I just spent 7 in Atlanta for a critical care conference. We were
wined, dined and totally overfed! I paid for one meal the entire week.
LOL. God love salesmen with generous entertainment budgets!
I stayed at the Embassy Suites at Centennial Park where the day
started (way too early) with the "complimentary" hot breakfast. People
raved about the omelets made to order. I pretty much stuck with grits,
fruit and yogurt. I wasn't really hungry at lunch time (who has time?!)
but the Happy Hour back at the Embassy Suites was again welcome! From
5:30-7:30 nightly one could kick back with adult bev of choice. Two at a
time, even! You did have to go up to the bar window to retrieve them,
but that's a small price to pay, eh? Everyone who went up always got two
of something each time. The bartender at Ruth's Chris later told me that
he was surprised by how much nurses can drink! Ha.(...god my liver can't
do too many more conferences this year. I think this one pickled it,
lol) The bar snacks sucked big time (those horrid tasteless colored
tortilla chips and salsa, or this generic spicy "chex mix" type stuff).
It never varied the entire week. Feh.
While we ate at the Ruth's Chris a 3 times, I have to say my
favorite meal was when about 10 of us were taken to "Two Urban Licks"
over in the Warehouse section of Atlanta. A totally incredibly urbane
place, with views of the city from the back of this old warehouse where
they just opened up the large "garage" doors and let the air in. They
had a nice patio set up over a bocce ball court, and even had a small
kitchen herb garden out back for the chef. Great jazz group playing
live, and slick "unisex" bathrooms behind a neon wall. I understand the
Exec Chef and partner Scott Serpas owns two other restaurants in Atlanta
with one having the word "One" in the title, and this one "Two Urban
Licks" and lastly something else with "Three.." I will make a point of
discovering them too on my next trip.
We started out ordering drinks ("if it's free, it's for me!" was our
motto) and then just ordered a mess of starters to share amongst the 10
of us. The daily printed menu (on heavy card stock, which are recycled
as "pillars" for small candles on the table the next day) included 11
appetizers and of these our table sampled 3- salmon chips. Described as
"short smoked salmon, chipotle cream cheese, capers and red onions on
top of a large homemade tortilla chip of some sort. ($9), Lamb
Lollipops, with grape chile jam and goat cheese (good!! do you hear that
Nancy Young!?) which were also $9. Also we tried the beef tenderloin
skewers with portabella fries and chimichurri sauce ($10) and they were
out of this world good! I'd love to recreate that chimichurri sauce
sometime.
Since I had so much meat with the appetizers, I just decided to have
their sping salad (greens, goat cheese, sun chips with a red chile
vinaigrette, $7) and a cheese plate ($11) for dinner. My cheese plate
was a large wooden round cutting board (?) with manchego, reypaener,
Vermont Cheddar, Humbolt fog cheeses, with house made lavash, and a pear
paste with marcona almonds. It was delicious and just what I wanted.
Others raved about the maple leaf duck breast that arrived with spring
onion goat cheese [censored] and pasilla pineapple jus ($19). One person had
the seafood gumbo and it too looked good. The menu was heavy on fish,
but did have a couple of beef and chicken selections.
Dessert was again a mass tasting event and they brought us multiple
servings of their white chocolate cheesecake served with blackberries
and passion fruit sorbet ($7), their lemon meringue cake served with
blueberry ice cream ($6), the banana coconut cream pie with milk
chocolate ice cream ($7) and a double chocolate bread pudding served
with Jack Daniels ice cream and white chocolate mousse ($7) as if we
NEEDED more liquor? LOL.
They had some interesting sounding infusions listed on the beverage
menu that they make themselves. I'll have to try those next time. A nice
looking wine and beer menu. A lot of folks were trying the Sweetwater
420 beer from Atlanta.
A friend and I came back to have a nightcap at Ruth's Chris, even
staying past closing and chatting up the bartender.
Next year the critical care conference is in Chicago, so I'll look
forward to another week of trying new places to eat there. My liver
should have recovered by then too......