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| - Ruby Watchco is like a blast from the past. The food is cooked with old-school, tired culinary techniques straight out a Julia Child or "The Joy of Cooking" cookbook. The ambiance follows suite. The music is a kitschy selection of tired 60's to 80's tunes. This is the sort of dining experience you would expect to find on an old episode of "The Love Boat" or a 1980 wedding party. Case and point: there is a set menu every night. No options, exchanges or substitutions. Also, the ingredients are meager. It's as if they are trying to serve a large group of diners on a minimal budget. The prix-fixe is $54 per person, which is highway robbery for what you get. See details below.
1st course - NIAGARA CONCORD GRAPE SALAD
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Rating: 3/5
The small portion of salad to share between two diners was not nearly large enough. The salad was OK, but made with minimal effort. The hyped-up marinated grapes tasted like regular grapes. Almonds were a cheap substitute to a more appropriate nut. The salad was screaming for a little goat cheese or blue cheese but why would you, when you try to minimize on expenses. The dressing was a tired old "Brown Derby" dressing. Like I said: blast from the past. Still, the salad was the highlight of the night. Things kept getting progressively worse.
Main course - RUBY ROASTED CHICKEN
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Rating: 1/5
First of all, chicken - of all proteins - screams low budget. Even at a wedding, you'd be embarrassed to serve such a cheap protein. And yet, that would have been excused, had they done justice to the humble bird. Instead, the meat was over-cooked. The flavors where tired and pedestrian. Each diner got a quarter chicken, not impressive considering the price of $54 per person. Hardly a good value for your money. There were 3 sides. One side was 6 stems of broccoli, which tasted burnt. It was advertised on the menu as Anna's best brocolli. I don't know who Anna is (and I'm not sure I really care) but if that's her best brocolli, I don't care to try her regular offering. A second side was a handful of cubed, baked celery root. Like I said - minimal cost. The third side was a carrot salad that was surprisingly good (with a little kick of jalapeno.) Overall, the main was a big flop. If you had ordered a $10 whole roast chicken from your local rotisserie, you'd have a much better meal that could feed a family of 4.
Cheese course - "ARTISANAL" CHEESE
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Rating: 1/5
There was nothing artisianal about this simple piece of cheddar! Balderson cheddar would have been just as good. Plus, the piece was embarrassingly small for two diners. The plum puree was wonky and the hazelnuts made no sense. The raisin puree was blah.
Dessert - CHEF LORA'S CHOCOLATE CAKE
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Rating: 1/5
Like Anna (the aforementioned, famed broccoli lady), I'm not sure I care for the name of the chef who made my cake. What I do care is that it was a plain piece of brownie with no redeeming quality. There was a comical smear of egg white froth, slightly charred with a burner. How 80's can you get? Another desert was a chunk of old school meringue. Why people in the 70's-80's chose to eat this Styrofoam, I do not know. Needless to say, we didn't waste our calories on the deserts.
Where is the love?
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