Hamersley's Bistro Review

Overall rating: 92

Food rating: 93

Hamersley's Bistro: Wonderful South End restaurant with meals that range from very good to great

We go to Hamersley's several times a year, but somehow I haven't gotten around to reviewing it.

Hamersley's is in the South End, which means parking can be a hassle if you don't want to pay to valet park. I know lots of people who rarely head to the South End for this reason, but Hamersley's makes it worth the trip.

The interior at Hamersley's is quite large with most seats in the main dining area providing a view of the open kitchen. The atmosphere is fairly upscale and formal, and people are dressed anywhere from casual to suits and ties.The noise level is moderate; certainly not to loud to have a conversation at a table for four. The waitstaff are typically helpful and ready to make suggestions.

That said, we find eating indoors at Hamersley's can be a bit stuffy at times, and in good weather we always try to eat at one of their outdoor tables next to a small park looking out onto Tremont St. This is just a beautiful location for dinner, both inviting and romantic.

Unfortunately, winter approaches, so we were eating indoors tonight. Gordon Hamersley was front and center cooking in the kitchen.

We ordered a couple of specialty cocktails: a pomegranate cosmopolitan and a "Green Mountain Manhattan made with maple syrup. The cosmopolitan was too sweet, and the flavors in the Manhattan were only okay.

Bread was served that was good but not great tonight. The bread selection can vary, and sometimes the breads are wonderful.

The menu varies seasonally. For an appetizer, I got a curried acorn squash and apple soup served with smoked shrimp. There was Greek yogurt and some green herbs to mix in. This had an interesting and unusual flavor and was very good.

For an entree, I got a special: a veal osso buco (yes, sorry about that) that was excellent. My wife got the pan-roasted lobster with chickpeas, couscous, and spinach that was great. It comes with a spicy sauce that the waiter strongly hinted she should get on the side rather than mixed in and that seemed like the right choice since it overwhelmed the other wonderful flavors on any bite it was added to. We got a side dish of Brussels sprouts with apples and walnuts that was also great.

For dessert, my wife got the pot de creme, which she thought was delicious though seemed less interesting to me. I got the apple upside down cake with maple walnut ice cream, which was incredibly good.

Before tip, the meal (including two drinks and a glass of wine) was $165. This was a lot of food. I have had better meals at Hamersley's but various dishes were really great. The food came extremely quickly, which made things feel a bit rushed, though this seems to have been caused mainly by our snapping up one of the last two orders of the osso buco.

If you haven't been there and like fish (or even if you're only lukewarm on fish), I'd suggest getting the spicy halibut. I've gotten this many times, and it is always amazing. Hamersley's is also known for their roast chicken, which lets you see what a great chef can do with roast chicken but still never seems as interesting to me as some of the other dishes.

Overall, Hamersley's provides a reliably excellent meal, and sometimes the food is just incredibly good. So, if you're willing to brave parking in the South End, this is really a great place to go.

Puritan & Company

Overall rating: 82

Food rating: 84

Puritan & Company: Good food in Inman Square

We've been to Puritan & Company twice now, and the food has been consistently good on both visits. Like most of the other restaurants we seem to end up at, it serves locally sourced modern American cuisine.

The restaurant is in Inman Square and the dining area has a fairly open floor plan, but is so dimly lit that I needed the light from my smartphone to read the menu. The noise level is quite high, but we were given seating at a table near the corner of a bench that allowed us to sit next to each other and this made for a reasonably intimate dining and conversation experience. However, at many other tables we'd have been across from each other and been raising our voices to be heard.

Our waiter was knowledgeable and helpful in selecting food and wine (they serve wine and beer, but not mixed drinks). I had ordered a white wine on his recommendation and he brought a second wine for me to compare, which I ended up choosing, though this was a bit of an unmentioned upsell as that wine was significantly more expensive (though worth it).

Excellent dinner rolls were served with butter. We ordered an appetizer of wild mushrooms served with an egg, arugula, garlic and a thin slice of smoked brioche. This was quite good.

For an entree, I ordered a special: sablefish, served over some greens and a lemony beurre blanc. This was tasty though the portion was fairly small. My wife ordered the other special: a rib eye steak that had been aged in-house and served with hen of the woods mushrooms and celery root. This was also quite good, though we were told it would come medium rare and it was actually very rare.

We didn't get dessert.

Overall it was a good meal at a fairly standard price. We know some people who are really high on Puritan & Company, but while we've enjoyed two meals there, we haven't loved them. Also in Inman Square, though a completely different style of food, Oleana is much better and more interesting at a similar price. A short drive from Puritan & Company and serving similar cuisine is Bergamot, which we think has better food, has larger portions, is somewhat less noisy, and, with their nightly prix fixe, is less expensive. However, Puritan & Company has its own styles and flavors and should be worth a visit.

51 Lincoln Review

Overall rating: 79

Food rating: 79

51 Lincoln: Pretty good, but better food available in the neighborhood

Continuing our trend with Lineage of going back to a restaurant we'd been to once in the distant past, we ate for a second time at 51 Lincoln. We'd been there years ago and had thought it was overpriced for what it offered, but have been hearing good things and thought we should give it another try.

51 Lincoln is in Newton Highlands and like many other restaurants reviewed on this blog features creative preparations of mostly locally sourced foods.

The restaurant includes a bar area with a TV showing sports that is pretty well separated off from the dining area. We had early reservations and despite the restaurant being mostly empty were initially given seats directly in the line of wind gusts when the outside door opened. The hostess was happy to reseat us when asked.

We started out with drinks, ordering a "scarlet martini" that we both thought was excellent. (Later, I ordered an inexpensive Riesling that was awful.) Bread was served with two dips: an interesting tasting hummus, and a tomato/chili. The bread was good and the dips were very good.

For appetizers, we got a poached pear salad, and the preparation of the pears, with a tangy/spicy vinaigrette was excellent. We also got a braised beef ragout served with polenta that was also very good.

If the meal had stopped at this point, we would have concluded we'd been overly harsh in our opinion of 51 Lincoln in the past.

For entrees, we got mahi mahi and chicken under a brick. The preparation of the mahi mahi (pan seared, with roasted butternut squash, oyster beurre blanc, butternut squash chips, fennel and golden beet salad) sounded wonderful but was pretty standard and dull and the mahi mahi was a bit overcooked. The chicken under a brick (chive buttermilk biscuit, chanterelle mushroom ragout, carrot puree) was similarly better on the menu than on the plate where it was pretty dull, though the mushroom ragout went well with the biscuit.

For dessert we got a special: a bread pudding made with mission figs and covered with dark chocolate sauce. This was tasty, but again not nearly as inspired as it sounded.

