Restaurants – Page 65 – West Boca News

Restaurant Review: Bistro Gastronomie

Update: At this writing (June 25, 2014), Bistro Gastronomie is closed at least temporarily. We are hopeful it will reopen.

We were invited to a pre-opening “mock service” at Bistro Gastronomie. Located on the north side of Yamato Road between Lyons and 441, the food was the best I’ve had in South Florida. There were rough spots in the service, but that’s normal for such an event. We highly recommend it to those who want a top notch meal.
Two of us attended and we each had a four course prix fixe dinner. My companion started with the French Onion soup. It was very good.

I had the mussels. They were cooked just right and with a sauce that worked well.

For the second course we both had salads. Companion had the “Local beet harvest”, as did another person at our table. Not pictured in this shot, but there were a few different kinds of beets, all tasty.

I had the Roquefort salad, with caramelized apples and spiced pecans.

These salads were outstanding. For “foodies”, the ingredients were a clear step above what you see from typical fine dining. The cheeses, nuts and beets were exceptional, and paired with dressings that fit without drowning out their flavors. This is one aspect of what’s special about Bistro Gastronomie – the ingredients. Chef Walden incorporates elements you won’t find in regular supermarkets.
Before the main course we were served a palate cleanser which was simple and refreshing. It might have been a raspberry sorbet.
Our main course took a while to be served. The kitchen struggled with the volume – again something we expected under the conditions. But despite that pressure, the quality of the food did not suffer. Companion found the crab cake delicious and disproportionately large. She would have liked it if there were more vegetables, especially the carrots.

I had the Dover sole, which had a “melt in your mouth” texture accompanied with capers and a delicate sauce.

Both entrees came with a selection of vegetables. One piece seemed like a cross between broccoli and cauliflower. There was a small roasted onion or shallot, and then a couple carrots, a tomato wedge, some green beans, and one thing we couldn’t identify – maybe a small potato. All of them complemented the main item.
For dessert we ordered soufflés but changed upon realizing they would take a while. Companion had a rich and “yummy” chocolate pie. I had the flan, which was perfect. They looked so appetizing I forgot to take pictures before we started eating them.
With all that description out of the way, some commentary is important.
The service issues we experienced are completely understandable for a pre-opening event. It’s a way for the restaurant staff to figure out what works and what doesn’t, and it helps them to provide better service to customers once they actually open (February 12th). It would have gone much better if they had done two seatings or limited the menu, but that wouldn’t have provided the stress test they need to be ready going forward.
Any service issues were a minor detail in an otherwise great evening. The chef and his co-owners deserve congratulations for bringing this to fruition.
Bistro Gastronomie is not the ideal restaurant if you want a quick and cheap meal before a movie. Service will certainly get quicker, but it’s never going to be fast casual. That’s not in their DNA.
This is the kind of place people will travel an hour or more each way to experience a fine meal in a gorgeous space. You should expect to be there for two hours and spend more than $50 per person. Most of us can afford to do something like this only a few times a year, for special occasions.
With that said, you could order the $21 Thai basil chicken entree a la carte and get in and out in less than an hour. Keep in mind the menu, as currently set up, does not include salad with the a la carte entrees. The other couple at our table felt many Boca customers will expect an entree order to come with at least a simple mixed greens salad. They might be right.
There is also a Sunday brunch menu with a 3-course option for $27. And Chef Walden tells us there’s a kids menu too, with eight items.
The restaurant website is: Bistro Gastronomie. You can browse menus and make reservations through their site. Reservations are also available by phone at 561-883-2002.
The hours are:
Dinner
Open Monday, Wednesday and Thursday: 5:00 to 10:00 PM
Fridays and Saturdays: 5:00 to 11:00 PM
Sunday dinner: 4:30 to 9:30 PM
Sunday Champagne Brunch
Sunday 11:30 AM-2:30 PM
Closed Tuesdays
Full disclosure: Along with everyone else, our meals were on the house. We estimate that, with drinks and upgrades, this was close to $200 in value.

5 Cuisines to Try in 2014

We moved to West Boca two and a half years ago, and we love to eat out. One of our biggest gripes so far is that we haven’t found a really good Chinese restaurant in South Florida. But we have found some different cuisines in or near West Boca that we’re glad we tried. Here are five of them:
5. Korean

Most people are familiar with Japanese, Chinese or Thai restaurants. But Korean food is still not well known in most of the US. There’s only one place we know of in West Boca, Sushi Yoshee, and it’s pretty good.
Anyone who likes other Asian cuisines will probably like Korean, especially the barbecue dishes. Bul go gi is a beef dish marinated in a sweet sauce and then grilled. There is a spicy pork version and a chicken dish too. Bibimbap is a very common and popular dish as well, with a variety of ingredients on top of rice.
If you want to try other places, we’ve heard good things about Manna and Gabose in Lauderhill. In some Korean places we’ve been to elsewhere, they have special tables with grills in them and – if you want – you can have the bul go gi and other grilled dishes served to you raw. You grill them yourself. We’ve read that Gabose has that option but we haven’t made it there yet.
4. Indian

