Restaurant Week

Once upon a time, in a far away land, Restaurant Week was created. It was the best thing ever. The end. Okay, just kidding. But seriously, restaurant week really is the best thing ever. For those of you uninformed readers out there, let me fill you in. Restaurant week is usually longer than a week (to my knowledge), and is a time where select restaurants in a certain city offer three course menus for $35. Part of the money spent goes to some sort of Food Bank. Now, in case you are not a frequenter of fine dining establishments, $35 for a three course meal is a bargain and of course gives you an excuse to go hit up a restaurant you have been dying to try. I think you see where I'm going.. I always take advantage of restaurant week. Even if I am on a major budget, restaurant week is the one obvious exception.

Tonight, my mom and I dined at Olivette, a restaurant inside the Houstonian Hotel. The Houstonian, from what I know, is a sort of resort, health spa, hotel all in one. The reason I chose Olivette is because it was a new featured restaurant in my 2009 Zagat book. (Check) However, the main reason was the lemon olive oil cake being featured on their Restaurant Week Menu. Out of all the menus I researched, something about that lemon olive oil cake sounded so enticing, that I had to have it, and I had to have it soon.

Now, I would just go straight in to talking about the desserts at Olivette, because they were to die for, however, I believe that this is a food blog not a dessert blog, so I feel the need to inform all you readers of the food as well. For starters, Olivette brings out a delectable bread basket. I am usually not a huge bread person, because I feel that it's a waste of calories (this coming from the person who will eat five desserts in one sitting). Unless the bread looks very peculiar or is served with some sort of flavored butter, I typically stray away. However, tonight I happened to be starving, so I dug in. One of the choices was some sort of crisp cracker like bread with fennel seeds in it, which was tasty to say the least. There was also this wonderful little ball shaped bread that tasted like a croissant stuffed with a hint of cheese and herbs that was just melted in your mouth. And finally was the sour dough bread. Now, I also typically do not spread butter on my bread (yes, to save calories-laugh all you want), but I decided to indulge, and let me tell you, the butter was so soft and spreadable. There is nothing worse than being served cold, hard butter that just ends up being flung across the table while trying to spread it. I then proceeded to dip the sour dough bread in the olive oil that had been served on a plate with olives on it, and it was wonderful. I guess I should also talk a little bit more about the olives, since the restaurant is called Olivette. Although, apparently Olivette is an italian word, and the restaurant used to serve italian food. Anyways, that is besides the point. I haven't had an olive in years, so I really didn't know what to expect. They tasted like a very very strong olive oil, and I'm not quite sure how I felt about having to take the pit out of my mouth at a nice restaurant. At least they had a plate to put it on.

For our appetizers we selected the veal ravioli served with spinach, garlic, and prosciutto broth and clams served with garlic, parsley, butter, and grilled ciabatta. Now this appetizer course was a little adventurous for me. I tried veal years ago, and literally could see the baby cow as I was eating it and haven't touched it until tonight, and I have never tried clams before. Both presentations were lovely. My waiter came over and poured the prosciutto broth into the bowl that my raviolis were served in, which of course was somehow mesmerizing. The veal ravioli was well portioned as an appetizer and was a nice light starter to a meal. As far as the taste goes, I really don't know what to say. It was different and good, but nothing special. It tasted mostly like a dumpling with a slight hint of prosciutto. The flavors meshed well, but overall, I could have done without. Now to the clams. Keep in mind, that I do not know what clams are supposed to taste like, but I would hope that they are not supposed to taste as they did tonight. All i tasted was the ocean, and not in a good kind of way. More of in a "you're boogie boarding at the beach and get wiped out by a wave and then salt water floods your mouth kind of way." In other words, pure salt. My mom, on the other hand, enjoyed them, so to each his own, I suppose.

For my main course I selected the grilled flat iron steak served with ratatouille, potato croquettes, and basil. My mom had the seared gulf snapper served with spanish chorizo, black olives, fennel, and sherry vinegar. My steak was perfectly cooked and seasoned. It didn't taste like your basic steak house steak, but more of a zesty flavor. I was so excited to try this "ratatouille" with my steak, because I have been dying to try it since I saw the movie Ratatouille, and was somewhat disappointed. Not necessarily in the ratatouille itself, but the overall flow of the dish. I just didn't think the flavor combination of the zucchini and other vegetables in the ratatouille went well with the steak. The potato croquettes on the other hand were delicious, but then again what's not to like about a potato croquette? (Which in case you don't know, sort of tastes like a breaded hash brown). Now, I am not a seafood person, but will try everything at least once, so of course I had to try my mom's snapper, and I will say it wasn't bad. I typically associate fish as a very light food and chorizo as a heavier flavored food, but the flavors of the two mixed surprisingly well together. And, the fish was not fishy!

Drum roll please...........Lemon olive oil cake. Need I say more? It was everything I thought it would be and more. You know how when you watch those movies like Made of Honor and the girl meets the man of her dreams who is perfect only to find out that he is not the man of her dreams, some other guy is(because duh, I could have told you that in real life people don't get married in castles in Scotland)? Well, this dessert was nothing like it. This was love at first sight and bite. There was no, "I'm not sure of this is the right one business"; this was everything I had been waiting for and more. It was lemon olive oil cake served with a lavender honey cream and blueberries. The cake itself was a yellow cake and was moist with a slight hint of lavender from the cream, very slight though, not too overwhelming. I loaded each bite with the cake itself and the cream then dipped it in the blueberry sauce on the plate and topped it with a blueberry. It was such a smooth clean taste, and the lemon and the blueberry were the perfect flavor combinations. Neither flavors were too tart like lemon and blueberry sometimes can be, and the sweetness of the cake balanced the dish perfectly. Like I said, it was a match made in heaven. For our second dessert, we had a chocolate pudding cake with fudge sauce, hazelnut ice cream, and hazelnut tuile. This dessert was just as incredible as the first. The chocolate pudding cake itself was similar to a molten cake, but the whole cake was moist and fell apart at the touch of a fork, which is probably why it is called a pudding cake. Each bite was filled with chocolate sauce and crumbled cake. I just scooped it up with hazelnut ice cream, which tasted exactly like hazelnuts, and it literally melted in my mouth. The hazelnut tuile was very artistic. I had seen a chef create tuiles, I believe on one of the Top Chef competitions. It basically looked like a long stick with the ball at the end of it of hardened sugar. The stick part tasted like caramel, and the ball had a hazelnut inside. A pleasant surprise. (Pictures will be posted soon).

All in all, Olivette was good, but it didn't blow me away. Except for the desserts. My mom and I decided that since we were in the area though, that we might as well stop at some other dessert places and pick some extra desserts up for the road. And yes, by this point I was full, but for some reason when it comes to dessert, my stomach miraculously is no longer full. Imagine that... Anyways we went to a little cafe in the area and picked up a piece of pistachio cake and some other dessert bar that were also amazing. However nothing beats this. After we had picked up our fourth dessert of the night, we were driving by Memorial Park, which is a very popular park in the area where lots of people go to run, walk their dogs, etc. And when I say lots, I literally mean that I thought a marathon was going on. What beats driving down the road watching packs and packs of runners as you stuff your face with your 4th dessert of the night? How about telling your mom that you should go to the local ice cream place and pick up a free ice cream treat for your dog, when really you just want some ice cream for yourself? And yes, I actually did do that....

http://www.houstonian.com/