One definite plus to our visit was the waitress. When my wife asked whether to get the chicken under a brick, or the much more expensive ribeye, she did not try to steer her to the more profitable meal. She also quickly removed the awful wine and didn't charge us for it.

The cost of the meal (with four drinks) and before tip was about $158. Sycamore, about two miles away from 51 Lincoln is similarly priced, has equally good drinks, and the food is tastier and more interesting, and Farmstead Table near Sycamore is somewhat less expensive and also has better food overall.

Unlike with our reassessment after eating at Lineage, I doubt we'll be heading back to 51 Lincoln anytime soon.

Lineage Review

Overall rating: 83

Food rating: 85

Lineage: Good food in Coolidge Corner

We first went to Lineage a number of years ago, and I remember thinking the waitress serving us seemed overly snooty for the quality of the food. We didn't go back for a long time, but recently my wife wanted to try Lineage again as she recalled enjoying the food a fair bit.

On this recent second visit, our waiter was friendlier and more attentive, and the place had a reasonably welcoming feel. On a Saturday night it was a somewhat older crowd than I might have imagined, not that I should talk....

Lineage is just off Coolidge Corner in Brookline, and we had no trouble finding metered parking on a Saturday evening. The space is moderate, tables aren't too close to each other, and the noise level is fine, though for some reason it doesn't have a romantic date feel to it.

I started with a cocktail that our waiter said was their signature: the bee keeper; it was rye with honey, coriander, and lemon, and was nice enough but tasted mostly like a whiskey sour and so was not as interesting as the description. A later glass of wine was excellent for the price.

Dinner rolls were delicious, and I would happily have had a second had it ever been offered. For appetizers, I got an heirloom pumpkin soup that was extremely creamy and seemed as if it had some cheese in it (I wrote that and then went to their online menu and note that the cheese was pecorino, something I apparently hadn't noticed while ordering; it also had walnut oil drizzled on top). The soup was good, if something of an odd color. My wife got the lobster tacos (their signature appetizer, per our waiter, made with avocado mousse and mango salsa) and had two complaints: the lobster was disturbingly cold, and the mango wasn't quite ripe. By the time I tasted one of the tacos, it had warmed up a little, and I thought the preparation was delicious but for the under-ripe mango.

For an entree, I got monkfish, prepared with an eggplant/olive/amaranth accompaniment. The monkfish was tasty but just slightly overcooked. The accompaniment was extremely tasty and made the dish. My wife got the scallops with parsnip puree, pomegranate, and Brussels sprouts. The scallops were also slightly overcooked, but more importantly the whole dish while perfectly tasty was less interesting than many other scallop dishes we've eaten at good restaurants in and around Boston (where scallops are always on the menu).

We left before dessert as none of the ones on the menu sounded that interesting.

Overall, Lineage was better than I had remembered it and worse than my wife had remembered it. The food seemed appropriately priced for the quality, and the drinks were a good value. There are similar quality and value restaurants closer to us, but if I were eating in Coolidge Corner, Lineage seems like a nice option.

Bergamot Review

Overall rating: 88

Food rating: 88

Bergamot: Very good restaurant and a nice value

Bergamot is on the Somerville/Cambridge border, and since first going there a few years ago, we've headed back pretty regularly. They serve locally sourced foods that they describe as "progressive American", and are in the same general ballpark in terms of cuisine as a place like Craigie on Main but are less meat-centric and less likely to serve odd cuts. The food is not as intermittently amazing as what you can get at Craigie, but is typically reliable and tasty. Mixed drinks and wines are quite good and reasonably priced.

The location can be a bit hard to spot, but they have a small parking lot attached to the building complex where you can usually find a spot, and there is also free on street parking available. The dining room is airy and welcoming, and generally the acoustics make it possible to talk and listen.

On a recent visit, I had short rib ravioli for an appetizer. This was tasty but perhaps a bit under-seasoned. For an entree, I had sea breem that was cooked perfectly: light and flaky and with a crispy skin. Dessert was a "caramelized banana Bavarian", which was a deconstructed dessert as is typical of Bergamot. It was served with Chantilly and peanuts and was quite good.

Bread served with the dinner was excellent as usual, and they always serve interesting flavored butters for the bread. Service was helpful but not intrusive.

Bergamot has a prix fixe (appetizer, entree, dessert) every night for $39, and this is definitely a draw. It is probably the least expensive high quality food that you can get in the Boston area on a Friday or Saturday night.

All this said, I don't want to imply that this is a cheap restaurant with mediocre food -- it's one of the better restaurants in the Boston area. Meals there are consistently enjoyable. However, not far from Bergamot are places like Oleana, TW, Hungry Mother, and Craigie, all of which are more likely to wow you, but at a higher price point. Although the menu at Bergamot isn't large, there's enough variety that almost anyone looking for good food can eat there and have an enjoyable meal at a very reasonable price.

Ribelle Review

Overall rating: 93

Food rating: 94

(Note: Updated rating as of October 2014: Ribelle has gotten better and better, and is now has some of the best food in the Boston area.)

Ribelle: Great new restaurant from the chef at Strip T's

We've been waiting to go to Ribelle since we learned, slowly, that it was coming to Brookline. We'd initially had the impression that Strip T's was opening a branch in Brookline, but later learned that it was to be an Italian restaurant in Washington Square; that it was named Ribelle; and eventually that it was actually open and feeding people, though they currently seem to be trying to hide that last piece of information as they get up to speed. Even the link I've provided above is to their Twitter feed, since they don't yet have a web page. They have, however, been serving customers for about six weeks.

Tim Maslow, the son at Strip T's who returned from New York and reinvented his father's restaurant (that appears from outside and in to be a sports bar) with wonderful Asian-inspired flavors and recipes at reasonable prices, has now opened Ribelle.

Ribelle is much larger than  Strip T's, is more upscale, and has somewhat higher prices. It's in the location in Washington Square that was previously occupied by Tamarind Bay. It has an open floor plan with one long wall half occupied by the bar and the other half by the kitchen. Along the other wall are individual tables, and in the middle is a very long row of connected tables apparently to be used for communal seating.

We went early, having checked ahead of time whether they could provide food for a child, and arrived while they were nearly empty, but that quickly changed as they became quite full for a restaurant that's only barely announcing itself to be open for business.

Our waitress, who looked somewhat like -- and sounded a lot like -- Jodie Foster in Silence of the Lambs, was energetic, knowledgeable, and quite helpful in working through the menu, including offering my wife samples of two of the three house red wines (listed as 1, 2, and 3, and by characteristics rather than by name) so she could choose. The chosen wine was good as was a mixed drink, though neither was great for the price.

