Twohearted

Any suggestions aside from roasting them with some tomatoes, garlic and rosemary and serving them on ciabatta? I also have some squid and a bottle of Jermann Pinot Bianco so I was planning on having a little Iberian-style seaside feast. I haven't settled on a squid recipe either if anybody can suggest one.

I'm not sure if this is traditional tapas (I'm guessing not), but it sounds like something I had at Alma de Cuba once. Inventive. ← Yeah, I doubt it, haha. I think the interesting thing is taking the tapas concept and applying other types of cuisine to it.

My wife and I were fortunate enough to eat at l'Ambroisie last May during our Honeymoon in Paris. It was our first 3-star dining experience and it was certainly memorable. We were, of course, eating there when the exchange rate with the US dollar was horrible, but there wasn't much we could do about it. We did try and eat there for lunch in the hope that it might be a big cheaper, but it certainly wasn't. Here's what we had: Me 1 - Feuillantine de langoustines aux graines de sesame, sauce au curry 2 - Noix de ris de veau braisee a la "financiere", etuvee de morilles a la creme 3 - Biscuit dacquoise au praline, giboulee de fraises de jardin My wife 1 - Salade de homard et brunoise de legumes printaniere, mousseline a la badiane 2 - Escalopines de bar a l'emince d'artichat, caviar oscietre gold 3 - Tarte fine sablee au cacao, glace a la vanille We also had a bottle of Meursault and some champagne (Roederer Crystal of course!). That all came to a total of 739E (OUCH). It's an incredibly beautiful restaurant in a beautiful area (Place de Vosges), which just happened to be a couple blocks from our hotel in the Marais. The service was also excellent and the chef was kind enough to sign a menu for us since it was obviously a special occasion for us. Unfortunately we did not bring our camera with us to the lunch, which is a decision I regret. Of course the food was unbelievable and certainly the best meal either of us ever had. My wife still talks about the sea bass with caviar and I can still remember those succulent veal sweetbreads with perfect morels. As I told my friends later: it was worth the cost.

My wife and I had dinner at Extra Virgin a couple nights ago for her birthday. I gave her the choice or Le Fou Frog, Michael Smith or Extra Virgin (all places we had not been to yet) and she chose Extra Virgin since she's a fan of tapas. The short: It was great for the money and we'll be back again. The long: Personally I was dreaming of a quality tapas bar similar to the ones you'd find in Spain so I went into it with very high expectations. Of course, that's rather unrealistic for Kansas City. Anyways, we had quite a bit of food (keep in mind these are small plates): braised pork cheeks - I thought it was little tough and had a bit too much salt, but the white beans were good with it. I saw somebody in this thread refer to Central and Michel Richard's braised beef cheeks are out of this world. beef marrow bones - excellent, but needed more radish on the plate hamachi ceviche - very good and I especially liked the texture with the corn nuts duck confit corstini - excellent beef empanadas - good, but I still like the ones I make more braised escarole with rice and parmesan - just OK, but I'm not a big fan of escarole in the first place white sardines - excellent with some garlic, tomatoes, oil from the can and a salad pepper On top of this we had 4 glasses of wine between us. All told we spent $115 not including tip. Considering that we were ordering many of the more expensive items off the menu and had a couple drinks each, I was pleasantly surprised that the bill was only that much. Of course I had higher expectations and some of the dishes didn't meet those expectations, but considering what we ordered and how much we paid I think it was right on. You can certainly spend $115 at other KC restaurants and do much worse. We will definitely be back to Extra Virgin. We are both dying to go there for their half-priced happy hour in the summer time for a First Friday with friends.