Wow! I’m actually catching up on my blog backlog! Ned came to town last weekend and it had been 7 (read em seven!) weeks since we had seen each other. That my friends is not easy. I am so thankful we talk three times a day though, even if for only 5 minutes. Did you know there is a Turkey Hill in Boston? Well, when he drives by every morning, I get the Turkey spotting update. See here for a snapshot of this event, apparently that turkey was huge.. whatever Ned!!!
In other news, my best buddy from college, Jana (remember? the one I went to Long Island to see twice this year??) had her baby on Wednesday!! Welcome to the world Lilly Hudson Guja!!! Did you check out that picture too?? How could you not adore that face! Gosh I can’t wait to meet her!
So back to the point of all of this, yes, dinner. A very late dinner I might add. Somebody chose to take the late flight into Baltimore… and so I picked him up at 8:45 and whisked him away to our surprises! First surprise was B&O Brasserie, second surprise was Hotel Monaco!
I had high hopes for B&O after seeing many blogging dinners and hearing Bob and Jen’s recommendations. The beginning of the meal started out fantastic and it went slightly down hill from there. But I got some good pictures, so please go for the jump and join me on my meal recap.
The cool menu. Love how they use leather backing and insert the paper.
Water glasses, love how they reused a wine bottle to make these! This reminded me of a failed attempt those Youngsters did at Young House Love. Must learn the trick to these!
And then we got some cocktails! Ned got the Manhattan, which was sweet and nicely spicy (possibly cinnamon?). Looks kinda fruity, but I assure you it was a manly drink.
I chose the Queen Bee – ‘Belvedere Vodka, Yuzu, St. Germain Elderflower Liqueur & Honeywater.’ My normal cocktail choices are sweet ones and I was expecting this to be more sweet, but I think it was nice and tart and a good departure from my standby choice.
Shortly after we received our cocktails, we ordered the rest of our meal and I inquired to the waiter if it would be alright to take photographs. He agreed and inquired if I was food blogger… and shortly thereafter, we received these amuse bouche plates! Now I had to wonder if this was a perk of my hobby? Best perk I’ve gotten yet!
It was a chilled melon soup with very thin slices of prosciutto, micro cilantro, and two dollops of ___? It was amazing. Loved the coldness, loved the saltiness of the pork and loved the subtle sweetness of the melon.
Ned and I then went on to our appetizers…
He ordered the Trio of House Made Sausages – ‘duck chorizo / lamb andouille / chicken kielbasa’ The kielbasa tasted really good with the pickled cabbage, the andouille tasted like it should, and the chorizo was my favorite. Something about chorizo that just makes me happy, (probably my memories of eating it on Christmas morning with abuelita). The whole grain mustard brought alot of flavor to the chorizo too, don’t know if it was needed though, as the chorizo had so much of its own!
I ordered the seasonal appetizer. Shaved asparagus, fresh HUGE peas, some sprouts?, more prosciutto and a poached quail egg. Eating this quail egg was the beginning of my “eggs-ploration” weekend. There is really no reason behind my aversion to it, so with this quail egg I took a stand and ate a good bit of it! As I was trying to save some of my appetite for the rest of the meal, I shared half of this with Ned. He loved it also.
Then on to entrees… Ned got a stuffed, crusted pork chop, with some sort of oyster stuffing, an okra relish, and a bed of black-eyed peas in a little skillet. It was good, he really liked the textural contrast between the crust and the gooey stuffing, and the pork was pretty tender and juicy. And the acidity of the okra relish helped cut the heaviness of the huge cut of pork.
I was trying to eat a lighter entree and for some reason thought the Chickpea Fritters – ‘harissa yogurt / fava beans / pearl onions / greens’ would fit that bill. Big balls of chickpea do not lead to light meals!! Duh! But I did like this dish, although the fritters were kinda dry. I think my favorite part of this was the collard greens, I could have eaten a whole plate of those!
Ever since I read that the Red Velvet Doughnuts – ‘cream cheese frosting / sweet potato cashew milkshake’ were on this menu I have craved them. And starting on Monday when I made the reservation I craved this dessert ALL WEEK. When I told our nice waiter that I could not wait to try this, he gave a little shudder. Because it was so late (11? maybe?) it was a bit of a singe having the kitchen make this technical dessert that late (this is all me surmising of course). But off my dessert order went and then it came back to us! I was not impressed. I was really expecting a nice light Krispy Kreme-ish kind of doughnut. What we got was similar to the heavy texture of an Auntie Annie’s pretzel. Not fluffy at all… The flavor of the dough was good and it probably could have used more of that sweet cream cheese frosting.
It came with the tasty milkshake. I can say I have never had a sweet potato cashew milkshake before that night. I liked it because really I have never met a milkshake I didn’t like and I even surprised the waiter with how I finished it! Why wouldn’t everyone finish it?? Maybe it was those cravings all week… It had a nice milky cashew flavor and the sweet potato presence was very subtle and the sugar dusting helped make it a little more sweet.
After dinner Ned and I grabbed another drink at the swanky bar.
Love this light fixture. Love how the window frames it!
Overall, we did have a very good meal. But that dessert finish just left me disappointed. I don’t know if we will come back anytime soon. I would like to hope that because we were the last ones on the dining ship, the kitchen was tired of us and that’s why the dessert finale was kinda lame, but who knows!
Filed in: Out to Eat.