I started out with the Tempera Lobster Tail and it was amazing. I’m not sure that I would have ever imagined myself eating fried lobster tail, but it was good. . . but anything fried usually is! Jason had the Bacon Wrapped Jalepeno Stuffed Texas Quail and it was good. Not near as spicy as we both felt like it deserved to be, but a solid appetizer just the same. Oh, and let me mention the portions here. . . they were not skimpy at all. (Yeah, we forgot to take pictures of the appetizers – we were . . . distracted.)

For the main course I had the Rainbow Trout with Crawfish and it was very yummy. I loved the way the crawfish raised the decadence of the dish – it made it just a little bit richer and a little bit more complex. The only thing I didn’t understand were the four undercooked baby potatoes. . . they served to elevate the fish fillet for a great presentation but I didn’t really want to eat the other three after eating the first one. Jason had the Cattle Rustler Flat Iron Steak which was covered in an incredible blue cheese and served with fat spicy onion rings. I honestly didn’t know a Flat Iron Steak could be so tender. They did a fantastic job on that dish. And the portion was HUGE. Jason took home a good chunk of the steak and we sliced it thin and he had it as a steak sandwich the next day.

For dessert, I had the Green Pastures Bread Pudding which was incredible and Jason had the cheesecake. We were stuffed at the end of the meal and very happy with the whole experience. It’s funny to us that the whole crowd there tended to be a little bit older than the crowds we were seeing at the other restaurants for restaurant week. . . I understand why the restaurant appeals to older generations (very good waitstaff with proper etiquette, traditional dishes, fantastic atmosphere) but I feel it is worth appealing to the younger generations as well. The food is delicious without being fussy.

Image courtesy of flick user erock517

When I’m not pregnant, I’d like to go again to try out their raw bar – Jason said the selection he received was outstanding and I certainly have a soft spot in my heart for good quality raw fish. He had raw salmon with a pineapple jalapeno salsa, another raw fish with a sauce (which I can’t remember, oops) and a raw oyster from Canada? Yum. I had the Charcuterie Tasting for my first course, which consisted of foie gras, pâté and a nice sausage that is made in house. Very decadent. The calamari was nice too, not oily as it frequently is.

For the main course, I had the Flounder with Capers and Currents and it was perfect. Nice, light and buttery with those sweet and briny accents. The Ricotta Ravioli was light and it was obvious that the ricotta was so fresh because it was especially delicious. The Braised Chicken reminded me of Coq au Vin, but only briefly on the after taste. It was tender and fell apart on the fork, just the way braised chicken should be. The one thing I thought was odd was that none of the main entrees came with a side dish. You had to separately order a side dish, independent of the Restaurant Week menu. I felt that wasn’t quite fair for a $35 fixed price meal. . .

Oh and dessert. Of course, their famous doughnut holes lived up to their reputation, served in a brown paper bag and perfectly hot. The Goat Cheese Cake with Basil Ice Cream and Pine Nut Brittle was excellent – it tasted like goat cheese cheesecake. It reminded me that I need to make some goat cheese ice cream. Soon. And the last dessert was a peanut butter and chocolate mousse with banana ice cream. Not my favorite, but I don’t like banana flavoring. . .

And sorry for the lack of pictures, we were enjoying our company far too much to whisk out a camera to take pictures!

Some of the standout restaurants on the list, to me, are:

• Green Pastures – $25 per person; All of the food I have had here at special events has been outstanding. Seems like the best $25 deal!
• Driskill Grill – $35 per person; This is a rare occasion to be able to eat at one of the most premier restaurants in Austin! Go! Don’t hesitate!
• Parkside – $35 per person; They were recently written up in Bon Appetit as one of the best ‘Brew Pubs’ in America. I think that makes it worth trying out.
• Paggi House – $35 per person; Don’t know much about it except that I’ve wanted to eat there for awhile.

There are other fantastic restaurants on there, some of which I’ve reviewed, but I think these four are new to the list.

We started with a Porcini Cappuccino – a warming mushroom soup with truffle foam. I thought the concept was cute but the flavor and texture was a bit lacking – I think I would have liked a richer soup since it was such a small serving. For the next course, we had Onano Lentils with lamb merguez (sausage) which is a traditional Italian New Years dish and an Antipasti platter of cured salmon, caviar, capers, egg, flatbread and marinated fennel salad. I really enjoyed the lentils, having never heard of this Italian tradition before but I couldn’t eat the Antipasti since the salmon was not cooked. Jason seemed to enjoy it though. Our ‘primi’ course was Caramelle a la Foie Gras with caramelized shallots, apple cider demi glace – which was a savory pasta ‘candy’ filled with foie gras, and a Black Truffle Agnoloti with crispy asparagus and Champagne cream – which was very similar to a ravioli. Both were pretty tasty, but not showstopping. For our ‘secondi’ course, I had the Hazelnut Crusted Rack of Lamb with Spinach and Potato Gratin, Roasted Tomato and Barolo sauce which was delicious (and I love lamb!) and probably the highlight of the meal. Jason had Olive Oil Poached Prawns with Crab and Leek Risotto, Orange Gremolata and Lemon Chive Broth which was an interesting experience because the prawns came out whole, with their heads still on! (Apparently the head is the tastiest part though.) I think Jason enjoyed his dinner, although we both agreed that the taste of the risotto was a bit odd. Both desserts were good but not outstanding – I had a Tuaca Sfmorta (Italian orange liquor souffle) and Jason had the Chocolate Hazelnut Bombe with Tahitian vanilla custard sauce. All in all, it wasn’t quite the meal I was expecting but we enjoyed the experience nonetheless. Everyone I’ve spoken with has been surprised by my lack of enthusiasm, so it may be that we’ll have to try this restaurant again, sometime in the future, when it’s not a fixed price menu.

