Location: 70 Rowes Wharf, Boston, MA 02110 (Map)
Executive chef: Daniel Bruce
Opened: 2002
Cuisine: American
Expect to spend: $50+ for dinner
Dress: Business casual
Setting: Romantic, elegant, harbor views
Bar/lounge: Yes, in the restaurant and floor below
Private dining: Yes
Other: Impressive list of wines from producers who have participated over the years in the Boston Wine Festival, running this year from January through April 6, 2007
Parking: Validated valet or pay lot
Awards: Various raves and reviews, but none very recent
Special events: Sunday Brunch Buffet
Restaurant's Web site: MeritagetheRestaurant.com

Foodie Chick Review
Date dined: Thursday, March 8, 2007
Occasion: Restaurant Week
Highlight: Amuse bouche and lobster sausage
Lowlight: Very late seating
Overall: Recommended, if only to say you've been there once. I've loved Meritage in the past, but I take back my previous "highy recommended" rating after this visit.

Wikipedia defines Meritage as "a word used to distinguish wines that are made in the style of Bordeaux but without infringing on that region's legally protected appellation. Winemakers must license the right to use the trademark 'Meritage' for their wines from The Meritage Association."

The Boston Harbor Hotel defines it with Chef Daniel Bruce's restaurant, founded on "a bold concept featuring the pairing of culinary flavors to wine flavors, rather than the traditional pairings of grape varietals and cuisine."

That's straight from Meritage's site and on point. Even the Restaurant Week menu does its part to exude the chef's passion for wine and food. Upon seating (when I finally was seated) I was presented an optional wine flight for $15, a Riesling, Shiraz and Port to complement each course. I'm not a fan of any of those wine styles, but I enjoyed all but one during this meal.

I dined with five other foodie chicks, all very restaurant-opinionated women who have a knack for tardiness. I made sure to remind them of the 7:30 reservation about 10 times before arriving. Just to reserve the coveted Restaurant Week destination, I had to take full advantage of my American Express early booking promotion back on February 5. I'd waited six weeks, so there was no way we were going to be late.

Three of us had dined at Meritage before and loved it so much that it's become a Restaurant Week tradition. The other three were so sick of hearing us rave for the past two years they finally made it a point to join us. I've now learned a lesson: Never hype a restaurant to your friends. You never know what they'll get when they finally do visit.

Amazingly, everyone was on time -- early in fact. It helps that Meritage validated for free valet parking, so we didn't have to trek from any parking lots. The last to arrive was 7:20 and our reservation was for 7:30. Perfect.

A couple of us had been waiting in one of the plush, traditionally furnished lounge areas downstairs from the restaurant in the Boston Harbor Hotel. There is no shortage of luxury seating, and you can ask the hostess to retrieve your party from any lounge area you prefer if you're looking for a quiet spot to await your table.

Once we'd accounted for all six of us, we went upstairs, checked coats and took a seat in another lounge near the hostess station. Turns out they were very sorry but our 7:30 reservation would not be ready for 30 minutes. So much for making a reservation far in advance and arriving on time. I was starving but I didn't let it bother me. We had plenty to talk about so we just sat and waited.

30 minutes came and went.

The maitre’ d swung by just after 8:00 to say something along the lines of: "People who should have come early were late and those who were supposed to be late arrived early." He was still sorry and said the table would be ready in just a few minutes.

10 more minutes passes and we're getting grumpy. Another hostess comes over and says the table will be ready in five minutes.

I'm generally pretty patient, but this entire delay bothered me for two reasons:

1. It's Meritage. I don't care if it's Restaurant Week or not, they can afford to offer their reservation-delayed guests free drinks, an appetizer or at least a bread bowl.

2. I'd talked up Meritage as one of the best dining experiences ever in Boston. Even if the delay is completely out of their control, hearing false claims about the table being ready within however-many minutes didn't bode well with any of us. Just be honest about the delay and don't try to keep us smiling with cute stories about how those silly 6:00 diners were just running late!

On a related note, several years ago I was asked to wait just five minutes at another Restaurant Week-participating restaurant, 209 Boston (a trendy spot on Columbus Ave. with good food and great service, though a far cry from Meritage stature), and received a free martini for the inconvenience. I just think Meritage could have afforded some genuine we-know-you've-made-an-effort-to-come-here sort of sorry. I suppose they think the fact that we're dining for $33.07 is concession enough.

At 8:20, we were finally seated.

10 minutes later the bread arrived.

We were so hungry that when each course was served we were all dead silent, devouring our food because we'd waited all day to eat this nice meal. I should get to that part already.

Our waiter arrived to bring us the Restaurant Week menus (didn't even bother to bring the regular menus, unlike most places) and he was quick to take our water and drink orders. He was friendly and nice, but seemed unsure of what to expect from us, maybe because he knew we'd been waiting so long. I think for this reason he was very attentive at first.

Meritage's Restaurant Week menu (see below) always offers four options for each course, which is also refreshing; some participating restaurants only present you with one or two. (Hope you like that fish dish!) My selections included the Maine Lobster Sausage with Lime Butter and Sautéed Spinach for first course (see picture), Wood Grilled Filet Mignon medium with Soft Whipped Potatoes, Horseradish Onion Cream and Meritage Syrup for an entree, and for dessert the Red Fruit Tasting Plate of Raspberry Cream Puff Cranberry Sour Cream Cake and Strawberry Tart. The filet reappears on every Meritage Restaurant Week menu, and I loved it so much in the past that I couldn't pass it up.

Once our order was placed (lobster sausage and filet almost all around), the bread server came by and doled out three types of bread to each of us. One was a raisin pumpernickel slice, another a toasted French bread crusted with sesame, sunflower and poppy seeds, and the last was your standard roll, but too hard. Also on the table were several dishes of warm butter each with the signature "M" drawn into them. I never thought butter could look so pretty...