The menu is divided into Vegetables, Fish, and Meats, with each section running from smaller to larger dishes. Telling exactly what this means is assisted by the price of the item and by the wait staff. The menu is much smaller than at Myers+Chang, but the ordering experience is similar, as is the delivery where they prefer to have foods come out as they are ready, with the expectation they will be shared, rather than as courses.

We had a roasted carrot dish, sprinkled with chopped hazelnuts and buckthorn jam, and accompanied by a carrot puree. It was wonderful. A slice of thick toast with an egg in the center served with truffles was also great. Pasta with pickled mussels and chicken of the woods mushrooms was good but not amazing, though it was the only dish we had where the flavorings seemed similar to dishes you might get at Strip T's. A pasta dish with pork sausage, peppers, Swiss chard, and tomatoes was wonderful and spicy. A vegetable dish with peppers served in a broth was also quite good. A sliced Wagyu tritip steak dish was tasty but much tougher than I would have expected.

Several of the dishes had sauces or remnants that seemed to call for bread to mop them up. Bread was not automatically served, but when we asked, some thick lightly toasted white bread quickly appeared.

We also ordered a pasta dish with butter for our child, and it came in a creamy sauce that was wonderful. The waitress worked with us to come up with a vegetable side that would work, and we ended up with green beans prepared with oil and some garlic.This, too, was delicious, and we checked on the preparation in the hopes of imitating it so as to encourage more consumption of vegetables at home....

Portions were larger than we'd been expecting given the arrangement of the menu and the suggestion to try various "smaller" dishes; we had quite a lot of food in the end. Even the child's portions were very large, and we decided not to have dessert.

It's hard to be sure of a restaurant on one visit, particularly when the cooks and staff are still working kinks out, but overall this seems like another great restaurant from Tim Maslow. It was warm, friendly, and fun, and many of the dishes were wonderful. We will certainly plan to head back there soon.

Buca's Tuscan Roadhouse Review

Overall rating: 73

Food rating: 75

Buca's Tuscan Roadhouse: Good Italian food on Cape Cod for very high prices

We were in Harwich for a few days, and Buca's was one of two expensive restaurants we tried in two nights. The second night we ate at Fin.

Online reviews of Buca's are mostly superb. We arrived early in the evening, and parking in their lot was quick and easy. The hostess and wait staff were welcoming and pleasant, though the dining area itself was a bit crowded with tables close to each other and to walls.

We started off with some specialty drinks that were fine, including a "Sicilian Margarita" made with blood orange liqueur, and a bourbon/rye drink. Bread served with olive oil was excellent.

The menu is very large, and we asked for recommendations, and were told that the specialty of the house appetizer was "Carciofi Ripieni Alla Buca": grilled artichoke hearts stuffed with gorgonzola and mascarpone, and wrapped with prosciutto, with a balsamic reduction. While this sounded amazing, it really wasn't very interesting to eat.

For entrees, I again had a specialty of the house, listed on the menu as "Caccuicco", but pronounced "cacciucco" by our waitress, though when I asked about this she quickly said she wasn't sure. I checked Google later and the waitress was correct; presumably she knew the spelling on the menu was a typo. However it's pronounced, it's a Tuscan fish stew that they described as similar to a bouillabaisse, but with a tomato base. This was made with fish and various shellfish, all cooked perfectly and with some nice garlic toast. Again, though, the dish as a whole wasn't really that interesting or tasty. Other dishes at the table were similarly well prepared but not that special.

Rather than  having dessert, we went out for ice cream at one of the local places we like in the area.

All in all, this was a perfectly nice place to get a somewhat upscale Italian dinner. The food was good but nothing special, though the bread was delicious. The problem is the price. The Cacciucco was $32 and the artichoke appetizer was $14 for a small portion; drinks were similarly priced. All of this would be fine if the food were as wonderful as it sounded, but for food that was just nicely prepared and moderately tasty, Buca's does not provide good value.

After our dinner there and before we went to Fin, I was left wondering whether the summer tourist nature of Cape Cod means that prices are inherently exorbitant for food that is only okay. We go to the Cape fairly often, but only rarely eat in fine restaurants. We had an experience of a restaurant on Nantucket a number of years ago where again the price seemed out of proportion to the setting and food quality.

Fin Review

Overall rating: 85

Food rating: 89

Fin: Delicious food, somewhat tense atmosphere

Fin was the second of two expensive meals we had in two nights on Cape Cod. The first at Buca's was overpriced and had us concerned about what this second meal would be like.

We were staying in Harwich, and had a fairly late reservation at Fin, which meant a relatively dark drive to Dennis. Despite help from the GPS, we had some trouble figuring out which entrance to take to park for the restaurant.

Fin is located in an antique house, and we were seated on the second floor. We were on time for our reservation, but had a several  minute wait as they got things ready to seat us. The hostess and the wait staff seemed harried and tense. They were perfectly pleasant, but there was nothing relaxing about the atmosphere from the moment we arrived.

The antique house was pretty, but probably contributed to the problem. Both we and the wait staff had to deal with a steep flight of stairs to reach the second floor. Tables were close together, and the space was overly air-conditioned, with cool air blowing on us during dinner.

The floorboards were such that anytime a patron or wait staff walked by, our table and my seat bounced up and down. Writing this, it sounds like some odd picky complaint, but it was actually quite distracting to have our meal and conversation disrupted whenever someone walked past our table.

We started off with two martinis: a pomegranate martini and a sour apple martini. Both were good but overly sweet for my taste, though my wife liked both of them. Rolls were slow to come to the table but very good.

We asked for recommendations,  and both of us had the house specialty appetizer, the oyster chowder. It was cream based, with bacon, chive oil, and white truffle oil and was amazing: much lighter and fresher than a typical clam chowder. For an entree I had hoped to get a halibut special, but it ran out just as we ordered. Instead I had grilled "garlic-thyme shrimp" served with some fried polenta and accompanied by spinach and roasted tomatoes and peppers that was delicious though not as amazing as the chowder (hard not to be disappointed after that initial course). My wife had scallops prepared with raisins, pine nuts, and prosciutto, and accompanied by a cauliflower puree. This was all wonderful.

For dessert, we were told that Fin has its own pastry chef, and we had a very nice chocolate tart with a raspberry puree.

It was hard not to compare this experience to Buca's, where we had been the night before. Each course was several dollars less expensive than at Buca's, but was dramatically tastier and more interesting. If Fin were in Boston, the food would place it among the best Boston seafood restaurants.

