Dinner at Casablanca
Aug. 23rd, 2006 10:00 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
drwexLast night we went to dinner at Casablanca Restaurant in Harvard Square.
It was good food, at... well, Harvard Square prices.
We'd wanted to try at least one place for Restaurant Week, which is actually two weeks this year. Last Tuesday's excursion was aborted by babysitter failure, so we tried again this week. Same bat-place.
Unfortunately for us, le menu had changed from last week and neither of us were particularly taken with the offerings for this week so we ordered off the standard menu.
I had a pea soup with a shredded herbed crab salad in place of the usual pork, and a seared duck breast with accompanying duck-and-fruit confit + spinach. I thought the pea soup was good, but too bland. The crab made a good strong flavor contrast but there was too little of it (a couple tablespoons) to sustain a full bowl. The duck was good and I appreciated the choice of red grapes in place of a sweeter fruit in the sauce. The breast slices were cross-cut after cooking, which gave them a different texture than one usually gets from duck.
Pygment had a venison cube-cut and pan-seared to a nice uniform pink, with some unknown greens and a strong mushroom risotto underlayer. She started with a stuffed mussels appetizer. We both felt that the mussel stuffing overwhelmed the actual mussels. The venison was quite nice, but I felt it was too bland without the mushroom sauce. It also had a cranbetry relish that worked well. Pygment liked the risotto; I'm not a big fan of risotto in general, but this was OK.
We tried another Chilean Merlot and while it was better than the Australian Shiraz I tried and the California Pinot our waitress recommended, I didn't think it was as good as the one we had at Gargoyle's.
The portions were ample and we ended up feeling too full for dessert, despite being quite hungry when we started. Service was prompt, attentive, and generally good though I was disappointed that they didn't have anyone who knew the wines well enough to advise me. At least they let me sample for myself.
I'm a huge fan of the movie Casablanca and was slightly disappointed that the restaurant didn't have more of the feel. There was one big mural but that was about it.
Overall, three stars out of five. Not likely to go back soon.
Getting a dinner out with one's sweetie is nice, though sadly rare enough that![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
buxom_bey exclaimed "You're together!" when she saw us both at Diesel.
It was good food, at... well, Harvard Square prices.
We'd wanted to try at least one place for Restaurant Week, which is actually two weeks this year. Last Tuesday's excursion was aborted by babysitter failure, so we tried again this week. Same bat-place.
Unfortunately for us, le menu had changed from last week and neither of us were particularly taken with the offerings for this week so we ordered off the standard menu.
I had a pea soup with a shredded herbed crab salad in place of the usual pork, and a seared duck breast with accompanying duck-and-fruit confit + spinach. I thought the pea soup was good, but too bland. The crab made a good strong flavor contrast but there was too little of it (a couple tablespoons) to sustain a full bowl. The duck was good and I appreciated the choice of red grapes in place of a sweeter fruit in the sauce. The breast slices were cross-cut after cooking, which gave them a different texture than one usually gets from duck.
Pygment had a venison cube-cut and pan-seared to a nice uniform pink, with some unknown greens and a strong mushroom risotto underlayer. She started with a stuffed mussels appetizer. We both felt that the mussel stuffing overwhelmed the actual mussels. The venison was quite nice, but I felt it was too bland without the mushroom sauce. It also had a cranbetry relish that worked well. Pygment liked the risotto; I'm not a big fan of risotto in general, but this was OK.
We tried another Chilean Merlot and while it was better than the Australian Shiraz I tried and the California Pinot our waitress recommended, I didn't think it was as good as the one we had at Gargoyle's.
The portions were ample and we ended up feeling too full for dessert, despite being quite hungry when we started. Service was prompt, attentive, and generally good though I was disappointed that they didn't have anyone who knew the wines well enough to advise me. At least they let me sample for myself.
I'm a huge fan of the movie Casablanca and was slightly disappointed that the restaurant didn't have more of the feel. There was one big mural but that was about it.
Overall, three stars out of five. Not likely to go back soon.
Getting a dinner out with one's sweetie is nice, though sadly rare enough that
buxom_bey exclaimed "You're together!" when she saw us both at Diesel.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2006-08-23 07:24 pm (UTC)Elayna's getting near the babysitter age. She's not quite there yet. We'll have her take the standard babysitter CPR course they generally have at places like the YMCA.
no subject
Date: 2006-08-23 10:48 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-08-23 10:55 pm (UTC)Is yours in sixth grade now, or seventh?
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Date: 2006-08-23 10:57 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-08-23 11:00 pm (UTC)We must introduce our kids when I get up there. :)
no subject
Date: 2006-08-23 11:02 pm (UTC)