Dinner at "Dish"

Dinner at "Dish" wasn't all that it was cooked up to be. I heard "Dish" was the new hot spot occupying the the space in downtown Hartford where the old 'Learners' use to be. The girls and I decided to go to "Dish" after seeing the movie 'Sex and The City'. Walking into the restaurant we were greeted by a hostess and were immediately seated. We had reservations, however, I don't think they would have had a problem seating us, it was Friday night and they weren't very busy; that didn't detour me, my mouth was salivating at the thought of my palate being tantalized and caressed by the prospects of what "Dish" had to offer. The decor was contemporary with what can only be described as karaoke music coming from the bar area, but was later resolved by the group to be a band.

The over moderately priced menu had little to be desired, everything is 'a la carte' unless you order what is considered an entree. For example, my friend ordered seared scallops with a side of creamed spinach. The creamed spinach was tasty, though the scallops were brought out on a separate plate with a smear of pepper jelly and ramekin filled with some sort of relish. It would have had a better presentation if the chef would have dressed the plate with some baby greens to occupy some of the white space. I easily settled on the brick oven chicken with cous cous and a fennel and orange salad. I figured, you can't go wrong with chicken... or so I thought. When my plate was placed in front of me, the first thing that I noticed was the amount of white space, which they tried to fill with a drizzle of balsamic vinaigrette here and there. My chicken lacked flavor and was over-cooked. The warm chicken was then layed on top of the chilled cous cous which was mixed with the salad. It would have been better if the cous cous was hot along with the chicken and the chilled salad served away from the hot food. The orange and fennel salad would have been ok if the fennel was roasted or grilled, I find those two cooking methods can really bring our the licorice flavor fennel can posses. Instead the fennel seemed raw in texture and taste. I decided to sample a friends lobster mash potatoes, once again, in an attempt to seduce my senses. Needless to say, I was unlucky in love, the mash potato did not seemed to absorb the flavor of the lobster.

Our server was very nice, however, it took a long time for our food to come out after we ordered, luckily we all were so busy catching up and talking about the movie it didn't seem to bother anyone. Will I go back to "Dish" again? No, I've had my fill, however, see for yourself, maybe your experience will be better. You've read my experience, now hear what other members of the restaurant group had to dish out on "Dish". I give "Dish" two out of five forks, and that's for the ambiance alone.