Best Romantic Dining
San Remo
THE ROOMS ARE intimate, the service efficient, friendly and restrained. There is no grand view for distraction, but the intimate rooms of San Remo are purr-fect for a lovers' rendezvous. The candlelight of these cozy rooms will glow softly in your amore's eyes. The soft music adds comfort and promotes whispers from the heart. And the food? Imagine a cross between tropical lagoons shimmering with the reflections of the moon, and a soft night, after stirring opera in Milan.
2210 N. Indian Ruins RoadChef and owners Alan and Ericka Sanchez are making San Remo one to put on your list for a dinner of romance. You're met at the door by the gracious Ericka, and led to your table, one of little more than a dozen seating only about 40.
The tastes prepared by the San Remo kitchen reveal abundant culinary talents, the kind of attention lavished on one's beloved. Take the appetizer Napoleon of beautifully rare duck breast layered with a sweet-sour compote of red onion, a bit of sharp goat cheese, grilled tomato, all finished with a reduction of balsamic vinegar blessed by vanilla bean sent by Ericka's parents in Tahiti. It is a stellar start.
Another is a salad of red and Napa cabbages and bok choy dressed with dark, umber tones from sesame with sweetness of ginger and piques of cilantro. A confetti of red, yellow and green peppers dresses the plate. The salad itself is separated by ginger and sesame-seeded wings of lavosh and spears of cut scallion from cool, fresh-smoked salmon. This brilliant dish could easily satisfy as a light meal on its own.
Char-grilled, thick-cut, T-bone pork chops are accented with a relish of mango, onion, pineapple and shavings of coconut meat. A nightly special pair of perfectly cooked beef tenderloin medallions is more Milanese in effect, served with simple sauce of wine and Sanchez's spices in reduction.
Do not forget dessert here: sorbets of changing flavor, maybe yellow-gold ginger and plum, nectarine with a hint of cinnamon, and sensuous mango; or share a simple but elegant Napoleon of fresh blueberry and tart lemon curd.
The rooms are intimate and simply dressed for quiet conversation. Sanchez's cooking will take you on a languid ocean cruise of tastes and flavors. At San Remo you will find deft and creative renditions of the familiar accented in unexpected and pleasing ways. It is intoxicating food to romance the palette, a place to share dining pleasures.
--M.F. Munday