The tense atmosphere was unfortunate. It made for a less relaxing night out than it would have been otherwise and makes me hesitant to recommend Fin as strongly as it deserves for its food. That said, we will certainly go back the next time we are in the area.

Elephant Walk (Waltham) Review

Overall Rating: 50

Food Rating: 50

Elephant Walk (Waltham): Not sure what's happened to them

We've been eating at Elephant Walk for many years, both in Waltham and in their other locations, but hadn't been there for a while for no particular reason. I saw a Groupon for them a few months ago and purchased it. While sometimes Groupons are a marker of restaurants to avoid, we were happy to have the discount, and we finally made it there on a recent Saturday night as the Groupon was expiring.

The Elephant Walk restaurants have always served off a Cambodian menu and a French menu. The original version of Elephant Walk in Waltham only had the Cambodian menu and was called Carambola (if memory serves me correctly), but it became "Elephant Walk" a number of years ago and picked up the French menu as well. It's a casual restaurant, with a much less fancy/happening feel than the Boston version, near enough to the Landmark Cinema to walk on a nice evening. Parking is also easy.

On this recent visit, and though others also likely had expiring Groupons and it was Saturday night, the restaurant was only about half full. Despite this, service was surprisingly slow. We were seated in a location where intermittent blasts of air were hitting us seemingly from the ceiling, though I had trouble telling if this was from a fan or related to the door opening and closing. They also changed the layout of the menu, making it extremely confusing. Dishes are repeated in multiple sections (Cambodian, Vegan, Gluten Free), and overall it's just hard to figure out what's available.

We ordered some drinks to start that were okay but nothing better. Some crusty French bread came with butter and was standard but nothing special. I ordered the avocado soup for an appetizer. This in the past was really one of their wonderful dishes and a reason to go out of the way to eat at Elephant Walk, and it was very good but not as amazing as it had been in the past. Two of my dinner companions ordered coquille St. Jacques, and both complained afterwards that the scallops were terrible -- clearly not fresh and perhaps close to turning bad.

For an entree I got a tilapia special that was underseasoned and scorchingly hot on the inside making me wonder if a microwave was involved in the preparation. I tried one of my companions braised short ribs, and this too was underseasoned and fairly uninteresting. We didn't stay for dessert.

I looked around on the web before writing this review, since I don't want to make a negative judgment on a single event, but others seem to be concerned that Elephant Walk isn't what it was. Also, this was a Saturday night and the experience was mediocre from start to finish.

I hope Elephant Walk finds a way to get the Waltham restaurant back up to its former level, and that the other Elephant Walk locations haven't also slipped so far. For now, I would suggest anyone considering going to Elephant Walk at least be aware that it may not be the same experience they might have had in the past.

Craigie on Main Review

Overall rating: 93

Food rating: 93

Craigie on Main: Excellent, unusual food, for a price

Craigie on Main is deservingly one of the top-rated restaurants in the Boston area. Located near Central Square in Cambridge, Craigie serves unusual cuts of meat and fish, prepares them beautifully, and has a welcoming comfortable atmosphere.

We went to Craigie most recently this week, but have been there a number of times in the past. You can eat in the bar area and get their highly-rated burgers (until they run out -- usually not long into the evening) for a reasonable price. The waitstaff are friendly and helpful and on past outings have brought over samples of various interesting drinks to try and have at times even made it possible to eat early with children without feeling out of place or imposing. That said, while the burgers are very good, I think I've had as good burgers elsewhere, such as at the much less renowned Farmstead Table. (If anyone can explain how the slightly better than other fast food from Shake Shack and Five Guys routinely ends up on lists of the best burgers in the area, mentioned in the same breath with burgers from Craigie, I'd be interested.)

We've also gone once for the Chef's Whim, which was really wonderful, though since it only seems to occur late on Sunday evenings (or occasionally other nights during restaurant week), we haven't had another chance to experience this.

On this week's occasion, we were in the bar area, but decided to have the six-course tasting menu. The bar area was much noisier than the dining area, and made conversation a bit difficult. Bread and rolls were served, which were very good and we got some Craigie-designed cocktails that were also very good. The amuse bouche was three kinds of fish, and a subsequent course of salmon was excellent. A pasta course was made with duck-heart sausage(!) and was fine but seemed like more of a dare than a necessary food. A prime rib course was really wonderful. There was a sorbet before dessert, and then each of us at the table received a different dessert. Mine involved spearmint ice cream and chocolate and was interesting and tasty; all the desserts at the table were very good.

The food was presented beautifully and unobtrusively. At one point early on our waitress got tied up with a large party and we waited quite a while to order, but other than that the waitstaff were attentive without bothering us constantly. The chef came over to the table briefly as the meat course was served, and while I could imagine this seeming awkward or forced, it actually felt like a really nice touch.

Overall, when we go to Craigie there's almost always something that is remarkably delicious like this meal's prime rib. The menu can be expected to include items made from pig tails or cod cheeks or, as with this evening, duck hearts.

For value, though, Craigie is fairly expensive. The six-course tasting menu is $98 per person, so with a couple of drinks you are looking at $125 per person before tax or tip. This isn't unreasonable for the quality of the food, and there's no place in Boston with really similar cuisine and quality, but you can spend a bit less and get at least as good food in Cambridge at T.W. or Hungry Mother, and Bergamot in Somerville has a similar feel/cuisine with not quite such impressive quality.

We really like eating at Craigie, and it provides a different experience from what we can get elsewhere in the area, but the price point is such that we typically only end up there once in a long while, choosing instead to go to restaurants we enjoy at least as much that are a bit less expensive. But if you like interesting and wonderfully prepared food, you should give Craigie a try.

Journeyman Review

Overall rating: 86

Food rating: 85

Journeyman: Small portions of perfectly plated food

I only recently heard about Journeyman in Somerville and then read some reviews, and we were excited to give it a try.

It's located down an alley from the parking lot for Union Square, and despite being reasonably clear on the location, we had a bit of trouble finding it. Once at the door, I had to convince myself it was really the entrance.

The building itself is some kind of converted industrial area. They did a beautiful job. The total square-footage is small, but the tables are reasonably spaced, there is a separate bar looking into the kitchen, there are high ceilings, and the whole space has a nice, warm, relaxed feel to it.

Oddly, the feeling of that space doesn't actually seem to carry over to the restaurant itself, which seems fussy and even cold at times. It is one of those restaurants that is constantly and intrusively changing flatware. They arrive with a wooden box to deliver these, and the process interrupts any conversation that might have been taking place. I'm happy to get fresh forks and knives, but that really can be a background event performed in such a way that I don't know it happened. One of our waitstaff seemed quite friendly, but the others had something of an offstanding cold demeanor that seemed intentionally put on.

