Last Supper in Nashville

I'm almost caught up.

It was our last night in Nashville and I thought that we would try the restaurant recommended to us for lunch, South Street. I found their website on-line and it looked like a dangerous place to eat, it was expensive and I wanted everything on the menu. I also knew that this restaurant was highly rated on Tripadvisor.com. The only knock I saw was that parking was limited. Boy was that prophetic.

We found the place and it was tiny. And there was absolutely no parking. We circled the restaurant once looking for a place to park but after that I said let's go somewhere else. When we go out to eat we will often call out a back up in case our first choice is packed or closed. Our back up was Stoney River. At the time I did not know that it was a chain, but it's not like we have one where we live. Again, this restaurant had great reviews on Tripadvisor and was called out as the steak place for locals, as good as the upper crust places like Ruth's Chris or Morton's but at a discount.

We found the place no problem, walked in and immediately I was stressed. The place was dark, overbearing and stuffy. Clearly most of the tables were business dinners so everyone was dressed up and we were quite casual. The hostesses were not friendly. But, Rose was famished; there was no turning back.

Now ordinarily I do not let appearances at restaurants get to me. One of my all time favorite restaurants is Cargo Portside in Brunswick GA which I'd put up against this steakhouse or any fancy restaurant in the big cities like Chicago and New York. I'd get there early wearing shorts and a t-shirt, earrings in both ears and sunglasses on. I'd sit out front, smoke a $20 cigar, sip on a glass of Shiraz and read the paper while they got my table ready. When my table was ready, I'd snuff out my cigar, follow the hostess in and walk through the glares of the local South Georgia elite as I was shown to my table. I'd get the appetizer special, the dinner special and often the desert special. I drop close 10 a hundred bucks and I'd probably tip 25%. My point is that my money spent the same, and to the restaurant and staff probably better than the elite locals. I don't think we should judge the book by the cover, mostly.

Maybe my problem at this restaurant was that we did not have a children's menu. There was nothing but $40 steaks, lobsters, fancy French preparations. Dinah and I are frantically trying to find something to feed to Rose that we know she will eat since we know she was starving. I said something to our waitress about how hard this was since they didn't have a children's menu. "Oh we have one, the hostess didn't give you one?" All of a sudden the dinner dramatically improved. I relaxed. I think Dinah relaxed. I looked around and noticed a few other people more casual than the business class. The dim lights seemed a little brighter. Deep breath.

I'm sure you can guess what I ordered. That's right, another ribeye and Caesar salad with anchovies. It's been a good week. Both were excellent, on par with what I had at Sal's in Lexington but still not as good as the Chicago Prime at Malone's. I don't remember what Dinah and Rose ordered. I think they both ordered shrimp of some sort. Rose's was huge butterflied and fried and Dinah's was spicy?

For desert we got the Chocolate Fudge Cake. There needs to be a disclaimer here. It's a Blondie with ice cream and fudge sauce and candied pecan pieces. How they get away calling that a fudge cake is beyond me. That said, it is eyes-roll-back-into-your head-good. Skip the restaurant ambiance, go for lunch and get this dessert.

Hotel Food and More

From Maryville we headed to Lexington KY to see my folks. We are not from Kentucky nor do my parents live there. My Mom is sometimes wheelchair bound and Columbus is a long drive from Blairsville so my Mom wanted us to meet in the middle. So Lexington it was. All the time leading up to it my Mom complained and fretted that Lexington would suck, there was nothing to do and the hotel would be horrible.

We had a great time.

I've been accused my whole life of being a pessimist. Still don't understand that.

Anyway, Mom booked rooms at a Marriott resort outside of Lexington. The rooms were nothing spectacular but they were nice. They had an expensive breakfast buffet, though I've had more expensive ones, much, much more, while working the past 10 years. It was typical of some Holiday Inns and Embassy Suites. The bacon was better than average. But they had an incredible fresh fruit bar. Absolutely perfect blueberries, humongous blackberries, deep yellow pineapple and three different melons, cantaloupe, honey dew and watermelon (two of which I don't eat). Oh yeah, ripe strawberries too. They also had a phenomenal hash brown casserole. Two things made it special. One, it was peppery. They did not use a light hand on the pepper. Two, crisp, toasty melted cheese on top. Mmmmmm. Those were two excellent breakfasts in Lexington.

The first night my Mom was recommended to eat at Malone's. And again the fretting over would it be any good. "You just never know what your going to get from someones recommendation." She had us look at restaurant descriptions in the travel booklet. My Dad and I were both up for Billy's Bar-B-Q but Mom wanted something nicer. Finally I said that since we didn't know the area, let's just go with the recommendation of Malone's.

