Dine Out 2007 notes

For reviews of Dine Out 2007 restaurants, please see:
Parkside (January 31, 2007)
Al Porto Ristorante (January 2007)
Figmint (January 2007)
LK Dining Lounge (January 2007)
Elixir (January 27, 2007)

All in all, it's a "gamble" to eat during Dine Out as, sometimes, one can't be sure if the restaurant is just out to grab "Dine-Out" cash or if they are actually willing to serve their (hopefully "usual") good quality fare at the discounted rate.

While Parkside was super-excellent and the others above were in varying degrees of "success", there were a couple of truly disappointing ones this year. Some excerpts from our reviews:

Ocean 6 Seventeen (January 2007)

[js]
So out of 10, total rating was probably a 3-4. A bit of a disappointment. I don't know if this is a function of DINEOUT (because it's so cheap then some restaurants might have a cheaper version of their menu) or just the restaurant is like that is all.

3/10 to 4/10 and one point of that is because of the company.

Central Bistro (February 2, 2007)

It was a case of the menu stating one thing, and the actual dish being another. Execution was also just not good, in general.

[js]
I really didn't know what this dish was trying to do: something was not "there there." I don't know if it's the execution or the conceptualization that was at fault here. It sounded good on paper, but I was disappointed with this dish. I felt like it was (a) all over the place; (b) not well thought out; (c) poorly executed; (d) somebody didn't care about the dish. And (d) is the most general and worst indictment at all.

[ts]
Maybe the problem was the menu descriptions: they made it seem like there would be "more" to the dish, so that when the actual item arrived, it's a little bit of a letdown. If they just wrote what the dish actually is, then one would know what to expect. (eg, the salad components; "forest mushrooms" = button mushrooms, "honey & citrus vinaigrette" = balsamic reduction, etc.)

Rating: 4-ish too... Am just trying to remember what I gave Ocean 6 Seventeen. Not sure which is better/worse.