Indian cuisine can be a little like Thai, with a variety of flavorful curries, but there are also substantial differences. Indian restaurants serve Naan, which is something like pita bread, condiments like Raita (a yogurt sauce) and chutneys. Many dishes can be spicy so you have to be careful if that bothers you. One non-spicy dish popular with many Americans is Chicken Tikka Masala, pictured above.
Unfortunately we haven’t found an Indian restaurant in West Boca. There are a few places that aren’t too far away. Last year we wrote about Khana Kh’zana in Coral Springs. Since then we discovered Chutney & Pickle, which is roomier, but we haven’t done a review yet. The two are nearly across the street from each other on Sample Road.
There are also two places in East Boca. Bombay Cafe is in a plaza on the south side of Glades Road near FAU and Boca Regional Hospital. Further east, on the west side of Federal Highway near 20th St, is Punjab. It’s in the Boca Inn. Of the four, our favorite is Chutney & Pickle with Punjab a close second. Khana Kh’zana is particularly good if you are vegetarian. Bombay Cafe seems more geared for takeout.
Indian restaurants often do lunch buffets (both Punjab and Chutney do – we’re not sure about the others), and that’s a good way to try various items.

3. Brazilian
There are many Latino communities in South Florida. Cubans are the best known and Padrino’s is a fine example in Mission Bay. While the Cuban community tends to be concentrated in Miami-Dade, we’ve noticed a lot of Brazilians in West Boca. Along with that we’ve found at least a couple Brazilian restaurants.
Perhaps the best known is Picanha Brazil in Northwest Sandalfoot Plaza (by the Cumberland Farms gas station). The food is served buffet style and you pay by the pound. They have a “churrasco” area with grilled meats. In the same building is Casa do Pao, a Brazilian bakery that also is an informal restaurant.
There’s Restaurante Brasil in Sandalfoot Square (near the car wash). There was a fancier place in downtown Delray Beach but it appears to have closed. There’s also Oba Oba on SW 18th just east of Powerline (same plaza as Carrabba’s). We haven’t been to Oba Oba but get the impression it might be the best of the ones nearby.
In our experience the Brazilian places do not go out of their way to make it easy for us gringos to figure out how things work. And the staff may not speak English very well. But the food is good and interesting, and it’s usually not too expensive.
2. Colombian

Somewhat similar to the Brazilian places are the Colombian restaurants. Our favorite is Rancheritos de Boca
in Somerset Shoppes. It’s not fancy but the food is good and prices are low. They have empanadas for a dollar each and arepa for $2.50. Arepa is a cornbread appetizer that’s just delicious.
Another Colombian place we like is Sergio’s Americas Bakery in Northwest Sandalfoot. We’ve been there for breakfast a few times and you get a great meal for not much money.
A third option, kitty corner to the Cumberland Farms, is La Balcone de las Americas. We reviewed it a couple years ago when it was called Donde Martica, but haven’t made it back there since the name changed.
Like the Brazilian places, their English may not be so good. Rancherito’s does better on that score. We like the Colombian places better than the Brazilians, but that may be more personal preference than a reflection of quality. Both are worth trying.
1. Kosher

While I’m Jewish, I grew up in a place where there were no Kosher restaurants. Bacon and cheese sandwiches were staples of my diet. I had almost no exposure to Kosher food until we moved to West Boca, and I was a little hesitant to try it. I was wrong.
There are some great Kosher restaurants here and it isn’t anything like what we expected. Our favorite at the moment is Mozart Cafe, which has the best sushi we’ve had in South Florida. Yes – Kosher sushi. We didn’t see that coming. We’ve been to Mozart Cafe a few times and never had a bad dish. It’s south of Palmetto on the west side of Powerline.
Other high-end options include Grill Time on Glades near Boca Rio, and Euro Fusion near Carrabba’s.
We just reviewed Pita N Go in Northwest Sandalfoot, which is less fancy but still good food. Another interesting variation is Marcus Kosher Chinese in Loggers Run, one more example of how Kosher food can deliver the unexpected. On the more obvious side is Boca Kosher Bagel, but we haven’t eaten there yet. Some of the Kosher places might be a bit more expensive than comparable non-Kosher restaurants, with Marcus being the most reasonably priced.
Last but not least, we give an honorable mention to Efe’s Turkish Bistro in Somerset Shoppes. We’ve been there a few times but haven’t gotten around to a review yet.

Pita N Go near Sandalfoot

Above is the kefta/kebab mini-plate at Pita N Go. The food was very good.
Recently we wrote about what we call Northwest Sandalfoot Plaza. It’s on the northwest corner of Sandalfoot and 441, where the renovated Cumberland Farms gas station has reopened.
Within a multicultural milieu that includes Brazilian, Colombian, Chinese, pizza and more, we find a kosher/Israeli restaurant. Pita N Go takes the place of what used to be Sagi’s Grill.

