January 2010

Felix's
I know, I know. I totally skipped this month. It didn't deserve skipping and I am ashamed.
Quick highlights:
Felix's is located in the newly hip Highlands area north and west of downtown. It looks like the kind of place I would love to go to every week if I were a better sort of person, the kind that drank piquant wines, and carried clutch purses stuffed with cloth hankies. But I'm not, so I settled into the bench seat, slightly away from the ceiling to floor windows that faced the picturesque street.
The menu, not long (which i guess is a good thing, meaning the chefs had a good things to get really right instead of staking blind stabs at many things), reads like a best-of-Julia-Childs greats. I think all but one of us went for the pre-fixed menu. The choices were few but just too good looking, we had to limit ourselves that much more.
I went for the Beef Stew (notice I am not attempting the French title), which came with a wild pile of greens with a perfect round crouton and smear of goat cheese. The vinaigrette was lemony and fresh. The beef stew arrived in a half-globe bowl of white porcelain, filled artfully with tender tender beef, baby potatoes, interloping mushrooms, and little carrots which had been pared down to dagger points all in a reduced red wine sauce. Again I wished I were that better person and could have appreciated the taste of wine, but I still loved it. I repeated the words "Beof Burgenion" (is that even close? No? Well, what are you gonna do?) over and over to drive in the fact of what I was eating. I felt like I stepped off the screen during a showing of Julie and Julia.
Also represented on the table was Coq Au Van (better? no? sorry) and a lovely simple steak for my lovely steak loving friend.
The service wasn't great. It seemed the waiter liked the two other occupied tables more than us, since they got constant wine refills and we had to go to the bar to beg for a water pitcher. But maybe that's the French way? They do let you linger as long as you want over a dinner.
One thing that was particularly winning of them was dessert. With our preset meals, five of us got a profiterole, a puffed pastry filled with vanilla ice cream and drizzled with chocolate sauce. Our poor entree only friend didn't have one coming to her with her meal. This fact broke our sweet waiter's heart and he included her in the merriment that only a carb-fest inspires.
Soom day, when I have the clutch purse and cloth hankies enough, I'll venture up to the Highlands again and maybe give those wine soaked veggies another chance.

November 2009

Mama Louise's
In order to celebrate the triumphant return of our from Julie from the distant and dangerous shores of Kuwait (does it even have any shores? I don't know), I mustered up my gumption and got us to Mama Louises. OK, all I really did was send out a text message and then a FB event, Megan did the actual picking of a place, and calling for a reservation, ie. all the hard work.
It was far afeild from my own house, in a strip mall of all places, but the restaurant was warm and inviting once inside.
Julie was excited to get her first taste of non-Middle-Eastern pizza, so she went with a white pizza with olives and other veggies. I had a hard time deciding between the pastas, so went with the Half-n-Half of home-made spaghetti and ravioli.
(Holy Crap, I almost broke the library's computer. Everything is fine now. Pheww!)
The Half-n-Half came with a choice of "meatball or sausage?" I went for the sausage. I was too engrossed with Julie's stories of peril to ask if the sausage was made onsite as well as the pasta, so that I can't tell you. Or tell for that matter what anyone else ordered or if they liked it.
The spaghetti was pretty good, thick, but not gummy. The ravioli probably came from a supplier because it was fairly indistinct. The sausage was good, spicy. The whole affair was served up in the funny, homey fashion you'll get at these family owned restaurants. The soup that came with the meal was fine, the salad though was hilarious. They just ripped up a couple leaves of Romain lettuce and laid them on a plate, with a slice of cucumber and one of pepperoni sitting to the side. In fact, my sausage, which I had assumed (wrongly) would fill the ravioli was plopped atop the spaghetti, but covered by the sauce. Well, maybe more charming than funny, but I enjoyed it.
For dessert, we all partook of the seasonal Pumpkin cheesecake. I think cheesecake does make everything better, don't you?
If in the area, I'd go back. We never wanted for filled water glasses, and except for the illegibility of the waiter's handwriting, the service was pretty good. The prices were mainline and it is a family owned business, so... yeah.
(P.S. I'm not spell checking this, so any mistakes, blame my public education.)

