Dinner with the Boss

Usually after a day of heavy eating, I like to go super light for the next few days. Monday was Yom Kippur, and I'm still feeling the heaviness from the food in my stomach.

Well, it turns out that my husband's boss is in town (he's in from Seattle), and so last night I had to go out to dinner. Normally I would have eaten a salad last night, but instead it was off for a fancy restaurant meal.

Now, I tend to always be leery about eating in restaurants because I think restaurant chefs tend to use a lot of fat to make the food taste particularly yummy.

Luckily, the restaurant we picked was Tavern on Main in Westport. It's a traditional New England place in a 150 year old building with exposed chestnut beams, and fireplaces (which actually work). The chef is quite good, and doesn't rely as much on fat and salt to make the food taste good.

After the introductions to the boss and the standard chit chat, I got to work scanning the menu. I knew that there would be plenty of fish on the menu, but not all fish is created equal. The polenta crusted sea bass I knew would be a caloric disaster.

Luckily I spotted a grouper with a pomegranate glaze over a bed of sauteed spinach. Perfect. The only problem was that it came with mashed potatoes (likely loaded with butter and/or sour cream). A quick discussion with the waiter, however, revealed that I could substitute brown rice for the potatoes. Yippee. I asked for the chef to go easy on the glaze (likely to be sugar) and got a garden salad to start.

While the men got dessert (I'm proud to say my husband got sorbet), I sipped on a bit of chamomile tea. Dinner with the boss accomplished.