Unfinished Business

I seem to be on a roll of preparing to do something and the something never happens. I put in a zillion hours prepping for two different trainings and neither ever occurred. I had a vacation scheduled and the hot weather caused us to postpone our travels.

I was feeling really down about all this and decided to treat myself to a dinner at Fresco. Fresco is probably my favorite Food Fight restaurant. Tariq donned a nice pair of dress pants and a tailored shirt. he looked so handsome. I even put on a dress. It was a lovely evening and I was slowly lifting from my funk as we approached the restaurant. We were greeted by the staff at the MMOCA desk and asked where we going. I told them we had a reservation at Fresco. They told me that was impossible as it was closed for a private party. My head exploded with a cornucopia of expletives which fortunately never left my lips. We left the premises, sat on a street bench and thought about where to go. After nixing about every restaurant you can think of I finally settled on Ichiban on Park St. We were overdressed and over-hungry.

Ichiban is an excellent restaurant. The diners are almost all Chinese. I am hellbent on spending an evening there just interviewing folks about what they are eating. I want to try everything but get timid when it comes time to order. The menu is huge and I cannot really tell what the dish is like before it arrives. The waitstaff speaks limited English and are unable to really help you out. I have been to Ichiban 3 times and each time I have enjoyed my meal. The food can be very oily but that is the case at Fugu as well, another authentic Chinese restaurant. Vegetables are fresh and crispy, tofu light and puffy and the sauces are diverse rather than everything tasting the same. Tariq ordered the Cumin Flavored beef with Chili Sauce which was our least favorite dish. I have enjoyed the Sichuan sauce twice, once with chicken and once with tofu. I loved the Japanese Tofu in Hot Pot, Braised Vegetable with Shitake Mushroom and the Vegetable Dumplings. You must give Ichiban a try. I love moo-shu pork but this is a whole different ballgame.

Now, back to the situation with Fresco. I learned an important lesson. I had gone on the website for Fresco and used Open Table to make my reservation. I received an email saying "your reservation is confirmed". Clearly I did not read the confirmation email as they had moved my reservation to the following day! Who knew? I had no idea they would do that. I had written both Fresco and Open Table about my experience. The lovely manager from Fresco called and explained to me what had occurred. She had me down for a reservation for which I had "no-showed". Mea Culpa- I need to be more careful.