Location: 1911 N Cleveland Massillon Rd, Bath, OH 44333
https://www.kenstewartstrebelle.com/
Date Tasted: 6/2/2022 (Thursday) (dinner)
Price: $21
Beverage: Madcap Brewing Co. Bullet IPA
<applause!> Great recovery Tre Belle! Although I rated this dish just a 2/10 back just about 2 years ago, today’s offering was a vast improvement and salvaged the rendition for future tastings.
The dish looked fairly similar to my prior tasting, but the quality of the execution was finally on par with everything else at Tre Belle. I still think there is a bit too much arugula so it comes out looking more like a salad, but that aside…
The meat (and everything else) was a perfect temperature, just slightly cold but not straight out of the freezer.
There were a bare minimum of onions, and they were not very strong so they added to the flavor instead of distracting or (typically) getting scraped off. Don’t get me wrong, onions are one of my absolute favorite things, but this is a delicate dish so one needs to be careful – especially with red onions. I would suggest white onions to always be safe, FWIW.
The balsamic treatment was perfect – just enough to get coverage when dragging the meat around but not over-dressed and not drizzled OVER the meat which makes it impossible to tone down if you prefer. Along those lines, the EVOO was in perfect proportion.
Needed salt, but that is not uncommon at all and perfectly acceptable. The light (amount of) pepper treatment was perfect, and the pepper itself was notably strong which I really liked. It jumped out and said “hello”!
The arugula was fresh and tasted fantastic. Crispy, peppery and not over-dressed.
Eggs, again, are not entirely out of the question on this dish but fairly rare across the cross section of offerings I have tasted. They go more with the arugula than the meat. There was a perfect amount and quality of capers.
The tomatoes were a welcome addition, not distracting from the meat and something to add to the extra arugula while finishing up the plate.
Cut, quality, and temperature of the meat was perfect as was the shape, shave, taste and proportion of the Parmesan.
Hard to say what I would improve other than to add a bit more volume of meat so it stretched to the edges of the lower part of the plate, and perhaps a little less arugula so you can see the meat more in the presentation. That would make it clear this is a carpaccio dish, and not a salad that happens to have meat at the bottom.
Tre Belle is fully redeemed, all in all a very enjoyable dish!
Overall Score: 8/10 – would recommend and definitely get again
