Last night my sister, Leah, Tina and I all got together for Restaurant Week. I had made reservations at Grotto on Beacon Hill, which I had wanted to try for a long time, but never made it over there. So of course, Restaurant week was the perfect opportunity to check it out. Now, for those of you who aren't familiar with it, during a typical Restaurant Week, restaurants will offer a set menu (with a few choices) and you get to have three courses. It's $20.06 for lunch of $30.06 for dinner. In my experience, Restaurant week meals tend to be a little disappointing. The restaurants are generally packed, trying to keep up with the demand, and they don't showcase their best dishes, cause it's just too expensive to do that. Grotto was an exception, because I knew in advance that they were offering their full menu for restaurant week. Which means you could pick anything you wanted off the normal menu, and still pay just $30 for 3 courses!
When we arrived we discovered a very cute restaurant in a basement location. It was small and cozy. Clearly not as finished and polished as other places, but I liked it. They had painted the roof all red and there was also lots of black. Truthfully, I think the name matched perfectly for the location. When we were given the menus, there was some slight confusion over what we could order, but we soon got it all figured out. I ended up picking an appetizer portion of the crab ravioli (which I could've also gotten as an entree size) and I got the halibut for my entree. I did seriously consider ordering the lobster mac and cheese as a full size entree which was a side order for the salmon entree, but i decided to avoid the decadence. of course, i'd regret this choice later on....
But here's my appetizer of crab ravioli. It was very yummy and colorful. Homemade pasta, and you could definintely taste the crab middle. Plus i like the tomatoes and toasted almonds that it was served with. I gobbled that down fast.
And here's a pic of Leah's potato gnocchi with some type of meat sauce. She also enjoyed it lots.
Here's a pic of my halibut entree. To be honest, I wasn't thrilled with it. It had come out dry and a bit overcooked. You could tell it'd been sitting under a heat lamp, waiting for all the entrees to be served. Plus all those other extra things on the side didn't really make up for the bland taste. I should've gotten the mac and cheese!(which looked great on Tina's plate, and she liked it a lot).
I did get to try my sister's duck entree, which was very yummy. And Leah got the same thing. Here's a pic of it below. The leg was super juicy and very flavorful. I would've ordered this had part of it not been wrapped in bacon. (But that's exactly why Leah ended up ordering it).
And of course, we had our dessert course remaining. Three of us ended up ordering the warm chocolate cake. Mine had a side of cinnamon ice cream, that was super intense. It reminded me of red hots. I didn't finish the whole thing, cause by this point, i was stuffed full.
But i did pass it onto Leah, after she had finished her Bread pudding with caramel ice cream. (below).
I'll admit that the service was a little neglectful, especially considering the large ratio of staff members to the actual number of customers. With 4 waitresses on the floor, they really could've been more attentive. But I blame this on restaurant week. Those waitresses probably weren't thrilled that they were working extra hard with more customers while making less in tips. I know i'd feel that way. Perhaps they'd be better on a slower night. Overall though, I think this deal was excellent. And dare I say, one of the better meals that i've had in Boston.So if you're looking for a romantic little hideway for dinner, I would certainly suggest Grotto for a delicious meal in an unexpected setting.
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