by Andrew Mellman » Sat Feb 09, 2013 1:02 pm
We went last night (Friday) at around 7:30. No, there aren’t reservations or call-ahead seating for parties under eight people. We had around a five minute wait, and were told that – with the kitchen slammed – they were not filling empty tables immediately to give the kitchen a chance to catch up.
For appetizers, our party of four had two mussels (one blue cheese and one curry), and both of us used every bit of the great bread to sop up all drops of juice it was so good. The other two split an order of nachos, which they also loved.
Main dishes were equally fine. My Argentinian burger had chorizo, cheese, and various other add-ons (it must have been close to 8 inches tall!), and was cooked absolutely perfectly (can’t tell you how many times I order “rare” and get “sort of pinkish” medium-well instead). The seafood “burgers” were deemed tasty, and all disappeared. It may sound funny, but for the sides my wife subbed out veges for the fries, and thought the asparagus and Brussels sprouts some of the finest she’s ever eaten. The standard fries are very good, but perhaps a tad salty for me (next time I’ll try the veges or the sweet potato fries instead).
For dessert, our friends had ice cream, and thought the chocolate better than the cocoanut or nutella (you order three flavors out of the selections available) but somehow managed to clean their plate totally. We split the pots de crème, and again loved the chocolate (great flavor, very light) best, then the nutella, and the pistachio least (it was great, but we were very full at that point and it was heavier than the other two).
One thing to note: eating out was our only activity for the evening, so we were not disturbed (and even expected) the delays and some problems that did arise. If you have to eat before a movie, or want a perfectly smooth evening, I might either wait a week or two or go during the week, when they aren’t slammed. For us, there was a 20 minute delay between the serving of the first appetizer and the last, after the appetizers were cleared we waited a half hour or more for dinner, and the nachos were generously served at “room temperature”, but again we didn’t care . . . I mean they have only had the keys since February 15th, trained a new kitchen staff, and on Friday must have had 2.5-3 turns with no advertising (other than a statement in the C-J that they were open) and a location almost impossible to find!
Plus, our wait was made easier by frequent appearances by Christina, who talked with us and explained what was going on.
We definitely will be back!
Andrew Mellman
