The waiter was attentive but not in the least bit overbearing. Our glasses were never empty (water/wine) and the dishes were brought out gradually to allow for more dinner conversation. This was by far the best meal I’ve had since moving here (probably the best all year).  One of my favorite dishes was the tarte tatin of caramelized onion and goat cheese. Absolutely out of this world! A roasted red onion on a flaky tart, topped with a dollop or two of goat cheese-how could that not be delicious?

The mood lighting was spot on so I was only able to snap a picture of a cocktail or two. Check out this little number…

lychee martini

There weren’t any REAL shockers in this article but I would be interested to see if #2 works effectively, who thinks to freeze mashed up avocado?  #4 seemed the most creative, since avocados are high in fat it makes sense that they would be good in baking, maybe I’ll put that on my kitchen to do list.

Here’s a few that I came up with:

Salad Ingredient- Dice up avocado and toss them with citrus juice and poppy seeds.  I think orange works well here but lime, lemon, and grapefruit are all prime candidates.  Add the diced avocado to your next garden salad for some richness.  Staying on the salad theme you could also add avocado to make a creamy vinaigrette like Miz Emily shared with us last June- Orange Basil Dressing.

Sandwich Ingredient- I know this is old news but since I am an anti-mayo Crow, my new favorite substitute on a BLT is Avocado.  The key here is to use a mushier avocado and spread it on the bread rather then adding huge slices that fall off and add to the overall messiness of the sandwich.  You need to save room on the sandwich for the extra bacon as you can see in the picture below.  Note: this was constructed by my Man Crow who happens to love Mayo & Bacon.

Soup Topping: It’s common to add a dollop of sour cream on certain soups such as black bean or chicken tortilla but you can step it up a notch by pureeing avocado with sour cream or creme fraiche and adding a dollop of that!
Breakfast: Avocados and eggs are a match made in heaven whether you eat them on the side or stuffed in your breakfast burrito.  There is a brunch spot just around the corner from my apartment called Bon Savor that has the best options for omelets with avocado, check them out:
French Omelet Stuffed with fresh avocado, sautéed asparagus, tomatoes, and melted Swiss cheese
Richie Omelet Stuffed with fresh avocado, crispy bacon and melted Swiss cheese
It’s always so hard for me to decide between asparagus or bacon but the important description to pay attention to is the word “stuffed” because they pack atleast a half an avocado in each omelet.

Some of these ideas may or may not be new to you but if you are a lover of this delicious fruit (yes i checked on Wikipedia and it is indeed a fruit) then you probably share the belief that adding avocado to almost anything makes it better.

http://www.breadstuy.com/

Banana bread and hazelnut coffee

 Fair warning-they do not take reservations and are usually packed for dinner by 7:00pm.  Don’t get me wrong, the wait is probably worth it, but we weren’t in the mood to hang in Inman for an hour. After attempting to get dinner there once before, we decided that their brunch would be less crowded.

Brunch is only served on Sundays from 11:00am to 3:00pm, which is perfect for all those lazy 20-somethings like us. We meandered in around 2:30, just barely missing the closing cut-off.  Our waiter came by right after we were seated and brought us piping hot coffee and mason jars full of water (cute!). The restaurant is small and cozy with a bar on the right. The seats were especially comfortable and reminded me of the big tall chairs my grandmother forbidded us to ever sit on.

After only a few moments of glancing at the menu, we both knew what we wanted. Derek opted for the biscuits and gravy (a true Southerner) and I had the BBQ pulled beef (an interesting but delicious brunch choice).  The food was on the table in a blink of an eye- this was great because we were hungry, but kind of made me feel rushed and made me wonder how long my food had been sitting out waiting to be ordered (I admit the feeling of being rushed is often well-deserved when strolling into a restaurant half and hour before close, but our food was out before I got my mimosa!).

All pies on the desert menu are made at Petsi Pies, owned by Tupelo owner, Renee McLeod.  We had a big serving of the brown butter pecan pie with a side of ice cream (compliments to Toscanini’s!) The pie was drizzled with a rasperry sauce and topped with big juicy blackberries. It was the perfect end to a great meal.

So, as many of you many know last week was the seconded week of Boston’s singularly named Restaurant Week.  This is a time of year where Bostonians flood our most popular restaurant in droves and Chefs cry for mercy while they drain the city of booze in the after hours.  Last year my man crow and I skipped out on the semiannual running of the hungries, but this fall restraint was too much to ask, especially after I saw that North End hot-spot, Mare, was on the list.

