I couldn’t wait to get to the hotel and write this down. Tonight’s meal was absolutely delish! Scott knows the owners of Geronimo. Although neither of them were present, we had an incredible meal.

The place smelled of perfection - always a good sign. You can tell how good a restaurant will be by how you are greeted at the door. We stood only a minute before the host approached and told us he was glad we were here. This was a first, nobody has ever used that welcome line! The place was tastefully decorated with a Southwestern motif and accents of stainless steel. Chic. The stemware was either Reidel or Spiegle I couldn’t tell, but you could hardly go wrong with either.

Johnathan, our waiter, was very professional except for being guilty of practicing one of my biggest pet peeves. He asked if everything was OK after every course and on one occasion approached with the inquiry before I could get my fork into the tart. One should assume in a place like this that everything is wonderful and if there is a problem for whatever reason, you are around making yourself seen by the guest so they can get your attention if need be. That’s just me.

I always enjoy doing the chef’s tasting menu when I can. Geronimo fortunately had two, a seafood menu and meat menu, both came with the option to have the courses paired with a selected wine. I opted for the meat and Scott the seafood. I had decided against the wine pairing for I felt that the varietals were a little weak. Scott chose the wine pairing; his selections were much more suited for those varietals. Now for the money shot.

I began with a warm tart of olive oil marinated tomatoes with olive oil infused goat cheese over smoked salmon, egg salad. Delicate and mighty tasty I thought the cheese was a bit excessive for the size of the tart. Next, Scott was served grilled Diver scallops with a petite frisee salade and a parsley chimi churi. I enjoyed butter braised Morel mushrooms with Maytag Bleu dressed Boston lettuce. At this point I ordered a glass of Zinfandel by Trinitas, a domestic and Scott had a local sparkling Blanc de Noir, a sparkling wine made from pinot noir grapes.

A delicate pairing of subtle well done textures set the mood for our next course. I am picky when it comes to dressing; often times asking for it on the side. I should have done it here, but I thought it might sound rude. The lettuce, although perfect in size and crunch, was drenched in the dressing and the addition of dry crumbles added to the overdose. The mushrooms were braised long enough to take on a buttery note and seared just enough to shroud the buggers in a veil of thin carmelization. At this point we were served an Intermezzo, a in between petit course that in theory is supposed to clean the palate and is usually sorbet. The sorbet du jour was coconut and it was sublime.

For the main event I had oven roasted lamb “Diane” with a green peppercorn cognac cream and fingerling potatoes. I ordered a merlot out of the vineyard of Robert Sinskey. To go with his ZD chardonnay, Scott had an Hawaiian tuna steak with Japanese horseradish potatoes and a tomato scallion compote with a lime soy shrimp fond. This was orgasmic as was my lamb. It was so good that Scott, not usually a fan of lamb had two bites.

To finish I had a duo of cheesecake, Bailey’s and toffee. A chocolate mousse and flourless chocolate cake sent Scott into chocolate convulsions. I though his Graham’s port was a poor choice; the sweetness dominated instead of complimenting. I wish we had saved some for later, I’m hungry again!

This entry was posted by Johnny on Wednesday, January 17th, 2007 at 11:47 PM and is filed under Pet Peeves, Food & Wine. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.

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