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TRIBEZA Dining Pick | Olivia
Photography by
Chris Patunas
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2043 S. Lamar
(512) 804 2700
Living right around the corner, I checked in daily on the construction near the corner of South Lamar and Oltorf and was happy to hear, after many summer months of drive-bys and guesses, that the slanted, modern-looking half-building was going to be a new restaurant. I can’t think of another dining venture in recent history that started, literally, from the ground up. Industry chatter got under way early for Olivia—not since Uchi opened in 2003 has a restaurant investment of this caliber chosen South Lamar for its guests to gaze upon.
Michael Hsu has been busy in recent years—he was part of the team that renovated Uchi from what was once Si Bon—and has forged an impressive niche for his talents in designing restaurants. Olivia unfolds from a wide-open bar area into a tighter walk past the open kitchen line and then finally becomes a compact dining room with only a modicum of space between tables, booths, and the superb wall of glass and wood, the focal point of the building. One can easily conclude that it feels good to be in there, which is a very hard thing to achieve. Adult and seemingly quite experienced servers were smooth and confident. Place settings of modernish white squares and rectangles, deep, elegant wineglasses, and frequent silverware replacement made for attractive tabletop impressions. All of it worked together well.
Now, the food.
Guests are presented with a menu that changes nightly with appetizers, salads, and entrées. An ever-changing menu is a highly gutsy move; people generally return to a restaurant to have a particular dish they’ve enjoyed before, not simply because the food is good. So if you cannot assure a guest that a particular dish will be there when she returns, you have to take care to see that the food that is there is very good indeed. That said, one can count on (most likely) a steak, a fish, a risotto, several game dishes, and a pasta here, as well as a vegetarian dish on each daily menu. Centering its philosophy on local ingredients and seasonal availability, Olivia lists the farmers and ranchers who supply the food at the bottom of the menu. On a recent Saturday night we took an early booth and selected five courses to share between the two of us. A gorgeous sliced beet salad with tangy Pure Luck Dairy goat cheese and sweet tiny yellow tomatoes dotting a balanced panzanella salad were the stars of the show.
Seared foie gras and a tasty tenderloin rounded out the savory dishes, while excellent desserts of a chocolate tart and a crème caramel made of local duck eggs were a very fine finish.
There is much to like here. Much potential.
Dinner only. Sunday brunch. Wine, beer, and sake.