Open for about a month, the interior has been upgraded from the dingy look Sagi’s had. It still has a bit of a fast food or fast casual feel as the name suggests.

The menu consists of hot items like shawarma and a variety of prepared salads. They cook in an open kitchen.

There are two sets of salads. The first are items that may or may not be included with your entree or sandwich, such as tabbouleh, hummus, and eggplant salad.

And there’s another set that’s for everyone, like a condiment bar.

We ordered a few dishes that ended up being a lot of food. In addition to the kefta/kebab plate pictured at the top, we also had a falafel pita sandwich and an appetizer combo plate.

Every single thing we ate tasted good. The quality of the food is excellent. It seems a little pricey when you consider the atmosphere. On the low end a pita sandwich or wrap is $7 but some of them are $9 and larger versions are as much as $13. The mini plate was $12 and a larger plate might be $15.
While it ain’t cheap, we think it’s worth it because you get both quality and quantity. Kosher restaurants might tend to be a bit more expensive because the ingredients and mechanics of running such a place cost more.
And we also like their shirts.

Jimmy the Greek: Guest Review

A reader sent us a review of Jimmy the Greek. We eat there occasionally and like it. The review fits with our experience and we like Jeff Ruben’s writing, so we are sharing it on his request.
We previously mentioned Jimmy the Greek when the West Boca Chamber met there.

Please note it’s on the north side of Glades, just west of Boca Rio, near the jewelry building.

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Hey West Boca News, I recently wrote a review for Jimmy The Greek located on Glades and Boca Rio. If you would like to put it on your site, that would be great! My name is Jeff Ruben, if you could credit me!
The phrase, “don’t judge a book by its cover” actually serves Boca Raton Greek restaurant, “Jimmy The Greek,” a purpose. Located on Glades and Boca Rio, Greek food institution Jimmy The Greek is housed in a 1980’s style building with a rackety wooden deck directly outside of it. Inside, you will be seated at decade old furniture and stare down at a gross tile with a lot of grout buildup, but as soon as you bite into their famous homemade pita bread with a side of humus, your mouth will water and you will think you are eating at a restaurant beside the Mediterranean on a warm summer day.
FOOD: Gourmet Greek cuisine… No other way to slice it. I started with a basic order of humus and pita to start my dining experience. The pita tasted just as if it was taken off of the stove and was so divine that it made my mouth water. The humus tasted very fresh, and was not very oily. For my main dish, I split the Greek Salad with Grilled Chicken and the popular Greek dish, “Slovakia.” The Greek Salad was tasted just as if the fresh greens had been picked out of the garden in the back; the grilled chicken was flavorful and was grilled to perfection. The Slovakia dish was extremely tasty, as well.
ATMOSPHERE: On the contrary, the atmosphere at this dining establishment severely lacks. Sadly, due to the restaurants odd appearance and location, it always seems to be always occupied by senior citizens. When you and your friends are looking for a restaurant on a Friday night, I doubt this is where you would want to end up. Taking a really good-looking girl on a date? Don’t take her here… at least not until the 5th date when you knows she’s a keeper.
SERVICE: Not to much to write about on the service end… The food was brought out in a reasonable time, and the waitress seemed to have a good attitude. It did take an abnormally long time to receive some water, but besides that, it was fine.
FINAL VERDICT: 3.5/5. If you are craving a blissful, authentic and delicious Greek meal and don’t mind a lacking atmosphere, then this restaurant is for you.
Jimmy The Greek
8221 Glades Rd
Ste 1
Boca Raton, FL 33434
(561) 477-3272

Superbowl Sunday Happenings

We called around area sports bars to see who’s doing what in West Boca for Superbowl Sunday. The one that sounded best to us is Miller’s Ale House (southwest corner of Glades & Lyons). It’s $25 for all-you-can-eat. They also have a couple of drink specials – $5 for doubles of Smirnoff, Captain, and Parrot Bay, and $10 for 5 Miller products. So that’s why they call it Miller’s!

Wowie’s Sports Grill (near Palmetto & Powerline) has 10 wings and a pitcher for $13.95, plus $2 sliders and $1 hot dogs. It’s $11 for a bucket of domestic beer. They will also be playing cornhole, beer pong, and flip cup games.
Turn 3 Sports Bar (Sandalfoot) is doing a buffet. TGI Friday’s in Mission Bay has “No Monday Sunday” with $5 drinks and half-off appetizers.
Bru’s Room in Coconut Creek (SE corner of 441 and Hillsboro) had a contest for “best seat in the house.” Winners get to bring four guests who receive 2 apps, and more. Having been there, we expect a packed house. They’re also doing 5 for $10 buckets of Bud and Bud Light; and 12 boneless wings and a pitcher for $10.99.
Hurricane Grill (Mission Bay) and Packy’s (Loggers Run) expect to do a lot of takeout orders. HG is doing 10% off if you pre-order at least a day ahead.
What else is going on? Please let us know and we’ll update our story.