Screw You: Making Food Choices
October 13, 2013 at 1:55pm
A college friend and fellow art major, Ann Lindell, was in town for a conference at Vandy, and she crashed with me for the weekend. She asked me to suggest someplace nice for dinner Saturday, her treat.
Well, you know me. Food? Eating out? Shoot yes!
But then came the decision making process of where, oh where to go. It's one thing when it's just what you want to eat. When it's what someone else would like too, and something that will reflect well on the foodie scene for Nashville... that's a big thing to me. Possibly this is blown just a tiny bit out of proportion for me because of a traumatic childhood incident. Namely, my family in New Orleans for one night, and my mom wanting to eat in the French Quarter in a lovely little courtyard, and my dad insisting that we eat at Howard Johnson's.
I have always suspected this was the real reason my parents divorced a couple of years later. As an adult, I have a horror of traveling out of town to anywhere and just eating at O'Charleys or someplace I could just as easily eat at home. Except maybe on that trip to Niagra when we had a car accident in New York state and we were starving and shaken up, and all we wanted was a Denny's safe and comforting Grand Slam breakfast.
But back to my dilemma. What SINGLE restaurant choice to represent both Nashville and my own culinary discernment?
My first choice, Arnold's, was off the table because Arnold's is only open Monday-Friday lunch. Damnit.
My second choice, Germantown Cafe, was off the table because it was Ocktoberfest, which means that whole neighborhood had been taken over by marauding hordes of drunken beer-swillers waving killer bratwursts and singing "Edelweiss."
I then entertained the notion of one of the fancy-schmancy, trendier-than-thou places in the Green Hills/Hillsboro area -- F. Scott's? But I'd never been to any of those restaurants because I hate Green Hills traffic.
So we decided on Ellendale's, which had in the past been a wonderful place for Sunday brunch.
I was not encouraged by the hostess, a very young and perky brunette in a too-short cotton/poly dress and a denim jacket. Ellendale's may not be super expensive, but when I'm gonna pay $23 for a steak, I'd like the staff to look a little more professional. I'm just saying. Of course, I wasn't gonna pay anything, but that only made it more significant to me, for Ann's benefit, that the hostess look like a grown-up.
We ordered -- Ann, a filet and a baked sweet potato, and me, the chicken divan.
I am including a photo of my plate. Now, I know restaurants are all into presentation, etc., but I honestly think their desire to make a rice-tower undermined the entree's integrity. Why? Because there was nothing on the rice -- no sauce, no gravy, no seasonings. Just (supposedly) jasmine rice. Dry jasmine rice.
I ordered the divan expecting a yummy cheesy mess of broccoli and artichokes over chicken and rice. What I got was a rice tower and a barely warm, nearly raw broccoli tree. It was harder to cut up the tree than to cut up my chicken. Of course, I was using a butter knife. I should have asked for a real knife, like the steak hatchet they brought with Ann's filet.
I will say, the chicken itself was excellent. A very large, fairly juicy chicken breast, with a dollop of a thick divan-ish... stuff smeared on the top. I can't call it a sauce because it had the consistency of spackling paste. Very tasty spackling paste, but certainly not something that could be spread around to the dry rice.
As I was hoping that Ann was enjoying her food, she looked down at her plate and gave a little laugh.
"I don't think this is supposed to be here," she said. "I don't think it's even organic."
And she picked up a metal screw that had been hiding somewhere on her plate. It was covered in the juices/glace of her filet, but I'm pretty sure it was not intended as a steampunk garnish.
The waiter was horrified, and fell all over himself apologizing. We were not so much upset as amused. I was just grateful the screw hadn't made it into Ann's -- or my -- mouth, where it could have broken a tooth.
But how in the heck does a screw end up on someone's plate of food?
As soon as we turned it over to the waiter, we realized I should have taken a picture of it. Missed opportunities.
I think Ann said they didn't charge her for her meal, and they sent us both home with a free "dessert sampler." However, the sampler -- tiny bites of each of their desserts -- rather missed the mark. The carrot cake bite was nice but the tiny sliver of chocolate cake was underwhelming; the chocolate brownie thingie I liked okay but Ann didn't care for it. But the real failure was the cheesecake. They had given us an actual slice of cheesecake and I saved mine for last.
We both took a bite, and I immediately looked at Ann.
"What did they do to this?" I asked, swallowing with difficulty and then grabbing my soda to wash the taste away. "There's something wrong with this cheesecake. It tastes like someone sprayed perfume or hairspray all over it."
"It's lavender," Ann said. "I remember seeing Lavender Cheesecake on the menu. They put lavender in it."
"Oh my god," I said, licking my fork once more. "You're right. But why would someone ruin a perfectly good slice of cheesecake this way? It tastes like sucking on the sachet in the back of Grandma's closet."
Not that I've ever actually sucked on a lavender sachet, but you get the idea. I never thought I'd live to see the day that I'd throw two pieces of cheesecake in the trash.
I am hopeful that Ann enjoyed our trip to I Dream of Weenie - Nashville's favorite hot dog stand. At least there was no inorganic material on her pimento cheese weenie.
But sadly, i think Ellendale's is off my list of places to go. And that's sad.
