Looking for Luce

Ahhh, Uptown...the bane of my existence. I have lived in Rock Hill for 4 years now, traveling fairly consistently to Charlotte, and I still can't get the hang of Uptown. Every time I go, I end up frustrated, with sore feet, and sweaty from getting lost and walking so much. That being said, there may not be too many dishes coming from Uptown for awhile. However, this blog is way overdue so maybe I'm close to attempting it again.....sometime.....

Anyhoo, Shelly, Anna, and I traveled to the evil Uptown to eat at Luce. This little restaurant is set WAY back in a plaza and has no signs to let you know it's back there (can you sense my frustration?). After I calmed down and had some water, I enjoyed the free bread and the calamari appetizer my dining companions were kind enough to order as I was getting lost on the street. The calamari was breaded and served with a spicy marinara sauce, delicious and light enough to make you think you could eay way more than you should. I love calamari, but when they put the little ones on there that really LOOK like little squid creatures, I have to pass and stick to the other options on the plate.

For my main dish I ordered the Tagliatelle. Now I had a hard time finding where to get this dish because it was originally served at Coco Osteria, which is no longer in business. Thankfully, Luce still serves some of Coco's favorites, this dish included. One hundred dishes are hard to get through and, unfortunately, some of the restaurants are no more, making it difficult to complete my task! The tagliatelle is described as "spinach tagliatelle, porcini mushrooms, prosciutto, parmesan cream sauce."




Salty, creamy goodness

I used to be an Italian food lover, but it's usually so heavy that I really stopped liking it. However, doing this 100 dish thing, I've realized a couple of things - When it's made well, Italian food is FABULOUS and you can always get a to-go box!

The tagliatelle is pretty similar to fettucini and this one was made with spinach, so it was full of flavor. The cream sauce was pretty heavy, but there wasn't too much on the dish so it evened out. The prosciutto added a salty flavor that balanced well with the pasta and sauce. They also added fresh cheese on the top, which gave it a tangy flavor. I don't really like onions in certain dishes, so I really didn't eat these. I guess if you like onions, they would have been good, but I wouldn't know. Overall, this was a really good salty, creamy dish with perfectly cooked pasta. I am still a HUGE fan of Vivace's pasta, but Luce comes pretty close.

For dessert, of course, I had the tiramisu. I am still looking for tiramisu as good as it was in Boston.

This would not be it. It was served, as you can see, in a cup - not as the piece that I'm used to. It was good, as tiramisu usually always is, but it is definitely not up to the quality of Mike's Pastry Shop in Boston.

As far as the rest of Luce, we sat outside because it was beautiful weather. Their patio is really nice and it's fun to see all the business people coming out of the buildings. The wait staff was very attentive, given the fact I have no idea exactly how much water I drank because they kept filling it up. If only they had a little sign at the entrance to the plaza......

Chicken (not so) Little

Ali, Andi, and I went to The Roasting Company for dinner one night and it was fabulous. Just walking in and smelling the food was enough to make me start salivating like Pavlov's dog. This little gem of a restaurant is located on Montford Dr. and its menu is filled with a variety of Southern and Tex-Mex cuisine.

The Top 100 dish is the "Quarter Dark," which is basically a quarter of a chicken with dark meat. Not being a fan of dark meat, I edited my choice to the "Quarter White" and was much happier. It's served with 2 side dishes. On an interesting note, all of their side dishes contain no meat by-products, which is a little weird considering you're probably going to get some sort of chicken on every plate. Anyhoo, I got the squash casserole and smoked cheese and pasta salad. Andi got the chicken and rice, and Ali got the chicken and black bean combo.

