Oak Room and Petit Robert Bistro, Boston

Oak Room

R and I ran 9 miles today. Combine that with the fact that my office is starting a Biggest Loser contest with the first weigh-in tomorrow and we had a really good reason to have a nice meal.

Boston has more upscale steakhouses than I have fingers: Smith & Wollensky, Grill 23, Capital Grille, Morton’s, The Palm, Chris’s Ruth’s, Plaza III, Abe & Louie’s, Flemming’s, just to name a handful. In my experience, some are good (Grill 23 and S&W), some are horrendous (Plaza III and the Palm) and some are fine, but hard to justify $40+ for a steak. The cold, hard truth is that none are better than Peter Luger, but since I can not drive to Brooklyn every time I want to go out for a steak, R and I continue to work our way through the massive list of Boston steakhouses.

Tonight’s contender was the Oak Room and Peter Luger has nothing to fear. It was an expensive, unremarkable meal. The dining room is paneled in dark wood with mounted stag heads and heavy curtains. It’s situated in the Copley Fairmont Hotel. The whole thing radiates old Boston Brahman. Our server was capable, but he looked more like a mortician than a waiter. We started with lobster bisque and escargot. My bisque was weak on lobster flavor and meat; if you can’t make it to the Maine Dinner for their superlative bisque, Legal Seafood will still give you a better version. R’s escargot was heavy on the parsley, but he enjoyed it. The bread basket was excellent, and it came with butter, hummus and spicy olives.

Both our steaks were overcooked, although my ribeye was still fairly flavorful. R’s NY strip was a disappointment. We got a sampling of all their sauces: Bearnaise, Au Poivre Sauce, Horseradish Cream, Merlot Demi Glace, Cafe de Paris Butter and Oak Room sauce. The demi glace was the best of the bunch; the Oak Room sauce was awful.

Our side of truffled mac and cheese was overcooked with floury sauce and almost no truffle essence.

The dessert menu was unappealing, so we decided to go elsewhere for dessert.

The search for the best Boston steakhouse continues. . .

http://www.theoakroom.com/

Petit Robert Bistro

I’ve been craving chocolate cake for a few days now and since the Oak Room did not have any we hit the dessert bar at Petit Robert Bistro. I got the Gateau au Robert (a chocolate sponge cake, filled with chocolate mousse) and R ordered the chocolate soufflé. My cake hit the spot; it was rich and moist. I thought the soufflé was underbaked, but R still finished it, so no big complaints.

http://www.petitrobertbistro.com/