the new Martsa on Elm

[pekmez.livejournal.com]

Martsa on Elm is open again, with its new menu and new management.

I went during the first week of December for their lunch buffet, and tonight for dinner. I am pleased. It used to be one of my favorites, and I particularly liked the range of things on the menu and the buffet that I surmise were a little bit more creative interpretations of favorite flavor combinations, particularly soups and vegetable dishes. (I was, and still am, very sad that a few of my favorite soups from the old Martsa will never be tasted again in the same way, *and* I can't figure out quite how to do the tricks they did with grains and turnips and slightly thickened soup that is neither creamy nor broth.)

The new Martsa looks about the same inside as the old one - some new art on the wall, a new rug, but mostly the same decor.
The menu has some items that overlap with the old one, and is still very broad and if anything a bit more creative and loose with the interpretations of "Tibetan food" (blue cheese, goat cheese, chipotle aioli mentioned in at least one appetizer each), and everything I tried both at lunch and dinner were well executed and tasty. I don't think we ordered anything that had exactly the same name as anything in its previous incarnation, aside from tingmo (steamed bread).

They said they planned to offer different entrees at the lunch buffet each day, not a fixed set of choices. The particular set the day I was there was a bit less exciting to me than the choices they had every single day at the old Martsa for years, but I had at least one favorite and I like the idea of variety.

Tonight we tried their momos, which were delicious, and several other appetizers, the hand-pulled noodle soup (small entree sized), and one entree. I think the average spice level / fraction of dishes labeled spicy is a little bit higher, the food is still wonderfully prepared, and the general sense of a widely varied menu with many things that make me say "ooh I wanna try that" is similar. So, aside from not necessarily getting to order any one specific favorite dish that did not happen to be a generic Tibetan classic again, I think it's fair to say that Martsa is back. Yay!