Friday, March 28, 2008

Date night! Restaurant Review: Trois

On Wednesday evening, Hubby and I went on a theater date to see "Avenue Q," which is, essentially, a Sesame Street-type musical for grownups. It's absolutely hysterical but not for those who are easily shocked, as you can tell with the opening number, "It sucks to be me." You also learn that "It's okay to be gay," "When you love a man, you may want to kill him," and "The internet is for..." Well, let's just say it's not for reading fascinating wine blogs. There are also puppets engaging in rather bawdy activities after getting smashed on Long Island Iced Teas, which is quite the feat considering that there really isn't anything to them below the waist.

Of course a nice evening at the theater requires a good dinner beforehand, and Hubby requested that we go to Trois because he's heard me rave about it after having attended profession-related dinners there. We started off in the bar downstairs, where he had Oban (single-malt Scotch) and I had a glass of prosecco. Unfortunately, Trois has not updated their menu or wine list online, so I can't say exactly what I had to drink, just that the wines I had are not on the older menus.

Upstairs in the restaurant itself, we opted for meals from the pre-theater menu, which is a prix fixe, three-course meal. For our starters, we both got the warm bucheron, which is essentially a mixed green salad with frisee and watercress with a slice of warm French cheese, apricots, nougatine, an with a balsamic reduction drizzled on top. All the flavors worked well together, although the nougatine made me fear for my teeth. For dinner, I had the skate wing, which was stuffed with bread crumbs and herbs, pan-seared, and served with haricots verts with almonds and a brown butter sauce. All the flavors and textures worked really well together and went nicely with the pinot noir the server recommended, which is also not on the online menu. Hubby had the beef bourguignone, which was also really good. He got the Selby Syrah, which I remember because we belong to their wine club. That wine was excellent and paired well with the beef.

Then came dessert, which was the highlight of the meal. Baked chocolate mousse with vanilla bean ice cream and some sort of caramel, all served with chocolate sauce. Wow. It was the best dessert I've had in a long time, and I eat a lot of dessert.

Score card:
Atmosphere: Very nice, trendy modern
Food: Very good
Wine list: Nice selection of glasses and bottles
Wait staff: Excellent and knowledgeable
Desserts: Excellent
Vegetarian friendly? Probably not
Kid friendly? No kid's menu -- please don't bring them here!
Would I go back? Definitely

No comments: