May The Stars Light Your Way
This evening, our trip up the ‘culinary ladder‘ continued as Wendy & I were guests at the first-ever (hopefully first annual) College of Pharmacy Etiquette Dinner hosted at the Midwest Culinary Institute at Cincinnati State Technical and Community College. A faculty member and I assisted one of our students in organizing…
Our week of dining is shaping up… From humble beginnings earlier in the week, we’ve progressed to tonight’s nice, homey, dinner. This evening, I made a simple roasted chicken and vegetables. Wendy made a green salad. The chicken skin was wonderfully crispy from the dry, high heat. Here’s how I…
Tonight’s dinner was the second night of the ‘upswing in dining scale‘ that we’re experiencing this week, which will peak on Saturday night. How’s that for a stay-tuned-style teaser?!
This evening, on a whim we called our friends Dave & Robin and the four of us decided (finally!) to go to dinner at Red Lobster, which Robin was apparantly craving. Dinner was decent… I had Shrimp Scampi and their Outer Banks Sampler (shrimp & scallops broiled with a deviled crab & seafood stuffing, topped with Monterey Jack cheese), a salad, and plenty of their cheesy biscuits.
From there, in response to my craving, the four of us went on a fruitless search for Jelly Bellys, which apparently are no longer sold in this city. We ended up discovering that A FUSION CAFE had closed (sad, but not unexpected).
Dinner at Red Lobster was good, but we could have gone to Steak -n- Shake, Izzy’s, IHOP, Chipotle, Old Spaghetti Factory, or … (inside joke on the selection method!).
What a humble meal this evening… It’s our GUILD WARS night, so Wendy stopped for grub from Wendy’s on her way home. Dinner was a cheeseburger, a bacon-and-cheddar baked potato (nevermind that I asked her to get me a broccoli and cheddar baked potato!) and…
Tonight, we went to Tracy’s house to watch the disappointing Bengal‘s game with a group of friends. Since Tracy was still reeling from the swanky New Year’s party she threw, she asked folks to bring some food to share. Wendy & I brought my mom’s famous…
Tonight, a group of us (Holly, Ed, Colin, Wendy, Jay, and myself) met at ONE DINING, a new restaurant situated in a converted city building in Mason Ohio, for a surprise birthday dinner for Angel (who turns the big 3-0 on January 8th).
Ed, Holly, Colin, Wendy, and Drew arrived early to be in place for the surprise. A nice red wine started flowing, followed shortly by a bottle of white (one of Wendy’s favorite whites, a Chenin Blanc/Viognier — our personal favorite is the Pine Ridge Clarksburg — while tonight’s wine wasn’t Pine Ridge, it was still very nice). Sean Kagy, the executive chef, came out to greet our table and offered us a tour after the meal. Our mutual friend, MichaelB, had alerted them that we were visiting the restaurant. After a bit, Jay & Angel walked in, and Angel was suitably surprised.
We started the meal with a sampling of appetizers — butternut squash ravioli (excellent); beef carpaccio; Maryland crab cakes (excellent); salad of maine lobster, crab & rock shrimp (lovely); and shrimp & crab chowder (very nice).
The main courses were osso bucco; ahi tuna with foie gras; rock shrimp, scallops and lemon linguine; duo of salmon and sole; and the seared duck breast. All the entrees were very tasty and nicely plated. The corn and mushroom crepe served with my generous ahi tuna was delicious. The tuna was well-prepared, too; seared on the outside and cool in the middle, topped with a nice piece of foie gras.
Desserts came out and were very nice — chocolate mousse crunch; lemon crush; pecan pie and others.
After the meal, Sean gave Wendy & I a tour of their new kitchen (which used to be the jail when it was a city building — fitting for a bunch of cooks, don’t you think?!), the prep area, and the rest. Not an inch of wasted space.
We thought it was a very nice touch that the restaurant laid a birthday card on the table for Angel, signed by the chef and staff.
The meal was very good and the service was about where you’d expect it to be for a new restaurant (10 weeks open at the time of this writing). No major mistakes in service, but not yet perfectly smooth. Two annoyances were that Wendy was looking forward to ordering a monkfish dish which was advertised on their website, only to find that it was not on the menu. For patrons attempting to become familiar with a new place, not having something that is advertised is a mistake. We were pleased by the wine list, but ordering a bottle of wine for dessert, we were told that it wasn’t yet in stock.
These small errors should not turn anyone away from trying ONE. It’s a fine meal and these service issues will be resolved in time.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY ANGEL!
 On Saturday, January 7, 2006, I worked at Pigall’s for my eleventh night. I arrived around 1:00pm, washed up, and quickly got to work. Robbie had me cutting up wild boar and duck meat on the slicer (which I first had to clean and…