A Fish Called Avalon

700 Ocean Dr., 33139.

Tonight we celebrated our 10 year anniversary, my close friends and I…

“The best thing I know how to make for dinner is a reservation”

LOL! Don’t like my joke? Fine… anyhow, I made a dinner reservation for this restaurant at least one month in advance at OpenTable.com. The location was nicely tucked in the center of Miami Beach’s, Ocean Drive.

A Fish Called Avalon is actually a restaurant in Hotel Avalon. It is easier to spot the neon green Avalon sign, rather than the little reception desk out front. Most people going about the area will probably be in beach attire or summer gear… that is the pleasure of being in Miami Beach.

For seating, there is a choice between patio or indoor. We opted for the indoors because, well, we still had a long night ahead of us and didn’t want our ‘do’ to get ruined by sitting outside. In March, Miami Beach carries a small breeze. Inside, the ambiance was elegant; table cloth, real chairs, and of course solid dinnerware.

To start off the night, we did a few toasts to ‘us’! The 10 years we stuck by each other and actually survived through each other… no easy task there. Hooray sistahs! A cheer to the Fantabulous 4!

After the drinks, the waiter brought our lovely complimentary bread… oh, we love free things and bread is one of them. I believe it was a sourdough bread mixture and butter balls were served on the side, butter so good, it can be eaten by itself!

For starters, we ordered the pan roasted crab and rock shrimp cake. The crab cake is place on top of a mango slaw and encircled by chipotle aioli. It was good, just what weneeded to settle us down after a few glasses of white wine. It was brought to my attention that crab cake is not hard to make, but the important thing was the fresh ingredients.

For my entree, I ordered the special of the day. Don’t pass up a chef special when given the opportunity, because most of the time, the chef will make it and it includes the fresh catch of the day with the freshest ingredients. Plus, the chef really gets to diverge from the main menu and create something original. The special was grilled cobia over creamy leek polenta and a ginger-carrot bearnaise sauce. I never had cobia before, but I must say, it was an enjoyable experience. The texture reminded me of swordfish, which is firm and tight, but slightly less firm and hard. The cobia did not have a fishy taste, it actually tasted a little creamy and was grilled fork tender. The leek polenta was good of course, I have yet to have bad polenta. The ginger bearnaise sauce sounded weird but it didn’t taste misplaced at all. This dish was excellent, well worth the money and made me a new supporter of cobia.

This is the Caribbean spice grilled grouper over boniato mash and mango relish. Boniato is a sweet potato, fyi. I don’t recall the taste of this particular dish, as to I am very un-partial to mangos.

This is the pan roasted local snapper with sautéed spinach and sweet roasted pepper tapenade. Tapenade is the technique used to purée popular ingredients such as olives and capers. Decent flavors for a decent dish, again, I have problems recalling what it tastes like, but doesn’t it still look tasty?

This is the grilled local mahi mahi with lemon grass scented purple sticky rice, hearts of palm salad, and a coconut red curry sauce. Doesn’t the dish look complicated? The taste was probably equally complicated. I like how they made the sticky rice purple, it gave the dish more attitude.

Ah dessert, first on the list is a pretty traditional cheesecake with caramel syrup and vanilla bean ice cream. The cheesecake was nicely plated and formed into pyramids, certainly made it that much more fun to eat. But, cheesecake never made it on to my top list of sweets, so I wasn’t as excited as I should be to eat it.

The second dessert, yes we decided to go all out that night, is the chocolate marquise with candied hazelnut, raspberry coulis, and fresh raspberries. The chocolate marquise is essentially a cake made with bittersweet chocolate and some type of liqueur or brandy or cognac. The dessert proved moist and fresh, the raspberry syrup was good, but I think the cake held its ground just fine.

For kicks, I’ve decided to show you our bill (eliminates the need for me to mention the price of each dish, one by one). It was not a cheap dinner, but who says that being together for 10 years would be cheap? We could of done much worse if we got another bottle of wine… I’ll mention that one for our 20 year anniversary.

I didn’t like the addition of the automatic 18% gratuity, no it’s not convienent… but what can you do? Overall, I was so glad that everyone liked this restaurant. I got the task of picking out all the restaurants for our trip (because I love food that much) and I felt like I had to redeem myself after the restaurant from the night before. The crowd on a Friday was just right, not too much but just enough. This is a great place for anniversaries and birthdays and other occasions. The Maître d’ joked with us throughout the night and came by often to ask if we were having a good anniversary dinner.

“HAPPY ANNIVERSARY GIRLS!” Until next time… 5 years?

