bzarcher | Lola

Alex has already put his thoughts up here, so I'm mostly going to try to give my own thoughts and compliments.

Also, a big thank you to Alex and my family for not minding the fact that I wanted to take pictures of the food!

As he mentioned, my dad and sister got sick on Friday night and unfortunately were too ill to come with us, which really was too bad, especially for Alison. She'd been looking forward to this as much as I was.

After picking my mom up and loading presents into the back, we headed up to Cleveland through both rain and snow storms, but fortunately after we broke through the last of the snow around New Brunswick it settled down into a light rain that tapered off as we finished the drive.

Arriving around E. 4th St's valet parking, the first thing I have to mention is the area Lola is set into - it's an absolutely beautiful space, nestled between several monolithic office towers and high rises. An explosion of light compared to the dark and silent buildings around it.

Also, to my total surprise, while I grabbed the pictures of the street and the restaurant's entrance, there was a dude in a freakin' Hartford Whalers jersey walking around.

I gave him the traditional greeting, and he responded enthusiastically. Hockey: It's not a cult, it's a family.

As Alex mentioned, the darker lighting and ambience takes a few minutes to adjust to, and can be a bit of an adjustment at first, especially since the restaurant was pretty packed. The bar area wraps around the truly massive wine cabinet (it takes up the entire wall from waist level to ceiling), and you can see the stairwell leading to the bathrooms and banquet room, a good bit of the dining room, and glimpses of the open kitchen.

The other thing we quickly realized was that due to the open kitchen, it was very warm in there. Not so much that anyone got too uncomfortable, but you did notice it after a bit. It also meant that when we got to the dessert courses, the ice creams and such tended to melt a little quickly, but that wasn't so bad.

I also have to mention the high level of service and courtesy from the staff. As Alex mentioned, when you're paying for a meal like this, you expect good service, but I felt that the Lola staff went above and beyond, and it deserves highlighting.

My grandparents and uncle got there first, and because we were a little early our table wasn't quite ready to go. The maitre d' came by, saw my Uncle was walking with a cane, and brought him a chair to make sure he could sit comfortably until the table was ready. After we were seated, the staff did a great job of making sure we had everything we needed, that questions were answered, and that our experience was good. The Maitre d' also checked in a couple times to make sure my uncle was comfortable. It could have come off as being routine or worse, as condescending about my uncle's weight, but there was a sense of genuine appreciation and concern.

It really made a huge impact on how well everything went, I think.

Alex briefly mentioned that I got the charcuterie platter for my appetizer. I have to say that as much as I loved my entree and the dessert, I think this was my favorite dish of the night.

Everything from the presentation (I love the puzzle-piece shape of the cutting block) to the way I was able to make these little awesome-bombs of a crostini, a bit of the mustard, some pickle or picked onion, and meat, was just amazing. I was very happy to pass this around, but I admit to being really glad that the last couple of pieces were all mine. Each cold cut was different, with a rich, silky texture in the duck/fois gras braunschweger to the sharp pop of the pepperoni. Each gave my tongue a nice little warm up before our next course arrived.

(I should also comment on the timing here. From the point we were seated and made our drink and appetizer orders, I'd guess it took about 15-20 minutes for food to arrive. However, after that, I felt like the courses arrived 'just in time'. Within a minute or two of everyone finishing and the dishes being cleared, the next course was presented.)

We didn't get any good pictures of the caulifower soup my Grandma got, but my mom and Granda both went with the pear and apple salad with butternut squash, golden raisins, blue cheese, and candied pecans. I thought this wasn't bad (and it's one of the only vegetarian appetizers), but when my mom mentioned she'd almost ordered the crispy pig ear, I can't help but wish she'd gone that way so we could have tried it. :)

The beef cheek pierogi that Alex got was really fantastic - just exploding with meat, the flavor was incredibly rich and you got the 'BEEFY!' vibe off of each bite. I've had pierogis that tend to taste more of the dough than the filling, but these were exactly the opposite. The filling was front and center, heightened by the sauce, and the dough coming in as a nice background note.

For my main dish, I kept bouncing back and forth, but finally settled on the Smoked Berkshire Pork Chop, on a bed of cheesy polenta with BBQ onions and shredded chiles.

Unf. Unf. Unf. Unf.