Your order is taken at a bar area with a cash register and then they call out your name to pick up your food. It's kind of nice not to have a waiter - more self serve - but the ticket for a credit card still has a "tip" line on it. That always confuses me - am I supposed to tip someone just for taking my order? Anyway, our food came out in a reasonably short amount of time and it was delicious. The chicken is rotisserie so it's nice and moist and it was a huge portion. I ended up taking home half of my meal. The squash casserole almost looked like a cornbread dressing and I think it did have some sort of stuffing-like component to it. When I read the smoked cheese and pasta salad, I missed the salad part and thought it was some type of macaroni. Well, it's not - it's an actual pasta sald. No matter - it was really good. It had spinach, penne pasta, and cheese, and it was served cold. Everything tasted great the next day for leftovers too!

The second best part of the meal? TCBY was very close so we got dessert too!!  All in all, a really nice dining experience.

Pudding Parts 1 and 2

As evidenced by the title, this is a tale of 2 puddings. The first is the banana pudding at Savor Cafe and Catering. I went with Andi to this Morehead St. eatery (Ali unfortunately couldn't make it due to the hellish work day she'd had - something we all can symphathize with, no?). I parked at the Open Kitchen across the street and half expected the mean man that works there to come and yell at me. Thankfully that did not happen.


Although the dessert menu was my goal, I had to have dinner first. Darn you, rules of society! I chose the "Carolina Shrimp & Andouille Sausage Gravy over Yellow Stone-Ground Grits" and it was heavenly. Being from the South, I'm a bit odd in the fact that I don't usually like grits. The only time I had enjoyed them previously was when a classmate from Delaware made cheese grits on our Radiology rotation...strange. I chose this dish because it promised a bit of spiciness and I was not disappointed. There was enough food to make up 2 meals so that was even better. The grits were nice and creamy and the sausage was just spicy enough. The gravy made me want to lick the plate and the shrimp were cooked perfectly. Andi had the "Pan-Fried Chicken Cutlet" topped with pimento cheese and bacon. Only in the South would a dish like that make the cut. It wasn't exactly what she was expecting but she liked it.


Now, the Top 100 dish is the Banana Pudding - it's pillowy and light and comes with homemade vanilla wafers:

It was so filling but yet really light so it didn't leave me feeling too full. Besides, the shrimp/sausage/grits dish did that enough for me. I forced myself to finish it, despite not having too much room in my tummy just because it was so good. All in all, an A!


The next pudding tale is of bread pudding at Customshop. Shelly, Anna, and I ate at the King's Kitchen and then had dessert at Customshop in Elizabeth. Now, if you remember, Fran's has a superb bread pudding that really sets the bar high. Unfortunately, Customshop did not deliver. The bread pudding was GOOD, just not THAT good. Besides, it was super heavy and had a lot of extra stuff in it:

It was prety hard to eat given its small container, and there were bits of apple and walnuts in it that I wasn't too crazy about. I think the apples would have been good on their own without the walnuts. This dish would be much better on a really cold night if you haven't had a full meal right beforehand, but it's never going to be as good as Fran's. The one thing, however, that will keep me from forgetting this restaurant is the selection of naked man pictures in the women's restroom. Yes, you read me correctly. There are some strategic leaves placed in a couple of the pictures, but not all of them. It left me with a few questions: does the men's restroom have naked women pictures in it? are children allowed in the restaurant? should there be some sort of charge to use the facilities? how much time do the employees spend in the restroom on a daily basis?


I think I'm just going to leave you with that.....=0)

The Return of Charlotte Restaurant Week

I am super behind on my blogging, but I'm sure I will be forgiven. This post is about Charlotte Restaurant Week and let's not even talk about how long ago that was!

When I read that Charlotte Restaurat Week was a-comin', I knew I had only one goal - to get reservations at The Melting Pot. As soon as possible, I made said reservations online and thanked my lucky stars they were still available. We had to do it on a Sunday night because Fridays and Saturdays were already filled up, so let that be a lesson to you!

Shelly, Anna, and I went to the Midtown location and had a fabulous dinner that I still think about fondly from time to time. First off, the drinks - it was relatively close to Valentine's Day and so they had this strawberry deliciousness thing that I got - the Love Martini (made with Malibu rum, peach schnapps, cranberry juice, and fresh strawberries):
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You can't see it but there's a tag that says "drink me"

It was wonderful and gave me a nice little warm feeling that added to the happiness of the night (please don't interpret this to mean I'm addicted to alcohol).






