Dinner Out

[pointerhaven]

Do you find that you tend to not have certain meals out, because they never live up to your expecatations...

Last night we went to a Texas Roadhouse, not my normal style, but I had a gift card. We both ordered the 10 oz Rib Eye, cooked Pittsburg Style, Rare. I ordered Grilled onions and mushrooms on the side. Baked Potatoes, butter and sour cream.

Well the steak was indeed rare, but not a char mark on it. And SALTY!!!! Good God, I couldn't eat more than three bites. The onions were barely limp and were hot tasting, you know bitter, the mushrooms were barely cooked thru. BP wasn't bad, dh's pot was not even warm...

Needless to say we were again disappointed in Richmond Fare...Should have gone with my first instinct and cooked a Shrimp Boil...

Tonight I preparing Red Beans and Rice, Salad and Crusty Corn Bread with Irish Butter...I think I deserve it after last night's meal. LOL

[Hammster]

DW rarely orders chicken breasts when we dine out because they are invariably overcooked and dry (unless we are at a couple places where they always do them right) and she says my chicken breasts are by far better than most restaurant's. :D (But she may be biased, slightly ;) )

[Robyn1007]

I agree that chicken breasts are one of the hardest things to order out and I can think of only one place where I will.

Alternately, I order steaks out when I want it because I so rarely cook steak that I'm afraid to really mess it up. :o

[miller88]

So often, eating out just isn't worth it, is it? However, I do prefer to get steak at a restaurant since I don't have access to the quality of beef nor am I ever able to cook it just right.

Salmon is one thing I rarely get when I dine out. Only because I cook it frequently at home and have so many great recipes.

[SugarNSpice]

I really hate Texas Roadhouse and Texas Land and Cattle - both truly terrible experiences.

My eating out usually revolves around Mexican food or any Thai/Japanese/Chinese style food because I simply can't make them at home and get the same results. There is a place just down the road that makes the most divine pad thai - I don't even want to bother trying to recreate it :)

[Terri_A]

Perhaps this is why the majority of the restaurants that I go to are places I've been going to since I was 5!!! The Mexican, BBQ/Chicken Fried Steak, and Vietnamese restaurants I like the best are places I was raised on. When I do venture to a new place, it's usually because it came highly recommended, or I have to be there for a meeting for work, or it's a group going out and you go with the majority's rule.

Steak restaurants in particular I don't like going to because if they cook your steak the way you want it, it's usually seasoned with a very salty seasoning. Italian restaurants are ruined for me because I always just think I could have made the same dish, but better.:D

I like my kitchen, the chef, the waitstaff and the prices...but I really need to hire a new dishwasher!!!;)

[SusanMac]

I think it's a chain restaurant thing. They might start out as good, but once they franchise &/or go public, they have to cut costs....try to appeal to the lowest common denominator....try to homogenize everything so it's exactly the same at each location, etc. Recipe for disaster in most cases (not all).

We dine out a lot, and I do typically try to order things I wouldn't make on my own. That makes it more unique, enjoyable, and I might even learn a few new techniques to try myself.

[cumulus]

So often, eating out just isn't worth it, is it?

No kidding.

There are very few things I prefer to eat while I'm out but include: most Thai, sushi, and usually fish. For the most part, this is because I can't find the best quality ingredients locally in order to make the above. Kansas isn't exactly teeming with fish, so I predominantly order it when out.

I never order dessert when out- I almost always think I could have done a better job :).

And we have a local sandwich place that hands-down has some of the best bread/fixins in the world. They're roasted turkey with cranberry sauce on walnut-sage bread is absolutely divine! I would go there before I attempted to re-create at home anyday.

[Robyn1007]

Darn it Cumulus! There's a place up in Boulder that does a similar turkey sandwich and now I'm craving it but I'm nowhere near close enough to get there for lunch. Grrrr. :mad: ;) :p

[SDMomChef]

So true! I can't even think of the last time that DH & I went to a chain restaurant, and when we do go out, we really limit it to a few local restaurants.

