La Fondue (Saratoga)

http://www.lafondue.com/

So today Alicia and I celebrated 11 years of putting up with each other and decided to walk to La Fondue in Saratoga to celebrate the occasion. This restaurant is actually owned by our landlords however fear not, I shall give an objective review as I always do. (As objective as a persons opinion can be!). We had a 7pm reservation and showed up on time to be seated. The restaurant has an eccentric decor and it seemed to change from the lobby (lions heads and pop art photography) to the area where we were seated (religous art). We ordered the "Feast for two". This involved salads, cheese fondue, 6 different proteins for the main course, and chocolate fondue.
The salads came out while the cheese fondue was heating up. I had a few problems with the salad. It comes deconstructed on the plate but the plate is packed to where you can't mix the salad without having it fall out. You have to eat the salad a little at a time and then mix it a little at a time. You have a choice of chef or spinach salad. We both got the spinach salad. My carrots and cucumbers were fresh but tasted watery. I don't know if that is from them being rinsed quick and then shredded and cut while not properly dried. Anyway, the salad is also just too big to come with all the other food that is part of the "feast". I would skip the salad if I went again.
For the cheese fondue we ordered the Cajun, which consists of cheddar, beer, shrimp and spices. Our server added fresh garlic to it and what looked like salsa. This gave the fondue a nice punch to it and it went well with the bread cubes and fruits and vegetables that came with it. The only weird thing was at the end you have all the little shrimp piled up at the bottom of the fondue. I don't know why they are in there you just eat them at the end I guess. This was a nice start to the meal thought and we both enjoyed it very much.
For the next part of the feast you got to pick 6 different proteins from quite a large selection, including exotic meats like kanagroo and crocodile. For our six we chose: wild boar filet, buffalo filet, pacific shrimp, free range chicken, pacific catch (tuna), and scallops. You get to pick your cooking method and we chose the electric grill. The proteins come with a mix of vegetables and 6 different dipping sauces. So if the restaurant isn't cooking for you that what can you judge them on? Mainly the service and the quality of the products given to you. All the proteins were nicely cut and looked fresh. I smelled the tuna, scallops and shrimp closely and was impressed. There wasn't a hint of a fishy odor or the product slipping past its prime. All the seafood proteins tasted excellent and there was a dipping sauce to go with whatever your tastes, although a few were a little sweet. The tuna was such nice pieces that we just seared the outside of them and ate them mostly without the dipping sauce. The same could be said for the scallops. The shrimp however did taste good dipped in the "mango chutney" sauce. The buffalo fillet strips were very good as well and there was a chipotle type BBQ sauce that seemed to be made for these. There also was a sour cream and chive sauce that Alicia liked for that as well. The wild boar fillet was excellent and honestly better than most pieces of pork you get at a restaurant. I could have eaten a lot of that. The chicken was good as well but was out shined by all the other great proteins we had. I should say it is also kind of fun to cook your own food like that. It's a novel experience that you don't usually get when you eat out.
For dessert we had the "Choctastic" fondue which was dark chocolate, hazelnut, and marscapone cheese. It came with an assortment of things to dip in it, from fruit pieces to chocolate cookie dough and pound cake. If you like sweets you won't be disappointed here. Alicia and I agreed that the orange slices tasted best dipped in this chocolate. The one small issue was the cream puffs that came with the fondue were still frozen hard on the inside.
The service was very good. Our waters were constantly filled and plates were removed as soon as they were empty. The food takes a little longer than a typical restaurant because you have to wait for the cheese fondue to melt, the grill to heat up for your proteins, and the chocolate fondue to melt before you can eat each course. This isn't the place to go for a power lunch or quick bite. We spent almost two and half hours at our table. You need all that time for the amount of food you get. This is another reason why I should have ate half of the salad (Alicia was smart and did just that) . Our server asked if we were celebrating something special for the meal. We mentioned it was our anniversary and out with desert came complimentary glasses of champagne.
I would definitely recommend giving La Fondue a try. I think the fact that you can try so many different proteins in one sitting is worth it alone. It's a unique dining experience and maybe somewhat novel but go try it and decide for yourself. I would also like to thank our landlords Mitch & Tracy because when the bill came out it was "comped" by them so we just left a tip for our server and tried to walk off as much of the food as we could on the way home.