Next up was the cheese course. We chose the Boston Lager Cheddar because it had some extra little herbs and, come on, it sounds great. The cheese course (if you haven't been there before) is served with different kinds of breads, veggies, and apples:


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Pot o' cheesy goodness

Then came the salad course. I got the house salad, which comes with "crisp romaine and iceberg lettuce, aged cheddar cheese, roma tomatoes, seasoned croutons, and sliced egg" (of course, nixing the tomatoes). By this time, I was really into dinner and completely forgot to take pictures.









Onto the next! We were in for a surprise for the main course because we assumed we'd have to order one choice for the whole table, but we EACH got to pick. Anna got the Coastal because she doesn't eat red meat. This choice included: "blackened scallops, sesame-crusted Ahi tuna, all natural breast of chicken, teriyaki sirloin, Pacific white shrimp, and spinach & artichoke ravioli." Shelly and I both got the American, which included: "seasoned choice Angus sirloin, filet mignon, Buffalo chicken, Old Bay shrimp, and wild mushroom sacchetti."


Once again, if you haven't been to The Melting Pot before, they bring out all these meats/seafood/etc raw and you cook them in a big pot in the middle. They also have fresh veggies and (my favorite) a choice of sauces. You get to pick a cooking style and we chose the Court Bouillon, which is just a nice broth that helps cook the food but doesn't really change the flavor. The sauces included a bleu cheese, sour cream, sweet and sour, teriyaki, and (my favorite) a curry sauce. You can see the remains of my dinner below:
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It doesn't get better than this

I can't remember what type of main course I've had before, but the combination of these two was great. The Ahi tuna was sushi grade, so you could just eat it raw or sear it. I'm not a fan of raw fish, so I chose to cook mine through, but Shelly seared hers and liked it. My personal favorites for the night were the buffalo chicken and Pacific white shrimp. But who am I kidding? I loved it all!


Now comes the piece de resistance (unfortunately not appropriately accented with French accents because I don't know how to do that on here) - DESSERT! I fought hard for the Original and didn't receive too much resistance. The Original is like eating a huge liquid Reese's Cup. It's milk chocolate with a swirl of crunchy peanut butter. Dessert fondue is served with fruit, crusted marshmallows (like crusted in oreos!), pound cake, and cheesecake that you just drizzle the chocolate on. I had recovered my senses enough to take a picture of this:
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Sweet, sweet happiness

My mouth waters just looking at it. It was the highlight of my night. No wonder Shelly and I (and Anna, behind the camera) looked like this:
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Clear eyes, full bellies, can't lose

Of course this was a great meal and I wouldn't change a thing. Of course I'm going to try desperately to make reservations at The Melting Pot every Charlotte Restaurant Week because we got ALL of this for $30 per person (+ the discounted drinks). NOBODY can beat that and no one should be expected to try. We're only human after all.

Seize the fork

One evening, Shelly, Anna, and I traveled to Elizabeth for dinner at Carpe Diem. If you remember my previous posts, Elizabeth also has a great ice cream shop. Also, upcoming is my visit to another restaurant in that area. I love going down there because it's easy to get to anfd there's FREE parking! Any restaurant that has that in Charlotte gets an automatic point in my book. Carpe Diem is a pretty fancy little place but we just wore our regular clothes and weren't treated any differently, so don't worry.


For an appetizer, we all had the goat cheese salad. The salad is mixed greens with wine poached onions and goat cheese mounds inside a hazelnut crust:

As you can see here, I added chicken to mine. Overall, I really enjoyed the salad. The goat cheese was delicious and I broke open the little "cakes" of it and spread it around on the salad. I even enjoyed the onions. The only thing I would have liked was something to add a bit of crunch to it. There were little carrot strings that helped, but some type of nut maybe would have been perfect to add some texture.

