Forgot to spend 3-4 paragraphs on the fancy dinner when Suzanne were lucky enough to have a night out during our Florida vacation. We went here.
And it was quite an interesting evening. Reservation was for 7:30 pm, left the house around 6 pm, did some shopping and then drove on the road along the beach from the Destin Mid-Bay Bridge all the way down to the Outlet Mall. Very interesting.....condos and rental properties galore....Suzanne and I hadn't driven through here before, so, we enjoyed the views of the Gulf and marvelled at just how many homes and condos were down in this area.
Got to the restaurant; sat at this small table for two...L-shaped booth seating for a cozy atmosphere. And the fondue experience begins. Waiter was very....weird. Very pushy about what he liked, didn't always seemed to be in the same mental plane as us. He was pushing the "Big Night Out"....we ended up going with the "Signature Selection"
First course is the cheese course. Suzanne and I chose the Fiesta Cheese Fondue...supposedly more Mexican-y and made "as spicy as you like". Reality says it wasn't really spicy, but, eh, that's life. Presented with tortilla chips, various breads, broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, and apples to dip into the cheese. Apples took a little bit of getting used to but, pretty tasty in the end. Had an apple by itself...they store them in lemon juice, and it was very sour....that taste gets lost with the cheese, but, by itself, gets your face to pucker up. I feast on the cauli- and broccoli, beginning a meal-long quest to eat the foods Suzanne isn't going to go for.....
Next is the salad. Suzanne got the Caeser, a safe choice, I got the house salad, which, you would think would be this normal, run-of-the-mill salad. Dressing is described as "sweet and tangy".....turns out that sweet and sweet would have been a better description, it's this orange-sickeningly-sweet concotion and well, the one thing I didn't like about the whole affair.
On comes the meat. The "Signature Selection" comes with filet mignon, shrimp, teriyaki-marinated sirloin, chicken, and fish (mahi tuna). We ordered the standard Bouillon vegetable broth for the cooking. Side dishes include squash, mushrooms, and potatoes. A whole array of different sauces come along side to.....a gorgonzolla port(?) that was good with the steak, a chive-sourcream-something mix called "the green goddess", a teriyaki sauce, a plum sauce, and a spicy shrimp cocktail.
And off we go.....standard health warnings about being careful with the uncooked foods, a brief primer on how long to cook, and it's time to eat. And it was great! Had most of the tuna, most of the shrimp, and a bite or two of the chicken and beef....surprising how different the two were in terms of toughness. Wiped out the squash, was suprised how much I 'grooved' on the mushrooms. Thought the garganzolla was a bit much, but the other sauces were fabulous.
So, it takes a while to finish dinner (about 2 minutes to cook each 'bite', so, it's a longer meal...) and then it's time for dessert. Signed up for "Club Fondue" before we came, so,they had emailed us a coupon for a free dessert, and, there's a lot of fancy ones, but, we settle on just plain dark chocolate. Out comes this plate of goodies, strawberries, a piece of cheesecake, bananas, rice krispie treats, marshmellows, pound cake. Very scrumptous.
Man it was good! Wish there was a location to Lansing (Suzanne and I say this about once a week...)......think the boys would have fun at a meal like this!
