Restaurant Week @ the Oval Room

Just ate at the Oval Room w/Liz.  It was amazingly good and I wanted to write about what I had before I forget.  I had a hard time deciding what to get because almost every single item on the menu was something I really wanted to eat.  But we eventually had to make some choices since Restaurant Week doesn't really work if you order everything :).  For those who don't know, Restaurant Week in DC involves a fixed price dinner menu (set at 35.10) where you get an appetizer, entree and dessert.  Definitely a great chance to try some of the best restaurants in DC (at least those who participate).

In the end, I got the following:

• Appetizer:  Pastrami cured salmon, dijon sauce, romaine rib and pumpernickle.  It was very beautiful though a little small.  It was also quite spicy which made it a bit hard to really enjoy the salmon as much as I wanted to.   I almost got a fried blue crab with a buffalo sauce, but it was a $5 upcharge and may have been a bit crazy since I was planning on getting the scallops.  Still, very very good.  Liz got heirloom tomato salad with a very fancy pepper sauce that was also excellent.
• Entree:  Sea scallops with a stew of cauliflower, chorizo and apricots.  I got three HUGE scallops, cooked perfectly with a very sweet stew (that was more like a sauce really) underneath.  Liz got a steak which was amazing and that she loved very much.
• Dessert:  Maybe the toughest category to choose from.  I was really torn between the a 'warm carrot cake, rum raisin puree and cream cheese ice cream' and an 'almond brown butter cake, peach salad and sour cream ice cream' not to mention a 'goat cheese sorbet, berries and cumin short dough cookies.'  Lucky for me Liz got the berries w/cumin cookies because she loves cumin in everything and is very kind and avoided the chocolate dessert so I could try it :).  I went with the Carrot cake and it was EPIC.  SO GOOD.  I just wish they'd served like three times as much.  Liz and I discussed how the amounts they gave were really quite perfect because you left feeling pleasantly full and not sick... but I wanted to get sick off of that carrot cake, I would eat it until I passed out.  YUM.

Definitely keeping the Oval Room on my list of excellent RW deals.  Up there with Vidalia and Tosca.  Can't wait until winter's Restaurant Week!