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2014-04-28
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I somehow got on Magnolia's mailing list, and last year around my birthday they sent out a special Chinese New Year deal. If you bought 20 seats (redeemable at any time in the following 18 months), you got a discount AND if you were one of the first 10 people to do so you got 10 free bottles of wine and free takeaway for 8. The email was sent out at an odd time and I noticed it as soon as it arrived, so I jumped on the deal, and managed to snag all the freebies. Go me!Anyway, 10 of the seats and
Anyway, 10 of the seats and the free wine were consumed last year, but my time was running out and it was time for a return trip.
Magnolia works like this: you show up at 8:00pm, and there's a complimentary drink (I couldn't tell if it was alcoholic, but I'm guessing no since they're BYOB) and complimentary hors d'oeuvres. We got some good cornbread w/ a cheese spread, some seafood thingies, and something else (sorry, I was mingling and didn't take pictures to aid my memory). At around 8:30, the party moves upstairs, into three rooms with 10 seats in each.
Once seated you get a soup and a salad course. The soup was seafood gumbo. There was plenty of seafood and I liked the gumbo. When I make gumbo at home, it is spicy, but this wasn't at all really. Really good: B+
The salad was Caesar salad with two tiny crab cakes on the side. The salad was straightforward, but very well done: a judicious amount of dressing and crisp greens. I totally did not dig the crab cakes though: cold, soggy, with no real excuse for taking up space. Overall: OK: C+
Greens: the greens were liquidy and bitter and soggy. I'm a mere Texan, so I may be trashing something that's wholly authentic here, but I'm guessing not. My wife makes some mean collards and she's from California (note: these weren't collards, I'm just making a comparison)... there wasn't much flavor here. Poor: D
I take it these are mashed sweet potatoes. I'm sorry, I was answering the phone when they brought in all the main dishes and thus I missed the naming of names. Very buttery and yummy, though on the cold side (I will address this issue more at the bottom). Good: B
I love catfish. My parents aren't real chef-types so growing up we had frozen catfish which they just deep-fried... but man was it good! Now that they're older they cook less and we go to a soul food place down near my high school... it's totally off the chain. I say this only to go on to say: Magnolia does terrible catfish. It's limp. It's cold. It has no crisp. It has no flaky fish texture. It has no flavor. It reminds me of chicken tenders at the cafeteria in elementary school. Poor: D
Soupy, mushy veggies in a pot: okra, corn, and tomatoes. It is what it is. OK: C
The red jambalaya didn't do much to distinguish itself from plain rice. It wasn't bad in any way, and I liked it as an accompaniment, but it pales in comparison to literally all the other jambalaya I've ever had ever. It's not even got that sort of liquidy paella thing, and the rice struck me as mushy and overcooked, like maybe it had sat in a rice cooker for too long. OK: C-
Chicken... dish? I won't gamble on a name here. It was mostly chicken and tomatoes. A little on the sweet side and a little simple in construction, but I thought it was good overall. B-
I don't solely belly-ache. Honestly. Take the ribs for instance. This wheel's on fire, rollin down the road... AbFab. Amazing. They're really tender, they just melt in your mouth. Saucier than the dry South Texas thing I'm used to, but definitely not in a bad way. Everyone loved the ribs and could not stop talking about them. Excellent: A(Note: not to take away from the excellent ribs here, but I do encourage you to try the ones at Roundhouse, which I'd rate A+.)
I'd had some cornbread as an appetizer (really top notch), so I didn't feel the need for much more bready stuff at dinner. But I thought these muffins were fine. B
Above is some grilled fish. This is where I want to take some space and just say how awesomely accomodating Magnolia is. Last time I came I brought a vegetarian friend and they made him veggie versions of every dish with animals in it. This time I had a pescatarian friend and they made her replacement dishes for all the meat dishes we got. That's the sort of thing that goes a really long way with me. Plus this fish was pretty good (I got to try some).
I literally could not... OK, so I had a bite or two of the pie. I am not a sweets person and usually by the end of dinner I am full anyway. So I don't really know what pecan pie should taste like. This seemed pretty good, and everyone else seemed to manage to eat the whole thing. (How???) B+A few words on food temperature: all of Magnolia's food is much better when it's piping hot. I know this because two of my friends canceled at the last minute, and I took home their portions as takeaway. Coming out of the microwave, many of the things I thought were tepid, bland, or just OK, were noticeably better. Somehow in the process from kitchen to serving dish to plate, the food just loses too much heat and it's like you're eating a poorly executed Thanksgiving dinner, where the potatoes are cold and the gravy's all congealed (if you're American, you know what I'm talking about).
Concluding thoughts: Look, I like Magnolia. I think there are good people who run it, who are totally nice and accomodating. The hors d'oeuvres, soup, salad, and dessert are spot-on. But between (a) the coldness, which definitely hampers, handicaps, or destroys the potatoes, catfish, and veggies and (b) the task of cooking 30 portions of each dish all together, the main part of the meal figuratively falls apart. Except the ribs, which only literally fall apart. The experience is a fun one, and I'm not regretful I bought 20 seats lo those 15 months ago. But it's only OK. C+
张贴