I think our favorite part of the evening at the restaurant was the jazz quartet that entertained us for the time that we were there. The singer was apparently a hostess on staff and they decided to let her be the entertainment for New Years. I think they should keep inviting her back to sing because her voice was a perfect compliment for a nice evening any night of the year.

Really, what we were there for was some good food and that’s what we got. Our waitress, Stasia, did a great job of steering our meal. We asked her for her general recommendations and it came to light that the chef’s favorite item on the menu was the lamb’s tongue fricasee which included a dijon pan sauce, yaupon honey, and cherry-apricot mustarda. I know, tongue. Weird, right? I actually had just read an article in Bon Appetit asking what the food editor’s favorite ‘good, inexpensive cut of meat’ was. Turns out it was tongue. So that article peaked my interest enough to try it. And it was good. Very good in fact. I would encourage all of you to put your preconceptions or queasiness aside to try it. Seriously.

So from there we ordered our recommended entrees. Mine was the gulf shrimp pot pie, with leeks, corn, and early girl tomatoes. The puff pastry was made in house. Seriously? It’s one of the most labor intensive doughs to make by hand. I’ve had several chefs just tell me to buy it frozen and never worry about making it by hand. Well that was incredible, to say the least. The pot part of the pie? It was delicious as well. It was very much like a shrimp bisque although not as heavy as what a traditional bisque is. There were layers of flavor and bright pops of corn. It all felt upscale but the same time very much like comfort food.

Jason had the milk-braised pork sugo,with tomato, white wine, and semolina gnocchi. I don’t think either of us knew what he was ordering. I don’t think that ‘gnocchi’ was an adequate description for what arrived. It was more like a baked polenta cake. Delicious, don’t get me wrong, but I think a gnocchi is a gnocchi based on its shape not necessarily its ingredient (which is normally potato, not semolina). Anyways, over this ‘gnocchi’ was an incredible thick tomato sauce with succulent pieces of pork belly and pork shoulder (I think). Definitely a comfort food.

Even though we were stuffed, we had to order dessert which was a chocolate terrine with port blackberry sauce and cocoa nib anise ice cream. I thought it was delicious, but what flour-less dense chocolate cake substance isn’t delicious? I was especially intrigued by the cocoa nib anise ice cream. I love anise flavoring and this ice cream was perfect. Yum! If I could just get a gallon of that to go, that would be perfect. Who said ice cream pregnancy cravings had to be Blue Bell?

All in all, we had a great night, with great food, with great service. Just look how happy we were:

We had the original Botticelli’s Bread as our appetizer and I thought it was alright. It was French bread stuffed with prosciutto, copa, mortadella, salame, mozzarella, parmesan, and roasted bell peppers. At $12, I’m not sure it was the best appetizer pick for the price but it satisfied the group I was with. The main courses were exceptional. I took a bite from everyone’s plate and everyone had ordered something quite tasty. Jason had the Tagliatelle with Meatballs in an Arrabiata sauce and it was a nice portion and pretty delicious. I had the Butternut Squash Ravioli with a Brown Butter Sage Sauce and it was amazing. I love butternut squash (I think I’ve mentioned that before) and the ravioli and the sauce accentuated the delicious savory sweetness of the squash. Yum! One of my friends had the same entree as I did and the other had a different meal, which for the sake of me, I can’t remember what it was called. It was essentially a ravioli with a cream sauce, tomatoes and peas and it was delicious. One thing I appreciated about this restaurant is that they observe the seasonal foods – the desserts change nightly and the waitstaff seemed very knowledgeable. Our dessert, which was described as a dense chocolate mousse with a ganache shell was decadent and delicious. The tiramisu. . . I’m just picky about about that dessert and this particular one was not one of my favorites.

Overall, I enjoyed our meal (I enjoyed the company more but the restaurant couldn’t help that) and I would recommend as a great special occasion/date night place!

My coworker talks about this place as being one of the better Mexican restaurants in town so we were excited to finally try it. It was definitely a perfect kitschy atmosphere for a Mexican restaurant. We had the large Cerviche and Polvos Fish a la Plancha after being told that the restaurant’s specialty was their seafood. . . both were delicious. As was the black salsa – I have no idea what was in the black salsa but I wanted to drink it, it was so flavorful. Everything was good, surprisingly so for such an unassuming Mexican restaurant. I highly recommend this restaurant – it was moderately priced (and you can find a coupon on the main page of their website for buy one get one half off main plate with the purchase of drinks) and the food was better than I could have expected.

Also, about Restaurant Week – according to my chef friend, this is the ‘preliminary’ restaurant week here in Austin with the nice restaurants in town. There will be another one in October that will be announced in September with the EXTREMELY high end restaurants. Not sure if it will still be $25. . . but even it’s it’s $35 for three courses, I’d go just to eat at some of the restaurants that are otherwise saved for very special occasions.

• Austin Land and Cattle
• The Belmont
• Chez Zee
• Ciloas
• The County Line On the Hill
• The County Line On the Lake
• Melting Pot Downtown
• Melting Pot Northwest
• Doña Emilia’s
• Imperia
• J. Blacks
• Jasper’s
• Kenichi Austin
• Ranch 616
• ReVive at the Wyndham.

This is a good way to get out and try a new restaurant that you’ve been meaning to try. Make reservations before you go so that you are guaranteed a seat!