When we went on a short vacation in August, we decided to eat at a local Italian restaurant. The menu looked very good. We ordered bruchetta as an appetizer - and it was so disappointing! The tomatoes were like grocery store tomatoes in December and you couldn't taste the basil or the garlic. Needless to say, the shrimp scampi pasta that we both ordered was also very disappointing - it was pretty much overcooked shrimp in melted butter. DH said that I have "ruined" him on restaurants. Fortunately, the next night we ate at a local restaurant that the B&B owners recommended to us - and it was fantastic. The menu used lots of creative twists on dishes, and it was so good that we ate there for dinner three nights in a row! :D

[Canice]

I never order chicken in restaurants, not because it's dry, but because it's boring. Same with green salads as a starter; no matter the pedigree of the ingredients, the freshness, seasonality, whatever - there's almost invariably something more creative on the menu. However, in certain restaurants I will feel compelled to order a steak if it has an interesting treatment, as I do not ever cook it at home, and I'd rather leave it to the experts.
Overall, I have to say that I love having dinner out and rarely think I could do a better job myself.

[Barrie]

My DH does awesome steaks on the grill. Our favorite cut, and the only cut we buy anymore, is bone-in ribeyes.

Last month, we went to a high-end steakhouse for dinner. We had a gift certificate so we weren't concerned w/ price. The waiter said their bone-in ribeye is their best steak on the menu so I went with that, and ordered it. It was a $48 steak and was, in all honesty, no better than what my DH does at home. My DH ordered the $60 bone-in NY and agreed w/ me, that what he does at home is just as good, if not better. And we're not buying prime or angus steaks at the grocery store -- what we get is choice, from Safeway or Fry's.

We almost always find w/ restaurant meals that we could have done it better (and of course way cheaper) at home.

[AvrilH]

Sigh. I have the same experience.

On Saturday we ate out as a family (for the first time in many many months, if you exclude Subway). We were crowded. The boys got bored. The meal was certainly no better than what I make at home. It cost me $90.

I suppose I had to go out just to remind myself why we don't bother to eat out!

[springsgourmet9]

I rarely order chicken out since I cook it a lot at home and have so many recipes. One exception is an upscale Mexican restaurant in WC where the chicken is cooked perfectly moist with a poblano sauce (yum!)

My DH & I go out every Wednesday night and I have been so disappointed for some time now that we often prefer to order just apps and drinks. I can cook better at home, except for ethnic foods (Mex, Chinese, Sushi). Actually some of my Mexican is preferable to most of the Mexican restaurants in our area. I buy our steaks at Wegmans and they're better than any steakhouse.

We stay away from the chains unless we're desperate. I guess its a curse that we foodies are rarely content with restaurant meals Everything is sub-par unless you are dining at a four-star restaurant and ordering something I normally don't cook at home but it sure is nice for someone else to cook once in a while.

[ChristyMarie]

We avoid chain restaurants like the plague but honestly, we have amazing meals out. And my husband cooks really well. I think it is just a matter of seeking out those higher quality restaurants. We truly enjoy dining out.

[Kahlico]

We avoid chain restaurants like the plague but honestly, we have amazing meals out. And my husband cooks really well. I think it is just a matter of seeking out those higher quality restaurants. We truly enjoy dining out.

Christy, as a newcomer to Chicago, I am mind-boggled by all the restaurant selections here. DH and I eat out once a week or so (lately it's been for brunch), and we have a scratch pad of all the places in our neighborhood we want to try (most locally owned). Nevertheless, we're still occasionally disappointed by our food. I have to admit, one of my favorite meals here was at an Italian chain restaurant (a big NO in my book, I hate chains and it's hard for me to find good Italian food at a restaurant), Maggiano's. We shared the linguini with clams and red sauce -- fabulous. Of course the portion was enough to feed a family of 4, which in a sense it did. We took home the leftovers and made another meal for two from them.

Even so, DH claims I can cook as well if not better as almost any restaurant, and for a much cheaper price. We've added the cost of my homemade pizza (crust and sauce both from scratch) vs. the cost of the same-sized pizza at several pizzerias. The figures are astounding. I could be making triple what it costs for me to make a pizza (and most meals at that).

It's a treat for us to eat out, mainly because it gives me a break once a week, and because it's nice to eat ethnic foods I don't have the equipment to try to make in my kitchen.

~Emilie~