Tag: cleveland

Cleveland, May 2012

Travel

To celebrate our 23rd wedding anniversary we took a trip to downtown Cleveland last Friday night.  I surprised Courtney and instead of taking a right turn on the way home from work we took a left turn and drove to the Ritz.  I was surprised that Courtney was surprised because it took a bit of doing to arrange everything and to keep the girls quiet.  We were very happy once we checked in to find out that we were upgraded to a beautiful two room corner suite with a huge sitting room, two bathrooms and great bathtub.

a plate of chocolate covered strawberries awaiting us in our room
happy to be by ourselves for the night
the view from our room. this is looking east down prospect. the building in front of the truck is the new Cleveland casino that just opened up on Monday.

After unwinding and having a glass of wine in our room we headed down to the lounge in the Ritz for a cockail.  We then took a stroll around downtown on our way to dinner.

classic Cleveland architecture
the arcade is still as beautiful as ever
inside the arcade. no one around at 7:00 on friday night. how do we change this?
just across the street though East 4th was hopping.
creeper shot of the cool bar at Lola where we had dinner. see http://www.EatOnEdgecliff.com for all the delicious details
we took a walk after dinner to try and relieve our food coma. ended up hanging out at the soldiers monument on public square that I don’t think I’ve ever really looked at too closely before. It was a beautiful night
came back to a turned down bed with chocolates on the pillow. nice.

We took another stroll downtown the next morning before breakfast.  We walked around the new convention center/ medical mart construction area, down to the rock hall / voinovich park and then back up 9th to Euclid.  I am so happy to report that I am optimistic about downtown Cleveland after a long time of not being so.  I hope it lasts!  Michael Symon had a nice bit today in the Huffington on Post about Cleveland.  Let’s hope that all this positivity keeps on going.  Article here.

public square entrance of tower city in the early morning.
the fountain on the mall by Key with the sun coming up

Eat Out: Lola

Eat Out

We finally made it Lola after trying several times over the years to make a reservation without thinking weeks ahead.  I made this reservation about three weeks ahead of time.  I surprised Courtney on Friday and instead of going home after work we took a left turn instead of a right turn and went to downtown Cleveland and spent the night at the Ritz and went out to dinner at Lola.  We had a great night…more details on my personal blog…eventually.  Lola is of course Michael Simon’s flagship restauraunt that is now located on East 4th Street.  We were at the orginial Lola probably about ten years ago when it was over on the west side.  After a glass of wine in our beautiful room at the Ritz and a complimentary cocktail in the lounge, we headed to East 4th.  Lola is very dark, with a beautiful bar, looking out on the street, with an alibaster top lighted from underneath with a huge wall of wine behind the bar.  Very cool.  We had a nice table right in the middle overlooking the open kitchen.  We ordered ourselves a bottle of white burgandy and relaxed.  I had beef cheek pierogies for an appetizer and Courtney had the artichoke soup.  The pierogies were filled with tender pot roast like beef with a gravy like sauce and some horseradish sauce drizzled over it.  Very rich and delicious.   The artichoke soup was earthy, tasty with hazelnuts sprinkled in it as well as chuncks of bacon.  I had the smoked pork shop that came sliced on top of creamy polenta sauced with a barbeque sauce.  Courtney had hangar steak which came with a tasty, coarsley chopped gremolata sauce that was very good.  The hangar steak also came with an order of fries…which won the prize for the night as they were perfectly done.   Overall I would say that the meal was great…but not over the top. I think we are becoming food snobs.  We probably ordered too many heavy things though.  The menu is almost all meat.  But I would definately recommend going there and would like to go back and eat at the bar.

EatOn Edgecliff Rating:  A-

Eat out: Crop

Eat Out

We have been trying to arrange going to dinner at Crop with John, Mary, Tony, and MaryAnn for MONTHS and our schedules finally aligned and we got to go last night. Crop used to be over on the west side somewhere and moved to a new space at West 25th and Lorain right across the street from the West Side Market this fall. The space used to be a bank built in the 1920’s and they rehabbed the space beautifully.  Huge ornate ceiling, huge restored mural behind the bar and rehabbed marble that they used everywhere.  It is quite impressive.  We had a great dinner as well.  I had some sort of Manhattan that they have on their cocktail menu that was delecious – especially the liquor soaked cherries that came with it.  We started dinner with an amuse bouche of raw tuna with a piece of roasted tomato in a vinagrette.  We split 4 appetizers among us: balsamic popcorn, cherry bomb, calamari and the soft shelled crab which was the app special of the evening.  They were all excellent – especially the cherry bomb which was a cherry tomato, stuffed with chorizo sausage, wrapped in wonton and deep fried; also the soft shell crab was super fresh, tender and tasty.  All our entrees were great.  I had veal shanks which came with white beans and olives.  Very tender and delecious.  Courtney has the fish special of the evening – some kind of Hawaiian fish  that I don’t remember the name of but was really good, served over a black rice pilaf.  We split a chocolate pretzel moussey cake desert as well as some pastries that were like homemade pop tarts.  After the meal we were given a tour of the old bank vault in the basement that you can rent out for parties.  Very cool.  Great place.  I can’t wait to go back.

Eat on Edgecliff Rating: A-  (The minus is only because they put TVs on the wall in the bar…sorry John)

beautifully restored ceiling
the bar with the mural behind it
the open kitchen with beautiful white marble that is all over the restaurant.
the bank vault party room

 

Eat Out: Michaelangelo’s

Eat Out

We haven’t had much luck eating in Little Italy besides the casual Mama Santa’s and Presti’s – both which are great and we go to all the time for lunch.  We have tried some of the nicer places over the years but none have been very good.  We have heard good things about Michaelangelo’s and have always wanted to go so we finally went on Friday to celebrate yours truly’s birthday.  We were there kind of early, so it wasn’t too crowded…but was filling up as we left around 8:00.  Right after work we went the the Cleveland Museum of Art to see the Rembrandt exhibition (very good) and then went to Michaelangelo’s after that.  It’s a very nice room, bigger that we thought as we have walked past it dozens of time, with a great cozy bar with a big fireplace that we will definitely go to next time.  We split calamari for an appetizer, not fried but sauteed and served with tomato sauce.  It was just ok – not too flavorful.  I had a bowl of escarole soup with beans, veal sausage and prosciutto.  Courtney had the grilled caesar salad.  Both were good…especially the soup which is definitely a meal in itself.  I had the mushroom ravioli stuffed w cheese and mushrooms with a rich dark buttery shroomey sauce with lots of mushrooms.  Very rich and delish.  Courtney had scallops served with papardelle which was made with a tomato and olive sauce. We were stuffed so unfortunately skipped on dessert.  The food was good, but wasn’t outstanding like I was expecting it to be, also for the price as it wasn’t cheap.  Still, I would say it is a nice place and would recommend.

EatOnEdgecliff Rating: B+  (next time try to eat in the bar and order less heavy things…or just a bowl of soup)