Carla Maria Dubis Tedeschi
Google
Came all the way from Tarpon Springs to meet friends for dinner and it was a great experience and definitely worth the one hour and ten minute trip.
Service was excellent. I don’t remember our waitress name but this five star review is in part thanks to her and the rest of the team.
The drink and cocktail menu is excellent. If you’re a wine lover they have a nice selection.
I decided to go with the espresso Martini and it was truly delicious!
For appetizers we had a beautiful and delicious charcuterie board, all meats and cheeses were fabulous. But the bread wasn’t much of a hit. Something with a nicer crunchy crust would have made it a lot better.
The Octopus was to die for, I will come back just for this amazing dish. As someone who has traveled a lot to Europe and now lives in Tarpon, Octopus is one of my favorites but it’s really hard to get it done the right way and this was truly remarkable! Kudos to the chef.
We ordered the Mussels and my friends enjoyed it, and we just wished there were a couple more slices of the crunchy toasted bread that came with this dish!
For main course we had the filet mignon, the pork, and the Chilean sea bass and as sides we had the Mac and cheese, mushrooms and a peach and cheese salad.
The filet was the perfect medium rare.
The pork, even though my friend asked for it medium well, it came as medium to medium rare… she took a few bites and took the rest home but didn’t want to send it back even though I could tell she wasn’t happy with how pink it was. For some pork should be always cooked well done and she may have taken it home to cook later because she took a to go box with it.
My sea bass was the only disappointing part of the meal. The presentation was not what I expected… but the flavors were also a little strange… a little too on the salty side for me, but I think I’m used to Chilean sea bass cooked with a crispier skin and sweeter flavors…
But it wasn’t just the fact it was a whole style of cooking, but there was a huge puddle of water at the bottom where the medley of veggies rested… I don’t know where all this water came from… but i would have enjoyed it more had the fish came in a bigger plate, dry seasoned veggies on the bottom and a crispy skin yet moist Chilean sea bass was on top…it was just an interesting taste… but again, not sure where all that oily salty water came from or if it was supposed to look like that. Obviously one review won’t change your recipe, but Chilean Seabass is such a great quality fish and I felt it could have been done with more finesse when served.
Mac and cheese was scrumptious and delicious and we ate every bite.
Mushrooms were good, but some seamed coated with gravy and others seemed as if they were thrown last minute without seasoning so we had to mixed them up with the rest to have them coated in the sauce.
The cheese and peach salad was a big no no for all of us in the party… very aromatic, almost like eating a scented candle, but the aroma wasn’t the issue… the cheese, which I sssumed it was burrata it was extremely soggy and watery… again, another dish that we had high hopes for but it just missed the mark a bit. I know Burrata is very liquid when cut, I understand that… if maybe was left whole and we cut it in the table and mixed it w the peaches and herbs may have been a better experience and presentation …but big kudos to our amazing waitress that came every time to check on us and noticed nobody touched the salad much at all, asked what was wrong, patiently and kindly heard our comments about how watery and soggy it was and she immediately offered to take it off the menu without us asking at all if it was possible to do so.
Overall it was an amazing experience and a beautiful place …but whenever I go back I’ll have to skip the seafood entrees and stick to octopus, meat and Mac and cheese!
We were full so we didn’t get dessert, but next time for sure!