Moist, perfectly cooked pork with a wonderfully smoky and spicy flavor that intensified wonderfully when you took a bite of the skin. The heat was really nicely controlled - you got flavor, and a little bit of bite, but nothing overpowering or that I thought would make someone unable to eat it. The polenta was basically what cheesy grits want to be when they grow up, with a silky texture and a nice cheddar-y flavor that set the pork and the BBQ sauced onions off really well. After we were done passing pieces around, I ate this thing right down to the bone.

Alex's lamb, which I tried, had a fantastic tenderness that set off the cabbage, bacon, and fennel. My uncle's hangar steak was the other dish I'd almost ordered, and it had a beautiful texture that really went well with the pickle sauce, though unfortunately I didn't get a picture. Here's Alex's lamb, though.

My mom went a totally different route and went for the duck, which was a neat surprise - I'd never seen duck prepared or presented like this:

The cranberry sauce really made the duck sing - it didn't feel fatty or heavy, and it basically melted into your mouth as you ate.

My grandma also got a beautiful plate of scallops and lamb sausage that I wasn't able to photograph, but the sausage was nicely spicy and the scallops were...well, honestly, you know I'm really, really picky about seafood? These were -amazing-. Savory and just a bit salty, I felt like I could actually 'taste the ocean' the way you hear some people talk about fresh scallops or really high quality fish. I don't think I've ever actually experienced that before, with the mint on top giving a little zing to my bite.

I would also be highly remiss if I didn't praise the Lola Fries. Served in a metal sleeve with a brown paper lining, these were hot, crispy, and so good. We kept trying to figure out what they'd been seasoned with until we broke down and asked, and found out about the rosemary. I never would have expected that, but it worked incredibly well. My uncle sent around his serving to try, and we all kept going back for extras to the point that we asked for another order of them to share! (And to the kitchen's credit, it was there within moments!)

Dessert was another set of hard choices.

I talked it over pretty seriously with our waitress. The peanut pie sounded incredibly good, but how many times in life would I get an opportunity to try bacon ice cream?

Finally, the bacon won out, and I was on for the 6. A. M. special - deep fried brioche french toast, caramelized apples, maple syrup, and the maple-bacon ice cream. And since I took a quick stop in the restroom, someone just had to clue them in about the birthday.

Fortunately, it wasn't a big production (which makes sense), but a really nice simple candle in part of the brioche.

Everyone wanted to try a little of the ice cream, and it was really good - if you have ever gotten maple syrup on your bacon at breakfast and liked it, you will probably like this. The ice cream got pretty melty because of the heat of the dining room, though.

Alex gives intense details of his deconstructed tiramisu, so I'll just let you appreciate the art:

They don't warn you it's deconstructed, so unless you knew going in I can see why it would be a surprise. I thought the bit I tasted was pretty good, but I also understand why someone wouldn't go for it.

I thought the Citrus 'Baked Alaska' my grandparents and uncle got was interesting in a "I think this is neat but I don't think I'd order it myself" kind of way.

The sorbet is actually a mix of grapefruit and white chocolate, and the black olive honey was really neat. My grandmother was really fascinated by it and I think she'd have bought a bottle of the olive honey if she could. :)

The biggest surprise at dessert for me was my mom's selection, the sweet potato s'more sundae.

I'm not a huge sweet potato fan, so I really didn't expect to try a spoonful of this and go 'Wow!'. The sweet potato was really mild and set the chocolate and graham crackers off wonderfully. The marshmellow blended in with a really great fluffiness, and I ended up telling my mom that if she made sweet potatoes like -these- at thanksgiving, I'd probably eat them. :)

Finally, we were served a nice meyer lemon and ginger jelly to finish the meal. These were really nicely sharp and tart, and served as a great palette cleanser.

My mom suggested that I should get a picture of the kitchen going before we left, so I did so on our way out - you can see some of the kitchen seating there.

Head chef that night was Corey, one of Chef Symon's right hand guys who you also see on ICA a lot. (The bald dude.) I didn't know it at the time, but I guess MS is in South Beach this week doing the beef cheek pierogies for the South Beach Expo - hopefully they enjoy it as much as we did!

All in all, just an incredible meal, and more than worth the wait. I'd love to go back, or to try his Lolita casual place some time. We spent a lot of the drive back talking about how good dinner had been, and how well it had lived up to the anticipation. Even my grandparents, who do enjoy doing a fine dining thing now and then, were really impressed by the quality of the experience. It was pretty much a perfect evening.