Blue Fin
1567 Broadway
New York, NY 10036
I am doing very poorly in terms of
my vow to be a better blogger. If you're a regular reader of
Taste As You Go, then you've probably noticed a slew of recent
restaurant reviews and a pitiful dip in the number of recipes. I have at least ten drafts in the queue, so my problem isn't a lack of content. My problem is a lack of motivation and an overabundance of second-guessing
why I'm writing this food blog in the first place. I've lost my creative mojo, and I hate knowing that that nagging feeling has lingered longer than it should have and I have no sure-fire cure lined up to get me back to blogging with consistency and fervor. I really hope this feeling goes away soon.
Why am I bringing this up now? Because I'm
finally writing a review of a lunch I had at Blue Fin with coworkers in honor of my thirtieth birthday back in May. With so many appealing choices on the
lunch menu, we all had a difficult time choosing what we wanted to eat. Salad... Burgers...
Sushi... The fact that we were ravenous didn't help us make up our minds any faster and I ultimately came back around and ordered the dish that I had considered first -- the
Lobster Roll ($26), served on brioche with applewood smoked bacon, lemon, cucumber, and tomato. Because of my serious aversion to mayonnaise, I made our server promise me that there wouldn't be globs of the offending condiment all over my sandwich, and, to his credit, my sandwich came out dressed just the way I liked it.
Lightly. There was enough mayonnaise present to bind the ingredients together but
not enough mayonnaise to overtake the rich, buttery flavor of the lobster.
Heaven.
That is until I bit into something sharp and crunchy that cut into the inside of my cheek. As the blood began to pool in my mouth, it suddenly occurred what had happened. I discreetly spit the fragments of lobster shell into my napkin and sat back, completely dumbfounded. While I appreciated the freshness of the lobster meat, I did not appreciate the stinging pain I was experiencing. We're not talking about a tiny piece of shell that could have been easily overlooked due to its size. We're talking about a significant piece of shell the size of my thumbnail! The person creating my sandwich back in the kitchen should have noticed this one.
After taking pictures of the evidence, I alerted our server of the situation. You could see the embarrassment all over his face. Especially after my coworkers made a point to tell him that it was my birthday. He took the shell pieces and my plate and disappeared into the kitchen. I almost felt badly for him and then I became aware (again) of the fresh blood inside my mouth. Expecting him to return with our check, imagine the looks on our faces when he brought out plates of dessert to make up for the weapon hiding in my sandwich!
It was extremely generous of the restaurant to bring out free dessert for the four of us and we devoured every bite of it. The Chocolate Graham Cracker S'Mores ($10) with toasted marshmallow, cinnamon ice cream were sinfully rich and made me forget all about the s'mores I'd made by toasting marshmallows on a stick over a campfire (or the grill in the backyard). This was the ultimate grown-up version of that childhood treat and I was not ashamed by keeping my fork close to that plate. On the lighter side of things, we had the Tahitian Vanilla Creme Brulee ($9) with raspberry shortbread cookies and fresh berries -- cool and creamy and perfect for sharing.
It looked like that lunch at Blue Fin would be remembered in the history books as the worst birthday lunch of my life, but things pleasantly turned around when that dessert was placed in front of us. It's amazing how much power free dessert can wield, isn't it?
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