It was about a 10 minute drive and we were running late which made me more than anxious. We also thought we were lost but Dinah called while we were en route and smoothed it all out. Nice place. Mom said it was EXACTLY what she had in mind. I thought it was a little pricey, but what Mom wants, Mom gets. I'm not complaining though.

Dinah and I shared some excellent PEI mussels while my Dad ordered some calamari as an appetizer. The calamari was OK for my tastes. I prefer the leg ends and this was just rings. I was thrilled to be able to get a Caesar salad with real anchovies on top. Oh so good. They had fresh bread with a creamy garlic butter on the table. I can't count how much bread Rose ate.

While I stuck with water with lemon since I was driving, Dinah order a local beer from Lexington, Alltech's Kentucky Ale. She deemed it pretty good. As a follow up she tried what was billed as the very popular Kentucky Bourbon Barrel Ale. This she found repulsive after one sip! I tried it and it tastes just like bourbon. If you like bourbon, this is your beer. I however was not in the mood for bourbon, nor am I a big fan of bourbon, so we just let that glass sit for the rest of the evening.

Dinah got the seared Ahi tuna appetizer for her dinner. It was thinly sliced the way I prefer it. I stole a piece and can attest to its wonderfulness. Mom got some kind of surf and turf, two shrimp stacked on top of a crab cake stacked on top of a Filet Mignon. My Dad and I both treated ourselves to thirty dollar ribeyes. Hey, Mom was buying. I had never thought that "Prime beef from Chicago" ever meant anything that special. I was wrong. My Dad and I both agreed it was the best steak either of us had ever eaten. And we've eaten a couple cows between us in our lifetimes.

Now if you are going to have a fancy dinner like this, you have to have dessert. Rose and Dad had ice cream. Dinah had a creme brule, her favorite but I can't remember what flavor it was. I ordered the chocolate chip cookie. It is worth driving to Lexington to get this cookie. The cookie was about an inch thick, six inches across, hot, half baked in the middle, with a scoop of vanilla ice cream on top and a slight drizzle of chocolate sauce. If it doesn't bring you to orgasm with the first bite it will at least make your eyes roll back.

My God it was a great meal, perfect too because unbeknownst to my parents it was our six year anniversary. Mom kept going on about how she thought it was the following week. I just bit my tongue; that was the last one. As an added bonus, Rose stayed with Grandma and Grandpa, so we were able to continue to celebrate our anniversary with a few drinks at the hotel bar before retiring to our room for a child free night!

A friend of mine once asked, why is hotel sex better? I don't know it just is.

Beef about Beer

Yesterday was a complete loss since I was recovering from a sleep study. I never sleep during one of those. OK, not never, I got 3 hours of sleep. Thus, no post yesterday. Right now I'm resting a little after working in the garden this morning. More on that later, I've still got a little catching up to do.

My neurologist appointment was Friday, May 1st and after that I considered myself on vacation. The next day, Saturday, we headed to Maryville TN to visit some friends for the evening before we headed on to Lexington to visit with my folks.

Maryville had been described to be as being in the sticks. Hah! Blairsville is 650 people, that's the sticks. When you have malls, Target, and every chain restaurant you can think of, you aren't in the sticks. We don't have that many options here in Blaisville for dinner so we were a little excited about dinner. Cinda suggested Texas Roadhouse. GREAT! We don't have one and for a popular chain restaurant's steak, they are one of the better places to go.

Now I have to admit upfront that I do have a history of messing with wait staff. I will tease, flirt, poke fun. All in good taste and good fun though. I'm never mean or rude and if you play along, you will get a better tip.

This night we took two cars because we didn't have enough seats to accommodate Rose's car seat. So Adam drove me in one car and Cinda drove Dinah and Rose in our car. Bonus time! We both get to drink! So taking advantage of the situation I was aiming for a beer or three.

Our waitress came to the table, asked what I wanted and I asked what did they have on tap? She paused. She paused a little too long. So I said, wait, let me guess, the usuals, Bud, Bud Light, Miller, Miller Lite, Coor Light, Mic Ultra, Sam Adams and one other. Big smile.

At this point she got pissy. No, that's not what we have, we have Budweiser, Miller High Life, Yuengling. Stop, give me a Yuengling. I looked at everyone, did she not just list the same beers I listed? Just because you say Budweiser it is still the same as saying Bud. I DO NOT need some 17 year old high school priss getting pissy with me about beer. Please, I went to school in Wisconsin. And after that, our quality of service dramatically decreased. She was polite the rest of the evening except to me. Whatever. She didn't get 25% tip that night. Her loss.

My ribeye was excellent by the way. Little did I know it would be only the first of many ribeyes that week. :)