Last Saturday night I ate dinner at Pacific Dining Car with two African American male friends. I ordered the grilled shrimp in mango-curry sauce appetizer ($15.95) which was excellent, but sadly contained only 4 (medium sized) grilled shrimp. The presentation was impressive and the sauce delicious. My friends got the crab cakes ($16.95) and sauteed scallops with lobster sauce ($16.95).
For the main course I ordered the 14 oz. filet mignon ($46.95), medium rare, smothered with mushroomd and onion rings as my a la carte "vegetable." My steak was perfectly done, very tasty, with a beautiful pink, juicy center. My friends ordered the seafood mixed grill (grilled fresh salmon fillet, crab cake, jumbo scallops grilled with bacon, mushroom caps and grilled shrimp, $43.95) and the other friend ordered the rib-eye steak ($40.95) with both the bearnaise and bourdelaise sauces on the side (do you know the difference between these two sauces??). One friend was happy with his seafood concoction but the other thought his steak was overdone and confused as to the lack of a bone in a rib-eye steak. He suspected it was a New York steak instead.
We had a very fun meal, but were generally underwhelmed by the serving staff. One friend had to ask twice for oil and vinegar to go along with the fresh bread. I asked our waiter (when he was querying us about how we were going to start our meals) about their famous "all tomoato salad" and he seemed not to know what I was talking about. The item does not appear on the printed menu. At 10:30 pm on a Saturday night, it took what seemed like about 40 minutes to receive our entrees. Afterwards, we gazed at the dessert menu, but I think collectively recognizing that we were already well over $200 for dinner (and in my case, being so stuffed I had about 1/4 of my steak saved in a doggy bag) none of us took the bait.
Overall, it was an interesting if uneven dining experience, probably not one I will repeat soon.
GRADE: B
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