July 2009

The Oven
Following a suggestion from one of our regulars, I decided to not only try a new restaurant, but explore the neighborhood as well. I set the time a little earlier for those who would like to do the same, though that turned out to be only two of us. I chose The Oven pizzaria not only because it was in a new area (Belmar shopping area) but also because there was scheduled to be a live band playing that night in the quad.
Belmar is almost directly west from my house, so the drive over at 6 p.m. was like being braised alive, minus the cooking broth. When I finally got there, passing the stretches of more affluent areas and other more colorful neighborhoods, I grabbed the first spot I found. i didn't bother looking for covered or free parking. What's a dollar for a space right in front of the restaurant? So what if free parking was only a block away behind the gym or two blocks away behind the sporting goods store? It's that darned automatic meter that ticked me off. Wouldn't take my coins but happily accepted my credit card. ( I think there's a scam working there somehow.)
During a brief stroll around the outdoor mall, we stumbled on an artsy clothing and accessory place. My friend decided she needed a new (and decided to later buy) purse. Then we meandered across a couple other cute places to eat to keep in mind for a later time. Unfortunately, the live band that was scheduled to appear didn't. There was an amp and a chair and a good crowd built up but no one taking advantage of them.
The Oven had outside seating that we took advantage of. I liked the place, it was slightly pretentious but not so hip I felt like a schmuck. We were seated next to two older couples on a double date. A snippet of their ordering process: "Maybe we could get one women's pizza and one man's." I was shameless eavesdropping, got caught and gave the woman a thumb's up for her suggestion.
The menu is heavy on pizza, with some random things available as toppings, but nothing too weird. There was also a healthy sized salad list and an "appeteazer" spread. I would have happily got the "Bowl of crazy good mozzerlla" but thought all that cheese might prove foolish. One of us did get the "oven roasted vegetable salad" which came with a nice sized parmesan cheese wafer which she sweetly shared.
Our orders went, from left to right, "the Basic Margerite", the "Spicy Buffalo style chicken", the "Fresh tomato" and the "Good Earth" (at least I think it was the Good Earth. I was concentrating really hard on my Fresh Tomato, trying to work around green olives.) I enjoyed the fresh mozzorella on my pizza and the giant leaves of basil. But if I went again, i would definately order the Crazy good mozzarella and then maybe a salad. One of our other neighbors got it and it looked amazing, all melty and delicious.
I wanted to see what the place looked like inside, just for a peak. There were long community style tables rather than little single party tables. The kitchen was open for all to watch the adorable little cooks in their matching hats work. The one complaint I would make is that, in the bathroom, there was only a single light and it wasn't near the mirror. I guess that's good, since my face was glowing from all the sweat accumulated from my drive.
So, what else. A good enough experience, and I'd go again if I was in the area or in the mood for watching roving bands of teenagers wasting an evening. (can you count the gerunds?)
http://THEOVENPIZZAEVINO.COM/

Watercourse

We tried several times to get things back on track, but it seemed the weather was always against us. Here in Denver, we've had the second wettest spring in recorded history. But we finally got there for a Saturday brunch.
It was a tough choice as to when to go: on the one hand, several people would be tied up in wedding business, on the other, an old 3T friend was in town and available for just one day. Finally, we realized that marriage doesn't necessarily mean permanent separation, and accomadated our soon-to-be foreign friend after all.
I was freshly showered when two Megan and Julie came to pick me up. So freshly, in fact, my hair wasn't combed. much less dried. Sans makeup, I braved the restaurant. This is kind of a hippie, earthy, alternative kind of place, so I wasn't out of place. The servers were tattooed and the other patrons were pierced, so no eye liner wasn't a problem. We took the corner booth, with a fine view of sunny 17th street and ordered a sweet potato cinnamon roll to share as an appetizer.
It was Delicious, really light, not too sweet, and strangely tasted nothing like sweet potato.

