The Melting Pot and My Birthday

This is not a review. I want to talk about my birthday. It was yesterday, September 29th and I turned 20something years old. We started planning a dinner about a week and a half ago and invited some awesome friends and I insisted we do Fondue.

See, my first Fondue experience was...well it sucked. I drove two hours to see a guy I didn't like very much then I had to pretend I liked him and it was painful, then we went to the Fondue place and he informed me I had to pay and I said "I'm broke" and he said "Oh well" and then ordered $90 worth of food. So...I didn't get to eat for the rest of that week. Not knowing about my Crohn's I also had to suffer the worst stomach ache of all time on the two hour drive back to my apartment.

So, I expressed to my loving husband that I want to have a fun Fondue time. Sharp sticks, molten cheese, chocolate covered everything, I mean, how could that NOT be awesome?

So we made reservations for up to 14 people (then like, 8 people couldn't come so we ended up with a tidy party of 6) at The Melting Pot in Towson.

This place is gorgeous and immaculate. Our waitress was SO AMAZING. She was informative, she told us about everything, explained it all so well and kept us blissfully happy. We had two kinds of cheese on our table the Wisconsin flavor and the French flavor and both were delicious. We got two kinds of cooking broths, Coq au Vin and Mojo and those were delicious and we had two kinds of chocolate Turtle and S'More and THOSE were delicious.

When we arrived there were balloons on the table and a little gift and card signed by the staff. It was beautiful.

I was thrilled to pieces with the whole event and if I were rating this place It would get well over 5 noms.

I do recommend that you, my lovely readers, go here for special events. They go above and beyond making everything perfect for you.

Gorgeous.

Mt. Washington Tavern

The Mt. Washington Tavern

5700 Newbury Street

Baltimore, Maryland 21209

410.367.6903

We'd heard good things about this place so we decided to hit it up over the weekend. It's located in a really cute part of the city. Since we were eating pretty late at night (it was around 9:30 when we went) I'd really like to try to get back there during the daytime.

When we arrived, we walked in through the front which is the bar area. Music was playing really loud and we were a little nervous. We asked for a "quiet" table and the hostess gave us this little smirk then led us through a hallway and opened a door to a gorgeous cabana themed restaurant that was softly lit by candles and white string lights wrapped around fake palm trees. It was really lovely.

We were greeted really quickly and given our drinks. We ordered an appetizer, crab wantons, jumbo lump crab meat, cream cheese and scallions served with a Ponzu dipping sauce. When the app came we put in the order for our entrees, Dave choosing the Parmesan Crusted Rockfish and me choosing the Shelburne Chicken. It took a little longer than we expected for the food to come out. Dave's fish was a "Wild caught Parmesan rockfish filet topped with Jumbo Lump and beurre blanc and sauteed green beans". They must have been out of green beans because he got a vegetable medley instead. His fish was amazing. Perfectly cooked, and the beurre blanc sauce was unbelievably creamy and delicious. I was jealous.

My Shelburne Chicken was "chicken breast wrapped around country ham and brie cheese with wholegrain mustard, pan-gravy and wild mushroom risotto". I was hopeful and excited because it sounded so delicious. It tasted like a pile of garbage. The mustard was entirely too strong, the risotto was more of a "wild mushroom pilaf". I got through one piece of this dish and had to push it away. I will say that the ham, chicken and brie combination was quite good. The mustard totally killed it though.

Thankfully the staff there was so wonderful as to let me choose another dish to try and delivered it on the quick. I exchanged my chicken for the Prime Rib, Queen's cut. It was "slow roasted boneless rib of Hereford Beef with crispy onions, Horseradish Creme, and Wild Mushroom risotto". I asked for no horseradish as it's one of those foods I can't eat.

The steak was fabulous. It was cooked perfectly, just fatty enough and soooo juicy. It was truly delicious. I did not eat much of the onions but they did add a good bit of flavor to the meat. They were crispy and salty and really good. I poked at the "risotto" and took a bite. I'm pretty sure it had been sitting out and was microwaved as it was oddly hot in certain spots and had that rubbery texture.

As mentioned before, this place is GORGEOUS on the inside. It gives you a sense that you're on vacation at a resort on the beach. The Rockfish was amazing and the steak delicious. So, I recommend you go and try those dishes. We had excellent service as well, which has helped to give this place the score of 3 noms.