woke me up. Remember those chocolate covered cherries with the syrup in the middle? This was like that, but no cherry in the middle and some sort of syrup. It was great. Reminded me of something Wile E. Coyote would try to use on the Roadrunner.


Overall, this was a highly entertaining and satisfying meal. We were concerned at first that we would leave hungry, but after 5 dessert courses, I was pretty full by the time we left. From an innovation standpoint, this earns top marks from me, only bested by the wizards over at Next. I thought the 15 course menu was worth every dollar spent, and it really did blow away my experience at Charlie Trotter's...which makes me wonder about the true reasons why Trotter's is shuttering its doors after 25 years...