MOTHER'S DAY RECAP

Following a breakfast of Pancake Truffles, my family (sans David since he was in Montreal for a wedding) headed to our fave dim sum place for lunch. Since it had only been about an hour since I had eaten I was crazy hungry but the 30 minute wait helped make some space in my stomach.

The usual suspects were eaten including these pork, shrimp and chive dumplings (none for me, evil shrimp!)Tripe (I wasn't in the mood for any):Pork dumplings (which unfortunately, this place makes with shrimp, evil, evil shrimp):Stuffed bean curd (it comes stuffed with bamboo, pork, shitake, etc):
My favourite rice dish with dried sausage and sliced pork belly (so bad but so good):And baby pork ribs?We also ordered a separate rice noodle dish. I thought rice noodle with beef and vegetable meant a plethora of vegetables but they weren't kidding with the singular vegetable spelling as this is what we got:The rest of the day was spent constantly on the go. There was a short trip to the mall, a jaunt to the cemetery and then we were off to MeVaMe for dinner for four. Oh and a 60+ minute wait. Yep, that's right. We arrived 45 minutes later than my dad and I had initially planned and because of it, our wait was more than an hour long. I kind of half expected it and thank goodness for the Kashi Dark Chocolate Coconut bar in my purse. It definitely came in handy. It saved me from having to gnaw someone else's arm off--phew!

Ordering didn't take very long and once we informed our waitress that we had waited over an hour (not in a demanding way), she brought us our salads, pita and pickles/peppers pronto:I even remembered to get the dressing on the side this time and I'm really glad I did once I saw my dad's platter sans salad; his had a small pool of dressing left--blech! I got my usual, lamb chops (medium), but this time with a side of fries:

My mom got the lamb skewers with fries:Dad got the stuffed rainbow trout (stuffed with mini shrimp, mushrooms and some other "crap"--his words, not mine), with a side of rice (unpictured):And brother #2 got the schnitzel with mashed potatoes:The photos are kind of crappy and I forgot about taking them before everyone could dig in so everyone's food has kind of been dug into already. What can I say...waiting more than an hour for food does that to people.

Anyway, I was not satisfied with my fourth dinner at MeVaMe because my lamb was seriously overcooked. I had asked for it medium and there was not one sight of pink anywhere to be seen. I ate one and a half of the chops and called it a night. I picked away at my fries and ate most of them while my mom ate one of her skewers. Her lamb wasn't as overcooked as mine but it was still a little overcooked. Anyway, our waitress eventually showed up, after at least 30 minutes, to ask us how our dinner was and my mom mentioned our meat being overcooked. After checking with her notepad, our waitress offered to see if she could get the uneaten portion of our lamb recooked. Well, I was certainly chuffed. I kind of wished I had done that in the first place but I'm always a little bit afraid of what the chef might put into (or spit into) my newly-made dish.

A little while later, my mom's new lamb skewer arrived and my plate of four new chops arrived cooked to medium perfection. It was great. It kind of made up for the fact that we had to wait over an hour, that we always have to ask for our water to be refilled, that our waitress didn't come back to ask us how we were doing until 30+ minutes later, etc.

Honestly, I kind of wonder why I've been back to MeVaMe so many times but then I remember how much it costs to eat the exact same meal at another restaurant (easily $20 plus) and then realize that perhaps all the aggravation is worth it. But then maybe I just eat there because 3 out of 4 times, I've never really had a say.

RESTAURANT REVIEW: GIO RANA'S

Gio Rana's Really Really Nice Restaurant is really just a big nose. From the outside, that is. I don't remember seeing a sign with a marquee indicating the Italian restaurant Sean and I were to dine at. All I saw was The Nose.

After a quick trip to the Leslieville Spit to see this:we decided to head to Queen St. West to run some errands and then headed over to Leslieville for dinner since our attempt to grab dinner the last time, ended up in epic fail. We decided upon Gio Rana's because it was close-by and because we were both hungry. I was just about ready to gnaw Sean's arm off.

The decor at Gio's is funny. The walls are not complete and it's quite dark inside, but we were able to grab a table for two on a Saturday night without a reservation. After a few bites of some bread dipped in olive oil and balsamic, we were ready to order. But wait, where the heck was our waitress? Chatting with another waitress? Dilly-dallying infront of the computer screen? Talking to the busboy? This seemed to be the theme of the evening.

Eventually we found our waitress and made our order.

First up was the prosciutto with fig stuffed with gorgonzolo cheese and honey. I have no photo to show, so imagine this instead. There's a round white plate. On top of that plate lies a child's handful of arugula. On top of the arugula is one black mission fig topped with gorgonzola and a drizzle of honey. Surrounding the mound is three strips of prosciutto. It was good. Was it $7.95 good? Probably not but I was hungry. And Sean and I had finished all the bread.

Next up were our entrees. We skipped the option of a pasta in case we ended up with too much to eat, which ended up being a smart decision on Sean's part. I got the ossobucco with roasted potatoes and Sean got the pork tenderloin with chickpeas. Meats hover around $14-15 and sides are an extra $5.95. I neglected to see the latter on the menu so when our waitress told us that sides were an extra order, we ordered but a mention of the cost would have been appreciated. In my case, as you'll soon see, $6 could have been saved.

My ossobucco with mushrooms:My side of roast potatoes (this plate is actually smaller than it looks):Sean's pork tenderloin with a walnut and gorgonzola sauce:
Sean's side of chickpeas (ceci) and cured pork (again, this bowl is actually smaller than it looks):
So I ate about 1/3 of my potatoes, Sean had some and then I had about 1/4-1/3 of my ossobucco and Sean had some and when I asked the busboy if I could have the rest of my meal packed up, he said "of course" but neglected to pack my potatoes! Okay, okay, so I didn't really gesture to the plate of potatoes but only to the plate of meat but you'd think that since someone is paying $6 for a plate of potatoes, you'd pack them up too. Common sense people!!

So not only that but their ossobucco was cooked using chicken broth. Chicken broth, people! And if you're not aware of the fact that I'm allergic to non-organic chicken, you would be right in assuming that Gio's ossobucco did not go down well that night. And just to make sure that it was the ossobucco and not just a fluke, I decided to eat the leftovers the next, next day and had the same reaction. Not so good. Was it my fault though? Should I really have asked if the ossobucco contained any kind of chicken? Sean didn't do so at the amazing Italian restaurant in NYC and his osso buco went down really fine. I mean, really fine. I still think about that osso buco sometimes.

Anyway, back to Gio Rana's. Overall I'd rate Gio Rana's Really Really Really Nice Restaurant a 7.5. The waitress was MIA for the most part; she forgot about Sean's tea, was MIA for our order, MIA for the dessert menu and just about every other time we tried to find her but the food was really good, despite my chicken issues.