BY MEG VAN HYGEN for WEEKLY VOLCANO 5/29/26 |
A year and a half ago, when Corbeau opened in the former Pomodoro spot in Proctor, it was hard to picture what a “Franco-Tacoman” restaurant might be. The phrase on their sandwich board made me think of Gainsbourg, that stalwart old Seattle brasserie with its French-ish menu of duck confit and steak frites and its dining room full of creaky spindle-back chairs and blurry foxed mirrors. I do love Gainsbourg endlessly. It just seemed a little late in the game to open a new spot with a conceit from the turn of the century. So it’s the threadbare shabby-chic consignment-store bistro again, but make it Tacoma? I couldn’t imagine.
Well, the difference is in the details. Opening a French bistro is a pretty broad brushstroke, but to serve Franco-Tacoman cuisine means to consider one’s sources very carefully. With pedigrees stemming from The Table, Bastille, and Canlis, among other restaurants, Corbeau’s co-owners, Trevor Hamilton and Craig Tronset, put a ton of thought and intention into where they get their goods, for starters. They’re focusing on local micro-seasonal produce and Pacific Northwestern seafood, cultivating close relationships with growers here in Pierce County in the process, rather than importing all their ingredients like most restos do. The restaurant’s foundations, meanwhile, still stay French: braised meats, emulsions, rich stocks and sauces, and the painstakingly curated wine program led by Hamilton, who’s also a certified sommelier.
The Tacoman element is in play when it comes to the vibe as well. Famously, traditional French dining can be a bit stiff, but Corbeau’s casual, neighborhoody aesthetic feels comfy and accessible. Dishes and flatware are vintage but not shabby, and the same goes for the space: inky blue walls, light wood, and pastel accents keep things at once classic and fresh. And although France is at the nexus of the menu, they’ll often bring in a little global influence from the broader Pacific Rim zone as well as the PNW culinary landscape too.
Tronset and Hamilton named their restaurant after the French word for “crow,” hoping it would embody corvid traits like intelligence, playfulness, and a strong sense of community.
How does this all dovetail into a restaurant that everyone should, aforesaid, be talking about constantly? Let’s start with the burger. My guy had a birthday a few weeks ago, and we floated a few spots, but once I suggested Corbeau, he couldn’t hear anything else I was saying. Although we were wowed by their new spring menu, with luscious attractions like lamb braised in Burgundy with pistachio gremolata and polenta cakes, and morel pasta in béchamel with fried garlic and tarragon, the birthday boy only had eyes for the luxe burger. Because he already knew how fantastical it is, and now he can never unknow.
To make it, they start with dry-aged ground beef from Pure Country Farms in Ephrata, stack it on buttered brioche, and enhance it with comté cheese, butter lettuce, pickled shallots, and garlic aioli. They also give you a milkshake tin of these skinny, glorious, crystalline-edged beef-fat fries. It’s a tall, sturdy burger, but for all its heft, it always vanishes too quickly because you don’t want to set it down, on an emotional level. Someone else could take a bite of it if you do. For my money (since I was paying, haha), this is easily the best burg in Tacoma, and I’m having trouble thinking of a better one in Seattle, honestly.
None of this is to say that everything else on Corbeau’s menu isn’t sensational. It always is. Just that these dishes change about every six weeks to follow the PNW’s agricultural microseasons, and the magnificent Corbeau burger is forever. That said, another recent standout is the Korean Caesar salad, absolutely snowed over with parm and tossed with onions, bacon, sesame oil, and a bit of jjajang (black bean sauce), all of which coats the minced bacon to create little umamescent bacon-jammy flavor bombs. The Basque cheesecake, dressed with cinnamon streusel and rhubarb coulis, goes crazy as well. But they well might be gone from the menu by the time this letter reaches you.
While neither terribly French nor Tacoman, the cocktail menu is killer nonetheless and reminds me a little of the elite booze alchemy that was going on at ALMA’s lounge (RIP). Tacoma is still ramping up on the craft cocktail tip, and although there are certainly some MVPs out there, Field Bar, Proof, and Bar Rosa come to mind, most cocktail menus in town are keeping things pretty conservative. In contrast, Corbeau’s new bar manager, Kylie Agostini (The Crocodile, Neumos), has loaded the new cocktail list with a bunch of super inventive weirdos.
I can’t stop thinking about the drink I had with pickle dill aquavit, silver cachaça, carrot juice, habanero, and pickle brine called the SYHAW. I don’t know what SYHAW stands for, but it was vibrantly orange and tasted like my vegetable garden. My dude got a cocktail called It’s Corn! that was equally delicious and cachaça-based but put mine to shame when it comes to creativity: gold (that is, aged) cachaça, Vietnamese corn milk, coconut cream, lime, vanilla, and nutmeg, all garnished with a baby corn. Man, this corn-based coquito had us inspired, talking about making ice cream from corn milk when we got home. Now that we knew corn milk existed. We were so excited.
I’m certainly not the only person who’s noticed all of the thoughtful sourcing and creative indulgence going on at Corbeau; the restaurant recently won a Snail of Approval from Slow Food, which is a big deal on a worldwide scale. Based in Italy, Slow Food is an organization that recognizes and promotes regional cooking made with sustainable foods, as sort of a diametric opposite of fast food. Smaller regional chapters award the Snail of Approval to restaurants that further the movement via things like using traditional recipes, local foodways and sourcing, seasonal ingredients, and eco-friendly practices like regenerative farming and low-waste operations. Corbeau is the only restaurant in Pierce County to have a Snail. From the announcement, Slow Food Olympia lovingly wrote:
“This Franco-Tacoma [sic] restaurant is a model of thoughtfulness. They care not just about the seasonality and provenance of their ingredients, but about all aspects of their business practices. … Corbeau is unapologetic about supporting important community issues that matter most to them. From immigration to labor to being transparent about the reality of owning a small restaurant business, they use their social media platforms for social good.”
All of that plus incredible food? What an embarrassment of riches we have stumbled into, Tacoma.
It’s baffling that I’m not hearing about Corbeau from all and sundry whenever we all talk about our local faves. This is an essential Tacoma restaurant. Yes, Tacoma has had great restaurants before, absolutely, but this place seems to usher in a yet-nameless creative culinary era in Tacoma, I say, wherein we’re really playing with the big dogs. They’re confident enough in their skills to get weird is what I mean. I get a little upset when Corbeau’s gorgeous food portraits float past my eyeballs on Instagram and then I realize all the people I know who could be enjoying these considered, whimsical dishes on the regular. But they don’t. Or they just haven’t yet.
All of this is to say that, if you haven’t been to Corbeau yet, you are seriously fucking up big time. Go eat that burger right this minute, and/or anything else on the menu you have room for afterward. Proceed there now, directly, as the crow flies. It doesn’t even need to be your birthday.
Corbeau, 3819 N. 26th St. Tacoma, WA 98407
www.corbeautacoma.com
@corbeau.tacoma