I braved the Vegan possibilities and ordered The Conejos plate with scrambled tofu. It tasted nothing like eggs, of course, but more like the curry it was spiced with. It was served over home fries with a little cheese decorating the top. Not nearly as bad as a dedicated meat-eater might think. My favorite thing was the wheat bread, though. Thick cut and toasted under the broiler then slathered in butter and raspberry jam.

Julie got the Banana bread French toast. Not French bread sprinkled with bananas and nuts. No my friend, banana bread, heavy and homemade, dipped in egg and fried up with a side of fresh fruit. I managed to steal a bite from the ravenous, home sick Julie and have to say it might be worth breaking your diet.
Our friend Alena joined us for the first time. Hurray! She and Megan both got free-range egg scrambles that looked pretty enviable, as well.
A nice place; bright, clean, neighborly, despite the paintings on the wall depicting scenes from Watership Down. If I hadn't been the chubbiest girl in the room, I would have been tempted to move right into the corner booth permanently.

October 2008

Wild Ginger
While I'm not personally crazy about Thai food, I wanted to honor a special request to try a place near the downtown Littleton area. Since I'm not one to hang out that far west, I had to put forth a little effort on my part (ie, an internet search). The place that jumped out this time was Thai, though, and other people love it, so I thought I could be less than selfish this one month.
And I'll tell you this, it was pretty good. We had a biggish group, eleven as it turned out, at a round table right in the middle of the restaurant, and I'm sure the rest of the patrons were wondering why we kept taking pictures. For a change, the restaurant was a popular one; the place was crowded, nicely decorated and well established. And it shared a parking lot with some colorful interesting places I might have to visit another time.
One funny thing, I got there a few minutes early (weird, I know) and so sat in the vestibule until the rest of the party arrived. I had handily brought my knitting, so I was working away at a sock when a party of women left. One of them, spying what I was doing, stopped to say "Oh! I should have brought my problem for you to fix!" I guess I look like a real knitter now.
Everyone else arrived just in time for our table. We had to squeeze one extra setting, but that just made things cozier.
The menu is large and most of it is way foreign to me. After quizzing the waiter for a while, I finally just told him to surprise me. When he asked how spicy I wanted my dish, I said medium. My friend Megan, always looking out for me, called out "That's white girl medium." It's funny, because it's true.
Julie and Desiree got the chicken satay as an appetizer, which Julie actually liked!
Keri got chicken and shrimp dumplings which to me looked like pasta wrapped meatballs, but tasted way different.
My entree turned out to be the green curry, "white girl" medium. And it was good. The slightly spicy, creamy, cocanuty sauce was so good, I didn't want to waste any of it. So while my delicate friends were pushing half their entrees into take out boxes, I was looking for more rice to soak it all up. The one weird thing, though, was the vegetables. Celery I know. But there were big chuncks of white eggplant floating in there too. I ate them because they're supposed to be good for a growing body, but not even the excellent sauce could make up for the gummy texture.
The rest of the table was full of colorful food, none of which I tried. Everyone seemed well satisfied. We were very glad to have a couple newbies to the group, and we're looking forward to next month when an old friend is coming to visit us.
On the whole, a good experience. I'd go back again and try just pointing randomly at the menu to see what came up. And run over to the Mexican market across the way.

September 2008

Beirut Grill
See, in my head, this place would require camo and helmuts. Instead, it's in a strip mall next to a Big Lots, a whole different type of battleground. We were in Englewood, the interesting bit, with it's Catholic bookstore and at least two Army Surplus stores.
I'd made a reservation for 6 people, and darnit if I wasn't dead on. When we walked in, there was one other party there, but the place filled in somewhat over the course of our hour.
Our waitress brought a complimentary relish plate. It was a nice jesture and so I ate a peice of pickled radish (I think) and an olive. Remind me that I hate olives. It was so pretty, with pink radish, slices of cucumber pickles and a rosebud tomato, but we forgot to take a picture.
We decided to share a few appitizers, since we all wanted a taste. We settled on the fallafels (so good)and one each of the cheese pie, the lamb pie and the spinach pie. I was expecting a cube of spinach and egg ala Sbarros, but instead got what looked like three little boats, made of dough and the filling nestled inside. The spinach was tangy with lemon, the cheese was a little bland and my favorite was the lamb. It was ground and spiced and looked more like a spread than anything else. It tasted smoky and rich.

