Kent Rathbun's Blue Plate Kitchen - a review.

Sooo, Ben, David, myself, and Ben's childhood friend, Rhonda, tried out Kent Rathbun's Blue Plate Kitchen this past Sunday night. The idea is about 'posh' down-home comfort food. The ambiance was great, dimly lit with comfortable seating, and candles lit throughout. I like that the decor consisted of canned goodies like jams, okra, and chutneys strewn about w/ the candles. Cute, smart...except I'm not paying $16 for canned jam, when I can can (haha) my own case of Ball jars for about that price!

At any rate, we started with martini's, mine the Pama, David had the Big Daddy, and both Ben and Rhonda had the Dirty Blue martini - which for both of them, was not dirty enough. Blue cheese olives were lovely, however, but everyone knows you can get those at Central Market, so, well, yeah.

Then on to salads, and I have to say that the cottage cheese/green goddess salad Ben and I had was AMAZING. Green Goddess dressing is definitely making a comeback, it was even featured in this month's Bon Appetit. For entrees, I ordered the fried chicken and mac and cheese, David had the meatloaf, Ben the catfish, and Rhonda the DP rotisserie chicken. Now, both David and Rhonda had no complaints, but Ben and I had dishes that were very salty. We figured out that it must equate to the fact that they're overseasoning their cornmeal and flour coatings. We were the only 2 who's dishes were fried and required they be dipped and coated. At first I thought, "Well, they are going for the whole southern thing, maybe it was on purpose?" But no, I know that no chef would over season on purpose, so for this trip we'll have to chalk it up as accident. Except, it's worth mentioning that the mac and cheese was a bit salty as well...I think it has to do with what I think was cured ham slices in the dish? I'll have to do some more sleuthing on that one.

I was a fan of the cute little bread basket, compromised of pumpkin bread, mini buttermilk biscuits, and what my grandmother always fondly referred to as "corn dodgers" - basically, sticks of cornbread (which oddly enough, I thought, needed salt!)

Overall, it was a nice experience, and one I would probably repeat again, but maybe during KRLD Restaurant Week here in Dallas, beginning August 17th! Go support your local restaurants people! :)