We also had dessert, but apparently I didn't take a picture of it, nor was it memorable enough for me to have any idea as to what it was....something with chocolate?

Overall, a delightful dinner and a good time with friends.

Opa or oops?

Shelly, Anna, and I traveled to the Greek Isles restaurant for dinner and baklava, a Top 100 dish. The thing I like most about Greek Isles? They have a parking lot! This seems like such a small detail, but it is very important when traveling into Charlotte, the land of paid parking garages.

We made reservations at the restaurant, but I don't think it's too hard to get in. They have a huge dining room, and we actually changed our reservation to an earlier time at the last minute. We did eat a little early but I've never seen a line there. For appetizers, we had the flaming cheese and a greek salad to split. The flaming cheese was wonderful and honestly the best dish all night.

For dinner, I had the Aegean Chicken, which is breaded chicken stuffed with artichoke hearts, feta, mushrooms, spinach, ouzo cream, rice, and asparagus. Here's the the kind of sad thing about Greek Isles. I've eaten there a few times and, every time I do, I get super excited about the food and feel a bit let down. I mean, it's good, but it's never as good as what I think it will be. Maybe it's my ordering, maybe it's my expectations, but that's what it is. This dish was good - honestly even better the next day - but the chicken was really thin and the dish was mostly about the stuffing. I was thinking it would be a big breast of chicken stuffed with some of the things mentioned. I mean, it WAS tasty, but just not what I expected.

For dessert I, of course, had the baklava.

Opa!

Here's what I have sadly discovered over time - I'm honestly not a fan of baklava! I know it's close to heresy but I've had so many and not really LOVED any of them so this has become my conclusion. I really do love the baklava sundae at the Greek Fest, but is this because it's mainly ice cream with baklava sprinkles?? Now, I'm not a fan of honey so that may be part of it. This baklava is soooo tall and was a little difficult to eat - VERY sweet. If you like baklava, you will love it and it is definitely worth it. If you're kind of on the no side like me....it's a bit much.

Honestly, this is a good restaurant and I will probably go again. The atmosphere is great, the service was fantastic, and the food was pretty good. I would like to find something there that I LOVE and it would complete the trifecta.

Give me Liberty or give me death!

My dining friends Ali and Andi went with me to The Liberty on South Blvd. for dinner one night. The Top 100 Dish is the Devils on Horseback - sounds interesting, yes? The restaurant is in a pretty cool little area, although parking was a bit rough. I might even suggest taking the little monorail to get there as it goes right by. After finding a space and getting in, we were all taken away by the ambience. This a pretty snazzy looking little restaurant, with dimmed lights and kegs used as fixtures. Unfortunately, we had to wait so long for a waitress that I had to re-visit the hostess stand to get one, so the service wasn't great that night. The food, however, was.

Devils on Horseback are grilled dates stuffed with bleu cheese and almonds wrapped in smoky bacon.



You really WANT me to be good



Sadly, I have to say that it wasn't my favorite part of the meal. I think the dates were the part that really threw it off. I love mixing savory and sweet (reference bacon-wrapped tater tots at Fran's) but somehow this just didn't quite cut it. However, the rest of the menu looked really good.

We all chose the Chicken and Dumplings (come on, it looked great!) and we were pleasantly surprised. This is not chicken and dumplings like you're thinking.

Not your mama's chicken and dumplings

Obviously, as you can see from the picture, it was like a huge chicken laying on a bed of veggies and gnocchi as dumplings. The dish was total comfort food, just like the original chicken and dumplings, and I couldn't really say anything bad about it. Alas, it paled in comparison to the dessert - Salted Caramel Budino.

You think Italian men look good? Take a look at me!

Budino is a type of Italian "pudding". This puppy has chocolate, salted caramel, butterscotch, and fresh cream. It is sooooooo sweet, but soooooo good. The only thing that would have made it better was a cup of coffee....why didn't I think of that???

All in all, this meal was wonderful - good friends, delicious food made up for not so great service....definitely trying this place again.