Ed Debevik’s

640 N Wells St
Chicago, IL 60610
(312) 664-1707

Ed Debevik’s is one of those family-friendly Diner/Burger joints that ridicules everyone who walks in, and continues to do so until you are obviously fed up. No need to ask politely or say your Thank You’s, but it’s all fun.

Every so often the waiter(s/tresses) will hop on the bar and dance their buttocks off. Fun stuff.

Chicago Hot Dog. Relish, onions, tomatoes, no ketchup.
Served with Fries. It’s a hot dog… Simply nice and filling. $5.75

Turkey Club. Roasted turkey, bacon, lettuce, tomato, and mayo served on toasted white bread. Served with Fries. $8.65.

Ice Cream Cookie Sandwich. Vanilla ice cream layered between two very large and crunchy chocolate chip cookies topped with cookie crumbs, fudge, and whipped cream. We over-ate. $4.95

Check out Ed Debevik’s Menu.

Earwax

1561 N. Milwaukee Ave.
Chicago, IL 60622
773-772-4019

Earwax is a restaurant cafe located in Chicago’s hipster neighborhood, Bucktown/ Wicker Park.
Pretty cool place to sit, chill, and chat, but also a fun atmosphere and dining experience.

Offers healthy foods and vegan alternatives.

Veggie Sausage Patties. Good with syrup, actually. $2.00

Vegan Banana Walnut Pancakes. Three very large pancakes with bananas served inside and on top. This was a very hefty meal. Like most vegan plates, the meal is very delicious, but after a while the soy-texture sits on your tongue. Still, very much worth a try, but one could share this order. $6.50

Turkey Sausage Patties. Nice diversion from your typical beef/pork sausage patties. $2.00

French Toast with Pastry Cream. Challah bread stuffed with pastry cream and topped with whipped cream and strawberries with maple syrup.
My friend ordered this and it was delicious. The pastry cream wasn’t too sweet, and the bread had great texture. Topped with powdered sugar for anyone with a sweet tooth. $6.75

Overall, Earwax was a good brunch experience. The servers are chill and the atmosphere is fun.

Check out the Earwax Menu for more food options and prices.

Max’s Wine Dive

4720 Washington Avenue , 77007.

During my many online searches of hip and new places to eat at… I can across this restaurant, or dive as it is called. Think of this place as diner meets upscale wine bar. They serve diner food from macaroni and cheese, burgers, fries, to lots and lots of wine. The ingredients used for the fare are all high quality stuff. Instead of regular ground beef burgers, you get kobe beef burgers, instead of cheese steak you get osso bucco with black truffle cheese, get the idea now? True, some people might believe why make diner food gourmet? Why spend $20 for a burger? Well, I say, you got to spice life up and keep it interesting… and this place certainly is.

I wasn’t looking for a big dinner on a Friday night… never do because there is always somewhere to go afterwards, but I did want to try out this place. I went with my buddy A, and we practically stayed here for at least 2 hours just talking. It was noisy inside and we sat next to the restroom, but we still managed to have some good conversations… I think wine helps. I started out with a white wine… a Riesling, I wanted something sweet.

I stuck with the appetizer menu and ordered, guess guess, Scallops… St. Jack’s. Seared New England diver scallops dusted with sumac and cocoa, served on top a creamy butternut squash and coriander seed risotto. I think I will try to stay away from scallops for a while, because that is all that I am showcasing right now. The scallops were seared right and the risotto was good. I could taste the hint of cocoa on the scallops which was a refreshing addition and the squash risotto was very creamy with little yellow chunks, soft. No complaints, but I don’t think A was a big fan of them.

A ordered the Rib Basket, Asian inspired 100% Six Point Berkshire baby back ribs with hoisin glaze and sambal. We made a joke with the line of chili sauce across the plate, denoting that ‘that’ is what made the dish Asian. But in reality, the taste was very Asian. I liked how they took the time to stack up the ribs but… I can’t help but hope they wore gloves to do it. The ribs were not dainty; all were good size. The taste was sweet from the hoisin sauce and the sambal, which reminds me of Singapore, was toned down a lot. It wasn’t spicy at all. American tastes I guess. Honestly, I’m not a big fan of sweet stuff for entrees and I tend to not order Asian influenced anything at a none Asian restaurant… I just don’t care for it because I’m very particular on my Asian food. But I think A liked it better than the scallops… eh.

As a little side dish, we ordered the lovely presented Max and Jack’s Frites, fresh cut, skin-on Russet potato fries tossed with Max’s secret fry dust. Nothing fancy about the fries… although there was a discussion on what went in the secret fry dust. We came to a conclusion that there was definitely cinnamon and sugar of some sort giving off a hint of sweetness. It was okay and the dip was some sort of a mayonnaise concoction. I try not dipping in it too much… its like fat on fat.