October 13, 2013 at 1:55pm
A college friend and fellow art major, Ann Lindell, was in town for a conference at Vandy, and she crashed with me for the weekend. She asked me to suggest someplace nice for dinner Saturday, her treat.
Well, you know me. Food? Eating out? Shoot yes!
But then came the decision making process of where, oh where to go. It's one thing when it's just what you want to eat. When it's what someone else would like too, and something that will reflect well on the foodie scene for Nashville... that's a big thing to me. Possibly this is blown just a tiny bit out of proportion for me because of a traumatic childhood incident. Namely, my family in New Orleans for one night, and my mom wanting to eat in the French Quarter in a lovely little courtyard, and my dad insisting that we eat at Howard Johnson's.
I have always suspected this was the real reason my parents divorced a couple of years later. As an adult, I have a horror of traveling out of town to anywhere and just eating at O'Charleys or someplace I could just as easily eat at home. Except maybe on that trip to Niagra when we had a car accident in New York state and we were starving and shaken up, and all we wanted was a Denny's safe and comforting Grand Slam breakfast.
But back to my dilemma. What SINGLE restaurant choice to represent both Nashville and my own culinary discernment?
My first choice, Arnold's, was off the table because Arnold's is only open Monday-Friday lunch. Damnit.
My second choice, Germantown Cafe, was off the table because it was Ocktoberfest, which means that whole neighborhood had been taken over by marauding hordes of drunken beer-swillers waving killer bratwursts and singing "Edelweiss."
I then entertained the notion of one of the fancy-schmancy, trendier-than-thou places in the Green Hills/Hillsboro area -- F. Scott's? But I'd never been to any of those restaurants because I hate Green Hills traffic.
So we decided on Ellendale's, which had in the past been a wonderful place for Sunday brunch.
I was not encouraged by the hostess, a very young and perky brunette in a too-short cotton/poly dress and a denim jacket. Ellendale's may not be super expensive, but when I'm gonna pay $23 for a steak, I'd like the staff to look a little more professional. I'm just saying. Of course, I wasn't gonna pay anything, but that only made it more significant to me, for Ann's benefit, that the hostess look like a grown-up.
We ordered -- Ann, a filet and a baked sweet potato, and me, the chicken divan.
I am including a photo of my plate. Now, I know restaurants are all into presentation, etc., but I honestly think their desire to make a rice-tower undermined the entree's integrity. Why? Because there was nothing on the rice -- no sauce, no gravy, no seasonings. Just (supposedly) jasmine rice. Dry jasmine rice.
I ordered the divan expecting a yummy cheesy mess of broccoli and artichokes over chicken and rice. What I got was a rice tower and a barely warm, nearly raw broccoli tree. It was harder to cut up the tree than to cut up my chicken. Of course, I was using a butter knife. I should have asked for a real knife, like the steak hatchet they brought with Ann's filet.
I will say, the chicken itself was excellent. A very large, fairly juicy chicken breast, with a dollop of a thick divan-ish... stuff smeared on the top. I can't call it a sauce because it had the consistency of spackling paste. Very tasty spackling paste, but certainly not something that could be spread around to the dry rice.
As I was hoping that Ann was enjoying her food, she looked down at her plate and gave a little laugh.
"I don't think this is supposed to be here," she said. "I don't think it's even organic."
And she picked up a metal screw that had been hiding somewhere on her plate. It was covered in the juices/glace of her filet, but I'm pretty sure it was not intended as a steampunk garnish.
The waiter was horrified, and fell all over himself apologizing. We were not so much upset as amused. I was just grateful the screw hadn't made it into Ann's -- or my -- mouth, where it could have broken a tooth.
But how in the heck does a screw end up on someone's plate of food?
As soon as we turned it over to the waiter, we realized I should have taken a picture of it. Missed opportunities.
I think Ann said they didn't charge her for her meal, and they sent us both home with a free "dessert sampler." However, the sampler -- tiny bites of each of their desserts -- rather missed the mark. The carrot cake bite was nice but the tiny sliver of chocolate cake was underwhelming; the chocolate brownie thingie I liked okay but Ann didn't care for it. But the real failure was the cheesecake. They had given us an actual slice of cheesecake and I saved mine for last.
We both took a bite, and I immediately looked at Ann.
"What did they do to this?" I asked, swallowing with difficulty and then grabbing my soda to wash the taste away. "There's something wrong with this cheesecake. It tastes like someone sprayed perfume or hairspray all over it."
"It's lavender," Ann said. "I remember seeing Lavender Cheesecake on the menu. They put lavender in it."
"Oh my god," I said, licking my fork once more. "You're right. But why would someone ruin a perfectly good slice of cheesecake this way? It tastes like sucking on the sachet in the back of Grandma's closet."
Not that I've ever actually sucked on a lavender sachet, but you get the idea. I never thought I'd live to see the day that I'd throw two pieces of cheesecake in the trash.
I am hopeful that Ann enjoyed our trip to I Dream of Weenie - Nashville's favorite hot dog stand. At least there was no inorganic material on her pimento cheese weenie.
But sadly, i think Ellendale's is off my list of places to go. And that's sad.
I Dream of Weenie, Nashville's hippest hot dog stand.