The menu is extremely limited: you can order 5 or 7 courses, and herbivore or omnivore. The menu itself was presented in an envelope, apparently so you could both be surprised by what arrived and make it clear to the waitstaff that you were planning to be surprised. We looked at the menu. After consideration (and presumably waitstaff disappointed in our lack of adventurousness), we ordered omnivore, though the menu itself had so few details that it revealed very little.

I started off with a single malt scotch-based cocktail that was very good, if you're willing to do that to a single malt (it was not such a high-end single malt as to make this sacrilegious).

The amuse bouche was a green pea soup covered with a layer of some buttermilk preparation, presented in a tall shot glass but with a spoon. We asked the server whether this should be eaten with a spoon or drunk, and he said the spoon was to get at the remnants. In reality, though, the buttermilk layer prevented anything from being drinkable until the spoon had been used. That said, once we could consume it, it was tasty. Two different types of thinly sliced bread were presented, which were okay but nothing special.

I ordered a glass or Riesling with my meal that was really excellent for the price ($11). The first course was a "spring salad", which involved various individual pieces of vegetables (for instance, a single piece of a leafy green) laid out on a plate with one or two pieces of some type of vegetable pasta. The arrangement was artistic and really beautiful, and the food was good, but it was actually difficult to get onto a fork and amounted to no more than two bites of a normal salad. This foreshadowed things to come.

The next course was a small piece of baked whiting that was delicious. I wanted more. The third course was two small round pieces of chicken in a broth. Neither of us particularly liked this, but again the presentation was flawless. The fourth course was two small pieces of steak that were well prepared but fairly standard. On the plate were various sauces and side preparations that were also tiny, but some were delicious and, again, everything was so beautifully presented that it seemed a shame to disturb the plating and eat.

We were then given a very tasty frozen yogurt and berry palate cleanser, and then offered various dessert options. We went with a chocolate dessert with vanilla ice cream that was delicious and much more substantial than the other courses.

I usually don't eat much during the day when we're going out for a nice dinner, but somewhat randomly we'd had a large breakfast and also eaten lunch. This was fortunate, since I would otherwise have been hungry at the end of the meal.

The price for two five-course meals with a total of three drinks and with tax was $172. I've seen various discussions online as to the expense of Journeyman for the small amount of food, but the ingredients were excellent, everything was clearly prepared exactly as intended, and the effort to plate foods this beautifully must have been substantial. The price seems appropriate given all this. I'd prefer, however, to spend that money on somewhat more and excellent food and less beautiful plating, but I can understand where others would find a meal of this artistry to be just what they are looking for, particularly for a special occasion.

All in all, Journeyman really isn't for us. I had never eaten in Union Square until two weeks ago and now have been there twice. I much prefer the food at Bronwyn (100 feet from Journeyman), and while the ambiance at Journeyman seemed more up our alley than that at Bronwyn, soon into the evening it seemed like a false promise of  casual elegance that actually turned out to be masked fussiness. It's clear, though, from online reviews and talking to friends that many people absolutely love Journeyman, and there is much they do incredibly well. Hopefully this review provides enough context that you can judge for yourself whether it's the sort of restaurant you will love.

Hungry Mother Review

Overall rating: 93

Food rating: 95

Hungry Mother: Small menu of excellent food

Hungry Mother recently won the Globe Munch Madness. Hard to know how much that is influenced by restaurants promoting themselves, but Hungry Mother has great food and certainly deserves to be in the top tier of any ranking of Boston-area restaurants.

We've been there several times, and the food is generally wonderful. I've noticed a few people commenting that the corn bread isn't that great, and that was our experience as well, which is surprising since typically it's easy to make really tasty corn bread. That, though, isn't a great way to judge a restaurant as a whole. [Update from 6/2013 visit: the corn bread was spectacular, served with delicious sorghum butter. I asked whether the recipe had changed, and they said it hadn't. This corn bread was completely different from what we had eaten previously, so I'm not sure what happened -- perhaps we got some cornbread special by mistake. In any case, I take back my prior negative comments about the corn bread!]

Although the food is "Southern", it's not really similar to any particular cuisine I've eaten in the south or anywhere else. On our most recent visit, we got two appetizers. The first, mussels in a saffron aioli mustard sauce sauce was as good a preparation of mussels as I've ever eaten. The second was a special: an open faced smoked turkey sandwich with bacon that was also delicious. For a main course, we both got the rib eye steak with a romesco sauce and this, too, was wonderful and perfectly cooked medium rare as ordered. A couple of mixed drinks were nicely made as well.

For dessert, we got the buttermilk chess pie, which was good, and the chocolate and olive oil cake, which was okay but nothing special. Overall, the desserts were below the quality of the rest of the meal. We've had desserts at Hungry Mother on previous visits that were better, but overall desserts don't seem to be their strong suit.

The waitstaff was pleasant and efficient, and our waiter was helpful in making suggestions about various options. With some notice, the restaurant will pick up tickets for you for a movie at the Kendall Square Cinema. All in all a great place to have dinner in Cambridge.

Bronwyn Review

Overall rating: 88

Food rating: 90

Bronwyn: Wonderful food, casual atmosphere

It took us an entire 11 days to make it to Bronwyn, the new restaurant from Tim and Bronwyn Wiechmann of T.W. Food. We love T.W., and so were both eagerly anticipating this new restaurant. We were also somewhat hesitant, as German cuisine, with a restaurant focused on beer and wurst, isn't really our typical preferred dining.

Where T.W. is understated, elegant, and a perfect place for a quiet date, Bronwyn early on a Saturday evening was energetic, loud, and filled with large groups, families with children, and couples. There is a bar as you come in with additional bar seating at an external window, and more seating in the bar area on tables reportedly made by Chef Tim Wiechmann. They plan to open an outdoor biergarten in the near future.

We sat in the restaurant area. Despite being newly opened and completely full, service was quick, friendly, and accurate with Bronwyn Wiechmann watching carefully to keep things running smoothly. Unlike T.W., there are drinks in addition to beer and wine, but the focus is clearly on German wines and beer. I got a rye-based cocktail (eins on their numbered list of five cocktails) that was excellent, and my wife got a Riesling Brut (I didn't know there were sparkling Rieslings) that was also very good.

There's been lots of buzz about Chef Wiechmann working on pretzels for the restaurant, so we ordered a pretzel rather than the assorted breads, which also sounded wonderful. The pretzel was enormous, wonderfully textured, and golden on the outside. It comes with a very spicy roasted apple mustard that was delicious. One pretzel was more than two of us could finish, though we came close.

