Lago for Lunch

I almost never get to enjoy lunch out during the week, but on this rare occasion I decided to treat myself and try the new Lago East Bank.  Lago East Bank begins where  Lago Tremont left off...expect the same great service and amazing food.

My dining companion and I went for lunch.  We ordered two sandwiches and shared.  It was a brilliant idea to try their great menu.  Lago also offers half portions of their pastas and for lunch this provides a right size portion of their amazing pasta.  Before I get in to the food, I want to discuss the service.  Our waiter was someone you would expect to find in a 5 star stuffy white table cloth restaurant.  He was attentive, friendly, answered questions, told us about happy hour and the use of the patio.  It was a cool day for summer but still warm.  We sat in the restaurant near the open doors to the patio.  He brought me a glass of ice because my ice tea ice had melted- I never asked, he just noticed and did it.  My companion would finish his diet coke and have a new one within seconds without asking.  The last time I remember service like this was out with my parents as a child in some fancy super expensive restaurant.  This alone sets Lago apart from anywhere else I have been in Cleveland.

Ok...now the important stuff...the food.  As I said we chose the sandwiches which were served with rosemary chips that were sliced super thin and perfectly fried.  I ordered the Salami Panini that included salami, sopressata, cappicola, sun dried tomato, olive tapenade, provolone cheese served on a thin crusty bread.  It was amazing.  It made me think of my father and how he would love a sandwich like this for lunch, but it was much more refined than he would make.  It as crunchy and salty and just a perfect idea in my mind of a salami Panini.  The hamburger was ordered medium and cooked perfectly.  It was topped with an aioli, grilled onions, cheese, lettuce tomato, and salami.  It also was a perfect combination of flavors, nothing over powered anything else.  The flavors were all distinct but well married together.  Both things ordered sound ordinary, but they are made to be memorable and not like anything served in any other restaurant around.  Out total cost- as we split the bill- was around $17 for the sandwich, drink, and tax.  As the frugally classy girl always looks at quality compared to price...Lago is at the top of my life.  The quality far outweighs the price!

I am excited to try happy hour sometime soon and blog about how it fits in to the frugally classy idea of amazing quality food at an amazing price. 

Tartine Bistro

I have been dying to try Tartine Bistro in Rocky River for a long time, finally I got to experience this quaint restaurant and happy hour was a great time.  We walked in and decided to sit at the bar.  The restaurant is small and there is a nice patio in front.  The door and windows were all open creating a great outdoor feel even inside.  We decided to go with the happy hour menu and it was well worth every penny. 

For two people we ordered 4 happy hour items and decided to try one of the pizza's as well.  We started with the cheese platter and it is a chef's choice of three cheese, lavender honey, and nuts served with crackers.  My dining companion is pregnant so we asked the chef to keep that in mind while picking the cheeses. He chose a tellagio which was salty and sharp, the prima donna which was sweet and creamy and tomme du levezou which had a nutty flavor.  We then each had an order of chicken chorizo stuffed peppers with a saffron aioli.  These were spicy but the aioli helped cool it with great flavor.  Each order came with 2 peppers.  We then finished the happy hour menu with the dates stuffed with goat cheese and served with bacon.  They were crunchy, sweet, and salty.  A perfect balance and I do not even like dates!  We then decided to splurge and get a pizza as well.  The happy hour items were each $5, the pizza was $15.  We ordered a peach and bacon pizza with a balsamic glaze.  It is new to the menu and great for summer time.  light, fresh and very good.

They also have drinks available for only $5 each  including he La Bicyclette.  It is made with Campari, a French dry white and soda served with a  lemon.  I like Campari, but appreciate that the bartender asked if I had ever tried Campari before.  Many people have not and it can be an off putting taste. 

The bartender provided wonderful service and conversation in answering all of our questions.  It was a great experience and now I want to go back for dinner sometime soon...but would settle for happy hour chorizo stuffed peppers anytime!

Brothers and sushi

Sailing was cancelled again...so what is a girl to do? Sushi at Brothers Lounge on Detroit. All drinks are a dollar off during happy hour.  So my vine martini with white wine and vodka is only $6.50. It is quite tasty.

The beauty of tonight is the sushi. Reasonably prices and only served on Tuesday. I ordered the 6 piece dynamite roll with spice tuna, salmon and avocado for $5.5 and then splurged on the 8 piece futo maki roll with spicy tuna, salmon, crab, avocado and siracha.  It is $11, but a huge portion.

The rolls were beautiful and fresh. Nice and light for a humid Tuesday night. The dynamite roll was spicy and perfect with the wasabi and soy. The pickled ginger was sweet with a kick. The futo maku roll really was huge with lots of fish inside and spicy siracha and a hoy mayo drizzled on top. There was way too much food for just one person, but of course I finished it all. Three rolls between 2 people would he perfect.

It's a nice contrast to the regular menu. Something special for a Tuesday night.

Flying fig lunch

An employee of mine was retiring so we decided to go to flying Fig for for lunch. It was the perfect spot for the special occasion. Well the lunch prices are extremely reasonable the food is phenomenal. At the end of the meal the total cost per person for a shared appetizer 3 meals 3 desserts and 3 ice teas was only $25 a person and that included tax and tip.

Now on to the important part... the food. We started with what is one of the best shared appetizer on the menu, the tempura battered green beans. They are light crispy and very fresh. They are served with a sword ginger sauce and a sweet thicker Asian sauce.

