RESTAURANT WEEK: RIALTO

For our second Restaurant Week dinner, I made a reservation at Rialto. I already had some mixed feelings about Rialto before dining there. Kjell and Huong had a not so great Restaurant Week dining experience a couple of years ago. Apparently they had a late reservation and by that time, Rialto had begun running out of food. And Big Ed had visited Rialto the previous week and advised to get the bluefish, but to stay away from the pork. Lastly, I checked out the comments on Chowhound regarding Restaurant Week, and they were pretty mixed. However, Jody Adams is still a pretty famous chef in Boston and my friend, Brendan, was working at the dessert bar that evening, so I was looking foward to a free dessert with dinner. (it's kinda standard in the industry to send out freebies if you're working back of the house. I overabused this power while working in a kitchen myself. Plus I gave him a huge bar of cocoa butter).

Our reservation was for 7:45 and we arrived exactly on time. We were told that they were a bit backed up and could wait in the bar area where mini appetizers were being passed. Well, after scanning the bar area, we realized that there weren't any seats available. And there were about 10 other groups of people who were also waiting for their reservations. We decided to go across the corridor and check out the marketplace at Henrietta's table, and then went back to Rialto to check on our table. However, judging by the sheer number of people waiting, I could tell that we wouldn't be seated at our table for quite sometime. We eventually snagged a small table in the bar area and got to sit down. We grabbed a few of those appetizers (they were ok, too salty for my taste) and I was a little annoyed that the guy circulating about never bothered to ask us if we wanted to order drinks. Then I started placing bets on when we'd get seated. I said 8:30. Tom said 8:45. Leah hoped for earlier. We were seated at 8:25. Yes, even with a reservation, we were seated 40 minutes late. That was not good. Especially considering the number of Restaurants Weeks Rialto had participated in. They should've had this down like clockwork. And yet, I wasn't annoyed as I normally would have been, considering I had good company, I wasn't starving and this was Restaurant Week, you need to have some patience.

We were seated at a large booth, which, though dramatic looking with its high back, was not all that comfortable and you could feel the old springs beneath the cushions. When we were given our menus, I was pleased to see that Rialto was also offering a good number of choices for Restaurant Week. In addition, you could "upgrade" your meal by adding different entress or appetizers for additional sums of money. (For example, I could've gotten a duck entree for an additional $15.) Needless to say, the restaurant was packed, and our waiter was a bit rushed, but still pretty pleasant and not hostile at all. If you'd like to see the menu, Tom's got it posted on his blog, so I'm not gonna repeat it here.

We put our orders in, and Tom, who was pretty hungry by this point, ordered an extra appetizer, something involving clams and sausages. At any rate, they made me take a pic cause they liked the plating. So here it is. I won't offer any opinions since I didn't try the dish myself.
Moving on, Leah and I both started with the gnocchi gratin. I normally do not order gnocchi. I typically find the texture much too chewy. (though i've had had good gnocchi, like the ones at Radius). However, this dish was described as a gratin, so I imagined gnocchi in a little cast iron dish, smothered in cheese and baked. Kinda like a fancy mac and cheese. This is what we actually got. I don't know why they described it as a graint, but it wasn't bad, though still a bit chewy. And not a huge portion, tho I enjoyed the mushrooms it was served with. Leah liked it more than I did.
While I considered ordering the bluefish, I actually ended up ordering the chicken breast. (Leah ordered the bluefish and enjoyed its slight heat). Now, I know that this is a huge risk during restaurant week. Chicken breast is already hard enough to prepare without totally drying it out. And it'd be even harder during Restaurant Week. So I was very pleasantly surprised with my order. The breast was a generous portion (much bigger than Leah's bluefish) and it was very moist (though a bit under cooked as you got to the drumette). I definitely enjoyed it.
Lastly, I finished with the tropical fruit sorbet with almond tuille. My friend Brendan had already warned me that the Restaurant Week desserts weren't going to be overly impressive. But i still enjoyed my sorbet (though they clearly been pre-scooped and frozen, so were served a bit too cold and icy). Tom found it a bit tart, but I really like the passion fruit flavor. It's one of my all time favorite flavors.
And finally, here's our free dessert. It was a dessert you could "upgrade" to on the Restaurant Week menu, and I think it would've been worth it. All of us clearly enoyed this dessert the most, which was essentially a molten chocolate cake, though it was described as a hot chocolate cream(why??). Leah loved the ice cream, which had alcohol in it, while i just liked the gooey-warm chocolate.

So all in all, despite the initial wait and the rushed and often missing waiter, we did have a successful restaurant week dinner. Leah said that she'd definitely bring her father for dinner in the future, and I certainly wouldn't mind going back again. It's been a good Restaurant Week for us, and once I recover from all the food and lack of money, I look foward to trying a few new spots next year.