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| - Kudos to Lolita for happy hour integrity! So many pricey restaurants try to lure customers in with desirable-sounding happy hour food specials that turn out to be really tiny portions - but not Lolita. Their $5 happy hour cocktails are strong, & their $5-$6 happy hour apps are the real deal - straight off the regular menu. & just as big.
I live right down the street from Lolita but hadn't been yet for a couple reasons: one, it's a little pricier than I'm used to for an average night out, & two, the pork-heavy menu has never really appealed to me. That said, I recently spotted their happy hour menu online & couldn't resist it - $5 fancy cocktails & apps? Yes, please.
Unfortunately, their in-person happy hour menu was different than what they have listed online, possibly because it changes seasonally & the site hasn't been updated? I was really looking forward to trying the Tremont Smash (spiced rum, apricot brandy, pineapple, passionfruit) &/or the Ranger (watershed gin, blueberry, lemon, soda), but neither was on the actual menu. I went with a bourbon cherry Coke, which turned out to be delicious, if a bit too sweet for my tastes.
We ordered two apps (the same as listed online, to my delight), & as noted, both came in surprisingly huge portions. Very exciting! The mac & cheese was made with chunks of juicy white-meat chicken, creamy goat cheese, & rosemary, just $6, & it was delicious - some zing from the goat cheese, some protein from the chicken. I could've done with more rosemary, but then, I could've eaten a barrel of it, anyway, so I have zero complaints.
We also got their charred eggplant dip, made with feta, lemon, chili, & toasted cumin, & served with housemade flatbread. I'm not a big eggplant person, but mainly because the texture squicks me out a bit. In a form like this, a little bit more like baba ganoush, I'm all in - & this was better than any baba ganoush I've yet had. It does indeed have a charred, smoky flavor, enhanced by the flatbread, which is slightly blackened on the bottom (not burned!) like a good wood-fired oven pizza crust. We devoured this - & when we ran out of flatbread, the bartender offered us a regular (but soft & delicious) bread roll to soak up the last of the dip.
The bartender was friend & polite, attentive but not on top of us, & he was chatty with us & fellow customers at the appropriate times - interesting, informative, talking about the restaurant's famous owner - but not overly chatty in an annoying way. In fact, everyone we interacted with was friendly, pleasant, professional, & not at all uppity in a standard fancy-restaurant way. This is a nice restaurant that treats you like it's not - in a good way. In a Cleveland way.
I don't know if I'll be back to Lolita for regular mealtime - like I said, not a big pork person - but I'll take all the happy hour I can get. This is hands down the best in town!
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