Hot Dish: The crown jewel of Goodhouse Social Club

Goodhouse Social Club’s halibut with caviar beurre blanc. (Amy Sowder photos)

Chefs Kiya Zander and Gabriel Sorgi.

By AMY SOWDER

In the heart of Goodhouse Social Club’s three-story culinary theater, where the sound stage mingles with cozy lounge areas and the rooftop bar overlooks the village of Mount Kisco, a single dish reigns supreme. It arrives like a work of art — glistening pearls of deep reddish-orange salmon roe nestled alongside jet-black hackleback caviar, their jewel-like orbs catching the ambient light as they crown a perfectly seared piece of Atlantic halibut.

“The whole dish is luxury from start to finish,” said Executive Chef Gabriel Sorgi, managing partner and culinary director of food and beverage operations at Goodhouse, which opened in July. The menu offers its audience casual burgers and fried chicken sandwiches for casual live-music crowds but also beautiful crudo small plates and dessert masterpieces for more fine-dining fans.

Indeed, every element speaks to this philosophy. 

The caviar tells a story of contrasts: the Alaskan salmon roe bursts with oceanic intensity, each pearl delivering a robust flavor with its distinctive pop. Meanwhile, the hackleback caviar — harvested from the Mississippi and Missouri rivers’ smallest sturgeon — offers something more nuanced.

“With the salmon, it’s a burst of freshness, and there’s a little more earthiness in the background with the hackleback,” Sorgi said.

The foundation begins with 7 ounces of Atlantic halibut, selected for its unique qualities.

“I was looking for a white, rich fish,” Sorgi said. “Halibut is firm, looks very nice and you can cook it medium, medium rare, and it’s just delicate enough and firm enough.”

The fish undergoes careful searing in clarified butter within a well-seasoned pan. As the halibut develops its golden crust, Sorgi bastes it with browning butter infused with fresh thyme sprigs, creating layers of nutty, herbaceous flavor.

Beneath this magnificent fish lies a plump island of pomme purée that defies expectations of mashed potatoes. Sous Chef Kiya Zander can transform Idaho potatoes into something ethereal — velvety, silken, and impossibly smooth. The potatoes begin in cold water for even cooking, she said, before being processed through a food mill to achieve their refined texture.

The crowning glory comes in the form of beurre blanc, a classic French sauce demanding skilled technique and timing. Sorgi builds the foundation with shallots and peppercorns before adding dry white wine, bay leaf and thyme. The magic happens when cold butter cubes are whisked in one by one, creating an emulsion that transforms simple ingredients into liquid silk. 

“If the heat is too hot or cold, or the butter too warm, the sauce breaks,” Zander said.

“This is such a simple dish,” Sorgi said while tasting the sauce and adjusting the seasoning with kosher salt — never iodized table salt, which he dismisses as “bitter.”

Yet simplicity here masks extraordinary complexity of flavor and technique.

The final presentation is a study in restraint and elegance. 

“There are no extra little things, no microgreens,” Sorgi said. Instead, the creamy pomme puree forms a pristine island, the halibut nestles in its center like a flaky nugget of gold, and the chive- and caviar-studded beurre blanc cascades down from the crusted filet, pooling around the potato island in verdant, orange-flecked rivulets.

The impact on diners is immediate and profound.

“It’s definitely our No. 1 selling entree. It’s hands-down the dish we get the most feedback on,” said Michael Voron, another owning partner and also the general manager.

“I see people lick their plates.” He laughed: “We recommend getting our handmade biscuits to sop up the sauce.”

For the kitchen staff, this dish represents more than technique — it’s an education in classical cooking principles. “Another cook said, ‘I’m learning things I never learned in culinary school,’” Zander said, speaking to the dish’s role as both menu star and teaching tool.

In Goodhouse Social Club’s four-station kitchen, this halibut dish represents the harmony that emerges when classical French technique meets contemporary American dining. 

“It shows in the final product that every step is thought-out, from the quality of the fish to the clarified butter,” Zander said.

Each forkful delivers on that promise — the firm yet delicate fish yielding to reveal its perfectly cooked interior, the caviar exploding with briny intensity in the velvety sauce dotted with delicate oniony dimension, and the pomme puree providing a creamy counterpoint that allows every flavor to shine.

This is more than a dish; it’s a testament to the power of technique and quality ingredients to create an experience worthy of plate-licking praise.

Goodhouse Social Club is located at 130 E. Main St., Mount Kisco.