Ravish-ing!

Ravish on Eastlake is my new best friend.

Location - check.

Atmosphere - check.

Drinks - check.

Food - check.

Service - check.

It's in an unassuming location across from Eastlake Bar & Grill in that new condo building. I passed by on my walk home from work a couple of weeks ago--it wasn't open on this particular day--and was immediately enamored of the cute, girly, green-painted chairs I could see through the window. They have clearly gone to a lot of trouble to make the place cute. Love it.

We started with a trio of house-made artisan (Michael says artesian) spreads. One was a yummy olive tapenade with fresh basil and capers, oh yes. Then there was a sultry smoky, sundried tomato pine-nut spread, oh my. And some creamy herbed chevre spread with La Panzanella croccantini (this is crackers, not tiny italian crocodiles) & baguette slices. We liked the crackers but the bread was a tad dry.

They had Stella on draft, on happy hour, and a very good selection of bottled beers including Black Lion Lev Czech Premium Dark Beer (which my resident homebrewer wants you to know is a lager) and this one with cute pink elephants, Delirium Tremens, in its own lil' tulip glass. Cuteski!

There were easily half a dozen reds and whites each on the wine-by-the-glass section of the menu, and it was predominantly Frenchy. Love it. The rose I had first wasn't the best I have had (and was oddly koolaid colored) but the Cotes de Ventoux whateveritwas was delicious. I think HP liked her fresh tasting Sauvignon-Semillion better than the chardonnayish house white that she first tried.

We ordered the Applegate Farms organic mini-pigs in mini-blankets (about 7 or 8 of them), with ketchup & mustard that claimed it was horseradishy, but merely tasted like stone-ground mustard. Did I mention the pigs were mini? MINI!!!! Serve her anything mini and HP is in. Mini piggies in little, teeny, tiny, itty bitty blankets of puff pastry yumminess. They were $1 off on happy hour.

Also, mini meatloaf sliders. (WHAT.) These came two per order.

Then there was the heavenly trio of salads, one for each of us.


Michael had the beet salad with Rogue Creamery Oregon bleu cheese, sherry vinaigrette, and some clearly-homemade spiced walnuts.

I had maybe the best caprese of my life, with basil and fresh mozzarella in just the right amount of balsamic vinaigrette. Love the red and yellow slices of heirloom tomato!

HP had the some lovely fresh greens heaped with raspberries and blueberries in some sort of balsamic loveliness, with sprinkles of feta.

I think we'd go back just for the salads. But then there was the very helpful bartender who convinced us to try Becherovka, which did indeed taste "like Christmas" with licoricey, spicey goodness and legendary cure-what-ails-ya powers. And "The Ravish" which is their signature cocktail (for now) which was some sort of creamy chocolate and cherry martini. Very nice.


And finally, the delicious Theo Chocolate: a little dish of 70% Dark, Sage, one vanilla, ghost chili chocolate covered caramel, and one little square that tasted like solid coffee (in a good way) the minute it hit your tongue. Fantastic!


Thanks to HP for the pics!!!