| rev:text
| - My wife and I ate at 131 Main last night and I found it, on the whole, and considering the price, no more than fair.
The service was quick and efficient. And this, actually, was a problem. It was *too* quick and efficient.
I know what you're thinking but bear with me - we placed a drink order. A beer and cocktail and they were both at our table so quickly we wondered if the cocktail was pre-made. Sounds good, right? But everything arrived so quickly after we ordered it. we still had a table full of appetizers and salads when our main courses came out. The pace was way off, and the whole dinner felt rushed. Not, mind you, that any member of the wait staff made us feel that they were rushing us. I'm not sure if it was because we arrived at 9pm or what but we had stuff piling up in front of us faster than we could eat it.
Now. "the stuff".
Not a broad beer selection here on tap. Old Meck Copper was the only micro-brewery beer on tap. The Cocktail, one Pama'Tini was sweet, but mediocre. It tasted pretty much like any drink at a daiquiri bar like a Fat Tuesdays or a Wet Willie's - but without the ice or freeze factor.
For starters we got Roasted Artichokes, and on a whim, deviled eggs.
The roasted artichokes were fantastic. Served 3 to an order, slightly blackened and covered in oil and served with a remoulade. They were just fantastic once I was given a quick lesson in how to eat them by my wife and another by our server- Don't bother chewing the leaves. Bite them and pull them from your mouth, scraping out the meaty insides. Of course the artichoke heart was perfect and needed no such oral gymnastics to enjoy.
The deviled eggs were just deviled eggs. Acceptable, but the homemade ones someone always makes brings to any corporate pot-luck or family get-together are better.
After discussing the meal options with our waiter I ordered the Marinated Ribeye, which came up because I mentioned I loved the artichoke's grilled flavor. And my wife ordered the Roasted Chicken. Both served with smashed red potatoes but I opted instead for a side of hand-cut shoestring fries and at the last second added a Cucumber Salad because the waiter's description sounded so good.
The Cumber Salad. Cucumbers, onion, and 1 tiny bite-sized tomato (halved) with a vinegar dressing. I thought it was very tasty indeed.
The steak was pretty much a failure. Marinated in a sweet soy sauce as the waiter and menu said- but I detected none of the grilled flavor of the artichokes that I had craved. I guess next time I'll get something like their grilled trout or salmon. This would have been ok, really, had the steak actually been good.
It was cooked medium-rare as I had ordered, but the marinade was so salty & sweet that to be honest it almost tasted like glazed ham and not beef. Go to any chain steakhouse and have the "Hawaiian Ribeye" or whatever their similar offering is and it will be better than this steak was.
So, I didn't like it, that's fine, I ordered it. That's ok. Thank goodness I still had a table full of deviled eggs, cucumber salad, and grilled artichokes to eat. Not to mention the side of fries I got and sampling my wife's choices.
Oh yeah. The fries...
They were great. No joke, some of the best fries I've ever had- maybe a touch over-salted but awfully yummy.
The Roasted Chicken was very tasty and went well with the smashed red potatoes. All dark meat, great demi-glace, yummy also.
We really wanted to try the Banana Creme Pie for dessert.
But unfortunately - it has peanuts in the crust and I am allergic. Good thing we asked, as this was a surprise.
They had 5 desserts available and 3 contained peanuts. My only options were the Key Lime Pie which we were told had almonds in the crust. I'm not allergic to almonds but I didn't want Key Lime. I also didn't want strawberry shortcake. So I was out of luck as far as dessert went. Not really their fault on this one.
So. To recap:
Great artichokes
Great fries
Good chicken
Good cucumber salad
Average deviled eggs
Bad Steak
For the price I thought it wasn't quite good enough. But I could certainly see myself coming back and trying something else or just hanging out around the huge fire-pit on the patio and having a few drinks. They did have an awesome patio.
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