As an entree, I ordered this sausage dish (I can't remember the name), Megan got the meat combo kabob, Julie got the chicken kabob and the other three all got the King combo, wich came with a lot. Each entree was preceeded with a plate of "homos" and fresh made pita. I would totally go back for that alone. After I downed mine, I unashamedly stole Julie's, since she wasn't finishing hers.
My sausage was spiced well, though pretty dry. They looked like three cigarellos laying on a bed of jasmine rice. And a small green salad.
Since I was having too much fun with my absconded pita and hummus, I didn't have time to ask how everyone else's was. But everyone either finished off their plate or asked for boxes to take home, so I'm going to guess they were satisfied.
Our waitress was fairly attentive, the only problem being that she was the only one on the floor that night, and it took a while to get her attention.
I was so enamored of the hummus, I've been craving it ever since. I even went to the grocery store and bought the kind that comes in a little tub. Not nearly as good, though Ritz crackers probably wasn't authentic.

August 2008

Helga's
It seems that every third time we do this, someone suggests Helga's, but we've never gone. I finally gave into the inevitable and in August we went. I mean, they do have the largest beer selection in the state of Colorado (though I opted for a diet cola). And the fact that it took the place of a Chili's, that bastian for suburban epicures, helped to raise it in my estimation.
It seemed to be, from the beginning, an interesting night. We took the evening in stages. I was on track to get there a couple minutes early, but ended up being late. And was still the first person there. When I requested a table for eight, the hostess looked at me funny. I assured her that more people were coming, then settled down to read a couple pages of my novel. That was 7:08.
At 7:17 Desiree came in. Our very attentive waiter took our order. I got a sampler platter, with weiner schnitzel, jager schnitzel and bratwurst. The menu has handy dandy suggested sides, but I decided to fly solo and got sauerkraut and potato dumplings. Desiree got the chicken schnitzel with fried potato dumplings. We were just tucking into our creamy, cheesy (if a little cold) potato soup starter when Carolyn came in (about 7:35)
Sauerkraut is not meant to be eaten in large bites. Wow! The scnitzel was really good. I have a bias against weiner schnitzel because I always thought it was just fancy chicken fried steak. I find chicken friend steak unnatural. But this was really good. The breading had a delicate crumb and a subtle flavor. The jager schnitzel was like the weiner, only not breaded but covered in brown gravy. The sauerkraut was actually really good, in little doses with a nice chunk of bratwurst.
At 7:50 or so, Megan arrived. The wait staff was in a bit of a tizzy at the moment. They didn't know quite what to do with each new addition. The assistant manager came over and helped Megan settle on the Rouladon "Pfalzicher Art", which is a thin slice of beef wrapped around onions, pickle and bacon. Fortunately for me, Megan couldn't finish the whole thing and let me have her leftovers to take home.
Then Carol huffed in, straight from the gym, at 8:10. I was liking my plat clean by the time she got her order, which was a duplicate of mine and Carolyn's, except she got noodles.
It is, to say the least, a heavy meal. The Germans are a robust people, and cheerfull for a reason. It might be the beer, but the food certainly helps. I had the forthought to divide my meal in half, so that I would have room for dessert. Megan and I shared the apple struesel cheesecake, while Desiree and I shared the layer cream cake. Carol sweet talked the waiter into bringing her a dish of vanilla ice cream on the house.
Probably better suited for a beer drinking crowd or a cold winter evening, Helga's was rib sticking and heavy. The wait staff was on top of it, which I like, and even better, there's a deli attached to the restaurant. So you can drop in and get a half pound of your favoite German deli meat whenever you want.