Loaded Elevated Nachos -Streets of St. Charles 7-14-2021 (again on 8-6-21...updated review)

Right next to Narwhal's is Loaded Elevated Nachos.  (I keep wanting to put a comma in between the two adjectives in their name).

There is actually a window in Narwhal's that you are supposed to be able to order your nachos, but it was closed when we were there...which was dumb as it was a busy night.  It was a Wed. night, but it was one of the Y-98 concert nights and there were hundreds of people in the area!

So, on the table at Narwhal's there was a napkin holder with a QR code for Loaded Elevated Nachos.  Our seating hostess told us to use the QR code, order and pay and Loaded Elevated would bring our nachos to us.  Again, we had a ton of trouble with this...the internet was so weak right there we ended up having to go next door and order.  The whole no waitresses/QR code thing is a fine idea if it is all working, but when no one's phones work in that area it is very frustrating.

Loaded Elevated has a wide variety of nachos.  Then come on metal sheet pans.  You can get one or two kinds on each pan.  There were 4 of us, so we decided to try 4 kinds.  Here is what we got :

Buffalo Chicken on the top and Bahn Mi on the bottom

Bahn Mi Nachos:  I really liked these.  I gave them an 8/10.  The pork meat was marinaded in a sweet sauce.  The chips were crispy the siracha mayo was spicy.  There were jalepenos and some other pickled vegetables (dicon radish? and carrot) that added some twang.  There were cucumbers that cooled it down.  Several textures and flavors.

Buffalo Chicken Nachos:  Mike got these.  He gave them about a 6/10.  There was not enough Buffalo sauce.  There was too much ranch and blue cheese.  When you looked at his plate you expected it to be orange, but it was white.  It was on homemade potato chips.  They got soggy too fast.

Philly on top and Ol Standby on the bottom

Ol Stand By:  Carmen got these.  She said they were good, but they weren't great...and she is a nacho expert.  Nachos are her favorite food.  We had nachos at her wedding.  We had nachos at her 25th anniversary part.  She KNOWS nachos!  She said the meat was good but the problem was the cheese.  It was liquid cheese and nachos are always better if the cheese is "sprinkle" cheese and then they've been put under a broiler.  She said it was also lacking things that could have been added (lettuce, beans, sour cream (it had a little of this)).  7/10

The Philly:  Anna got these.  She said they were good but again, the potato chip base got soggy.  She liked the meat.  7/10

For dessert we shared the cannoli nachos.  I'd give those a 9.5 out of 10!  The cinnamon sugar chips were crisp, the mascarpone cheese was sweet.  The berry jam was yummy.  The strawberries were sweet and good and the dark chocolate sauce finished it all off well.  YUM!

This place was fun.  It was fun to share all of our different nachos and try new things.  I'd go back and try some of the other styles.  

UPDATE:

OK, I've been here again.  I tried 5 more kinds of nachos.  

The California BBQ...it was OK but the pineapple salsa was SUPER

The gyro...just OK.  They meat was kind of mushy and didn't have much taste.

The cajun...super yummy.  Probably the best flavor of the night, but you have to eat them fast, as they make the chips wet super quickly.

The Mexican Street Corn...Jon added chorizo to this to make it an entre.  The corn and sauce was good, but the chorizo didn't have much taste.  This was OK, just not great.

The jerk chicken...this one had shredded chicken that had been made in a crockpot.  It was juicy and good.  The jerk spices were yummy.  They added fried plantains to the chips...super good!).  I liked this one a lot, but the juice made the chips soggy, so you need to eat this one fast.

We again had the cannoli nachos...super yummy!!

Narwhal's Crafted in Streets of St. Charles 7-14-2021

I was surprised at this place.  I made a reservation for 4 (which was odd, because it is a bar with frozen drinks...who would have thought you could make a reservation...but I read online that you could, so I did).  When we arrived it was rather cold inside, so we sat outside on the east side (out of the sun...which would have been super hot).  The seating hostess was super nice and gave us the exact table we asked for.  

They don't have menus.  They have QR codes.  This is all fine and dandy if they had some kind of internet booster, but right there at that spot, all of us had 1 bar of internet and could not get the QR codes to work.  It was a super pain in the butt!!  Finally we were able to see the kinds of drinks on Anna's phone.  Nowhere on the menu does it talk about "flights" of drinks, but I had seen them online and the seating hostess said we may want to start with those. 

We couldn't get the online ordering to work (bad internet), so we ended up going in to order.  We started with two flights.  We ordered:

Watermelon Frose, Thai Collins, Peach Bellini

All 3 were good.  The frose was a little too much rose wine taste.  The Thai Collins was my favorite of the whole night.  I found it not too sweet and slightly tart.

Hibiscus Gin and Tonic, Cucumber Mojito, Banana Dave

The hibiscus one was interesting, I don't love cucumber...but Carmen really liked this one.  The banana Dave one had rum in it and it tasted like a banana milkshake...totally a dessert taste.

Then we ordered (but I don't have photos) Key Lime Pie (good but super sweet), Strawberry basil lemonade (good, probably my #2 for the night) and a chocolate mudslide (like the banana Dave, super sweet.  Chocolate ice cream type drink).  

This was a fun place.  I expected it to be a bar of young people.  I was surprised to see a WIDE variety of ages.  There were 20s to 60s.  There were lots of people walking by as it is right by one of the big parking lots.  

I would definitely go back here and take friends.  It is a yummy and fun thing to do on a hot day.   

