Dinner At The Ritz

You have been invited to a small dinner party at one of the 'best' restaurants in the city and although you have never eaten there before, you are certain that the food will be amazing, always an ideal accompaniment to perfect company. Your car is valet parked your table is ideally situated for people watching, you order that first cocktail and the evening is off to a great start. Conversation flows easily until you notice a distant chalkboard which lists many of the dishes available for the evening. Your menus have not yet arrived so with varying degrees of myopia you all contribute by reading what you can actually see, in order to "shed some light" onto that dimly lit board, you read in loud voices to combat the hearing loss that touches at least half of the people at your table. It is like a team building activity and pretty successful too! The menus arrive and there is a lengthy round table discussion about who can share what with whom to ensure that everyone gets to taste at least some of everything! The server does an impressive visual presentation and after you get over the shock of seeing various slabs of raw meat alongside jumbo fresh veg on the display platter, you make your informed decisions. The food is served at last and of course fine dining would not be fine dining without at least one person (clearly a Quebecer) sending something back to the kitchen. It is somewhat comforting to realize that even at the Ritz a main can be served at a temperature that is less than the required "hot". The sent back dish returns to the table in perfect splendour and the celebration continues swimmingly with sparkling water and conversation. The sighting of a reknowned attorney and a famous author is the icing on the milk chocolate cake and there are not enough adequate descriptors for the chocolate souffle. The Ritz did not disappoint and a return visit is definitely something to look forward to.