Now, let me start with a disclaimer.  I know that you are never supposed to judge a restaurant based on a restaurant week meal.  The kitchen is over burdened, the chefs are board with the dishes that have been created more from price points than true inspiration.  The waitsaff is tired from two weeks of insanity.  I understand this.  However, this is a restaurants time to shine- to show that despite the conditions they can do good, even great,  work  and therefore expose themselves to an all new and interested clientele.  During this time it is the duty of the restaurant to put out a meal delicious enough to temp us back to cough up the full price in future, more peaceful times.   Mare simply did not achieve this.

My expectations were high of Mare.  Since living in Boston I have often passed by their quaint North End location with its chique blue and glass exterior and gazed enviously at the dining patrons.  To me, at least, Mare always seemed like the best of the North End’s modern Italian, and it has prices that indicate it deserves such accolades.  I was thrilled to see it on the Restaurant week list, excited to finally try a place I had been curious about for so long.

The disappointment started almost immediately.  Mare is small and crowded within an inch of its life, but I can excuse that as being typically authentic of the North End.  What I couldn’t excuse were the televisions (Is this TJI Fridays?)  posted in all four corners of the dining room that continuously played a tacky DVD showing aerialviews of Italy’s most famous locations.  It was almost as cheesy as the green lighting that decorated the back wall.  What had looked so clean and sophisticated from the outside looked downright tawdry within.    The service in general was very good throughout the meal, but we were sat without a copy of the restaurant week menu and had to ask for it from our server.

If you’re interested, you can peep the menu here. Looks good, right?  The man crow and I stated with a glass of Pinot and a glass of Prosecco (both yummy) and for our first courses chose the Maine Peekyote Crab Poloette, lemon caper ailoi, and bitter green salad and the thin crust pizzetta di mare with assorted seafood, fresh tomatine and parsley.   The Poloette’s were certainly the best part of the meal- crunchy on the outside and sweet and warm on the inside, but the “bitter green salad” was more of a garnish.  The Pizzetta was boring , with a bland sauce and unattractive presentation.  The seafood was fresh and good, but would have benefited from more seasoning.  Between the two of us, we had no desire to finish more than half of it.

For entrees, I chose the grilled rainbow trout, charred leeks, funghi trifolatwith whole grain mustard and ManCrow had the hand rolled ricotta gnudi, wagyu beef bolognese with shaved parmigiano.  The presentation of my trout was terrible- just a whole grilled trout on a plate with a leek on top.  No sauce, no garnish.  I didn’t even realize it was supposed to have had a mustard vinaigrette on it until I looked back at the menu.  All together it was nothing more impressive than I could have cooked at home with a trout and olive oil.  The braised leek was probably the best part of the entire dish.  ManCrow’s fancy-sounding fare was basically very dry cheese gnocchi with bolognese.  It was a very small portion with the most basic of presentation: past+sauce in a bowl.  (Remind me again why I’m paying for this?)  He claimed the small portion was made up for by the fact they the ricotta gnudi’s were little gut bombs, and then he complained about a stomach ache for the rest of the night and into this morning.

For desert, we both choose from the very limited menu, the tiramisu panna cotta with chocolate  truffle, brandy caramel sauce and savoiardi crumb.   It was merely mediocore (although probably the best course of the meal), but in the future I would point out that the flavors of tiramisu doesn’t exactly pair well with brandy caramel.  Also- the “savoiardi crumb?”  Literally, a crumb.   We left, my curiosity about Mare thoroughly quenched.  Unlike it’s examplary neighbor, Terrimia, who we visited for restaurant week a couple of years ago and which was so fantastic we’ve visited several times since, I can’t imagine ever going back to Mare.   The meal was still drastically overpriced for what we got, and had we had been paying full price, I would have been furious.  This is one location this crow will be unlikely to fly to again.

Their coffee is great, their sandwiches look (haven’t tried them yet!) wonderful and you have to try their strata- absolutely spectacular!

www.ulacafe.com

The Boston Crows  got a girls night out last week in celebration of Riane’s visit, and boy did we do it up!  Mo, Holly and I have been simply dying to try out relatively-new hot spot Drink for what feels like ages, and this finally afforded us the opportunity.  Located in the rarely visited Fort Point neighborhood of Boston, Drink did not disappoint.  The drinks were exciting and original, the munchies were delicious and the bartenders were friendly and attentive.  We were in Crow Heaven.

Owned by Chef Barbara Lynch, the proprietor of several fabulous locations around these parts, Drink is a pretty unique concept- it is a cocktail bar without a cocktail menu.  All drinks are made custom to the taste of the drinker; you tell the bar tender what you like (example: fruity, clear liquors, with some fizz) and they whip something up.  If you don’t like it- no big deal- they’ll make you another.  There are a few “suggestion” drinks listed on a blackboard behind the bar, but they were inconspicuous enough that we didn’t even notice the list until round three.

