Chop Tank

"E", "J" and I enjoyed a wonderful 3 course prix-fixe dinner at Chop Tank located in NYC's Greenwich Village at 308 Bleecker Street. Also included was a wine tasting with each course.

Each table was served a basket of home made Old Bay potato chips - very addictive.

"E" and I decided to have the white wines and "J" had the red wines.

"E" started with the shrimp taco while "J" and I both had the fried oysters - crisp on the outside and very moist on the inside.

"J" had the fried chicken - which was several pieces of chicken coated with extra crunchy batter.

"E" and I both had the lump crab cake entree.

For dessert "E" had 2 scoops of the homemade cinnamon ice cream and "J" had 2 scoops of homemade vanilla ice cream. I had the Smith Island layer cake - 10 layers of vanilla cake with chocolate frosting - excellent!

The food and service was excellent, but the restaurant was quite noisy.

Phillip's Famous Seafood - Charlotte

While waiting to board my plane in the Charlotte airport I stopped for lunch at this Maryland based restaurant. I had a soda ($2.49) and a premium crab cake ($14.99) with my choice of two sides (mashed potatoes and steamed vegetables) and hush puppies.

The crab cake was a little oily, but mostly lumb crab meat. The mashed potatoes tasted mediocre and the vegetables were overcooked and bland.

So I topped it off with a slice of key lime pie ($4.29) which was pretty good.

Market - Vancouver

...located in the Shangri-La Hotel at 1115 Albani Street offers a 3 course prix fixe lunch for CA$32.

I started with a homemade cherry yuzu soda and the dungeness crab cake appetizer - which was good, pure crab meat without filling.

For my entree I had the wild salmon with truffle mashed potatoes and sugar snap peas. The salmon was the pinkest color I had ever seen.

And for dessert - chocolate pudding with candied violets.

Harbor House Milwaukee

...is located at 550 N. Harbor Drive right on the Lake.

This open, airy, bright restaurant has lovely views and excellent seafood.

We started at the bar with wine and onion rings - light and delicious!

Then when we were seated we shared 3 dozen oysters, fried calamari and crab cakes. I had the scallops with mashed potatoes for my entree. For dessert I had the key lime pie. I wish it had more meringue.

Overall a very good dinner in Milwaukee!

I noticed the crowd tended to be the older demographic and that might be based on the pricepoints