currently a miss. there's a cornucopia of creativity present in chef adam cooke's menu at restaurant 17 that will delight most anyone. my wife and i enjoyed our snap pea and strawberry salad, and the in-house prepared meats and pickled vegetables on our charcuterie plate surely glowed from the kitchen staff's loving attentions. it is evident there's a whole lotta chemistry goin' on in the back. unfortunately, up front, in the dining room, there's a creative-killing paradigm alive and thriving that's as palpable as a room full of dark-suited accountants intently sharpening their number 2 pencils in unison.
while the wait staff was friendly, engaging and genuinely seemed concerned about their performance, most of them simply didn't know what to do. sadly, no one was directing them. during the course of the evening, despite lots of employees milling about, no one refilled our water glasses. no one refilled our wine glasses. there seemed to be some confusion on which utensils to clear away, when to bring new ones, the timing of serving and so on. basically the basics. the most appalling kerfuffle of the evening, though, was when they brought us our entire order; salad, appetizer and entrees at basically the same time. and surprisingly, none of the staff seemed to think anything out of the ordinary in doing so.
we had just had our salad and charcuterie set down when another server followed behind with the entrees. it looked like he was getting ready to shove items on the table around, in good ole highway-diner fashion, to make space for the entree plates. the plan, i guess, to abandon them on the table, to let the dishes get cold, while we worked on our starters. i told him we weren't ready for the entrees yet. he walked away with them only to return 2-3 minutes later to make yet another attempt at delivery. he stood there, looking back-and-forth between us, at the plates and then towards the kitchen; frozen to immobility. since he had not the least idea what should happen next i instructed him to take the entrees to the chef and explain that we had just begun our salads.
when we were finally served our main course, what we received were those same dishes that had now sat finished, for more than a half hour. my medium rare steak had been cooked into medium well.
now, i'd like to make a case that steaks ordered at two different temperatures are not the same, interchangeable items. a customer wanting well-done would be repulsed by a bloody-red center and likewise, a customer wanting rare would be equally repulsed by the listless, leathery quality of well-done. ordering one temperature and receiving the other is equivalent to ordering pork, for instance, and instead receiving chicken. imagine ordering pork and being told that 'yes, you ordered pork, but the kitchen erred and cooked chicken and so, that's what you're getting.' incomprehensible, really. but due to a timing error on the part of the kitchen i would get the listless leather. their relentlessness to sell the plate at the expense of the customer's dining experience, unashamedly forcing their mistakes on customers, is something i have never experienced in an upscale, boutique restaurant before, and it was quite a shock.
restaurant 17 has the creativity to become a local gem and foodie enclave, but sadly, may never get there. certainly not while there is such a disparity of philosophies tugging it in opposite directions.