BARcelona Tapas Restaurant in Clayton 7-13-2021

My sister, Carmen, was visiting and we decided to try tapas for dinner.  So, Anna, Carmen, and I headed to Clayton to try BARcelona Tapas.

Anna was trying to be good, so she started with a house salad.  It was big and full of veggies.  The vinaigrette dressing was good.  

I was NOT trying to be good, so Carmen and I started with a cocktail.  Carmen tried the rose sangria.  It was flavorful and had chunks of apple in it that really added to the "nose" (aroma).  She liked it.  I had a "Paloma Margarita" which the menu says is a margarita made with grapefruit juice.  It was good, but it tasted like a normal margarita...I couldn't really taste any grapefruit.  I was kind of disappointed the drinks came out in plastic cups.  The decor of this place was definitely not high end (it had a Spanish feel with colorful tiles on the tables, etc, but the plastic cups made it feel more like a college bar.  (Maybe that is why BAR is capitalized in there name...who knows??). 

We ordered a whole array of tapas and didn't actually order any entree or paella.  The paellas on the menu sounded good, but by the time we were finished with our tapas, we were full.  Here are some of the things we ate:

This was a selection of 3 Spanish sausages in a sauce that looks like mustard but wasn't.  They were all split and grilled.  Some were better than others.  

These were bacon wrapped dates filled with goat cheese.  I love dates, and I love goat cheese.  The bacon kind of overpowered the flavor of both of those.  They were covered in a balsamic reduction.  If you love bacon...these would be good.  I just wish the bacon flavor had been less. 

This was a mushroom dish.  They were sautéed garlic and maybe a touch of wine.  There really wasn't much to them.  They kind of tasted like canned mushrooms that had been heated up and sautéed in some garlic.  

These were roasted brussel sprouts.  They were roasted enough, but they weren't really roasted well.  They were kind of greasy.  They also didn't have much flavor.  They need salt and maybe a little acid (balsamic??).  I've had roasted brussel sprouts that were much better than these.

These were crispy artichokes.  They had been breaded and fried.  They had some melted manchego cheese on them.   There was also a couple of dipping sauces.  These were done really well.  They were hot, crispy and not greasy.  Dipped in the marinara they were wonderful!

This was probably our favorite...it was called Queso de Cabra.  It was goat cheese (that tasted a lot like ricotta) in a tomato sauce with garlic bread.  Carmen and I enjoyed this a lot.  Anna doesn't like ricotta cheese, so this was not her cup of tea.  

Overall the meal was good.   The service was good and the place was nice.  I'd come back and try some different things next time.  

Kemoll's Chop House 7-10-2021

 A looooong time ago we used to like Kemoll's downtown.  It had the BEST location.  It had a restaurant on the ground floor and another section of it on the top floor.  The views of St. Louis and the Arch were wonderful.  The food was good.  The views remained, but the food waned over the years.

To try and fix their dwindling reputation, the Cusamano family decided to move and change the style of the restaurant.  Kemoll's Chop House in Westport Plaza is a combination steak house and Italian restaurant.  It is expensive for both styles of food.  There is not an entree on the menu that is under $45.  That is steep!  

Mike and I started with a cocktail and the meatball appetizer.  It was OK.  It was in their house meat sauce.  This tends to be a heavy, somewhat sweet meat sauce.  I had one meatball, Mike had a couple.  I think there were only 4 or 5 in the app.  We took the rest home  It was kind of heavy for an appetizer.

The wine list wasn't available online, so I had to do my research there.  Our waiter didn't see very knowledgeable about the wines, but we didn't do a lot of asking.  It seemed that one of the girls from the bar was in charge of all wine from the large wine cabinet in the dining room.  I don't know if she was a sommelier or not (our fault that we didn't even give her a chance).  We ordered a wine called Requiem.  It was a California cabernet.  It was good but not incredible.  

For dinner I chose the special of the evening, a sea bass on a bed on capellini pasta with a lemon butter caper sauce.  It was good but very rich.  The fish is buttery all by itself, but then to add butter, wine, capers and asparagus,  it was all too much.  The portion was quite large.  I ended up taking A LOT of it home.  It almost reminded me of restaurants like Maggiano's or Carmine's (both chains found in tourist areas) that charge you a lot for an entree but give you a large portion.  I wish they'd give you a small portion and charge you 1/2 the price!

Mike started with the house salad.  This was delivered with house garlic cheese bread.  I don't know that I really liked the bread.  It was kind of crunchy.

  

Then Mike had the veal parmesan.  The veal comes with a side of pasta.  The amount of food he got was kind of ridiculous.  The veal covered an entire dinner platter and then he also had a side of pasta.  He didn't even eat 1/2 of it.  He said the flavor was good and they used good, quality veal.  The house sauce was on the sweeter side.  He said it was sweetened with carrots, as they were in the sauce (little, tiny pieces).  

For dessert Mike got the ice cream cake...it was very much like what you get from Dairy Queen, only larger.  I got creme brulee.  It was good, but it was too much.  It could have been better if it was smaller and had a few berries on top to contrast the sweet cream taste.  

So, that's the ongoing thing with Kemoll's...the food is good, but all the portions, including the desserts are too big and thus too expensive.  

It was a nice place.  There was a guy at a piano who was entertaining and kind of fun to have in the room.  People would make requests from time to time.  

We enjoyed ourselves, but I don't know that we'll be back any time soon.