For the main course I had vegan and so workers had the eggs sandwich with the bread on the side. The vegan had beautifully homemade hummus grilled eggplant pickled onions roasted red peppers arugula and a balsamic dressing between ciabatta bread. It was a perfect combination and the sandwich was large.  My coworkers grilled eggplant sandwich was just as beautiful. There was a beautiful pile of arugula with thinly sliced marinated eggplant, a roasted red pepper/sundried tomato paste, and according to my dining companions a pickled fennel. They serve the bread on the side as requested and it was a delicious homemade onion focaccia.

However well the meal was wonderful desert stole the show. I had a banana rum bacon brittle ice cream that is made in house. It was made with wonderfully wholesome ingredients. My coworkers each ordered the butterscotch budino with salted caramel and a hazelnut cookie. They both wanted to scrape the mason jar for more.

The meal was very special and right next door is a little shop also filled with fresh ingredients to take home. The meal was memorable and delicious.

Morton's

So lots of happy hours have cheap food and drinks, but not all have amazing quality...Morton's has both!  First of all, it is Morton's so the service level is higher than normal and the bartenders get to know who you are and your likes in hopes that if you come back in the future they can impress you with this skill.  Better than anything...the food and matched with the pricing...this may take over from Pier W as the best happy hour.  Although I guess i could say Morton's has the best Happy Hour in Cleveland and Pier W the best in Lakewood.

So...what wonderful delectable bites did we try that just set me over the edge?  Well there were three of us for dinner/happy hour and so we ordered aq variety of items.  We started with the wedge salad bits.  It is just that, a wedge salad in a few bites on a plate.  Each bite has crispy bacon, fresh tomatoes and fragrant blue cheese.  This cost for this happiness $6.  Next we ordered the mini cheeseburgers (2), crab cakes, and trio of filet.  Each of these items is $7.  This emans the total cost of our happy hour full dinner was less than $10 a person for crab, fliet, burgers, and salad.  For the cost, the quality was just amazing.

Crab cakes- these are not some little item of breading and egg with some shreds of crab.  No these are crab pieces with just enough breading to hold them together.  Mini cheeseburgers- each one comes on a delicious bun with tomato and onion and cheddar cheese.  There is no need to use ketchup, mustard or mayo on these burgers.  All that would do is cover up the taste of the meat that just melts in your mouth.  Lastly, the filet trio.  Each piece of filet comes on top of a small crostini.  One has bernaise, one a wine sauce, the last a horseradish sauce.  Each one...amazing and fork cutting goodness.  We were able to split each piece into three and have a decent size portion. 

During Happy Hour they also have martini's and specialty drinks for $8 a person and wines for $7.  On this night I was blessed to be with a friend who has a wine locker and her wine selction was amazing!

Morton's officially has my top spot for happy hour.  Where shall I try next to try and drop it out of contention?  The fugally classy look at cost and quality not just cost. 

Toddles until I find my next fun place to dine!

TOAST

One of the newest places in Gordon Square is Toast.  It is a farm to table type place with all kinds of variables to its menu each night.  I like variables...so I went in for the fun.

I started with the "bartender's choice" for my drink.  You tell the bartender the spirit and if you want sweet or not and then let them create!  I went for non-sweet vodka.  I got a refreshing minty drink that was perfect for a warmish summer night.  My dinner companion asked for a wine that would pair well with chocolate- she was ordering the hand made chocolate truffle with almond.  The bartender gave her a glass of wine that was from a bottle left over from a wine tasting.  It was full bodied and smelled amazing. 

For my food choices...I went with the trio of toast, brocoli beer cheese soup and a sweet pea cake.  The trio of taost changes daily.  On Saturday it was a halibut confit, rabbit, and a vegetable with fresh pea shoots.  All three were amazing.  The toast was perfect.  A lot of times you order these items and the toast is so crunchy it falls apart, or soggy in the middle from the toppings.  This was crunchy, not soggy and it did not fall apart as you bit down.  The brocoli beer cheese soup was different.  Normally you expect thick cheesy broth with some piece of brocoli and a flavor of beer.  This soup was finely chopped brocoli, in an actual broth that was scented heavily with beer.  The chese was on top and the bacon piece were perfect.  LAstly, the sweet pea cake.  Ok...so some people think pea cake gross.  But it was really good.  My complaint was more with the frosting that was almost like thick slabs of butter instead of frosting.  It was not too sweet, which is my preference, but the texture was slightly off.

I am looking forward to another meal at Toast in the near future.  This time I may actually order something substantial.

Press Wine Bar

I got a pleasant surprise yesterday when a few friends stop by in the morning from out of town.  They were hungry and I wanted to find someplace new.  So we decided to try Press Wine Bar for brunch.  GREAT choice. 

The food was reasonably priced for brunch and it was delicious.  I started with an $8 Bloody Mary that could have been a meal itself.  It came with a spicy bloody mary mix, salty spiciness on the rim, and smoked bacon and a deviled egg on top.  It was well worth the $8 and never lost flavor, even as the ice melted. 

For Breakfast I had a mexi skillet with eggs, potato hash, poblanos, fried tortilla, and salsa verde.  It was a great blend of egg and flavor.  It had a little spice to it and they did bring me a side of hot sauce...always a must with egg dishes.  My two favorite dining companions egg had an omelet.  One had prosciutto, onion and cheese and the other had wild mushroom, provolone and argula.  They both came with a side of toast and potato hash.  The toast had very light butter, which I think is better then sopping bread.  The meals were a proper size and each cost under $10 for a Sunday brunch meal. 

I would love to go back and try their entrees and dinner menu as well as the wine on tap.  But for now...it is a solid brunch place for future endeavors!