THIS RESTAURANT IS CLOSED Biba

THIS RESTAURANT IS CLOSED Biba Restaurant Review:

It has been ten years since chefs Lydia Shire and Susan Regis opened Biba back in Boston again, if you’re wondering---and their food is still as wildly eclectic and tasty as ever. The two-level space features a downstairs bar that can run with the hippest and a flamboyant upstairs dining room swathed in fiery pumpkins and bold blacks courtesy of Manhattan designer Adam Tihany. If you can snare a window seat, the views of the Public Garden are what the kids these days would call money. Biba is the only restaurant in the country with two chefs that own James Beard Awards. That’s a testament to both their talent and their longevity. We know of few other cooks who have such an uncanny handle on disparate cuisines; we know of even fewer who have the creative faculties to keep such madness under control. Biba never has been and never will be food for the timid: Flavors come on in a bum-rush and sauces are often heavily reduced and operatic in their largesse. But the savories are almost always well-crafted and never betray their cultural sense of place. Roasted rack of rabbit tastes of the forest with a risotto of bacalao, pine nuts, and currants. Red snapper is encased with couscous and parsley and plated with a preserved lemon aïoli; it’s North Africa in an upscale dining package. Grilled lamb steak is a study of Sardinia’s shepherding culture: Basted with the local wine, surrounded by sheep’s milk gnocchi, and dabbed with a beautifully bitter dandelion pesto.