This place was so packed when we got here and it took a while for us to get a seat. Plan to arrive early for happy hour… and even as we finished, there was still a lot of people. Again, the environment is loud and crowded, definitely not a romantic place, but more of a hang out. Half of your life’s secret can be shared in this place, why? Because everyone else is talking so loud and you will start talking just as much, fully knowing that with all the background noise, no one can hear you anyway.

I’d recommend this place for a fresh, hip, hangout… beware of yuppies.

Masraff’s

1025 S. Post Oak Lane, 77056.

It’s fine dining time! It took me a while to decide and then finally pick and go to this restaurant. First, it is not well known because it has no ties to a chain of any sort… it is a one of a kind place in Houston. But, there are plenty of reviews online for this restaurant. Finding this restaurant deemed a little tricky, I was not aware that S. Post Oak and N. Post Oak was in fact parallel streets…

Masraff’s is a casually elegant upscale restaurant with a Euro-American dining fare as well as ambiance. The building itself looked like a historical cottage, but very nicely decorated and spacious inside. Went to eat here on a Tuesday night, thinking that the restaurant would be rather empty… but there seemed to be a big event/convention gathering going on with lots of men in business suits.

The dinner started with complimentary bread, butter, and olives! I love olives and the ones that they served were top-notch and fresh.

For appetizer, the waiter helped us decide on a lobster dish. The lobster roll consists of lobster, roma tomatoes, cilantro and asparagus mousse wrapped in a roll then fried. It was served on top of D’Anjou pear puree and tomato beurre blanc sauce. The pear puree made this dish rather sweet. It was okay, but different. There was other things on the menu that I would have rather tried like foie gras and roasted quail.

For my main entree, I chose the caramelized diver sea scallops with Italian soft polenta topped with white truffle oil. You will see that there is a trend with me and sea scallops lately… the scallops were seared just right and they cut softly through. Now, polenta… I love this stuff, fried, cooked, whatever. The polenta was cooked in a white truffle oil and I can definitely taste the creaminess that is the two combined. It tasted like an extravagant gruel to me.

The other dish was the pan seared Chilean sea bass with creamy shrimp and leek orzo pasta, tomato confit, and saffron sauce. I got a little taste of it, the sea bass was fork tender and the cream/confit/saffron sauce was delicious. The orzo pasta looked pretty cool, definite not the usual bore.

For dessert we shared the bittersweet chocolate fondant, crème Anglaise, and vanilla bean ice cream dish. It was essentially melted chocolate inside a hollow cake. Once you cut in, the warm chocolate oozes out at you. Not too heavy or filling. They also offer a bunch of soufflés on the menu.

The only grip that I have with this restaurant was our waiter. I mean, he was polite, but he needed to pick up his service. Be more tentative to filling glasses and asking if things were to our satisfaction. Also, he had an accent, not going to try to figure out from where… but the accent got in the way of him describing dishes to us. I don’t care how authentic or sexy an accent can appear at upscale restaurants; you still have to make sure your patrons understand you. I had to ask him to repeat himself several times and in the end, I just said forget it. But other than that, this is definitely a recommended date, anniversary, birthday place on my list. Dinner entrees range from $20-$35.

Hyde Park Bar and Grill

4206 Duval St., 78751.

Hyde Park Bar and Grill has been a well-known quaint establishment in Austin, Texas since 1982. It is a great place to go on a Sunday because they offer brunch service and ehhmm, a few drinks on the menu too. As I walked in, I noticed right away the bar area in the dead front center of the restaurant, or house as I would call it. They were serving mimosas and bloody Mary’s all morning.

Still a little groggy from the night before and waiting on a friend, we order a half order of their famous fries. Their fries are battered dipped then fried. The batter reminds me faintly of another restaurants calamari batter… buttermilk and seasoned batter. Any how, they are famous and they sure were good. They came with the special Hyde Park sauce which is a mayonnaise mixture. We were afraid that the half order would be too much, but as we started talking, the fries disappeared almost instantaneously.

I’m not a big fan of breakfast food, so I stayed away from the brunch menu… and went straight to the entrees. It was a close battle, whenever I see CFS (chicken fried steak) on the menu, I get sidetracked… No, I told myself I should try to eat a healthier meal for lunch because a big dinner awaits. Healthier meal does not necessarily mean healthy, just healthier. I ordered the steamed vegetable plate which is an anyway-you-like-it combination of 4 of their side dishes. On mines was the macaroni and cheese, cilantro Basmati rice, corn and cheese tamales, and steamed broccoli with lemon pesto butter on the side $8.95, not bad. The mac and cheese was the more runny kind, not the grainy type… pretty good. One can’t really screw rice up… or steamed broccoli… The corn and cheese tamales however couldn’t leave their wrapper home. As soon and I opened the up, they started either crumbling apart or stayed stuck to the leaves. The flavor was okay, but the mixture of the rice and tamale was great. One of the things I have to give props on is that I could tell that they used very fresh ingredients for each dish.

