Restaurant Review: The Melting Pot

Somewhere Stephanie had been dying to eat for a very long time. Not bad, not outstanding, but definitely not worth the price tag. Don't get me wrong, the food was good, and some of the morsels were definitely interesting (hit the jump for more details), and I enjoyed my meal and the service was fantastic. All that aside, I think I can do it better.

I'm going to do it at home with some bagna cauda along with some shrimp and lobster tail, or maybe a shabu shabu (but with a dashi stock as opposed to water). Definitely something I'm going to have to do with people over, as I find the communal nature of fondue to be rather pleasing.

Hit the jump for details.

So the way the meal works, you do things a la carte or you can get the "Big Night Out" which is cheese fondue, salad, main course fondue and dessert, which is what we went with (complete with a coupon for a free dessert - thank you Internet!).

Cheese - cheddar & Emmenthaler with beer, garlic and Worcestershire: Like I have mentioned in other posts, I am a sucker for tableside service, so I loved it when our waitress made our cheese fondue for us. Granny Smith apples were tasty with it, as was the bread. Celery was not - gross veggies

Salad - It was a ho-hum salad. La dee da.

Fondue - They recommended a cooking time of 2 minutes for all things meat, which was too much for the lobster, shrimp and steak, just right for the pork, and too little for the chicken. Steph and I agreed that the highlights were the "limoncello-balsamic sirloin" (beefy yet tangy) and the "orange-fennel pork tenderloin"... flavor profiles I'm going to try and simulate at home. Too many dipping sauces, too. Oh, they had some porcini purse that was peppery and tasty.

Dessert - Cookies and Cream: Dark chocolate, flambeed marshmellow and crushed Oreos (again, tableside service!). The highlights here was that Stephanie actually ate cheesecake (!!!) and the Rice Krispie treats were the best non-homemade Rice Krispie treats I've ever had (I like mine super-dense and compacted...which these were).

Was it worth the $$$? No. Was it worth it to make Steph happy because we've been trying to try it for a few years now, and we finally were able to get it done without anything mussing it up? Yes.