For appetizers, we got the borscht, which they serve hot. The borscht was the first clear sign that while this is "German" cuisine, they are updating and putting their own stamp on traditional recipes. The borscht was served hot, but was not a typical hearty hot borscht. It was light and subtle and just wonderful. We also got the smoked kale pierogis served with an egg remoulade that was moderately spicy and perfectly complemented the pierogis.

For main dishes, my wife got the roast chicken served with grilled pineapple. I'm not sure how the chicken was prepared, but it had a soft texture unlike most roast chicken, and the flavor of the pineapple made for a really nice combination. I got the jägerschnitzel, made with veal and served with wild mushrooms, walnuts, and honey. This was a truly amazing dish -- as tasty as anything I've had at T.W. or anywhere. The thin pieces of pounded veal were perfectly cooked and browned, and the mushrooms and walnuts enhanced the flavors without overpowering them.

For dessert, we split a piece of "German chocolate cake" served with whipped cream. This wasn't what I would usually think of as German chocolate cake, and was instead a fairly dry cake without layering. It was very good, though we were quite full by that point.

Apparently part of the thought behind Brownyn is that it's a lower price point than T.W. Our meal came to about $120 before tip for two people, which was a perfectly reasonable price for the superb quality food, but not inexpensive. However, this is clearly a place you could go and order beer and appetizers with a group and have wonderful food and drink at more a moderate price than  T.W.

Overall, the food was wonderful. Whatever lingering concerns we had about "German cuisine" were laid to rest early in the meal and we loved the dinner. All that said, T.W. Food, with its relaxed quiet elegance, is much more our style for a date night out. Bronwyn intentionally has an almost rowdy feel to it, but clearly works well for families as well. We live too far from Bronwyn to stop in for drinks and appetizers, so it's a place we'll come back to more often with groups and with children than for a night out for two. We also love eating outdoors, and once the biergarten is open that could be a great way to enjoy this food. If you're looking for a place with spectacular food and a casual energetic atmosphere, this has to be one of the best options in the Boston area.

Sycamore Review

Overall rating: 91

Food rating: 91

Sycamore: Good food (keeps getting better), excellent drinks

Update as of Winter 2016:

The trend has continued. Sycamore is really now an excellent restaurant. It is far superior to any of the other Newton or Waltham restaurants. A great place for a meal, or for a drink and appetizers at the bar.

Update as of Spring 2014:

We've been to Sycamore twice more quite recently, and on both visits the food was substantially improved. We were there last week, and started with drinks that were, as in the past, wonderful. I had a parsnip soup that was made with foie gras, and although hard to picture how that would work, it was subtle and delicious. I had a very good chicken for a main, and others at the table had a very good squid dish. We had sides of curried cauliflower and of broccoli with bread crumbs and cheese that were also  very good. The desserts were good but not amazing.

Most good restaurants, once they've plateaued after opening issues, seem to typically decline slowly over the years. Sycamore hasn't done that, and while still fairly pricey is now a reasonable value for that price. The drinks are better than almost anyplace around, and the food is now a cut above that of the other good restaurant in Newton Center, Farmstead Table.

Definitely worth a visit if you've never been there, or haven't been there recently.

Update as of Summer 2013:

We went to Sycamore for a second time, after going to an early movie in West Newton.  The restaurant was energetic and buzzing, and they were playing rock music loud enough that it was noticeable while talking.

Our waitress was again attentive and willing to make recommendations. On her advice we got a peach and herb appetizer made with pistachio butter that was delicious and interesting, though it failed to mention that it included prosciutto, and also a mussel ragout that was smokey and also delicious. The bread that came to the table was only average. The drinks were again excellent, different from what was offered on our last visit, and larger than the overly small drinks from that visit.

For a main course, I got bluefish that was prepared with andouille sausage. The waitress told me the bluefish was fresh, and it was certainly cooked perfectly, but the spicy sauce of the preparation, though tasty, overwhelmed the bluefish so that I'm not sure I would have noticed if it were older and fishy. My wife got the steak, which was good but nothing special. A side of roasted carrots was good.

The listed desserts didn't seem that interesting, so we walked up the street to JP Lick's (hard to go wrong there...).

Overall, again, the drinks were excellent and the food was good, though the appetizers were far better than on our last visit. The main dishes were a bit over and under seasoned, respectively, but tasty. The overall experience was probably about as good as you can get anywhere in Newton, but the price is relatively high.

At this price point there are restaurants reasonably nearby with at least as good food for less money, such as Strip T's in Watertown, and for a similar price there are restaurants with better food in Boston, Cambridge, and Somerville. The geographically closest good restaurant is Farmstead Table, which is quieter and simpler, but has similar quality food for less money. Sycamore, though, has as good or better mixed drinks as anyplace I've been in the Boston area.

Original review:

Sycamore has been getting a lot of buzz recently, including a positive review in the Globe, and with an unexpectedly free evening we decide to go there early. It is in Newton Center next to Bill's Pizza, and though small has a fair number of seats for couples and small parties, a small bar, and has a nice friendly feel.

Our waiter was attentive and knowledgeable and willing to make recommendations, which I always appreciate.

The list of cocktails had a number of unusual creations, and we got a drink special made with blood-orange vodka that was excellent, and one of their regular drinks, a "Persephone" that was made with tequila, egg whites, and, as expected given the name, pomegranate. It was also excellent though pink/purple enough in color that I wasn't sure I would want to be photographed drinking it. Our only complaint about both drinks was that they were relatively small.

We ordered two "snacks": the warm gougeres (they describe as "alpine cheese puffs") were not very interesting cheese puffs, but were fine. The salt cod with mashed potato was served with toasted bread and was quite tasty.

For an appetizer, we split the garlic soup, which included a 5-minute egg to be mixed in. This was a perfectly good soup but less interesting and less garlicky than it sounded.

For mains, we got the za'atar spiced chicken, which was perfectly cooked and tender but again not as flavorful or spicy as it sounded. We also got the squid with tagliatelle (made with squid ink) that also was tasty but not wonderful. For sides, we got cauliflower with raisins, pinenuts, and capers that was good, and asparagus with bacon that was very good.

We split the pot de creme dessert, which was good but pretty straightforward. It was served with peanut brittle.

One disappointment was that a couple of things I'd been planning to get based on the online menu weren't offered, including the seafood cassoulet entree and the chocolate-cranberry bread pudding dessert.

All in all, this was a good, though fairly expensive meal. The expense in part was because we got a second round of drinks because they were delicious but small.

Having Sycamore and Farmstead Table as new restaurants in Newton Center is really expanding the upscale food offerings in the area. Also, Sycamore is apparently open late for drinks, snacks, and desserts, which creates a nice option for going out after a movie at West Newton Cinema; there have been very few places open in Newton for a late drink, coffee, or dessert.

