A Study in Contrasts

Wednesday night, we were on the road back from a wrestling match and I decided to stop for dinner at the Chardon/Painesville exit. I'd seen a sign for the Red Hawk Grille and was intrigued. However, we did not spot the Red Hawk Grille until after we'd eaten. I did see John Palmer's Bistro 44. Since I'd heard good things about the restaurant, I decided to pull into the strip mall and check it out. J just shook her head when she saw the menu prices, but since I was paying, she had no say. It is pricey for just a stopping-for-dinner-on-the-road meal, but we'd not been out to a swank place for quite awhile. It was well worth it! The first thing I noticed was the row of Asian-looking paper-shaded lights above us and the roaring fireplace we didn't get to sit next to. You can't get the fireplace seat every time. I started us with a cheese plate. It was about double the price of the cheese service at The Winds and the cheese selection wasn't as good, but they did have fruit and a very nice balsamic vinegar on the plate, along with lovely toast "points" that were actually small slices. The pears and raspberries were perfect with the 8 year aged balsamic. The sole strawberry was showing evidence of being out of season, while the raspberries, surprisingly, were good. Neither of us touched the blueberries. Those are one of the foods whose actual flavor I truly dislike. Their texture is none too pleasing, either. The cheeses were a fairly unremarkable Cheddar (we weren't told the provenance of any of the cheeses), a tasty blue cheese in really unflattering shades of orange and blush red and a quite good aged Gouda, not quite as delightfully granular as some I've had, but no slouch at all. No Cowgirl Creamery Mt. Tam, no Cypress Grove Purple Haze, no Mahon or Pierre-Robert. But good, nonetheless.

For our main course, we split one of the specials, a certified NY Strip, medium-rare, with a blue cheese crust and a thyme-red wine reduction. The steak was splendid, perfectly cooked & with just the right crust to meat ratio. It was served with good skin-on mashed potatoes and a gorgeous tangle of sauteed wild mushrooms.

Dessert was called Chocolate, Chocolate, Chocolate, but for me, I could have totally skipped the chocolate mousse cake with ganache. Not that it wasn't good, but I am picky about cake and really prefer to eat my own chocolate nemesis cake or traditional wedding cake, frothy white with white icing, or no cake at all. Call it spoiled, if you will. However, the raspberry sorbet was so over and above the cake that no cake was required at all. It was magnificent, even capturing the heart of my dear sweet tooth wife, who generally eschews sorbet because it's "too sour" and makes faces when forced to try it. I don't believe I've ever met a sorbet I don't like but this one was high on the list. Not quite Jeni's Splendid (www.jenisicecreams.com and they ship!), but ahhh anyway Along with the cake and sorbet was a tall shot glass of "Bailey's hot chocolate" that earned the place of "favorite" among the desserts for me. A sumptuously silky elixir of goodness, I didn't want to share, but J loved it, too. Not as much as she adored the sorbet, but I must learn to make it. That golden texture!

All in all, the dinner was just perfect for soothing our kid-drama jangled nerves and making the evening more pleasant. The food was wonderful, the atmosphere really calming and warm and the service top notch. So, if you're in the Cleveland area & want a very special dinner, I do highly recommend this spot. www.johnpalmers.com is the website.

Now, for the contrast. Last night was J's night to cook. She got home late & then we went to Trader Joe's to shop for today's manager's lunch at the plant. By the time we ate, it was 10 p.m. We sat down to big bowls of cheeseburger Hamburger Helper, corn, olive oil bread and applesauce. And I skipped my corn (turned out funny, texture & temp-wise) & applesauce (too bland & found some black flecks in it-creepy!). Ha ha! No pretentious food snobbery here.