Karen and I have been celebrating our birthdays together since our first year of law school. Our birthdays are a mere 8 days apart and in the past, we have eaten at wd-50, Kaz Sushi, Restaurant Eve (my first ever tasting menu) and City Zen among other places. This year Karen sent me a list of possibilities that included Marcel's but I decided on Vermilion in Alexandria.
The lovely Karen. It's her first appearance on the site but not her last.
The server convinced me to agree to the tasting menu. I hesitated because I was not sold on the dessert but I let our server know and she guaranteed that it was delicious.
Amuse-bouche. I don't remember what it was but it was delicious.
First course was lobster tortelloni with davon crest chilies, fines herbes, lemon & roasted shellfish sauce. It was good but I sometimes just don't like the consistency of lobster. It's a little too chewy for me.
Line caught Virginia Rockfish with warm potato-leek salad, bacon, hollandaise & green peppercorn. It was good but the potatoes were cold which threw off the dish.
This is not a dish I would typically order but it was the best of the first three courses - Maryland all natural beef strip loin with baby potato confit, wilted mizzuna, local onions & salsa verde.
And the surprise was that our server brought out a third dessert for us to share which I cannot even find on the dessert menu. It was a chocolate hazelnut cake with hazelnut gelato and it was very good.
And this is the figgy toffee pudding with candied walnuts, caramel & sour cream ice cream. This was my favorite. The flavors just worked well and I loved the sour cream ice cream.
We told the server after the fact that it was our shared birthday dinner and she included this card in our check. It was very sweet.
I enjoyed reading about our culinary adventures -- who knew that the ice cream accompanying the figgy toffee pudding was sour cream flavored?! And, the pictures came out really well (except, perhaps, the one of me, which does not seem to be too flattering).
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