Myers+Chang Review

Overall Rating: 89

Food rating: 86

Myers+Chang: Good food; fun place

I've been hearing about Myers+Chang for a while now, but hadn't gotten there. We had theater tickets last night and it seemed walkable from parking at the restaurant, so we gave it a try.

Myers+Chang is in the South End at the intersection of East Berkeley and Washington. They describe themselves as:

A funky indie diner setting offering Chef/Owner Joanne Chang and Executive Chef Karen Akunowicz's very personal interpretation of Chinese, Taiwanese, Thai, and Vietnamese specialties.

We walked in and were greeted with smiles and what felt like real welcomes from a waiter, the hostess, and a bartender and were taken quickly to our seats. The place does have a fun, happening feel to it, much like Towne seems to try for but without the fussiness and noise.

For drinks, we got a  blood orange margarita and a glass of wine, both good. We realized later on walking out how much alcohol was in the margarita.

The menu lists a fairly large number of items divided up into "dim sum", "...and then some", "dumplings", "noodles", and various other categories. We were told the food would come out as it was ready, in no particular order.

When we asked for advice, the waitress told us that she thought we should just go with our gut so that we had our own "Myers+Chang experience" rather than having someone else's. I don't personally worry a lot about having someone else's dining experience, but decided not to push the issue...

From the beginning part of the menu we ordered a carrot-ginger soup that was very good and pork and chive dumplings that were nice but nothing particularly special. From the rest of the menu we got the wok roasted mussels that were also very good but not unusual, a tasty tamarind-glazed hake, and grilled kalbi short ribs, that were wonderful. For dessert, we did get the waitress' help and she said that if we were chocolate lovers to get the flourless chocolate cake ("chocolate and cocoa nib terrine") that was excellent.

The above foods plus a glass of wine and two blood orange margaritas came to about $110 with tax.

I thought this was very good Chinese/Southern Asian food, but the tastes weren't particularly groundbreaking or amazing. Although the ingredients are better at Myers+Chang, the Asian tastes are more interesting at Strip T's. The price was quite reasonable for a restaurant you can eat at and walk to the theater district, but expensive if the comparison is to excellent Chinese food as you might get at Sichuan Gourmet in Framingham.

Overall, though, this is just a really fun restaurant. We enjoyed being there, and I would recommend it as a place for a group of friends or for a date. The food is fresh and well prepared and the atmosphere is great.

Strip T's Review

Overall rating: 87

Food rating: 90

Strip T's: A really unusual restaurant

Update as of Summer 2013:

I raised my ratings for Strip T's, as I think they've gotten more consistent, are using higher quality main ingredients, and the lunches have also gotten better. With this, the prices have gone up a bit, but overall they remain a pretty great value, even more so for lunch than for dinner. Strip T's has really moved into a group of our favorite restaurants for food. The overall dining experience still seems odd, and there are quieter more intimate places for a date or to hang out with friends, but in the Newton, Waltham, Watertown area, this really has become the restaurant with the best and most interesting food.

Original review:

We've been to Strip T's several times for dinner. I don't think I've ever been to a similar place. It's location and name suggest a dive sports bar, and the internal decoration suggests the same. There's a counter with some high stools for seating, and a tiny dining area with a few tables.

Everything about Strip T's suggests that if the food is any good, it should be good burgers served with good fries and onion rings and good beer. In reality, though, the food has an Asian flare, and even taking that into account the chef does all sorts of odd combinations of foods and tastes.

Mostly, this works extremely well. The food is generally really good for the Boston area. If there's better food in Watertown I haven't found it, and you'd probably have to head one town over to Waltham for the nearest better tasting food (at one of the two great Italian restaurants in Waltham, La Campania and Il Capriccio, both more expensive than Strip T's).

The banh mi, a Japanese vegetarian sandwich, is great. One night I had the roasted wild striped bass, which was a fairly small portion of fish. The fish itself was only okay, but the accompanying sauce, kohlrabi, clams, and roasted pistachios were wonderful. We also got a side dish of brussel sprouts (with sardines?!) that was great. For dessert, we had the goat's milk panna cotta, which was also great, but also a mocha chocolate cake that had little if any mocha flavor and just wasn't that tasty or interesting.

Most recently we went there for lunch, because we'd heard the burgers really were great and they don't serve them for dinner (and mostly don't serve the banh mi at dinner either). The burger is served with a miso/lemon aioli on a really nice and flavorful bun. I ordered mine medium rare, and it came medium well. Despite that, it was delicious.

We have the sense that the food at dinner gets better preparation than the food at lunch, but the lunch food is still very good. Also, the preparation and sauces at dinner sometimes seem better than the actual quality of the main ingredients, particularly when it comes to fish dishes.

I'm impressed by the number of favorable reviews on TripAdvisor (Zagat gives it a 21 for food, which is inappropriately low). The unexpected foods and odd taste combinations seem likely to not be what most people walking into an apparent dive bar in Watertown would be looking for. But if you like this sort of food and are looking for a chef who experiments and usually seems to succeed, this is a great place to eat and a great value.

T.W. Food Review

Overall rating: 96

Food rating: 95

T.W. Food: One of the very best restaurants in the Boston area

T.W. Food is not only one of the best restaurants in the area, it's also probably the best restaurant that most people have never tried or even heard of. I'm not sure why it's relatively less known, but perhaps it has to do with the odd name (the chef's initials) or its location in Huron Village in Cambridge, around the corner from Formaggio Kitchen.

While the consensus (for example on Zagat's and TripAdvisor) is that T.W. is wonderful, I'm startled to see occasional negative or average reviews of the place. I do know that when I recommend it to people whom I don't know well, I worry they may not enjoy some of the odder concoctions. This is definitely a place for people who are serious about top quality food.

Generally food ranges at T.W. from great to spectacular. The soups are particularly amazing, as is the bread, but I've never had a meal at T.W. where there wasn't some component that just blew me away.

The tasting menu is fairly expensive for Boston but is a great way to experience things you might not normally order (sweetbreads, foie gras creme brulee), though we're always a bit overstuffed when done.

The Kitchen Improv later on Wednesday evenings is a much lower price and really fantastic if you are willing to just eat whatever the chef prepares. This works really well for a group of four, since typically everyone at the table is getting different dishes and you can share and/or trade.

The wine pairings on Tuesdays may be among the best price-performance meals anywhere: four courses of great food paired with four glasses of wine (three full glasses plus a dessert wine glass) for $55.

Sunday brunch has the chef playing jazz  with a couple of other people. Among other dishes, they serve the best French toast I've ever eaten.