My friend had the same steamed vegetable plate as I.  The same macaroni and cheese, but with fresh steamed green beans and roasted red potatoes.  I think she also got the rice pilaf.

Then there was burgers… the Texas Raised Kobe Beef Burger $7.95… which I totally forgot to ask how it was… It looked pretty scrumptious, but Texas Raised Kobe? I have yet to try… must put that on the to do list!

With beef, comes turkey! The ground turkey patty reminds me of Boca, just lighter in color… but I bet it tasted a lot better than Boca burgers. $5.95.

This is one of those places that makes Austin unique. Small eatery, small dives, neighborhood setting. If I lived in Austin, I would definitely go back on Sundays to just chill with friends, eat lots of battered fries, and wash away my hangover with a big tall Screwdriver.

Food 101

4969 Roswell Road, Suite 200, 30342.

I made a quick trip to Atlanta, Georgia two weekends ago for a quick visit with the relatives. Of course when there, I wanted to eat out at something fresh and new, for the sake of this blog! Anyhow, my cousin made a reservation to a restaurant called Food 101, online… it was quite nice to receive a dinner reservation confirmation by email unsuspectingly, I must say. Kudos to you cuz for using opentable.com!

It was located at the end of a shopping strip. As you can see, Altanta was snowing that day. The reservation was for 6:30pm and the restaurant was just starting up so there wasn’t a lot of people around.

The table setting was nice and all was well, we had light conversation through the bread and butter.

For the first appetizer, I decided to get the Kobe Beef Tartare. I’ve never had tartare before, or so that I can remember… so this was a good opportunity as any to get it, especially since it will be made with ‘kobe’ beef. Basically a steak tartare is just raw meat combined with an egg, spices, and lemon juice. Horseradish aioli was served on the side to try and counter the mental phobia of bacteria lurking in raw meat. This dish was very tasty. There was no raw off flavoring you might get with non-fresh meat, and the spices complimented the meat well. The BBQ potato chips were freshly made and tasted quite delish as well.

The second appetizer dish was the PEI mussels chosen by my lovely cousin. The mussels are soaked in a roasted tomato broth and toasted ciabatta bread is provided on the side. The mussels tasted fresh, plump, and juicy. We ate it all, and didn’t even waste the bread.

For my main course I had the George Bank Scallops. I love big scallops. The scallops were seared, maybe a little tad bit too much, but it didn’t deflect the flavor of the fresh scallops at all. What came underneath the lusciousness, was a mushroom asparagus risotto. I don’t remember having risotto, but this risotto reminds me of oatmeal. Is it a taboo for me to call risotto oatmeal? Well, that was the closest thing I could think of. It was more like plump oatmeal, very tasty though mixed with mushroom and asparagus.

My cousin had the buttermilk fried chicken. Fried chicken done in upscale restaurant is just different. You can tell that lots of attention was given to the selection of the pieces, the thorough-ness of the batter coating, and the time they took to fry each piece. The fried chicken, more like chicken tenders, came out extremely juicy and not greasy. With a little brown gravy on the side makes it just right. The Idaho potatoes were whipped. At first taste, it was so light, reminded me of potato flakes, a different stance to the usual heavy mashed version.

Overall, this restaurant is definitely worth a second trip. I would try out some of their other southern fares while there. The prices might be a little high, but compared to other restaurants of the same caliber, it was expected. If you are ever in the hood, give it a go.

Rockfish Seafood Grill

11805 Westheimer Rd, #370, 77077.

[Dec. 21, 2007] Rockfish Seafood Grill, my friend and I haven’t had the easiest of times finding this restaurant, even though it is located out in the open on Westheimer… I guess long story short, we weren’t sure how many locations this restaurant had around town. She raves about the fried seafood here and I though that I should definitely give it a go.

Feeling excited about our night to come afterwards, we decided to get two appetizers. The first one was the Mexican Shrimp Martini. It is called such because the waiter will take all the ingredients, shrimp, salsa, spices and mix it in a shaker like how martinis are made. But forgetful me got so caught up in the making of the shrimp salsa, I didn’t take a picture of the shrimp actually in there. The presentation was pretty, I assure you. The taste was good but nothing really different than any other shrimp salsa.

