Last night we went to Marea, an Italian seafood restaurant on Central Park South. It was fantastic.
Wine List: organized from lightest to fullest body. I really hate when wines are organized this way. They should be organized by country, region and then type and producer. T
Amuse Bouche - a parsnip soup. It was really tasty, but I'm getting increasingly tired of soup as amuse. It seems lazy to me. Making a big pot of soup and putting it into individual shot glasses is not particularly "amusing." That said, I love soup, and generally I like the flavor of any amuse soup given to me.
Tasting of Raw Fish - fluke, mackerel and tuna. The fluke was really nice and fresh tasting. The mackerel was unreal - it was served with duck proscuitto and pomergranate seeds. The flavor combination was so good, I wanted it to linger in my mouth, so I gave both bites of the tuna to the husband.
Antipasti
Husband: lobster and butternut squash soup
Wife: crab with burrata and eggplant
Wife tried husband's soup and was very impressed. Wife is a sucker for all iterations of butternut squash soup and this was no exception. Wife's dish was innovative and excellent as well. Burrata is made by forming a hollow bowl of fresh buffalo mozzerella cheese, filling it with fresh curds of mozz, topping it with fresh cream, and covering up the bowl. It's basically a little piece of heaven on earth. It's tough to find, because it needs to be served very fresh and is therefore very expensive if actually produced in and shipped from Italy, or you have to find someone who is into making this fresh cheese locally. God Bless NYC where you can find several such persons :)
Primi:
Husband:
Wife: the best pasta I've had in 2010 (i.e. fresh fusilli with octopus and bone marrow). I could have eaten the pasta plain it was so good. More restaurants should do fresh pasta. However, I was greatful for the excellent and rich sauce.
Secondi:
Husband: swordfish. He says it's quite excellent. I do not taste as I don't particularly care for swordfish
Wife: scallops. I know. "BORING!" Scallops are like the roast chicken of a seafood menu, put there for people who aren't adventurous with food. But I like scallops, and they sounded good. They were really big and excellently seared.
Dessert:
Husband: apple thing. Because he always gets the apple thing (it is very American of him)
Wife: chocolate thing. Because wife always gets the chocolate thing (uh, it's chocolate). Wife likes the chocolate thing. It's creamy. The ice cream, whatever flavor, might have been vanilla, was gobbled up in one bite. I'm almost being serious. I think it was freshly made.
Mini chocolates:
There was a peanut butter thing. Oh my Lord, the peanut butter thing. Husband insisted he was too full. Wife, despite her better judgement, insisted he try the peanut butter thing. Husband was not disappointed. Wife was disappointed because she totally missed out on the other half of the peanut butter thing. Wife makes resolution to share less with husband.
