Edible Art: Rigsby's
Where: Rigsby's - the arty and hip Short North stalwart that exudes an easy sophistication and cooks some of the most honestly Italian-inflected upscale food in the city
What: Vacherin Glace
Artistic kinship: The mid-'40s abstract expressionist works of Jackson Pollock
Imagine an impastoed and shimmering Jackson Pollock drip painting folded into a frozen mountain of a dessert and you'll start to grasp the multi-textured and festive immensity that is Rigsby's take on the notorious Vacherin Glace.
Squiggles of cherry and chocolate syrup (sometimes wildly applied) and accumulated flakes of crispy blanched almonds decorate this celebratory birthday cake of a happy-face-making glacier.
As much a geological phenomenon as an artful dessert, Rigsby's massive, feeds-four Vacherin Glace (Rigsby's menu sells it short at feeds-two) is a flurry of freshly whipped cream layered over nearly chest-high strata of excellent coffee ice cream interspersed with a stiff meringue that crunches in the mouth like so much "snow day" snow.