Fancy Dinner

My Seperated at Birth Twin and I have decided that we're going to go to a fancy/interesting/special restaurant once a month so we can expand our dining horizons and see how the richer half eats.

Our bar was set a few years ago when we went to Morimoto and had the $120 chef's choice tasting menu (omakase) for our birthdays. Holy crap, that was good. I still dream about some of the dishes we had.

A few months ago we went to Pearl, which then promptly changed concept and/or closed (it's now called Akoya). It was great. A bit pretentious, but the food was delicious.

Last night we went to James, which is a high-end local ingredients place. I loved the decor, our waiter was great, and the food was... for the most part good. I had herbed sweetbreads and my friend had sashimi, we shared a stinging nettle tortelli, and then I had the lamb and my friend had the veal. Then we shared a salt caramel semifreddo. The sweetbreads were nicely herbed but could have stood to be a bit crispier. The sashimi (which I got a bite of) was delicious and fresh. The tortelli was wonderful, it was my favourite dish of the night. The lamb, which was cooked medium rare, managed to be dry (I'm not quite sure how that's possible). On the other hand, the veal was perfectly done. The semifreddo was very nice, the perfect end to the meal. So, the food was okay leaning towards very good in my opinion. It was also extremely expensive. My portion, for an appetizer, a shared second course, an entree, and a shared dessert (none of them large dishes) came to $75. Which would have been okay, I guess, if it was amazing. But I've had better food for far less at places like Saute. Plus, we were only offered bread once during the meal, and when I got home I ended up eating a bowl of popcorn and some pineapple because I wasn't full. For the price we paid I expected to at least end up with a full belly.

So although the service was good and the place is gorgeous, my food did not measure up. I'm glad we gave it a try, but I won't be going back - if I'm going to spend that much money on that little food, it had better be knock my socks off amazing. This was just good (and the lamb just barely made it into that category).

Any suggestions for further experimentation? We'll eat pretty much anything.

Greek Feast

This weekend I decided that I wanted to cook Greek food, so I invited some friends over for Sunday dinner and started searching for recipes. I had lamb in the freezer so I decided to make souvlaki, but I wanted to try something different than the the slapdash 10-minute recipe I normally use (it's delicious by the way, I just wanted to try something different). While searching online I also ran across an interesting recipe for Dried Fig Souvlaki. It involves feta cheese, figs, sage, and prociutto. What the heck, I decided to give it a try. I was also set on making rice, but found a recipe for Greek oven roasted potatoes, and since I love those in restaurants, I wanted to see if I could make them at home.

Surprisingly, I ended up batting three for three! I decided that I don't really like the taste of fresh sage, so the fig souvlaki wasn't my favourite, but my guests seemed to really love it. The lamb was delicious and the potatoes are addictive.

I also lazy'd out and bought baba ganoush, tzatziki, and dolmades from Kamal's Middle Eastern Specialities in Reading Terminal Market. I also walked over to Cafe Fulya to pick up some of the best baklava I've had since the stuff made by the little old ladies at the Syrian Orthodox church in Sioux City, Iowa.

I'm looking forward to leftovers for dinner tonight.

I forgot to take pictures, but here are the three recipes I used:

Lamb Souvlaki (I misread the recipe while making it and used a tablespoon each of oregano and garlic instead of a teaspoon)

Dried Fig Souvlaki (I used 1/2 a sage leaf per fig because a whole leaf was far to overpowering when I tested it out first)

Oven Roasted Potatoes (I halved the recipe and it worked out just fine, with lots of leftovers(I think we were all getting pretty full))

There was also a great Greek salad courtesy of my guinea pigs...I mean dinner guests, but I don't have that recipe.

All in all, a successful evening. The only casualties were a pair of salad tongs that snapped during washing and a salad plate that I dropped in the sink and shattered.

Plus, my friends just got cable yesterday, including HBO, so I went down to their place afterward and watched the True Blood season premiere.

I think I'll try Afghani food next, or maybe Thai or Vietnamese. Guinea pigs welcome.