Restaurant Review: Art at Four Seasons

Can Kerry Sear’s latest venture in the new Four Seasons rise above hotel restaurant status?

It’s a Tuesday night in early winter, and the bar at Art Restaurant in the new Four Seasons hotel, open since November, is flying. Servers weave and swerve, balancing trays of cocktails, doing their best to keep up with a capacity crowd. The cooks manning the open counter-dining station make piano-key clanking sounds in sparkling stainless bowls, furiously dressing and then artfully stacking tender baby lettuces, each carefully balancing a delicate Parmesan tuile on top. There isn’t a seat open at the more casual (yet still plenty swanky) lounge end of Art. On a Tuesday night. And we’re in a recession. What gives?

Then I spot chef Kerry Sear, working the room, ferrying gorgeous plates wearing ruby-red beets like jewelry, and pastas trailing the heady scent of local truffles. And then the dapper Thierry Rautureau, chef of Madison Valley’s fine-dining destination Rover’s, turns the corner and begins chatting up two other chefs. He waves hello to yet another one seated at the counter a couple of stools down from me, where I’m sipping a perfect martini ($12) out of a glass with a glimmering gold stem.

Finally, it hits me: Tuesday is, nine times out of 10, the chef’s night off. Art isn’t just packed—it’s packed with local restaurant-industry folks, scouting out the new place in town and sizing up Kerry Sear’s food. And Sear, cool as a cucumber even with all eyes trained on him—is making sure every single fried taro root chip is exactly where it belongs.

Sear is a pro. At Cascadia, the gloriously pretty restaurant he opened in 1999 (and which closed in October), luxe décor—think Limoges china, hand-blown glassware and a designer-clad waitstaff—was matched by precise, intricate plating. There, Sear prepared superb seven-course tasting menus showcasing sensationally fresh, seasonal, local produce (an almost groundbreaking concept in 1999). Its debut was met with resounding ooohs and ahhs, and added to Belltown’s already white-hot dining scene.

But when the tech boom went bust in 2000, followed by the tragedy of 9/11, money started drying up. Sear had 150 seats to fill, and the diners just weren’t showing up. By 2002, the chef was forced to lower his price point and, frankly, dumb down his menus. Out went dishes like “Wild Grass and Herb-Baked Partridge with Blackberry Reduction,” in came happy-hour sliders. Really tasty sliders, but still.

Art’s opening signaled the promise of a Kerry Sear comeback. With the deep pockets of Four Seasons behind him and a built-in audience of tony hotel guests as well as wealthy diners living just upstairs in 36 private multimillion-dollar residences, it seemed like the opportunity for this talented chef to wow us yet again. So, though I was glad to see Sear’s yummy sliders carried over to the bar menu at Art (three for $14), along with Seattle’s first East Coast–style lobster roll (at $18 it’s pricey, but wonderfully delicious), I was hoping for a glimpse of the old Kerry Sear. In other words, I didn’t come to Art to eat sliders. I came to eat partridge.

There are two wildly divergent environments in which to sup and sip at Art: Choose the lounge, with its low-slung, boxy leather chairs and swank, clubby air, and you’ll feel a little bit of the big-city movers and shakers rubbing off on you. Or opt for the subdued dining room, where sand-hued upholstery meets low lighting and the occasional gold-plated side table, to close a deal over rib-eyes and big-boned cabernets ($35 and up) in starchy formality. Single diners may sit comfortably at the winding chestnut counter, which carries over from the bar into the dining room and provides a prime people-watching perch. 

Floor-to-ceiling windows promise to showcase iconic Puget Sound views from any seat in the house (though during my dark, dreary midwinter visits, they simply reflected the images of those sitting closest to them). Clever metal light fixtures make the ceiling look as if it’s dotted with stars, and stacked slate, sandstone and local woods create tactile accents all around. Except for a distracting light installation behind the bar and in the dining room (which diffuses light in unflattering shades of green, orange, yellow and so on as it winds its way through the rainbow), the dining room and bar are a tailored celebration of the elements of the Northwest.
It’s the food at Art that left me lukewarm.

Clearly, Four Seasons is attempting to distinguish itself from the “hotel restaurant” genre by bringing in a locally renowned chef, by sourcing ingredients from local farmers and even giving the occasional nod to hometown food favorites such as Estrella Creamery. But dining at Art lacks that air of authenticity that our best local restaurants have. Art feels more like the idea of what a Seattle restaurant should be rather than a restaurant that organically evolved in our city’s increasingly rich and layered dining scene.

Of course, the profusion of gimmicks doesn’t help. The “counter” menu features an assortment of raw, cured and warm dishes, most of which are paired with “paintbrush” dips. I ordered the vibrantly fresh kampachi ($10) and the tuna belly (which wasn’t quite as fatty as tuna belly ought to be, $12) from the “raw” section, along with four sauces (each dish is served with two sauces; each I sampled was clever and tasty, but the best was a deeply sensuous wasabi cream). But then I saw it: an actual paintbrush with which to “paint” my fish. Though this is inspired by the restaurant’s proximity to Seattle Art Museum— you’re painting your fish and creating art—my corny meter hit capacity. I chose to dip my otherwise-delicious fish instead, leaving the paintbrush untouched.

Another sticking point may be inherent in the “hotel restaurant” model: You’ve got to please everyone from beef-loving businessmen to Midwestern tourists while, ideally, also impressing the locals. Hence, the three menus to choose from at dinner: a casual bar menu with those sliders and other shareable appetizers; the counter menu with raw, cured and smallish dishes; and a dining room menu with everything from sturgeon to wild boar to $8 french fries.

On the formal dining menu, where appetizers are categorized with labels like “cool” and “warm,” I ordered the “cool”  truffled beef tartar ($18). With its perfectly fried egg and tiny toasts, it was scrumptious. Entrées, including a thick-cut, single venison chop ($36) and a tender hunk of lamb loin heady with rosemary and olives ($36), are perfectly cooked, but are served à la carte. You’ll have to “accessorize” (the label given to side dishes) with, say, crushed potatoes ($8) or wonderfully fragrant carrots with cumin seed ($8), both straightforward and delicious. Desserts, created by pastry chef Ryan Witcher, are sublime, especially a brilliantly tart lemon meringue pie (a pie in name only, it’s actually a more traditional meringue filled with lemon sorbet, $12).

And yet—even with all of the elements done just so—I left Art feeling less than satisfied. With so many menus, so many attempts to please everyone and so many forced attempts at whimsy, a meal here doesn’t leave much of an impression. And, though it may be of little concern to the bigwigs staying (or living) upstairs, dinner at Art costs a pretty penny. Perhaps on a sparkling clear day, when the ferries and seagulls are doing their beautiful dance in the chilly waters of Elliott Bay, I’ll return for a drink and that outstanding lobster roll. And once the novelty wears off, I think Thierry and the guys will find that the locals are still filling the dining rooms of Seattle’s neighborhood haunts. 

Art, 99 Union St., Downtown, 206.749.7000
Breakfast, lunch, dinner daily, $$$