The restaurant is quite small, and achieves a simultaneous feeling of being casual and formal. People are there dressed anywhere from suits to jeans. Most of the waitstaff have been incredibly knowledgeable and able to describe the preparation of an ingredient down to cooking temperature and time in case you want to try to replicate something at home. Knowledgeable or not, they are friendly and take great care of guests. It's a perfect restaurant for a date or romantic night out. Because of the Huron Village location, there's always free on-street parking even for non-residents of Cambridge.

We only first went to T.W. a couple of years ago and couldn't figure out how we had failed to find it for so long. It's just a wonderful place to sit, and talk, and eat great food. I love this restaurant.

Farmstead Table Review

Overall rating: 78

Food rating: 79

Farmstead Table: A nice addition to Newton restaurants

We've eaten at Farmstead Table several times since they've opened. The food is consistently well-prepared and good, and the prices are reasonable. The space is a bit cramped, but has a nice friendly atmosphere that is complemented by the attitudes of the waitstaff.

I've ordered the "braise of the day" twice. Both times the description sounded amazing. The actual dishes were good, but nothing spectacular. In contrast, the fish of the day meals have been remarkably good. I've heard rumors that their hamburgers are excellent but haven't had the chance to try one yet. The day I was planning to do so, they had a lamb-burger special that was amazingly good -- one of the best burgers I've had anywhere.

Soups, salads, and appetizers have been fresh and nice but nothing memorable.

They have some good house cocktails that we've had and enjoyed. Desserts have been good as well.

Overall, this is a nice new restaurant for Newton and unlike any other existing Newton restaurant that I've been to. It's a relaxed, easy place for dinner with good, fresh, local food and prices that aren't exorbitant. We plan to keep eating there.

Lumiere Review

Overall rating: 80

Food rating: 80

Lumiere: I keep wanting to love this place...

I live close by Lumiere, and its ratings on TripAdvisor and on Zagat routinely place it among the best restaurants in the Boston area. So I would love to love the food here. I've only been a few times over many years, and each time the food is good but never great, and never as good as what I can get elsewhere for the price.

We went recently for the first time in several years. The bread was very good, and the drinks were fine. Both of us had the scallops appetizer, which was also fine, but nothing special. The carrot puree was a bit too sweet for the scallops. For an entree, I got the striped bass, which was excellent; my wife got the chicken, which was not. It was cooked a bit tough, and was served with a za'atar/yogurt sauce that I've had much better versions of elsewhere.

For dessert, we had a special: an apple tart with sour cream sorbet. The tart was very tasty and the sorbet was really interesting. We also had a chocolate souffle cake that was overly sweet and a bit mushy in texture.

Overall, this was a perfectly nice meal, but not consistently great as you might be hoping for given the many superb reviews of Lumiere.

Oleana Review

Overall rating: 91

Food rating: 94

Oleana: Excellent food in Inman Square

We ate at Oleana back in February, 2013 and again in April. It takes weeks to get Saturday night reservations there.

This is clearly one of the top restaurants in Cambridge, and probably the best one serving non-American/non-European food. The cuisine is mostly Turkish, with wonderful spiced dishes and aromas.

The space is nice but tightly packed. On our first visit, I was seated facing toward a wall that was long enough that really there was nothing to see other than the wall without swiveling my head. Other tables were close, but the noise level was low enough that it was possible to talk and be heard, yet loud enough that conversation across the table felt reasonably private. Not so on our second visit. We were so close to other tables that conversation couldn't really be private, and it was impossible for the woman sitting at the table next to us to leave without risking her rear-end brushing the food on our table.

Our server was great on the first visit. We asked for recommendations and he was happy to make suggestions, all of which were excellent. We also had a number of questions about the food that he got answers to after checking with the kitchen. The server the second visit wasn't as helpful with recommendations, but was very good about not rushing us.

Each time, we were given three kinds of bread (including some near cubes of bread that I did not recognize but were very good and much softer than they looked), served with olive oil.

On the first visit, for appetizers, we had quail kebab which was very good, and tamarind-glazed beef and eggplant that was wonderful. On the second visit, we had beef kibbeh nayyeh (I think) which was very nice, asparagus fatteh with chick peas and pine nuts that was interesting and tasty, and sfela cheese saganaki with sesame and figs that was and incredibly interesting blend of flavors. My wife really loved this last dish; I liked it a lot.

For main dishes on the first visit, we had scallops with a butternut squash crispy pie that was also wonderful, and a striped bass special that was very good except that the fishy taste of the bass didn't work all that well with the spices. On the second visit, we had the scallops again (again wonderful), and tamarack tunic lamb with Turkish spices which was excellent but had a lot of similar flavors to the kibbeh nayyeh; I wouldn't really want to have both in the same meal.

There was a comment on TripAdvisor that the food was too salty to eat, and this had me concerned before our first visit as I've felt like a lot of restaurants are oversalting things lately. However, while there were many spices and tastes mixed together, I did not find things to be overly salty and thought the level of spice was exactly right.

For dessert the first visit, we had Turkish-style profiteroles that are served with warm salep, a drink made from orchid root (one of our questions for our server was about this). You sip the salep along with the profiteroles. This was different and all very tasty. We also got the tangerine caramel parfait with a chocolate tart and Aleppo honeycomb (the Aleppo chili was another question). This was very good, but not as exciting as it sounded. The second visit, we got the chocolate pave, the best part of which was a wonderful labneh sorbet with kumquats, and the baked Alaska, which was really good.

Overall, both times were really great meals. They were also quite expensive meals with glasses of wine at $13 each and all the dishes several dollars more than you might see at comparably good restaurants in the area. The biggest downside to Oleana is how tightly packed everyone is. There is apparently outdoor seating once the weather gets good, and I look forward to trying this down the road.

Rationale for another blog reviewing restaurants in the Boston area

I've been writing fairly detailed reviews of restaurants on other sites, and figured it made more sense to create my own blog to hold them. I haven't loved the lack of flexibility of those other sites, though obviously the traffic is higher than I'm likely to achieve here....

With that in mind, I figured I'd give the rationale/philosophy behind this blog. We tend to eat out at fairly expensive restaurants and these will comprise the majority of the reviews here. Of course, price doesn't equate to quality or value, and I'll try to comment on all three in my reviews while giving a sense of places as a whole, how they fit into the restaurant scene around Boston, and to provide an overall food rating for everyplace I review. At times, though, I'll review restaurants that are less expensive and/or in areas far from Boston.

Once I get the hang of working with this blog by getting this post up and visible, I'll be copying (with minor modifications) some reviews I wrote for other sites.