Let Go and Just Enjoy With DUO Detroit

One of the hardest parts about going out for dinner is choosing where to go. Which is followed up by the difficult task of choosing what you want to eat once you get there. I have always had a hard time deciding what I want to eat at a restaurant, so I try to get my dining mates to team up and order with me so we can all try a few things off the menu. I like variety, which is why I have recently fallen in love with places like Katoi and The Peteroboro, where it's easy to order a few things off the menu and share them between the group. I also recently tried a new type of dining called Omakase, where all the deciding is done for you and I absolutely loved it.

Last month I was lucky enough to attend a DUO Detroit dinner. This pop up one night only event featured a 10+ course meal was served over four hours. The chef created a one of a kind experience that required nothing but an open mind. Instead of worrying about where to go and what I was going to eat, I sat back and enjoyed the ride.

Each month the location of the dinner changes. For this meal we gathered inside The Holding House, a new event space and art gallery in Detroit. DUO took the raw space of the gallery and converted it into a fine dining establishment for the night. Then, over the next four hours we were taken on a journey. The courses were labeled as follows: snacks, slice, south, summer, surprising, cruciferous, 2014, herbaceous, central, floral, citrus, sweet and rich. Each course was served alone on a plate and explained to us in detail before we tried it.

I ate caviar for the first time, found out that I love grapefruit when you pair it with a good cheese, and tried hibiscus sorbet! It was a roller coaster ride for my taste buds and I loved each and every dish more than the next. I found myself enjoying good conversation and a few bites of a new food every 10 minutes, which meant that I left full, but not overstuffed. The experience of letting go and going on a ride with the chef was wonderful.

Throughout the night, we talked, we ate, we laughed and we truly enjoyed ourselves. I highly suggest taking a date and trying this for yourself if you are lucky enough to get seat at the next one, or even the one after that. Duo only lets 50 people into each meal and these dinners sell out really fast. You need to follow them on Facebook and make sure to buy tickets the second they are released. All you need to do after you buy the tickets is show up and enjoy! 

The next DUO dinner will be served on September 17th. This one will be extra special because it will feature four chefs instead of one. The team that will be cooking this meal will also be going to the culinary Olympics together. Tickets are normally around $50 a person, but for this dinner they will be $100 as it is a fundraiser for the Olympics. Plus, four different chefs will be cooking which means there will be more courses and more variety throughout the meal. If you miss that one, don't miss the next one in November! 

~S