Casa Cobre (Saratoga)

http://www.casadecobre.com/
Tonight Alicia was in the mood for Mexican. Instead of getting in a car to find a place to eat we walked downtown to try the local Mexican place, Casa Cobre (House of Copper). Getting a seat at 6:30pm on a Friday night was not a problem. The place did fill up though by the end of the meal. The atmosphere is nice, warm Mexican colors and art and a nice looking bar. We sat down at a table for two and it was a little longer than the usual table. Alicia seemed farther away than usual. The area we were seated was on the smaller side so it got a little loud towards the end of the meal when the place filled up.

So after walking in the cold something hot sounded nice. There was a queso fondido on the menu. Melted cheese sounded just right and we ordered that along with the house margarita and a margarita called the Purist. The cheese came out bubbling in a little crock with warm tortillas on the side. It looked nice but was pretty bad. The cheese was very stringy and the chorizo tasted like one you buy at the local supermarket. I should have just burned 8$ dollars out of my wallet instead of ordering that. It was also gone in a few bites so I ordered the chips & salsa as well. You actually have to pay for chips and salsa here (3$) but it is easily worth it. The chips are right out of the fryer and warm. You get three different salsas (all of which are good) and a pico de gallo which honestly was the best pico de gallo I've had anywhere. Pico de gallo is pretty simple so I'm sure the fact that they actually had ripe tomatoes in there helped. (And where the hell do you get ripe tomatoes in January?). Ok, Alicia's house margarita came with key lime juice and triple sec. She enjoyed it very much and I thought it was passable. The Purist margarita was terrible. It consisted of fresh lime juice, agave, and tequila. It tasted like limeade and left me fishing for hints of the reposado that was supposed to be in there. I probably should have said something and I didn't bother finishing it. Alicia said she would finish it for me but had enough of it very quickly and was done with it.
Alicia ordered a Chile Relleno. Out comes her dish and a beautifully presented plate comes out with one of the nicest Pasilla peppers I've ever seen on it. It looks plump and of course is stuffed with a really nice Mexican cheese. It's covered with a guajillo type sauce and served on a bed of rice. This was the perfect pepper with deep dark green flesh and that awesome peppery spice that a ripe Pasilla has. This was by far the best Chile Relleno I've ever had and Alicia liked it very much but it was too spicy for her so I gladly finished it off. For myself I ordered Chicken Mole. Mole is my favorite Mexican sauce and I tend to judge all Mexican places by it. This dish too was well presented and garnished with sliced bits of egg and red onions. It had a nice aroma and I was looking forward to digging in. I tried the first bite and the Mole was missing something. It was mild and had no punch or depth in it. If Estrellita's (Los Altos) puts over 40 ingredients in their Mole then this place must use five. It was certainly edible just really mellow and uninspiring. The worst part though was there was so little chicken in the mole. At times I thought they forgot to put it in but then would see strands of shredded chicken mixed in the sauce. This is unforgivable. This dish is just lacking all around and I'm really disappointed. It is a stark contrast to the Chile Relleno Alicia got. Another thing, the mole enchilada comes a la carte. So I had to order beans and rice on the side (4$) and (3$) respectively. It's not as bad as it sounds because it's enough for two people or three "dainty" folk. The rice was good and mixed with well cooked carrots and potatoes. The black beans were amazing. They were by far the best I've had anywhere at home or at a restaurant. They were not in a heavy sauce or syrup but freshly cooked and served with onions sweated down to nothing but sweetness. Alicia described the beans as melt in your mouth and I can't say enough about them. I didn't know black beans could taste that good. That was enough food for us and we skipped desert.
I should say the service was good as well. A friendly waitress and bus boy brought us the food with good speed, kept the waters filled, and were clearing plates as soon as they were empty to help keep the table neat.
With tip the bill was 84$ and it was not worth it to me. This restaurant leaves me in a strange place. The chips/salsa were above average and the black beans were the best I've ever had. The Chile Relleno was just unreal and a must have for anyone who loves peppers and an awesome vegetarian dish for the non meat eaters. But how can I recommend a place that can't make a margarita? Or a chicken mole? I've never had a meal where such great and poor items were served in the same sitting. Okay so I have the only solution I can think of. This is a good one too for "hoity toity" Saratoga.

Order Chips/Salsa ($3)
Order two Chile Rellenos ($11x2)
Order side of black beans to share ($4)

Enjoy a good vegetarian meal for two people at $29 plus tax/tip
Order anything else at your own risk/reward.