Dan Fox and Chad Vogel are currently renovating the space that once housed Underground Kitchen, site of their upcoming restaurant, Fox & Bird. In the meantime, they’re building their names through special meals, such as the upcoming Slow Pig event in March and last week’s Valentine’s Day dinner, held Thursday and Friday at the Livingston Inn and a reprise of last year’s Century Dinner.

It was a fun evening that began with appetizers and cocktails in a parlor room, continued on to a luxurious five-course dinner with wine pairings and concluded with desserts and coffee in that same parlor room.

Chef Fox is a master of the heritage pig, and the pork belly appetizer was my favorite–I enjoyed it while sipping an old fashioned and a cognac-based cocktail made by Vogel. By the way, those were just two of several creative libations he was crafting that night. I would have had more, but I knew five glasses of wine were on the horizon.

The meal, in order, with my thoughts:

• Crawfish Lemongrass-Coconut Bisque – The pork and crawfish dumpling was a wonderful touch to a superbly seasoned bisque.
• Smoked Duck and Foie Gras Pin-Wheel –  Prior to the evening, I never would have thought to eat foie gras with beet-apple compote or candied orange, but they all complemented each other perfectly.
• Ossabaw Speck-Wrapped Black Bass – Nice, light dish, with delicate accents from the squid ink reduction.
• Grapefruit-Pistachio Crusted Lamb Chop – Loved the lamb, but I didn’t care for the bed of roasted carrot, beet and French Puy lentils, which opposed the lamb too much. I also was surprised that despite this dish taking more than 30 min. to be served to us, the lamb was very rare.
• Future Fruit Farms Brown Butter Peak Cake and Bitter Chocolate Cake – Most memorable part of these two desserts? The candied rose and beet petals. Flowers can apparently be tasty, too.

While these dishes may not necessarily be served at Fox & Bird, it’s a great preview of things to come. To see more photos, please visit our Fox & Bird Flickr set.