I think I ate a lemon... at the Burning Pear

My friend Michele mentioned the restaurant The Burning Pear to me a long time ago. She said it was a nice restaurant within the Marriott Hotel and I should try it one of these days.

And Eddie and I did, on our date night, finally venturing out to something different.

The decor and the feeling of the restaurant was not at all impressive. It looked like I walked into a Holiday Inn for their continental breakfast. The only difference was that there were some rolled silverware sets on the table, and an eager server that was ready for his second table. We sat down, looked at the somewhat impressive menu, and was ready to challenge our taste buds. Nothing, however, jumped out at us immediately. The listings seemed dull, and the only other table there were eating sandwiches. I was beginning to think Michele was losing her touch.

Troy, the server, said he usually did not like pork chops, but their pork chops were amazing. Hence the side note they'd put on the menu that the pork chops were voted "Best Pork Chop" by the Houston Chronicle. I closed the menu and said bring it on, I'll try the much revered pork chops, while Eddie went with the Braised Short Ribs.

Someone please tell The Burning Pear that their decor and atmosphere gave them no justice because the food was wonderful. We started with a small caesar salad and a cup of tomato soup. The piece of anchovy on Eddie's caesar salad gave it a nice touch, and the jalapeno cornbread presented in a metallic basket was great. The short ribs, served with roasted asparagus and garlic mashed potatoes were done well. Underneath the giant heap of the short ribs were some veggies that pulled everything together. That was when Eddie stopped quickly after the first few bites, and said, "I think I ate a lemon. I'm not sure." At this point, we are still not sure what it was, and we didn't ask.

After laughing at Eddie, of course, it is my duty to do so, I dove into the great pork chops. The dish was served with perfectly made poblano cheese grits, brown sugar glazed carrots, and creole mustard sauce. I imagined the person who came up with this combination woke up in the middle of the night and made the dish and fell back asleep happy. The carrots were done well, the pork chop was a nice cut and cooked nicely, glazed and sat on top with a great amount of the sweet creole mustard sauce. The poblano cheese grits were a nice cushion to tame down the creole mustard sauce. I felt like a carnivore with this huge cut of pork in front of me, and wondered if I really needed a knife and fork. Why not go all prehistoric-10,000 B.C. on that?

We left The Burning Pear happy with great food, great service, and Michele is back on the cool side.