Kaleidoscope Cafe

Kaleidoscope Cafe

Upon walking up to the door, I thought this place was closed.  After walking in, I thought I was in the wrong place.  After all, it was 6 O'clock on a Wednesday.  Somebody should be in here besides me.  But there wasn't.  I immediately thought to myself, "Why isn't anyone here.  Is this a mistake?"

The decor was awful.  It needed updated.  The walls needed painted.  If they weren't doing tons of business, they should take away a few tables to make it look less cluttered.  It would look fuller if there were less tables.  Maybe they should get an interior decorator to help with the space planning in here.  I can see why people aren't coming in and staying.

I hear the only server taking an order to go.  Someone must like the food, but I see why they don't want to sit in here to eat.  I see the theme that they are trying to do, but it's not succeeding.  It needs a make over. 

I asked about gluten free items on the menu.  I was handed the lunch menu and told some of the things listed as gluten free, like the pork, weren't gluten free.  And the chicken apple sausage was listed as gluten free, but wasn't in that preparation, but could be prepared in a different preparation.  Obviously, they needed new menus printed, too.

I ordered the cornish hen. I was told it would take 20-25 minutes.  I understood, but was hungry.  It really did take that long.

The cornish hen half was moist with a crispy skin and had a yellow savory sauce.  It had sweet figs, seasoned squash, two cherry tomatoes, and smashed potatoes.  The smashed potatoes were evenly lumpy like they should be, with some skins in the mix.  The chunks were soft enough that they melted in my mouth.  As far as smashed potatoes go, these ones were pretty good.

The pork wasn't gluten free because of the soy sauce.  But I hear was delicious as well.  The presentation was good.  In case you wanted to see the pork, here it is.

Finally, at the end of meal meal, two other groups were seated.  The acoustics were awful and I was glad I was finished with my meal.  Perhaps the odd kaleidoscope triangles on the walls were there to dampen the sound. They make sound dampening ceiling tiles that would probably work well for this place if they didn't want to instal carpet.

Overall, the food was delicious, the service was friendly, but the space needed updated. 

108 43rd St, Pittsburgh, PA 15201
http://kaleidoscopepgh.com/

The Crested Duck Charcuterie

The Crested Duck is only open form 5-10 on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.  There are only 20 seats in the whole dining area and I think you will definitely need a reservation to get a table, but it is well worth it.  The food is amazing.  This is the place that is providing the cured meats to the other places around town that you're ordering, like the Omni William Penn, Spoon, and Bar Marco.  Its better to come to the source. 

This place is amazing if you like cured meats.  The small charcuterie plate is $10 and comes with four cured meats & the large plate $20 comes with eight cured meats.  Who wouldn't go with the large plate to sample everything this place has to offer?  They don't tell you what the meats are before you order them, and I'm sure it's what ever is ready when you go so it probably changes every couple weeks.  Its byob and the cork fee is $5.  I was told all of the charcuterie was gluten free, but the salad and desserts were not.

When the plate arrived, the server told me the name of everything on the plate was, but I really am not super familiar with the names of cured meats.  I know something was venison, something white was called Lardo, and there was plums, nuts & tiny pickles on the plate. Most of the meats were sliced thinner than paper.  Everything on the plate was delicious, with the exception of the the one large, red, round pate like meat closest to me. I didn't like the texture or the flavor, but if you're into that sort of thing, it probably would be delicious to you.  It just wasn't my thing.

Then my smoked duck with strawberry BBQ sauce came.  It was beautiful.  It was delicious.  It was tender & smokey & juicy.   The BBQ sauce was sweet and spicy.  I need more of this sauce.  It was that good.  On the side of the place was a radish ans micro greens salad. Oddly enough, it was good for radishes.

I stopped the server.  I told him whoever thought of strawberry BBQ sauce was a genius.  He said, "That was me. I made the BBQ sauce."

I made sure to tell him he was a genius.

