The Bench

Sometimes it hurts to say goodbye.

Why such a poignant mood? Well, it seems chef Aaron Burns is pulling his crispy pork belly from The Bench’s menu after a year. So we are left only with fond memories of a dish with a homey Sunday roast quality that disguised some rather clever technique.

But the chef is not one to let a menu laminate. The Bench’s kitchen swirls with ideas and experimentation. Take the wonderfully delicate Berkshire pork chop as an example. Instead of serving it as a glistening hunk with mashed potatoes and green beans, Burns took a decidedly more playful approach. Alongside the chop sits a side of fried rice, shaded into a deep nutty hue by soy, the torpid bite muzzled with sesame and sugar. It becomes a subtle, earthy foundation for a mirepoix – little flecks of carrot, celery and onion that trace through the rice leaving bittersweet trails and wisps of autumn grass. A fried egg placed on top lends richness to the rice, developing into a kind of culinary autostereogram.

Remember those things? By gazing into a common two-dimensional image, a hidden and more complex three-dimensional design would emerge. Burns has somehow achieved something similar with simple fried rice – except that he’s not content to let you relax and drift into reverie. A side of house-made kimchi, teetering between hot and tangy, gives the plate one more dimension.

And this is all without more than a brief mention of the pork.

“We brine the pork chops for 24 hours,” Burns explains. “The brine is almost Thanksgivingy – a little clove. It goes so well with pork.”

Clearly he’s not shy about breaking a grammar rule or two.

Burns constantly introduces new menu items, recently adding a presentation of pan roasted scallops that shouldn’t come together so easily, but… well, just how does he coerce a truce between cushy shellfish and frowning nibs of Brussels sprout?

“The puree makes it stand out,” Burns says. The dressing of celery root and pear is the perfect mediator, offering an earthy savor on one hand, a delicate sweetness on the other, both embraced by the smoky currents drifting from a crispy sear on the scallops and scorched edges on the lean sprouts. A splash of yuzu adds a refreshing glint of citrus.

So the dishes can be impish and inspired. They can also be deceptive. Just take, for example, a bowl of cauliflower soup that casts doubt on all assumptions about the vegetable – that it is gritty and nearly lacking in flavor. But this is a beautiful, irresistible puree. A touch of curry accents the pale earthy sweetness of cauliflower, providing a dusky tone that reverberates lightly through each spoonful, rattling hints of garlic and onion just enough to stir their gruff, bittersweet notes.

There’s a lot of thought in every dish. That the chef and his crew never stop tweaking and inventing is what makes The Bench worth visits and revisits.

But about that… wow – what was it he cut from the menu?

THE BENCH 1700 17 Mile Drive, Pebble Beach. 11am-4pm and 5:30-10pm daily. (800) 877-0597, pebblebeach.com