POSH Dining

Yesterday kicked off Fall Arizona Restaurant Week - a time when the fancy schmancy restaurants across the valley offer prix fixe menus at a discount to get diners into their doors. I always look forward to restaurant week since normally I can't justify eating at places where a salad costs $20. So last night, Matt, Claudia and I got all prettied up and headed over to POSH in Scottsdale to get our eat on.

One of my friends at work had recommended the place, and the concept sounded really cool. It's improvisational dining, which means there is no menu and the chef just surprises you with each of your 4 courses. You are able to give them some guidelines to start off, though. They have you fill out a form that asks questions like how you like your meat prepared and what foods you absolutely would not eat. They list out all of the seasonal meats and fish that they have on hand, and you can cross off the ones that you're not feeling adventurous enough to try. Claudia and I were a little more timid than Matt. Among the list of items I would not eat: Quail, duck, sweetbreads (NOT actually bread - don't be fooled!), and Kangaroo (WTF. Seriously. I plan on going to Australia someday and do NOT want to get kicked in the face by an angry kangaroo avenging his father's death. Pass.) So that basically left just steak for the girls, which I was fine with because I love steak. Matt was a lot braver - the only one he crossed off was sweetbreads, and that was only after I read him the lovely Wikipedia description of what they were.

For the fish options, I was a lot more open. I don't like shrimp and I don't like mussels, but was willing to try any of the other options. With our sheets sent off to the head chef, we sat and waited for our surprise meal. First, they brought us a palate-starter that tasted like fancy mayo with cucumber and saffron. Then came the real thing. The courses we received:

Course 1: Soup & Salad
Claudia got a bowl of Summer Squash Soup with a hint of pumpkin.
Matt got an Endive Salad with cranberries and imported Italian bleu cheese.
I got an Arugula Salad with goat cheese and toasted almonds.

Winner: Arugula Salad

Course 2: Fish
Claudia got a Ceviche Halibut with tortilla strips and bell peppers.
Matt got Escolar with risotto and sauce.
I got raw Ahi Tuna with cucumber caviar (cucumbers have eggs?!) and jelly (pronounce jele - all French-like).

Winner: Escolar
This one surprised us a little since I also Googled "Escolar" and was a bit turned off by the description. The particular website called it the "most controversial fish" since its wax and fat content makes it at the same time very delicious and very rough on your *ahem* digestive tract. Matt promptly pointed out that he eats at Filiberto's on a regular basis, so we probably should be worried about the fat effects of a little fish. Good call. It was buttery and delicious and one of the best fish any of us had ever tried.

Course 3: Meat
Claudia and I both got a NY Strip Steak since it was the only option we hadn't crossed off :) But we were rewarded for being chickens because it also came with a side of chopped cheesy potatoes and perfectly cooked green beans. The steak itself was seasoned and cooked perfectly.
Matt got Duck Confit with lentils and a savory sauce.

Winner: Steak!

Course 4: Dessert
This time Claudia and Matt got the same thing: Panna Cotta with berries and sauce.
I got Rum-soaked Pineapple with Cognac sauce and ice cream.

Winner: Panna Cotta
Matt and I were nervous about the Panna Cotta - the only other time we had ever had it at another restaurant, it was not even close to good. This time, it was sweet and light and delicious!

They topped off the night by bringing us some Plum & Blackberry Popsicles with the check. All in all, it was a wonderful meal and I was so glad we were all adventurous enough to give this improvisational dining a try. This would be a great place to go for a birthday celebration or even a fun date night. I know it won't be the last time we go there!

Restaurant week is off to a good start.

Vacation Sentiment

Pamela and I are planning a vacation for this fall and we've narrowed it down to two locations; Aruba or Jamaica.  We've looked at flights and resorts for both places and they both look awesome and we can't decide.  So I figured since I turn to Google for so many other answers, why not try it out to help us decide on our vacation.

The numbers are based on the amount of Google search results yielded from an entry in the form of (Location) "(Adjective) vacation".  I figured this would give me a general idea for the overall portion of people that were satisfied or not satisfied with their trip to either location.  I plotted the results against each other for easier comparison in terms of percentages. 

Positive Sentiment

Negative Sentiment

Results:
1)  Jamaica returned more hits for both the positive and negative searches.  
2)  The ratio for the positive searches was about 65% for Jamaica and 35% for Aruba.  The negative searches came out to around 80% for Jamaica and 20% for Aruba. 

Conclusions:
Jamaica returned more results for all searches, this is most likely due to Jamaica being both larger in size and possibly a more common vacation destination.  However, Aruba had a higher percentage against Jamaica for positive sentiment than it did for negative sentiment.  This tells me that across all of the Google results, a higher percentage of people were satisfied with their trips to Aruba than with their trips to Jamaica.  I realize there are flaws with this process and by no means is this conclusive evidence that Aruba would be a better destination.  This all just comes down to one more data point for us to use in making our vacation decision.