Restaurant Review: Black Rock Kitchen & Bar

    Great food is something that the city of Buffalo is known for.  We have the biggest food festival in the U.S. and an unbelievable amount of great restaurants to choose from.  It seems like every month there are new places opening up each putting their own spin on creating something different.  The bar has been set high for quality.  The slowly rebounding Black Rock area has had their first injection of something fresh and cool, that being the “Black Rock Kitchen & Bar”.  The reviews have been pretty good so we figured we would give it a try.
    The inside of the restaurant is artsy and hip as I expected.  We arrived around 6pm and the place was just about full already for dinner.  We pulled into the lot across the street where they had a sign for parking however, a man standing in the rain with an umbrella was directing people out of the lot saying that the bar next door was calling and towing cars.  It wasn’t too much of an inconvenience though, I was able to locate a spot down the street.  The crowd was insanely diverse.  Old people, young people, middle aged people-there was definitely a universal interest in this place.  It was very dark so it was difficult to get any decent pictures.  The menu was very different.  There were a lot of things that I had never seen before like “Roasted Marrow Bones” and “Fois Gras French Toast”. 
   We sat down and ordered our drinks.  I went with the Southern Tier Pumking, which is the best pumpkin beer that I have ever tasted.  Nicole ordered a glass of wine. 

For an appetizer, we went with “Fried Mushroom Goat Cheese Wonton” served with a truffle mayo.  We didn’t have to wait long for anything we ordered.  This appetizer was cooked to perfection in terms of the level of crispy from the deep dry. Unfortunately it lacked any flavor.  I could barely taste any goat cheese or mushroom (two ingredients that should have definite flavor).  Nicole didn’t mind them but to me it was like I was just eating the shell of a wonton and dipping it in mayo.  I was not impressed at all.

$9.00

For entrees, I ordered the Duck Leg BLT and Nicole ordered the Roasted Pork Enchiladas.  My sandwich looked impressive and I was pretty excited to eat it.  The fries were a little soggy and pathetic, almost looking like they came from the bottom of an Arby’s curly fries container.  The sandwich was satisfactory, but barely.  The duck was a little dry and didn’t taste like much of anything.  I honestly could have just ordered a regular BLT and would have tasted the same.  This definitely looked better than it tasted.

Nicole’s enchiladas were probably the best out of all the food we ordered.  They didn’t look like much but they were indeed the best of the bunch.  The pork was cooked nicely and the Poblano sauce it was dressed in was tasty, but again, nothing special especially for $12.00.

    The Black Rock Kitchen & Bar was sadly overrated and overpriced.  In a city full of great food, I would not recommend this based on my first visit.  The amount of good reviews the place has received will probably make me give it another chance, but I can definitely state that our visit disappointing.

Black Rock Kitchen & Bar on Urbanspoon

 

Excited for the Weekend!

    I can’t wait for this week to be over.  I have a boat load of stuff to do this weekend and hardly any room to breathe, but I like it…..I think…so far.  Our contractor thinks he will be finished with everything by the end of next week.  The new counter is set to go in around Wednesday and I’ll be able too cook again and share my pizza recipes. 
    Saturday, Nicole and I need to spend the day making sure that we don’t have pealing paint on any of our windows, so it will be an entire day of doing that.  There can’t be pealing paint when the inspector comes.  We just want to be able to cook again like normal people and have a bathroom sink again!
    Sunday is going to be awesome.  I am a Bills fan.  I’m not a Bills fan that cries about how bad we are and puts them down all the time.  Every season is a new shot in my eyes and this season is no different.  I like what they have done with the defense and the QB that I pushed for to be the starter from the beginning is starting.  Sunday will be a day of football and food and I cannot wait.

    I’ll have a new restaurant review this weekend.  We want to go out to eat tomorrow so I should have something new to share.  Once this house stuff ends, I should be able to get back to the normal posting on here, beers, food, and shirts!

A Welcoming "Atmosphere!"

    A new restaurant has opened on Allen St. here in Buffalo, NY and tonight Nicole and I decided to give it a try.  The place is called “Atmosphere @ 62” and at first we had no idea what to expect.  We couldn’t find a menu online anywhere and we had a hard time finding out anything about it in general.  We walked into the restaurant and were immediately greeted by a nice gentlemen, presumably the owner, and a woman behind the bar informing us that they were still waiting to get their alcohol license.  I immediately threw a fit yelling and screaming about how preposterous is was to even have the nerve to call themselves “open”.  I stormed out of the building furious.  Actually no, I didn’t really do that.  We were fine with that and they sat us down and handed us the menu.  I was excited to try something new tonight.  The place had a mildly artsy, classy, urban feel to it.  They sat us at the window which was pleasantly distracting.  The Allen St. area has gotten a lot better but there is still the occasional freak show, schizo character that will walk by staring into the restaurant.  I enjoyed the feel of the place and was comfortable inside.  Not knowing anything about the place, I was worried about attire and dress code, but the place was dress casual.   The one peculiar thing to note is that the tables seem a bit on the small side, small enough that our menus overlapped when we had them open on the table at the same time.




    We started off with an appetizer and decided to go with the Peach Pizza Pita.  This seemed so different, that I had to try it, and I’m not even all that crazy about peaches.  It consisted of marinated peaches, mascarpone cheese, sage, and honey on pita dough.  It was incredible.  The cheese was delicious and not overpowering with the peaches to add a subtle sweetness that really balanced everything out nicely.  It was really tasty.  Each entree came with soup or salad.  The soup of the day was a pepper gouda soup.  I love gouda cheese so this was perfect.  While we were waiting for the soup, they brought us out some fresh bread with oil.  The oil had fresh garlic, herbs, and balsamic vinegar.

The soup came out next and it smelled great.  The service was excellent and everything was brought out in a timely manner and our water was constantly refreshed.  Our soup was very tasty, something that I thought would be great in the winter.  The flavor was fantastic and the only thing we found to be a bit overpowering was the spice.  This soup was really spicy.  Nicole likes hot food, and she said that this was even almost too hot for her.  Minus the intense heat, this soup was delicious.

Pepper Gouda Soup

Shortly after we finished our soup, the main course came out.  Nicole ordered the penne alfredo with sun-dried tomatoes and mushrooms, in a white wine alfredo sauce.  I ordered the baked pork chop stuffed with apple walnut and apple brandy cream sauce, served with roasted potato and vegetable.  Her alfredo pasta was creamy and delicious.  With low expectations of this normally boring dish, it was surprisingly delicious.  My pork chop was great too.  It was so great that I got too excited and while I was cutting into the pork, I slipped and sprayed pork remnants all over Nicole’s face.   I’m not very graceful.  The apple stuffing was a great companion to the perfectly cooked pork chop.  It was a great piece of meat, not under cooked and not dry.  It was really great.


Stuffed Pork Chop

     Everything was genuinely fresh and delicious here and we were happy to have such a great, creative addition to the restaurant scene here in Buffalo.  Once the alcohol license comes in, it will complete the puzzle for this place and become a really great dining experience.  Welcome Atmosphere@62!

Atmosphere@62 on Urbanspoon

Atmosphere @ 62
62 ALLEN
Buffalo, NY 14202
(716) 881-0062

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