Dine About Town number two dinner tonight! You can read about my first Dine About Town dinner at Garcon here.

I took my mom out to Luce (pronounced Loo-chay), a restaurant at the Intercontinental Hotel on Howard and 5th. Overall verdict. I liked it. The food was delicate and deliberate, and the servers really cared whether we had a good meal. Two different managers came over and asked whether everything was OK in addition to the attentive waiter. We were also offered a foie gras amuse-bouche soon after we were sat which I tasted. So much for being a vegetarian. I had to try it. I think Mumsies had a good time too. We enjoyed two grappa cocktails. I’ve never had grappa before so the experience was much sought after. Grappa has an upfront strong assertive taste to me, but a smooth disappearing finish.

I chose a Moscone Pear cocktail for my mom – a herbal infused grappa drink with fresh pear puree, lime and lemon juice and a grape garnish. Cute, lightly sweet, very juicy and delicious.

I got the When in Rome – a sort of margarita on the rocks with grappa in place of tequila. Less sweet than the pear drink, it was refreshing and also wonderful.

Luce’s Dine About Town menu offered two choices for app, entree and dessert so Mumsies and I ordered everything on the menu. Entree’s were shortribs for mother and salmon for me. (We switched plates after the photo below.)Instead of the vanilla bean semifreddo listed as one of the dessert choices on the menu (which I would have loved to try), Luce had a basil panna cotta instead.

One word – weird.

The croissant bread pudding was much better with the coffee spuma and cream sauce. The waiter surprised us with after dinner chocolates after I requested the check.

All in all, a wonderful dining experience.

xoxo,

Jenn