LOVE TO LOVE YOU, BABY

To quote the great Donna Summer, I would love to love you, Natasha.

But I just can’t. 

Natasha’s Cafe– a restaurant in downtown Lexington, Kentucky– has so many virtues that make me want to like the place.  It’s downtown, it breathed life into a quiet block, and expanded our dining possibilities in the city’s core.  It engenders a great symbiosis with my beloved Kentucky Theatre.  It’s funky.  The front, with cafe tables for al fresco dining, is as attractive as that of any other restaurant in town.  It has a neat international boutique to stroll through before the drinks come (I ill-advisedly bought a beret there once when they were at the old location on Southland Drive.  My wife wears it now.  I act like it was always hers.).    They go to great pains to augment the dining experience with inventive entertainment events. 

Overall, I sense that I should like it, because it’s good for me.  Like Joyce.

And yet… and yet.

My wife and I went there to enjoy the aforementioned symbiosis before heading across the way to a movie at the Kentucky Theatre (By the by, go see The Savages.).  Nobody loves a good symbiosis like I do (especially with remoulade). 

One thing never disappoints.  The place is beautiful.  Whoever designed the place, did a masterful job.  The lighting is just right.  The decor fits the motif (They wisely skipped the going-out-of-business auction at Long John Silver.).  The fixtures and furnishings lend an Old World aura.

The bar menu is limited but carefully selected.  I had a Polish beer– ok, two– that I’d never heard of.  The dinner menu has a nice selection of international cuisine that sets Natasha’s apart.

We didn’t have a lot of time before the movie, but we ordered two courses which came in good time and were brought to us by an attentive and experienced server.  My wife started with borscht, I a salad.  She liked her borscht, but I didn’t think it had been cooked well to extract the savory flavors I know borshct can have.  I had recently had it at a great Polish restaurant in another city and it was ten times better than Natasha’s.  I think if she had the other borscht she would go back to Natasha’s, order it again, and vomit it on the floor.  I realize this is not a totally fair test.  If she liked it, she liked it. 

My salad– a house “Greek” salad– would have been better received had it been the complimentary side to my meal.  Instead it was a $6 add-on that portended more by its price than it delivered.  For $6 I expect more than a scattering of lettuce which afforded me a scant view of the bottom of the plate, with exactly one pitted olive, some cucumber, and so little feta that I couldn’t quite remember if it had been on the plate when I finished the salad.

For our second courses, she ordered a salad and I a mushroom pot pie.  I think her salad was called a “Fru Fru Salad”.  It was also $6, as I recall.  She confessed a little trepidation when she saw my paltry salad.  She was right to be afraid.  This may be our limitation, but we had never heard of a salad with diced raw butternut squash.  We had never heard of raw butternut squash at all except as something the rabbits in our garden might consider.  We both found it unappetizing and hard to eat.  Fall and winter squashes MUST be cooked to extract flavor and to get tender enough.  Otherwise, it was a basic salad with vinaigrette.  She did not finish it and we decided to kindly inform the server for the sake of constructive feedback that they might want to reconsider the raw squash.

My pot pie:  it was the tastiest thing we had and it made me wish we hadn’t been such pigs when the nice, fresh loaf of bread came at the beginning of the meal.  You see, I’m a sopper from way back.  I offered my wife as much of it as she wanted to compensate for not really getting a dinner herself.  We both enjoyed it, but agreed that the price ($14) was also misleading.  Again, I would not complain had the price not promised more.  The size was fine, but not an ounce more than absolutely necessary.  However, for $14, I expect more than three or four new potato quarters and a half dozen plain ol’ white mushrooms, covered with a square of puff pastry which is impressive if you don’t know how easy an effect it is to pull off.  The potatoes and mushrooms were stewed in a very tasty cream sauce.  But, it contributed to our overall feeling that we were simply not getting our money’s worth.  I think if they were to reconceive the dish as a menagerie of wild and unusual mushrooms– caramelized with onion, with a bit more cheese in the sauce– it would have been a successful dish I would have made a point to return for.  Instead, it’s a stingy dish that just misses.

That’s the problem:  value.  I would not tell anyone not to go to Natasha’s.  It’s an interesting place that makes an effort to be unique and succeeds on many levels.  It’s perfect for a date when you’re too nervous to eat much, but want to impress.  We left with the same feeling that I’ve had before but never verbalized, that we could have gotten much more for our money. 

We will probably return.  It would be disingenuous of me to condemn so completely an independent restaurant which does so much right based on some imperfect experiences.  My own restaurant has committed many sins and surely been written off by some patrons.  Some things happen in a business that are beyond the control of an owner who can’t be everywhere and see everything.   And I know the unjudged sins of cliche and mediocrity are on the souls of Olive Garden, TGI Friday’s, Rafferty’s, and all the other winners of the American restaurant game.  Nobody wants more to see them put out of business by the likes of Natasha’s.

I know from experience that controlling costs is absolutely vital to making a restaurant successful, but there are little tricks you can use to give the customer the feeling that she got a little more out of the deal than she paid for.  A few surprises in my pot pie and more substantial salads would have turned our experience around.

But, here’s hoping a few changes are made to improve a restaurant that I want to see succeed and build on a longevity that has often puzzled me.