The Critics Ate Salmon, Duck, Burgers, and Tacos This Week

Two Takes on Salmon

Boston Magazine’s Jolyon Helterman pays a visit to Les Sablons in Cambridge for his latest review. He kicks off his assessment of the restaurant with two takes on the same salmon dish, noting that visitors may find themselves walking a line of neo-French cuisine and traditionalism. “There’s a lot to love here,” he writes, including raw bar bites like bass crudo and beef tartare. The small plates section of the menu “is a gastro-moderate’s dream,” with rye spaghetti in a bright pesto sauce and an escargot vol-au-vent that he calls “gloriously flaky.” Plus, the striped bass entree is “terrific,” Helterman writes. Overall, Les Sablons “lacks the big-tent inclusive feel of its Kenmore sibling,” Eastern Standard, but Helterman reckons it’s something that could be solved with “a little tweaking.”

A Tale of Two Dumplings

For The Improper Bostonian, MC Slim JB checks out the Hunanese cuisine at the recently opened Sumiao Hunan Kitchen in Kendall Square. On the dumpling front, he finds “simple, exquisitely executed” gyoza, but the soup bao “break two promises” — they look machine-made (despite being described as “handmade” on the menu) and are barely soupy. Noodles, too, have ups and downs, with “rich, fatty goodness” and “salty umami” coming from the non-noodle ingredients of one dish, but the noodles themselves are “so overdone as to disintegrate into globby pieces in the bowl.” Despite some missteps, the restaurant’s “pleasures...are plentiful enough,” and highlights include the Mala duck, spicy crunchy cucumber, and Shaoshan cabbage.and Shaoshan cabbage.

Burgers Galore

This week for the Dig, Marc Hurwitz visits Best Burger Bar in Brookline. Alongside a cocktail list designed by the legendary Brother Cleve, the restaurant’s “dry-aged Angus burgers really shine,” Hurwitz writes. The “gut-busting” Big Tex burger comes with pepper jack cheese, bacon, onion rings, and a homemade barbecue sauce, while a version called Le Big Mac “pretty much blows away the McDonald’s Big Mac (which really isn’t such a bad burger when you think about it),” according to Hurwitz. There’s also an “excellent” poutine and another cheesy french fry option topped with manchego. For those not in the mood for burgers, there are hot dogs and wings, and vegetarians can tuck into a veggie burger.

“Deeply Satisfying” Tacos

The Boston Globe’s Catherine Smart visits Yellow Door Taqueria in Dorchester for her latest “Cheap Eats” review. The restaurant “packs a lot of chic charm” into a narrow space, and chef and part owner Colton Coburn-Wood oversees the menu, which features a range of tacos. Smart recommends the “delicious” spicy chorizo taco, which comes topped with a quail egg and has salty sausage and creamy fried potatoes. Additionally, the Colorado taco comes stuffed with stewed pork, and Smart calls it a “well-seasoned and flavorful little tortilla-topper.” The sweet and salty Azteca taco with tequila-habanero braised beef is “deeply satisfying,” and Smart recommends a “refreshing” Rosita cocktail (jalapeño-infused blanco tequila, aperol, grapefruit, and lime) to go along with a meal.

• Review: Les Sablons in Cambridge [BM]
• Fire Flower [IB]
• Best Burger Bar [Dig]
• The Yellow Door Taqueria Is One You Want to Enter [BG]