Phoodie

Tonight Geo came back into town and we decided to make the most of this lovely weather by going to a new restaurant. We met up with my brother Perek and his wife Leah for what we THOUGHT would be some laughs, a few drinks and some apps. We showed up to the new place, which was relatively unassuming and only like BLOCKS from my house. I was like "Yay! A new regular hangout!"

Um, if you ever see me there again, SHOOT ME. Or, you know, just steal my wallet and poop on my face because that's what it felt like happened tonight.

It's called T3RZO. We liked the L33T speak part of the name and the fact that it was opened by another restaurant that we love. Plus, it said "WINE BAR" so I was sure I would love it. Now, caveat! It's super new so hopefully they'll change everything about it in time for it to not fail. Especially after MY scathing review.

The place was small, but had good parking. Probably because no one was in there yet. We walked in and were led to our table where Perek and Leah were already waiting. When the waiter approached us, we had a zillion questions. "What are Boards? Why is everything on the menu, like, PURPOSELY vague yet still misleading?" But Leah had the most important question of all. "What wine do you recommend?" The guy was all "What do you like?" And she said, "Um, pinot noir, something lighter, not super sweet and...oh yeah, like less than $10."

She had read my mind.

The guy makes two suggestions which made sense and fit the criteria and then a third which he was really selling hard. I figured that he had taken our stipulations into consideration before making his "helpful" recommendations, so I chose the last one. It was NOT under $10 a glass. It was NOT "not super sweet" and I had gotten the last glass in the bottle with some tasty sediment in the bottom of the glass. It was a $50 bottle of wine that everyone hated. HATED.

After we realized he had suggested something way out of the budge, we had to alter our food choices. We couldn't understand a damn thing about the menu because it just listed different animals (for cheese) and like 100 different ways of cooking frog legs. Puke. We chose a few things that we thought were safe and enough for two couples to enjoy. Some bruschetta, a fancy mozzarella and some "really delicious" meat. Here's what we got:

In case you can't tell, that's a piece of bread with 100 pounds of mushrooms on it, 6 half-slices of deli meat, two slices of a carrot, 1/4 of a cauliflower head and a hunk of mozzarella with olive oil on it. Even a woodland rabbit who sidled up next to me was all "This is garbage."

The problem was, these tiny bites of food were stupid-expensive. And if they had been the best things I'd ever eaten, that'd be a different story. But the mushrooms were cold and flavorless and sat limply on top of soggy bread. The meat was needlessly tough and chewy. The carrots and cauliflower were....I don't know, I didn't want to spoil my appetite by eating things I already knew I hated. The cheese was good, but so is the kind that comes in brick form.

On top of it, waiter dude kept coming over and asking how everything was. How do you tell someone that nothing you have ordered has even come close to warranting the price printed next to the needlessly vague and Italian-y sounding description on the menu? Plus, he was really awkward with us. Probably because he had sold us on a bottle of wine that was way out of our price range and had served us cold food in servings fit for a tiny fairy. No wonder he couldn't make eye contact with us.

So $100 later, we were all still hungry and thirsty and dying for something that even SORT OF resembled a good meal. I came home, poured a glass of wine from a bottle that cost me $6 and nibbled on some Laughing Cow cheese which was just delicious.

Anyways, folks in Minneapolis, I would stay away from T3RZO at least for now. Now, I'm not some chick who thinks that I can get a delicious meal for $5 or anything, I just like to get what I pay for. If your cheese platter is $50, I will come back again and again if that cheese is $50 worth of delicious. But all I got at this place was cold food, bad service and sedimenty-wine. It's pretty dumb and pretentious and overpriced for what you get. I shudder to think what I'd get if I ordered off their highly-pushed seafood menu.

That does it for this edition of "Pharon Talks about Phood". Join us next time, won't you?