The restaurant is shaped like a rectangle and only three tables wide, so just about anyone can see the view of the harbor. It's a very warm setting, with toasty woods mixed with deep reds, oranges and black. When you walk in beside the bar you'll pass a metallic counter-height table that seems to add a contemporary twist to the elegant restaurant, then you'll pass white-clothed tables and substantial upholstered benches and chairs, and finally arrive at a tinted wine case at the end of the room, where we were seated. Everything looked inviting and cozy, yet it was freezing in there.

As we started to eat all of the bread -- and request seconds of the pumpernickel (which of course they ran out of because it was 9:00 already) -- the first wine flight arrived along with my amuse bouche. I love that Meritage gives you a little teaser to kick off the meal. It a shot-sized serving of a fairly simply tomato soup, but Chef Bruce's team used some ingredients that could make even those who don't love soup want another serving. I was so chilly that I savored it, which meant it lasted all of three sips rather than just one. The fact that it was something warm may also be why I loved it so much.

The first wine was a 2004 Pierre Sparr Riesling from Alsace. Rieslings are too sweet for me, but the two-ounce pour was a nice complement to the tomato soup as well as my first course.

Mmm, lobster sausage. This was the best part of the meal. The portion was small, but offered a perfect balance of flavors between the sausage and sauteed pinach. It helped that the sausage was topped with a small lobster claw. Meritage could make this dish into an entree, and I wish they had after trying my grilled filet minon.

The filet was cooked to a perfect medium, as requested, but I could hardly taste the meat it was so doused in "Meritage Syrup." (See picture.) I like to taste my steak, so the overabundance of that gravy was too much for me. The table was divided on that point. Half wanted the meat smothered; the other half wanted no sauce at all. I think it should be served on the side, but then I guess that would take away from the whole presentation. Taste wins over presentation in my mind.

Several of us also noted in unison: "The potatoes are salty." This just wasn't shaping up to be a great night for Meritage. But I did like the wine pairing with the filet, a 2002 Fire Station Shiraz from California (label below0. It was a little sweet for me, but I loved the flavor with the dish, and it was my favorite wine of the evening. One of my friends agreed and double checked the name with the waiter to be sure we heard the brand correctly (Fire Station, not Firestone). 

Finally, dessert. The waiter stopped coming by frequently by this time, so we waited nearly 15 minutes for our desserts. We were all falling asleep at the table when they arrived and none of us thought they were worth the wait. On my last visit I'd tried the Chocolate Tasting Plate, a White Chocolate Mousse Bombe, Milk Chocolate Crème Brulée and Dark Chocolate Flourless Cake. Since I knew how all those tasted and thought they were just good, not great, I went with the Fruit Tasting Plate: Raspberry Cream Puff, Cranberry Sour Cream Cake and Strawberry Tart. The sour cream cake was my favorite of the three; after my first taste I saved the rest for last. The tart would have been much better if the shell wasn't so hard and the cream puff was rather uneventful. It seemed like nothing more than whipped cream with three raspberries in the middle of a sliced puff. Nothing spectacular overall, though I would buy a Cranberry Sour Cream Cake for a brunch if they were to sell it.

As for the final wine -- a Warre's laceName w:st="on">WarriorlaceName> laceType w:st="on">PortlaceType> from Duoro, Portugal -- I should have skipped it entirely. For someone who doesn't like sweet wines, I should know better than to drink port. I took one sip and left the rest.

At least we did end on a good note. You can present your valet ticket to your waiter to have your car called before you get outside. It wasn't ready and waiting for me, but it was close. Better than waiting 20 minutes like some other guy in the foyer who didn't have his waiter call ahead.

Even though Restaurant Week is over for many participating restaurants (some have extended another week), you can count on Meritage's menu being very similar next time around. Only a few items seem to deviate from one Restaurant Week to the next.

If you've been collecting your own Restaurant Week dining experiences, let me know what spots you've loved so I can add them to my list for August.

Happy dining!

- Foodie Chick

Winter 2007 Restaurant Week at the Boston Harbor Hotel's Meritage
Meritage takes the unique approach of matching wine and food by offering small and large plates paired with specific wine characteristics. $33.07 per person

First Course
Cream of Porcini Mushroom Soup with Sweet Onion and Parsnip Tower
Or
“Meritage Salad” Cucumber Wrapped Baby Greens Tossed in an Ice Wine Dressing
Or
Maine Lobster Sausage with Lime Butter and Sautéed Spinach
Or
Crisp Cabbage and Shallot Filled Chicken Breast Quinoa, French Beans and Sweet Corn

Second Course
Fennel and Parmesan Cheese Risotto White Truffle Oil, Cippolini Onions and Black Kale
Or
Pan Roasted Scottish Salmon Baby White Turnips, Gold Beets and Baby Zucchini
Or
Bergamot Rubbed Moulard Duck Breast, Broccoli Rabe Blackberry Sauce
Or
Wood Grilled Filet Mignon with Soft Whipped Potatoes, Horseradish Onion Cream, Meritage Syrup

Third Course
Selection of Artisan Cheeses with Toasted Walnut Bread Brown Turkish Figs in Syrup
Or
Citrus Tasting Plate of Lemon Blueberry Curd, Caramelized Orange Pound Cake and Key Lime Pie
Or
Red Fruit Tasting Plate of Raspberry Cream Puff, Cranberry Sour Cream Cake and Strawberry Tart
Or
Chocolate Tasting Plate of White Chocolate Mousse Bombe, Milk Chocolate Crème Brulée and Dark Chocolate Flourless Cake