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| - If I'm not grading Zack Bruell standards, this was a great experience. I do agree that the service is not near the standard one would expect from his group, but the food was outstanding and the location is gorgeous.
My husband and I had reserved via Open Table, requesting a window seat a mere 30 minutes before we were heading over on a Sunday afternoon. We arrived and were immediately taken to a perfect corner table, inside, on the windows. The complimentary bread arrived almost immediately - and we were thinking, 'who said the service here is lacking ..." but, 10 minutes later when we still did not have water, we started to understand the other reviews.
Our server took our drink and appetizer orders, our drinks arrived, but our water was not refilled for about 10 minutes after booth were empty and the bread was never replenished. We were in our seats about 20 minutes before the appetizers arrived. Both were outstanding I had the soup special - a corn puree that was heavenly - with a heavy drizzle of olive oil that was surprisingly the perfect compliment to the rich corn. My husband had the BLT mussels and finished every drop. It smelled amazing and I got to dip a bit of the crostini that came with it into the sauce, and it was briny, bacon-y, tomato-y goodness.
We finished our appetizers and my soup bowl stayed on the table for the next 10 minutes and was only removed when our entrees arrived. My husband's mussel shell bowl was never removed - and stayed on the table until after they cleared our dinner dishes. Since the main windows were open to the outside, there were flies inside the restaurant who were very interested in the mussel bowl. This was not pleasant, but after the initial check on our entrees, we did not see our server until we were finished with our meal.
The Lobster Roll was small, but well prepared. No real briny flavor (I am comparing to East Coast - including Maine), but a nice (warm) butter poached flavor, paired with celery (and I think fennel). The roll is small and there is not a ton of lobster for the $22 price tag. There are A LOT of fries on the plate. They're good, but they make up about 2/3 of the plate. My husband had the salmon special with squash and fingerling potatoes. He enjoyed it, but not as much as the BLT mussels.
All in all, we enjoyed our meal, the view of the river was amazing, the service was -- I think the best description would be "immature" - not quite making that leap to what one expects at Alley Cat prices or Zack Bruell's reputation. We both agreed Alley Cat doesn't make our must return immediately list, but it's definitely a place we would come back to and, maybe try the upstairs or just do appetizers -- because those were both some of the best we've had -- anywhere!!
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