The environment itself is warm and comforting- 3  long wooden bars with brick walls and perfectly low lighting.  Behind the bars it is mostly sterile stainless steel and stone- not a single booze bottle or mixer in sight.  Only several glasses filled with garnishes and basic bartending tools can be seen by the patrons.  The bartender’s dapper attire gives some indication of their skill- even the barbacks were in vests and ties!

We wanted to try as much as we could and between the four of us we came close to succeeding.  Mo and I started off with two vodka and champagne cocktails- hers topped off with house-made grenadine and mine with their homemade raspberry syrup.  Holly and Riane went the gin cocktail route (Holly’s was a gin and grapefruit concoction)  and after the first sips we knew we were off to a great start.

Of course, it being dinnertime and all, the crows needed to munch.  Drink has a small menu of  snacky items to compliment their cocktails.  Everything sounded delicious, and everything was reasonably priced at under $15.oo.  We wanted to try it all but finally settled on bacon wrapped dates ($9), french friens with a lemon aoli ($6?), the house cheese plate (which came with a hard and a soft cheese, citrus marmalade, a portion of salted nuts and baguette, $12) and a plate of cheesy puff pastry bites (only $2!!!!!!!!).  Everything was as satisfying as promised and we mowed down while we watched our lovely and attentive bartender prepare our second round.

Honestly, I get a little blurry on the particulars after this point, but I know that there were more drinks and that they were amazing.  After conducting a survey of the crows, here are some of the highlights:

• A Dark and Stormy, made with Drink’s housemade (and spicy!) ginger beer
• A Bee’s Knees; you could taste the fresh honey
• Cucumber and Hendrick’s gin with grenadine
• A Pink Lady- made with a raw egg white (good until it got warm)
• a play on a whiskey sour
• Dueling tequila drinks: one that was margarita-esque and one that tasted almost like tequila on the rocks but with a stronger smokey flavor.  (This is when it starts to get blurry)

All together, we had an amazing time at Drink, and although it was a bit to pricy to become a regular crow perch, we all agreed that the bill was very reasonable considering the damage done and the high level of service and skill that we got. (Side note:  I would highly recommend coming to drink on a weeknight as apparently it gets super crowded on the weekends, and the personal attention we got on a Tuesday was half the fun.)  Drink sets the bar so high it will be tough to find another cocktail establishment we like as much, but if you know of any, please leave suggestions in the comments!

For more information on Drink, check out the following article on boston .com: here

Instead of the usual bread and butter to start, our waitress gave us homemade bagel chips and an herb cream cheese. I ordered a corned beef Reuben (yum) and Derek got the BBQ grilled chicken sandwich.  My sandwich was a little on the dry side; I usually like a bit more Russian dressing on my Reubens but the meat was so flavorful and cut so thin that I couldn’t stop eating it long enough to ask for more dressing.

The meal was just fine but I couldn’t help but feel like I was eating at a diner-only more expensive. Our two sandwiches (mine with potato salad and his with french fries) came to just under $30. Glad we decided not to order beers!

Next time I’ll throw down the extra $2 and get an entree.

I should have taken Anthony Bourdain’s advice and skip the bread and potatoes and focus right in on the meat but i couldn’t deny my love for carbs, especially dipped in delicious meat juices.  We ate ourselves into a food coma and ended up leaving Anotonio’s with an ungodly portion of pork.  We ended our New Bedford experience with a trip to Lydia’s Bakery for some much needed coffee and sweets.

The next morning i had a revelation on what I should do with my leftover mountain of pork: make one of my favorite sandwiches, the Cubano.  I waited a day, then shredded up the pork, chopped my lettuce, tomato, onion and pickles and created an assembly line.

My man crow and I each made two Cubano’s each- one for dinner and one for lunch the following day at work.  Since we both have different preferences, mine being extra pickles and mustard- hold the mayo, and his being extra pork and mayo- hold the mustard, we decided to construct our own.  My kitchen lacks a panini press so i had to brainstorm an alternative.  This is how you construct a make shift panini press: heat olive oil in a large skillet, add the Cubanos, spray the top of the sandwiches with extra virgin olive oil spray, place a layer of aluminum foil over them then top that with a smaller skillet.  To weigh it all down and achieve the “press” put a tea kettle full of water on the top skillet.  The set up is not visually appealing  but it does the job!

Finished Product served w/ a simple slaw

Not only does this little restaurant boast a live bluegrass band on the weekends from 11:30-4:30 but all brunch selections come with a free drink (mimosa, bloody mary, soda or juice). Pretty sweet, huh? I suggest the brandy-soaked baked french toast or the croque madame. If you’re ever in the area, I definitely suggest checking it out-just make sure you get a reservation. Our party of four waited over 45 minutes to be seated!!