Lodgepole creates a special Valentine’s Day experience with Idaho ingredients

Moscow restaurant highlights local veggies, pork and wine in seven-course meal

Story by Anteia McCollum

Valentine’s Day is an occasion special enough to get out the more luxurious dinnerware at Lodgepole on Main Street in Moscow, and this year they’re pairing a eccentric seven-course meal with the fancy cutlery. 

Lodgepole has been serving food made with local ingredients since 2015, influenced by the family traditions and personal adventures of owners Alex and Melissa Barham. Their location is small, made even smaller by the pandemic, but charming nonetheless. 

A salad from a past meal at Lodgepole: Burrata with prosciutto, persimmon and greens with barrel aged balsamic | Courtesy of Lodgepole

After spending most of January planning, preparing and rehearsing for the Valentine’s special, Lodgepole will host around 50 couples for the occasion. That doesn’t include the packed floor the weekend prior. 

“We’re romantics at heart,” Lodgepole manager and sommelier Michael Lewis said. “We always try to look forward to Valentine’s Day. It’s when we get to stretch as a staff and as a restaurant. We like to bring in bright flavors from abroad to contrast some of the winter produce in our area … and create a sense of whimsy and romance.”

The romantic dinner service will begin with a strawberry tarragon topping on house-made labneh and flatbread, paired with a bubbly rosé. An ahi tuna crudo salad with local microgreens, New Zealand passion fruit, avocado puree and pickled veggies, all paired with a Marlborough sauvignon blanc, will follow the light starter. 

“We always say what grows together goes together,” Lewis said about the wine and passion fruit combination.

A recent dinner at Lodgepole also featured caviar, alongside smoked wild Pacific Northwest king salmon in fir tip glaze over risotto | Courtesy of Lodgepole

A vichyssoise, a cold potato and leek soup, with Pacific Northwest crab and served with caviar from the Seattle Caviar Company. The soup, which is not something Lodgepole generally has on the menu, will serve as a mid-meal break paired with a “dynamite” Chablis wine, Lewis said. Following the vichyssoise will be a housemade sweet potato gnocchi with fried sage and parmesan, coupled with an Oregon pinot noir. 

The pièce de résistance, the main dish, will feature kurobuta pork tenderloin, sourced from Snake River Farms, served with local mushrooms and a root vegetable puree made primarily from locally sourced parsnips. A sangiovese classico with an herbaceous flavor will help bring out the flavor of the mushrooms in the main dish. 

“We don’t want you to be so full of food that you can’t kiss at the end of the night.”

“It’s Valentine’s Day, and the idea is to keep it light,” Lewis said. “Beef isn’t for everybody. A lot of other local restaurants are serving beef. I think this is an opportunity for us to do something a little lighter. We don’t want you to be so full of food that you can’t kiss at the end of the night.”

Lodgepole isn’t holding back for a creative Valentine’s meal, but it doesn’t stop there. Dining partners will enjoy not one, but two desserts to finish off the night’s meal.

“We love dessert in this restaurant to begin with, and on Valentine’s Day we go hog wild with it,” Lewis said.

The first delicacy is citrusy and floral to prepare guests’ palates for the chocolate that is a necessity for the occasion. Lemon rose profiteroles topped with powdered sugar and hibiscus paired with a Champagne cocktail contrasts the chocolate raspberry tarts with vanilla frosting and a local Grenache from Rivaura in Juliaetta. 

“You can’t have Valentine’s Day without chocolate,” Lewis said.