The crispy pork was amazing, too.  I don't know what they did to it to make it that crispy & tasty.  The yellow squash was a raw with a light oil dressing and had pretty little blueish purple edible flowers on it.

I had no room for dessert.

I will be back.  This place was wonderful.  I loved the presentation and the taste of all of the food and I didn't get glutened from any of it.  I can't say it enough, Amazing!

603 Broadway Ave
Pittsburgh PA 15216

http://www.crestedduck.com/

Chez Rob

My brother invited me over for dinner.  In the spirit of restaurant reviews, I decided to review his dinner as a blog post.

The decor was cozy like a modern dining room kitchen combo that was well lit from an open sliding glass door.

The menu was a fixed price three course meal.  The evening's selections were nicely printed on a one page menu.  The allure for the night was some of the ingredients were modified with molecular gastronomy to change the texture of ordinary ingredients.  This was a BYOB place.  They didn't charge a corking fee.

The first course was a beautiful salad with cucumbers, cherry tomatoes, bacon, chives, dry spices, & feta cheese.  The bacon was crispy and the vegetables were crunchy.  It had a beautiful presentation and nothing was modified to the best of my knowledge.   It was a nice start to the meal.

The second course was a traditional Japanese soup with magic noodles.  The broth was a mix of light beef and chicken broth.  Mushrooms and green onions floated on top.  Then the magic noodles were added after the soup was presented.  Squirted out of a condiment container, the onion paste puffed up into a fried rice noodle consistency as it hit the warm broth.  They tasted like a mild onion flavor and added excellent texture to the soup.  Magic noodles are gluten free because they are only made from onions.

The main course arrive.  The lamb rib chops were a bit lemony with a light rosemary herb flavor.  They were grilled to a medium temperature, crispy on the outside and moist on the inside, set on green onions and rosemary. 

On the plate was two cucumber slices with tzatziki sauce and a tomato slice with tomato basil paste.  I poked the tzatziki sauce. It juggled a little and ran out onto the plate like a sunny side up egg. It tasted of cool cucumber and garlic.  The second one I popped into my mouth whole and let it explode its flavors onto my tongue.  I cut a sliver of the tomato basil and tasted it.  It was overwhelming me with tomato flavor.  The paste was the consistency of canned cranberries.  I didn't care much for it, didn't taste much of the basil, and thought it should have had fresh mozzarella cheese slices throughout it like a caprese salad.  I'm not much of a tomato fan anyways.

All of these courses were prepared gluten free and there was no sign of cross contamination.  Overall, I was pretty happy with the presentation, flavors, and modified textures of this meal.

The Carlton

The Carlton

The Carlton Restaurant has beautiful hard wood accents on the walls and an extensive wine selection in a full wall wine rack. They had some nice selections on the wine List.  The menu is on the more expensive side, but worth the experience if you are looking to go somewhere for an anniversary or special occasion.

All of the appetizers were $11.99, which struck me as odd because some were obviously made with more expensive ingredients than others. Some of the options were a crab cake, BBQ shrimp, or a grilled portobello mushroom.  

The grilled portobello mushroom was marinated in balsamic vinegar, and was accompanied with sun dried tomatoes, zucchini, pine nuts and lettuce.  It was pretty tasty.

There were many wonderful choices on the menu.  The server told me they could make anything I wanted gluten free because they make everything to order.  I wanted the filet Oscar style, medium rare.  It came with asparagus, mashed potatoes, a lemony Bearnaise sauce, and crab meat.

The filet was cooked perfectly medium rare.  The mashed potatoes were evenly mashed, with a buttery flavor, and creamy texture.  They were very enjoyable.  I wanted creme brulee for dessert, but I simply didn't have room.  Overall, I had an enjoyable experience.   The server was nice, the atmosphere was fancy, and most importantly, I didn't get sick.

And if you wanted to see what the braised boar looks like, it's probably not gluten free, but here it is.

http://www.thecarltonrestaurant.com/
500 Grant Street (BNY Mellon Center), Pittsburgh, PA 15219