Just Outside the Box

Photo by Brendan Burden
Justin Champagne-Lagarde is doing his best to build a restaurant that uses no plastic and makes its supply decisions based on sustainability and ethical farming practices.
The dining room was designed with help from Bridget Sullivan, a real estate agent and friend of the couple. In normal times, the section above is for tasting menu diners while this front area is a less formal lounge.
The duck dish is the eighth of nine dishes on Perch’s midwinter tasting menu — a feast that starts with a beet and Pernod emulsion and ends with caramelized parsnip ice cream with chestnut cake and a maple Verjus reduction.
The duck is aged in koji — a fungus grown on rice from spores — wrapped in Atlantic dulse and Pacific kombu and cooked at 60 degrees in the Alto Shaam before being finished with a sear. Disc-shaped potatoes are bathed in a birch syrup and butter confit. There’s caramelized beet, a sauerkraut croquette and charred scallions that snake across the top of the vegetables on the side of the plate. Sprigs of microgreen, brighten things up. A red wine sauce sits in the middle, inviting dipping from all sides.