I finally made it out for restaurant week last night. To celebrate our anniversary a little early, we made reservations a The Yellow Porch. We sat at a nice little table on the porch itself and watched the sun set behind the Expo Design Center while sipping our $20.08 bottle of No Sauvignon Blanc. Though The Yellow Porch has a bit of an incongruous setting, the owners have truly done a great job with the porch itself. From the strings of lights and the vegetable garden to the candles (citronella for the mosquitoes, too) and the soft jazz, you mostly forget that you’re across the street from Wendy’s and The Home Depot!
The meal started off with a baby greens salad which we both topped with a garlic blue cheese dressing that lacked the umph I had expected. But I peppered my salad up (though not with freshly cracked pepper as I saw one waiter providing) and was happy. In addition, we were delivered a basket of bread with a saucer of oil and vinegar and chunks of fresh mozzarella. Delicious!
For our entrees, we argued over who would order the paella, and Aaron won. At the last minute, I thought the pork loin sounded better. And, ultimately, I thought it was a little better. The pork loin was stuffed with house-made sausage and served with poblano skillet corn, green beans, and mole sauce. Now, this dish was a bit overly “composed” for my taste, looking too fancy for me to enjoy, but I dug on in and made a mess of it. At least there was ample plate for sorting it all out, unlike my experience in some other restaurants. It wasn’t too spicy, though I hit a spot or two with a little more power (a rogue poblano chunk not equally distributed among the corn, I suppose). I was a little surprised at the ratio of sausage to pork (more sausage than I expected) though the flavors had melded enough that it didn’t really matter.
For dessert, there was no question or discussion: two Bananas Foster White Chocolate Bread Puddings, please. I was a little tipsy when dessert came, and I liked it pretty well, though I sort of wolfed it down. I have a great dislike for whipped cream on most desserts, so I scraped that off and ate it separately. I didn’t really note anything very white chocolatey about the pudding or anything like a banana flavor, though the sauce was definitely a bananas foster sauce. All in all, I think the bread pudding had been made a couple days prior and reheated and that the bread pudding on the Whole Foods dessert bar is on par if not better.
Like a few other folks have mentioned on Nashville Bites, the service was a little slow to start, but we never really lacked for what we needed. And a non-rushed dinner was pretty nice after a busy, busy week.
My experiences tonight at The Acorn will, hopefully, be posted up tomorrow!
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