Happy birthday to two!
Who? Elaine and Sean were b-day starts last week, so we're going to start out with Elaine :)
here? Taste! A bar and eatery attached to its sister store, the Brasserie. The ambiance upon walking in is pretty impressive, since the chairs are long wooden ones with lit candles, and there are low lights warming up the rustic interior. There's an open kitchen facing the entrance, but a set of stairs lead downwards to what I believe is a bigger, more industrial kitchen downstairs.
We got a table upstairs, and I'm pretty sure that if Josh didn't make a reservation, then we wouldn't have gotten a seat at Taste that night. The whole place was filled up!
Happy Debra and Elaine
Excited Anna and Sean
Sleeping Daniel and photographer Josh
Another shot of the birthday girl!
Taste features a menu of small plates and a larrrrrge selection of drinks shaken up by well-known bar tenders on the ground floor. There were two entrees to choose from, the Chicken and the Pork Burger. I've heard good things about the pork burger on Yelp, but last time I went to the Brasserie next door, Betty said the chicken was so good! So I thought maybe I would be able to sample a bit of how good the Niche (the mother branch of both Brasserie and Taste) can make a chicken~ :3
The small plates were indeed enticing (lamb sugo! pork scrapple!) but I was set on finishing an entree plate, so I didn't order any. Everyone else ordered a small plate to go along with their entree or to eat alone, and I got to sample almost all of them. Durr, next time I should just order some too so I can share with everyone ^_^" Will do next time!~
A bite of the barbacoa (Taste's rendition on street tacos) was enough to tell me that this dish was delish! The beef was moist and tender, and the bread it was sitting on went well with the meat. Yum! Also delicious was the pork scrapple, which was a mixture of pork meats (like liver) and cornmeal, flour, and spices. This one was topped with an egg. It was a hearty, creamy, pork-pate-like dish :) The lamb stew was also really flavorful; I don't know if I could choose a favorite! The way the lamb dish was set up reminded me of Indian food: it came with pita bread pieces and a metal bowl of stew. Mmm.. Indian food, haha!
Barbacoa
Pork Scrapple
Anna and Sean made a meal out of the barbacoa, the scrapple, and the parpadelle (which the waiter promised Anna was very light). I don't think 3 small plates is enough for two people, since Sean was still hungry afterwards! :P I gave him a part of my chicken, which was surprisingly super moist @_@ How in the world do they do it? It wasn't as if oil was squirting out with each cut, but there was no "mehh, so dry" feeling when I chewed ^^b
Parpadelle, barbacoa, and scrapple
The greens on the side had rhubarb, and they used wine when sauteing. The taste to me was strong, because I think I'm kind of sensitive to the taste of alcohol, but it was definitely not unpleasant :) I polished off my plate and was satisfied, so Taste is a good place to go if you want to avoid feeling overstuffed with huge portion sizes! I think 1 entree and sharing small plates with friends would be just the right balance of food amounts ^_^
Chicken
Afterwards, the kitchen brought out the amazing FROYO CARROT CAKE that Anna made! Made with love and froyo from Chill, it was yum yum delishhhh~ I think all the girls love carrot cake and froyo, so the combination was quite heavenly :D
It was funny, because the candles that I grabbed from the apartment had a lot of "trick candles" inside the same package, and Anna happened to pick out almost all of the trick candles. What resulted was Elaine almost passing out from attempting blow out the candles that would relight by themselves! I always wondered how those candles relighted.. magic?~
:)
Happy 21st, Elainey pooh!
Anyways, I'm glad that Elaine enjoyed her birthday dinner, although a bar-centered restaurant was probably not the best choice after a crazy night the night before ;) But it was fun nonetheless, and I had a lot of fun looking through the camera lens... still attempting to learn how to photograph in the dark! @_@''
A shot of the bar from downstairs
Taste
4584 Laclede
St. Louis, MO 63108
~*~
The next evening was time to celebrate Sean's birthday and completion of the GRE!! He took the test in the morning, so he was pretty dead afterwards-- what better than food to heal the soul, right? ;)
We all met up at Asiana Garden, by Sean's choice, and we ordered the "squirrel fish," as usual when we eat here:3
Book was busy the night before, so he couldn't make Elaine's birthday dinner, but he joined us at Asiana. So he took quite a few pictures of people using my camera! Camera credit to him for the next four pictures:
Anna
Sean
Daniel
Debra
I think it's really interesting how Book takes pictures. I like to take pictures of a lot of background and a bit of the subject if their humans (haha)~ Otherwise non-living objects take prime space in my compositions ;) But for his pictures, he (almost) fills the entire frame with the person! I think that's pretty bold and cool :D So I tried that with him and Elaine after looking at his pictures. Hehe, I like his picture :P
The culprit Book! :P
Elaine
But I still think my pictures have more background space, don't ya think? :)
I forgot what we were talking about on Daniel's phone ._.''
HAHA HILARIOUSSS-- Josh and Sean seemed to be grooming one another... :P
*on the other side of the table* *cricket cricket* XD
Haha, I actually don't remember what we were staring at... must be either Debra or Elaine who were sitting across from us! ^^ Okay, pop quiz!~ Based on composition, look at the next two pictures and decide which pictures Book and I took, kay? Go!
Oh, this is the delishhh squirrel fishhh :D
And I love eggplant! Elaine pondering when to make her move ;)
What is your verdict? Well, I took both of them. Book was taking pictures with people filling up the frame, and although my background isn't huge in these two pictures, I have a larger foreground area that takes up a sizable amount of space compared to the person. Got it? Yay, now you are a Wendy-picture identifier expert! ;)
Anna ordered a cookie cake from the Great American Cookie Co. at the Galleria for Sean, and I was pretty excited for it. I WUVVVV cookie cakes!! It's a cookie with the most yummy frosting... seriously, I don't understand why their frosting is so darn good~ But I think I'm mentally biased for white and black frosting, because my taste buds didn't know what to expect when I was nomming on green and blue frosting! :P
Happy 23rd Sean! :D
:)
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