Bishop's Post in Chesterfield 12-10-12

I'd say we give this one a 2/5 stars.  

In the 35+ years we lived in Missouri, this establishment has been many things...Crazy Fish, Andriana's Steakhouse...we've tried them all.

Now, it is Bishop's Post.  The sign at the front said "Classic Comfort Fare"  To me that is comfort food, like meatloaf, mashed potatoes, chicken and noodles, etc.  

There was one meatloaf dish and one friend chicken dish on the menu.  Most of the menu is full of steak and seafood.  It is not a place to go if you are looking for a lot of what I would call "comfort food" dishes.  It is also too pricey for regular comfort food.

I started with a Honey Kissed cosmo.  It was a little odd, as it is made with peach/orange blossom vodka and has a big smell of peach.  

Then I had a small cup of gumbo.  That was really quite good.  It was more filled with meat than seafood.  I'd rather have seafood, but it was seasoned really well and very yummy. 

I had done my homework with the wine list and we ordered a red blend that has a very odd name: Gundlach Bundschu.  It is a 160 yr old family of winemakers in Sonoma Calif.  This red blend is good and not terribly expensive.  

 

 The problem was me when it came to most of the food here.  They have several dishes that many people might like:

Seared sea scallops on angel hair pesto pasta.  I don't love pesto pasta.  

Pan seared halibut on smoked tomato risotto.  I don't like smoked items...sometimes the smoke is too strong and ruins the taste of the entire dish.

The "special" was shrimp, scallops, and lobster linguine with a Dijon cream sauce.  I don't like mustard.  I asked them if they could do any other sauce...they suggested alfredo.  I said no, it would cover the subtle taste of the fish.  

So, I got their Shrimp and Scallop Pasta.  It had sun dried tomatoes, Kalamata olives, and herbed olive oil over pasta and the seafood.  It was not very good.  The oil was just that...oil.  It had no taste.  The pasta tasted like pasta with olive oil on it.  Butter would have been boring but better.  They need to learn to make a seafood stock and with a little white wine and butter turn the seafood stock into a seafood sauce.  Alas...they didn't.  So, I ended up eating the seafood out of the dish and leaving a lot of the pasta.  

Bonus points for them.  While I was enjoying my dessert, the general manager came over and said, "I notice you didn't eat much of your pasta.  Can I ask why?"  I told him the oil sauce was just too bland...even with sundried tomatoes and Kalamata olives.  He was nice, but I doubt they change it.  I had crème Brule for dessert. 

Mike had a fairly good experience with his dinner.  He ordered the prime rib.  He knew he wanted extra to take home for leftovers, so he ordered the biggest piece they had.  It came with twice baked potato, Yorkshire pudding (which, as you know is not pudding but a starch that should have had some kind of gravy for it) and green beans.  The meat and beans were good.  He said the potato tasted like maybe they made a huge batch of twice baked potatoes a couple of days ago and then kept them in the refrigerator and just heated them up in the microwave for dinner tonight.  

For dessert Mike had some gooey butter cake and ice cream...with a cappuccino (of course).  

The restaurant was fairly nice.  The wait staff was fine.  The wine list was rather small.  I found the overall menu small and lacking variety (they had asparagus in almost every dish...I had to ask for it not to be put in my pasta).  The gumbo was really quite good, but there really was nothing that made me need to return to this restaurant.  

On a side note...they do have a lovely, HUGE outdoor patio that is mostly covered for summer dining.  

Prasino-Streets of St. Charles 12-3-22

 I'd give this 3.5 out of 5 stars.

I have talked to other people at school who LOVE this restuarant.

There are things I like about this restaurant.  I like the semi-nice/semi-casual vibe of the restaurant.  You could dress up but we came in jeans and were fine.  Mike was in a hoodie and felt underdressed for a Sat. night.  

I like the decor.  There are distinct areas that you can eat: at the bar, at the hightop tables in the bar area (louder, TV screens), or in the dining room.  I liked being given a choice.  

I like that they take reservations.  

I thought they had an adequate wine list.  I'm not even being a wine-snob here.  They have this big room with wine coolers on 3 sides.  It is all very "wine-ish."  So, they look like they are trying to be a wine restaurant and they they have a kind of small adequate wine list.  It is fine...but not if you are trying to impress people and seem like some big deal with wine drinkers.

The thing I found confusing is their menu.  It just doesn't have any kind of rhyme or reason.  It has burgers and wraps with a couple steaks, a seafood, and a pasta.  That's all OK together.  But then they have a section of a bunch of different tacos.  That is weird.  But then they also have a section of a bunch of different sushi.  None of the sushi is vegetarian or without raw fish.  So, it isn't a complete list (kind of like their wine list).  If you know and like sushi (and I do). these few sushi rolls seem rather incomplete and sorely out of place with no other japanese items (miso soup, sake wine, etc.).  

Mike and I had just driven 7 hours home from Nebraska and drove straight to this restaurant, so we were tired and hungry.

We ordered cocktails, which were fine...but my glass was mostly ice and not much "cocktail."  We ordered a bottle of Decoy cabernet.  The waiter couldn't wrap his head around the fact that we wanted all the drinks to come out together, even though we weren't going to drink the wine until we had dinner.  We tried to explain that we wanted the wine opened and allow to "breathe" but this seemed foreign to him. 

He ordered a steak sandwich and fries.  The waiter had to explain to him that the steak was chopped up and then put on the sandwich.  I thought that was weird.  We laughed about it with the waiter.  Did someone actually think there was just a whole steak on a bun??  He said, "Yes, that's what some people expect."  After all of that...Mike liked this sandwich.  They edges had been crisped up on the grill and the meat was flavorful.  The french fries were really more like potatoes that had been oven roasted and then dusted in a heavy dose of paprika.  Mike didn't really care for them.  He would have liked regular fries better.  

I ordered the lobster ravioli.  It was just OK.  I don't know why anyone puts something with such a delicate taste like lobster in a cream sauce.  The sauce overpowers the taste and you can barely taste the lobster.  The pasta was nicely made and was still firm enough.  The escarole in the sauce gave some color but nothing else (it added no taste or texture).  The squash in the sauce added a little sweetness and texture to a rather "soft" dish.  The little pile of cheese in the center just melted into one lump and couldn't be spread out.  That was disappointing.  

Overall this restaurant was OK.  We didn't eat anything that was so amazing that it made us want to come back soon.