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| - So after a string of realy good meals in Charlotte lately, I was significantly underwhelmed by a Saturday night meal at Crepe Cellar. Underwhelmed is probably too nice...because it wasn't for the stellar fried cod...the place sucked. Five dishes - French Onion Soup, sauteed garlic shrimp, house salad (mixed greens with crostini and red wine vinagrette), fish and chips and shrimp and grits.
French Onion soup...this was like dishwater except dishwater has more flavor...theme for the night was "we don't care if we flavor our food). How do you mess this old school classic up? You can even use beef bouillon cubes and throw some decent gruyere and crostini in and salvage it...I have never had to salt, salt and salt my French Onion Soup...they need to learn a lesson from Captial Grille or Lulu in this department...not off to good start.
Sauteed shrimp...this was supposed to be like the Cajun Queen version...except Cajun Queen knows how to do bbq shrimp...granted there's is over the top with garlic and butter, but isn't that what you expect from this type of dish? Once again my dad (who, keep in mind, is 75 and usually eats at places like Pier 51 at 5:30PM with my mom...and considers Dragonfly a fancy place) and I are both searching for the salt shaker...for "New Orleans" bbq shrimp!!!! You know when you can look at a shrimp and see that it's best days were probably 3 months ago when they froze it??? They were decent size sauteed shrimp at one time, but freezer burn and time took their toll...at least I could tell they were pre-BP...probably Vietnamese tiger shrimp (2 for one Harris Teeter), but I digress. That's what these shrimp looked like - I was worried about the shimp being off more than I was them being flavorless...but they were a pretty good combination of both. The brothy goodness you would expect from this was basically a version of their French Onion soup broth/with UNSALTED butter. Then to add insult to injury, their bread was some Le Brea knock-off that wasn't even toasted to hide the staleness!
House salad - mixed greens with red wine vinagrette...can we move on? How do you ruin a mixed green salad? I don't know...ask the chef at Crepe Cellar.
Shrimp and Grits - I wasn't really excited about getting this after my bbq shrimp, but the waitress insisted this was the best thing on the menu (I give her the skunk-eye at this point...and thank her for another Jack and Diet). We ask for a larger salt shaker in anticipation...The shrimp were at least from a different batch than the sauteed boys...overdone - probably finished in the grits for too long. The tasso gravy needed salt. Let me pause for a wikpedia entry:
Tasso ham is a specialty of Cajun cuisine. It is a spicy, peppery version of smoked pork made from the shoulder butt. In this case, "ham" is a misnomer, since tasso is not made from the hind leg of a pig. This cut is typically fatty and, because the muscle is constantly used by the animal, has a great deal of flavor. The butt, which will weigh 7 to 8 pounds, is sliced across the grain into pieces about 3 in / 7.5 cm thick. These are dredged in a salt cure, which usually includes nitrates and sugar. The meat is left to cure briefly, only three or four hours, then rinsed, rubbed with a spice mixture containing Cayenne pepper and garlic, and hot-smoked until cooked through.
Grits weren't good either, but I'm past that now...
Fish and Chips...basically beer battered cod and curly fries...savior of the meal. Beautifully done piece of cod...flaky, flavorful and held it's texture nicely. Fried just right, not too airy, actually a little crisp with the batter...would agree w/ their menu assessment from Charlotte magazine saying it's the best...especially since they can't compare to Big Ben's anymore. Fries were like anywhere else's...at least the ketchup was salty.
I guess I was just shocked based on other experiences/reviews on Yelp.
Cheers!
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