Bistro 27

Since it was First Friday, albeit a small one, this past Friday, K and I thought it'd be a nice adventure to try something new and go for one of the Broad St corridor restaurants. Any restaurant I go to on a Friday night has an automatic advantage with me: I'm in a good mood, because I'm about to have my first cocktail of the weekend, and I'm having it with the woman of my dreams. We chose Bistro 27, and were seated at a little table right by the front window, and adjacent to the bar. It was the perfect spot for people watching, as the gallery-goers made their way down the street. In Bistro 27, there is smoking at the bar, and at the 2 small tables nearby.

I often like to scope out a restaurant before we go, by checking other blogs and sort of getting a general vibe. I had remembered reading in someone's blog review of 27, that they were put off by dirt on the tablecloth. I had to laugh, because when we got there, the waitress was trying to set a vase of flowers on the table, but it kept spilling over, and she finally gave up, whisked the cloth off and put on a new one. When we sat down I noticed it was dirty.

They have an interesting cocktail menu at 27...options that I had not seen before. I had a rum cocktail, and K had a pomegranate martini. Mine was good, but hers was better. Over the the course of our meal we each had a couple of them. When I asked our waiter/bartender how he made them, he graciously provided instructions. I also noticed that they have 27 wines under $27- which is a cute and clever concept.

We received a basket of bread, with both fresh sliced crusty bread and focaccia. this was accompanied by a dish of tomato infused olive oil for dipping. It had a smoky rich tomato flavor and I found myself putting an awful lot of it on the bread.

For an appetizer, we shared the Calamari Fritti. It was served with both a ramekin of marinara, as well as a Saffron Aioli. Both sauces were very good- not amazingly fabulous, but very good. The Calamari on the other hand, really was fabulous. The batter was very light and crispy and the Calamari was almost melt in your mouth tender. We both deemed it some of the best ever.

The service was a little slow, and our waiter was very nice, but he was almost a little hapless... I think that's the word I'm looking for. He dropped his little black cloth that he was carrying around next to our table at least 3-4 times... he'd lose his train of thought when he was trying to explain the specials, and his eyes would sort of wander off, and when it was taking a really long time to get our next drink he whooshed by, promising it was on the way, and declaring it was 'crazy in here!" The dining room was only half full at that point... In all fairness though, I'm not sure how many servers were working.

With the tasty drinks and app, we had high hopes for our entrees... although I am sad to say, they both fell a little short. I ordered the Veal Scallopini. It came with mashed potatoes, greens and asparagus. The mashed potatoes had been squeezed out into a little swirly tower. I tend to find this disturbing, since the potatoes have to be of a certain consistency in order to be squirted out like that, and I really like them a little more dense and homestyle. Not to mention, that when you take these home in the doggy-bag, and eat them the next day, you'll find really strange textural changes have taken place- they get really starchy-weird. How's that for a culinary description? I never said I was sophisticated- I just know what I like. I did enjoy the greens- they were prepared with plenty of garlic, and some pine nuts.

The veal looked nice- the edges were a little crispy and there was several slices on the plate. And in contrast to my meat dish at Comfort last week, there was a good portion of sauce on it. At Comfort, the meat didn't need any sauce though- I think that here, it did. The Veal itself was ok. Nothing special, not horrible, not that great- it was cooked ok, and it tasted ok.... but unfortunately the sauce was really not good at all. It was a little glutenous and almost institutional tasting. It made the whole plate...well...gooey. And there was none of that lemony citrus flavor I associate with Scallopini- and no capers. This is a classic, clean and simple dish, and it shouldn't be that hard to execute well.

K ordered the fish special. The fish was called 'Awahi' I believe, but when I tried to do more research on it, I didn't come up with much. So I may have messed up the name... But what she got, was 2 little filets, about an inch and a half thick, and 2-3" across. They looked sort of like small swordfish steaks. The fresh citrus sauce that it was served with was very tangy and tasty- it tasted like mango, kiwi, cilantro with lemon, lime and peppers. The sauce was the best thing on the plate. The fish came with the same potatoes, asparagus and greens. K only ate one piece of the fish, pronoucing it "eh...okay."

Probably the biggest thing that bugged us about our meal at 27, was that after we finished our entrees, our plates sat in front of us. And they sat. And they sat. And then they even sat some more. I went to the bathroom at one point and came back, thinking surely by now that plate will be gone. It wasn't. We invented a laughing game, holding our breath when the waiter walked by and trying not to laugh when he didn't pick up the plates. It really did go on a crazy long time... and we tried the eye contact thing too- where you stare at the waiter, and then stare at your plate... that didn't work either. It wouldn't have been that big a deal except that the table was really tiny.

So, our assessment: Bistro 27 is a nice place to go for drinks and an appetizer. I'd go again for a drink and a snack. But dinner was fairly expensive, and we just didn't think the quality of the entrees is there yet.

Bistro 27
27 West Broad Street
804.780.0086