On Friday night, B and I finally checked out Snowdonia, a new restaurant our friend Carlos opened a few weeks ago. I met Carlos three years ago when we worked at Five Napkin Burger (home of the world’s best veggie burger) together, and it was so exciting to see his dream of owning his own place come true.
Snowdonia is a “Trappist-style” gastropub, where nearly everything is cooked in beer. Beer-battered fish ‘n chips, cider-infused salad dressings… pretty cool, right? They don’t yet have their liquor license, but they’ve got Boylan’s sodas to sip on if you’re craving something a little fancier than water. Right now they’re open from 7-11 on Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights… perfect for a girl who gets home at 10 during the week!
The space is beautiful: floor-to-ceiling glass windows, exposed brick walls, dark wood floors and tables, and a beautiful bar. My grainy iPhone photos don’t do it justice!
Moments after we ordered, we were brought out a couple oysters for an amuse boûche. They came garnished with pickled red onion, and were deliciously briny. And chilled! Gotta beat the heat, right? B and I were literally just saying that it’s been too long since we’ve had oysters… first world problems.
We split two items: the pub salad with hearty vegetables, beer nuts, pecorino romano and cider mustard vinaigrette. Note to self: put more cheese + peanuts in my salads.
We also tried the grilled shrimp cocktail with curried catsup (so. good.) and herb mayo. The shrimp are served cold, which was wonderfully refreshing after nearly melting into a little puddle on the sidewalk yesterday. I used to have a mild aversion to mayo, but as I’ve gotten older, I’ve actually been sort of craving it. Kind of like how I now am all about key lime pie and everything coconut, whereas before if it didn’t have chocolate, it wasn’t “dessert.”
(Are we friends on Instagram yet?)
There were other items on the menu that sounded really delicious- hello, mussels cooked in beer! with bready croutons!- but I’m trying to be “good” and stick to my doc’s orders about the whole no-gluten thing. But if I get the okay soon, Snowdonia’s fish ‘n chips will be mine! And we’ll definitely be back soon to hang out and nibble on other tasty appetizers.
Hooray for date night! We are keeping the romance alive, ladies and gents.