This is a tough one. At various points throughout dinner I was undecided between 3 and 5 stars but…read moreultimately settled on 4 because of the dessert.
My friend and I stopped in here after 10 PM on a Saturday night (an early dinner time here) and we were the only other table. It may as well have been a private dining experience. The only other table in the joint left shortly after we arrived.
This is a very small restaurant located in a boutique hotel with an even smaller menu. Eight tables indoors. Three outdoors. Two appetizers. Three main dishes. Two desserts. That said, this place is not for everyone. If you don't like what they're serving, you're not going to enjoy your experience.
I wanted to start with the squid, but they were out so they offered me scallops instead, which came out in a delicious gravy that would pair perfectly with Thanksgiving. My friend got the only other option, the ceviche, and we shared and very much enjoyed both. The ceviche was served in a coconut curry sauce with cilantro and peppers. The fish was rockfish, which was also the same fish they served as the main course and the one he ordered. He said the main course rockfish was the best fish he's ever had in a restaurant. I tend to agree. For context, he owns fishing boats and his family is in the seafood business. Don't take his comments lightly. The risotto they served with the dish with goat cheese was also something out of Thanksgiving dinner. Absolutely delicious. And the mustard sauce served with the fish was not too potent, but also not even necessary. The fish on its own needed no sauce to enjoy the flavor.
I foolishly opted for the osso bucco and wished I hadn't after trying his fish. It's not that the meat was bad. But it wasn't very tender and it was served with the same exact sauce as the scallops. I assumed when they ran out of squid and offered me scallops instead, they felt that they needed some sauce for the scallops, so they used the same sauce served with the osso bucco. In fairness, this is a very small restaurant, so I can sympathize with their limits, but perhaps a beurre blanc sauce should have been the choice for the scallops. After all, the chef trained in France and what restaurant doesn't have butter and white wine?
Speaking of wine, that's about your only choice here next to a few beers. My friend unsuccessfully tried to order a cocktail with gin. He then suggested they make the same cocktail with vodka. No vodka. So they brought out a bottle of Glenfiddich, as if that was even close, but that's ultimately what he settled on.
For dessert, we split the only two options they had: an apple strudel with a delicious praline ice cream, I believe, and the chocolate fondant (which was basically a brownie) with a lemon-ish sorbet. Both sprinkled with the same grains, but both so damn good. We considered ordering another round of desserts but our stomachs told us no.
Good coffee, too, even though I think it came out a simple commercially available single serve machine.
Outstanding service as well, topped off by the chef coming out of the kitchen to ask how we were enjoying our meals. I love it when that happens.
If not for some of the understandable repetition we saw and tasted throughout the meal, or the almost too-limited menu, I think I'd be at 5 stars. But overall, the service, the ambiance and much of the food were just too good to give 3.
