St Patty's Day, Interrupted

We went out to dinner for St. Patty's Day last night. We had to, I'm Irish!
We went with friends to the Melting Pot for their Irish beer dinner. The setup was pretty nice--they had a big room with 3 long tables and 3 fondue pots for each table.

As a side note, Troy didn't like the setup. As he said, if I wanted to go to dinner with some strangers, I wouldn't have chosen the beat bloated dude we had to sit next to. For the record, the couple near us were actually very nice. A bit chatty, but nice.

Anyway, the first course was cheese fondue, of course. It was paired with Kelly's Irish Cider, Raspberry flavored. I loved that stuff! Wow, I could drink that all the time. I'll have to find somewhere to get my drink on with that stuff.

The second course was salad. I chose the Caesar. It had Parmesan-crusted pine nuts. They were outstanding, and a nice addition to a Caesar. I'm usually pretty picky about my Caesar salads.

(flashback to '93) My Caesar pickiness stems from a cross-country drive I was on. Stopped at a Denny's in Utah. Yeah, I know, a Denny's in Utah. I ordered a Caesar salad because how could you mess up Romaine, croutons, Caesar dressing. Yes, you can get all fancy with that (made tableside, anchovies, parmesan shavings, etc), but at its core, those are the 3 things that make a Caesar a Caesar. Take one away, and no Caesar. So anyway, I order my Caesar, there in Denny's and the waitress says:

"what kind of dressing you want with that?"

Me: "Excuse me?"

Waitress: "What kind of dressing do you want on your Caesar?"

Me: "Caesar dressing"

Waitress: "Honey, I know you want a Caesar, but I need to know what kind of dressing you want on it"

Me: "Can I have Caesar dressing?"

Waitress gives me sort of an angry look

Me: "Caesar salads generally have a dressing on them called Caesar dressing. Why can't I have that?"

Waitress: "We don't have 'Caesar' dressing"

Me: "Ranch?"

Waitress: "Yeah, I can do ranch for you"

So out comes the salad with Romaine, tomatoes, carrots and ranch dressing. I guess in a Denny's in Utah, "Caesar" means you want Romaine lettuce instead of iceberg in your salad. Oh, and you want to pay $1.00 more for that "fancy" lettuce.

The best Caesar I had was in Florida. One of those places that make the salad right at your table. Kind of cliche, but in this case, the salad was awesome. Hint of anchovies, garlic croutons, Parm shavings, a very garlicy fresh-made dressing, Really crisp Romaine cut at bite-size pieces. Yummy.

So back to St. Patty's Day...
Paired with the salad they offered Wexfords. Wexfords is one of those Irish beers that, like Boddingtons and Guiness,comes in the pub can with the little ball in there that makes the beer pour all funny. Now don't get made at me purists, I say funny to mean just that its different than your standard beer pour. Usually, I don't like beer that comes in funny cans with little balls in it. However, I reallly enjoyed Wexfords. Or maybe I was just in love with my Parmesan-crusted pine nuts and my taste buds were dead from the Raspberry Cider. In any case, it is a beer I will order again.

The entree was standard Melting Pot fare--raw meats and veggies for you to boil up on your own. It was served with some double-chocolate malt bock stout nasty crap I would rather not taste or drink. So I gave mine away.

Ah, and then towards the end of the meat course, comes the Smithwick's. Ah, I love me some Smithwicks.

But then came the phone call. From the sitter.

Little Zack fell down and bumped his crown. And cried for 20 minutes. My son doesn't cry for 20 minutes. He only moans at night for 20 minutes when he wants his bottle or his mommy. So we left. Early. Before the chocolate course. Great sadness.

And I didn't get to finish my Smithwick's.

By the time we got back to check on him, Z was his old happy self, no sign of pupil dialation, etc. We think the crying was cause he got scared when he smacked his coconut.

Did I mention I didn't even finish my Smithwick's? And that I didn't get the chocolate fondue?

Tonight is our anniversary (13th!) and a trip to Morton's. Maybe no interruptions this evening.

Reds

Back in October (yes, I am seriously late in blogging this, keep your comments to yourself), I went on a business trip to Toronto. We were up there for the ONA conference. Online Newspaper Association. Yeah, I never heard of it either.

It was a nice conference, and I was lucky enough to have an evening free as my boss went out to dinner with some ex-coworkers of his. I asked the concierge at the hotel for a place where I could find some good food and a nice glass of wine and she suggested the restaurant "Reds" named not after the baseball team or the Warren Beatty movie, but after red wine. Ah, good find!

The bar at Reds was hopping. It was hard to miss because it took up the entire first floor of the place. Their selection of wines by the glass was excellent, and better, reasonably priced. And in October, the US dollar wasn't doing so good vs. its Canadian brethren. The dining room was upstairs and the first impression I had was that it was noisy. Because it was open to the bar below. Once I got over that impression, I liked what I saw. The entire front of the restaurant overlooked a pleasant but busy street, well-lit at night with lots of people and activity. Major plus when you are dining by yourself to have something to focus on (side note: i read when dining alone, when I'm not actually eating).

The service was very attentive but not intrusive. Another major plus.

For appetizer, I had a seafood stew with mussels and shrimp. In the stew was some asparagus, corn, carrots, and green onion. It was polished off with a dollop of pesto. Very complex flavor, nice texture. A great start.

One of reds specialties, in addition to having a great wine list and lengthy selection of wines by the glass was that each and every appetizer, main dish and dessert came with a recommended wine to pair.

With the seafood stew, they recommended the 2004 Scarbolo Pinot Grigio. Not only was the pinot grigio excellent, but the pairing was outstanding. Needless to say, I was excited for the rest of the meal. And by the time I realized how excited, my plate was cleared and I have no picture.

On to the second course. I have a picture, but have no idea what they called it. It was a bit of shredded duck blended with olive oil, salt and pepper (that is the lump just behind the fork. Behind the duck is a roasted blueberry. The triangles to the left are herb crostini type things. Each piece individually was just OK. However, together, very very strong. A bit salty, but overall an extremely awesome combination.




Note: thanks to Corey, I seem to have figured out how to correctly get my photos inline. We'll see if it lasts ;-)

The main dish was up next and so I decided to order another pairing with my entree since the first was so well done. The problem was that instead of ordering the small glass, I ordered the bigger glass. It came nicely prepared in a small carafe. Made for a great table setting:



My entree was a filet server atop some mashed potatoes, with some al dente veggie pieces and thinly sliced potato chip type things. The sauce was a red wine reduction, flavored with mushrooms. The pairing was a Langmeil Shiraz that was quite peppery, and again, paired nicely with the richness of the sauce and the meatiness of the tenderloin. Presentation of the dish was beautiful as well:



To finish up, I went with the cheese course, not being much for dessert. I went back to the well and had another glass of the Pinot Grigio I had with the app. Reds had a wonderful cheese selection. You could choose 2 or 3 from among 20 artisan cheeses. I selected the Isle of Mull Cheddar from Scotland, the Thunder Oak Gouda from Canada, and finally a Manchego from Spain.




Such a nice finish. I wish I was back there right now.

In summary, an excellent dinner. Would only have been made better by having good company with me :)