The second of the appetizers was crab and fried asparagus. Not an original name, but definitely an orginal dish. Fried asparagus! I had to try it… and I must say, I do fairly like it. I really don’t even need the crabmeat lemon butter sauce, but I think that it is there way of holding up to the elegance of having asparagus. Eh. Would get it again, but I will eat the two thing separately.

With the onflow of two appetizers, I wimped down on my main course. I didn’t want to be too stuffed for my night out later. I got the salad and soup combo… although I forgot if there was a combo like this on the menu. I started with the Southwestern Caesar salad, which really just consist of caesar salad with some tortilla chip strips on top. They could of made it even more southwestern by adding corn or black beans…

Next, I had the Boston clam chowder. While peering over the soup section of the menu, I was mentally trying to distinguish my clam chowders… Manhattan clam chowder is the one in the tomato broth, the one which I don’t care for. This Boston clam chowder was done right. I would so so go back for this soup. Loads of clams in it and even whole clams with shell and all. Comfort food for the winter.

My friend had the Fisherman’s basket with shrimp. Lots of fried goodness. Once in a while I would love to just splurge on fried food, but that night was not the night. Everything was fried to golden, shrimps were fresh. This dish came with jalapeño corn fritters, which you can’t see, and apple cider slaw. The corn fritters were really good and different than the normal hushpuppies I am use to getting in a dish like this. I’m not going to make fun of my friend for not finishing this platter, it was good amount of food… and she did considerably better than the last time I ate with her. :smiles:

This is a great chill, local place to get some decent seafood without the fuss and they also have a wide bar selection.

Yard House

330 East Colorado Blvd. #230, 91101.

The Yard House Restaurant is a chain servicing many states; and it is more of an American fusion than just American. I went there on my vacation to Cali earlier this season with some great friends. I usually try not to put myself in the pictures, but I couldn’t find another store front picture… so yeah.

The Yard House is not only known for their vast selection of food, but more so for their vast selection of draft beer, offered by the goblet, pint, or half yard. Of course I would not pass up such a deal, that is one of the main reasons I wanted to go. I ordered a sample of the Kona Longboard Lager from Hawaii and the Spaten Lager from Munich for $1 each. Back and forth I went… I think the Kona is sweeter, but the Spaten had less of an after tasted… So I went with the Spaten in the infamous half yard! That’s 1.5 feet or 18 inches or 32 oz.!

For appetizers we had the sweet potato fries with syrup dip. The fries were pretty good, but I don’t think that it was offered on the menu, you just kind of ask for it. Dip it in syrup and it felt more like a dessert than appetizer.

I ordered the Garlic Chicken Noodles; I really couldn’t decide on what to eat with their huge menu… so I just chose this one. I would love to go back to try out more dishes. The noodles were very garlic-y and Asian, had a very nice chewy texture, pretty good. Minced chicken, asparagus, spinach, shiitake mushrooms, smoked tofu, and edamame ~$14.25 I could barely finish my dish because… well, I was getting a buzz from my 32 oz. of Spaten… heh.

My friend had the Coconut Shrimp appetizer (what a wimp) and it was with spicy green papaya salad, sweet chili sauce, and cilantro pesto. The coconut shrimp was fried pretty well and brown ~$12.95

My other two friends shared the New York Steak Salad. It contains green beans, roasted peppers, avocado, crispy potatoes, red onion, and baby lettuce tossed in gorgonzola vinaigrette with beefsteak tomatoes and a pickled egg. On the side was the steak, I think perhaps a New York strip cooked medium rare, sliced thin~$16.45 I tried it and it was indeed tasty. Nothing like good ole steak.

The atmosphere was classical meets rock, nice and relaxing for any day after work. The prices are however a little steep, but the presentation of the food is above par. I would recommend a visit, and I heard from a friend that they are opening one in Houston, Texas March 2008… we shall see. Would definitely go there for the beer on draft.

|Yard House Homepage|

Cosi

Cosi

Vegi Muffaletta: Grilled eggplant, chopped green olives, banana peppers, green onions, olive oil, provolone, parmesan cheese & shredded romaine.

Pretty tasty; generous eggplant.

Cosi is a popular place for lunch here in Chicago. Expect it to be very packed from noon until 1PM or so.
Luckily, there are several locations around busy, Downtown Chicago as well as across the nation.

Even as a corporate franchise, Cosi is known to serve healthy, tasty sandwiches in a contemporary, social environment. The most distinctive trait about this cafe eatery is the open-flame hearth and their variety of flatbread sandwiches.  Ask for fresh bread.

Also serves simple Breakfast and Dinner plates.

Sandwich with chips/carrots and drink average from $6-7.