Valentine’s Day 2010

Valentine’s Day has been a tradition for Jamie and me ever since our first year of dating. We usually try to make a day of it, doing at least one special activity together and a special dinner. This year I had only planned on dinner, mainly because my brother had generously offered to babysit but only for the evening (I did not expect more). So after doing some online research for good restaurants with V-Day specials I made reservations for The Melting Pot, which I will describe a bit later.

The week before Valentine’s Day our plans changed when my brother got even more generous, offering to take the kids anytime after church ended! We were so psyched, since we could now do something besides go to dinner! We decided to see Avatar 3D that afternoon.

After church we took the kids to McDonald’s for lunch, then dropped them off at my brother’s and headed to the theater. Now I am not going to go through a complete review of Avatar, as there have been enough of those. The bottom line is that it has a very liberal, unrealistic and incorrect view of humanity tacked on to what is otherwise a beautiful sci-fi action film.

After the movie we got back in the car to head for dinner. Since I still did not want to spoil the surprise for Jamie I put the restaurant address in the GPS (she prefers taking direction from the woman on the GPS anyway). Once we got to the plaza we had a bit of a problem finding the place as we had never really been in that plaza before, but we found it after a few minutes.

After waiting a few minutes in the lobby we were seated at a booth in the bar. I was not happy with being sat in the bar but it is not a huge deal. Our waiter came and explained our options for the special V Day menu, then left to get our appetizer course.

Now if you have not been to The Melting Pot, let me explain how it works. The Melting Pot is a fondue restaurant, serving different kinds of fondue with each course except for the salad. There is a hot plate in the middle of the table with a double boiler pot sitting on top. The fondue is served along with pre-cut food for dipping. For our first course, we had a choice of Chipotle Cheddar or Fig and Goat Cheese fondue. I was not sure I would like the goat cheese but since Jamie does not like things that are spicy I decided to try it, and was pleasantly surprised. We were brought pieces of bread, granny smith apple slices, and some veggies to dip in. We had a great time dipping in the warm concoction.

Our second course we both chose the Southwest Caesar Salad. Now I have difficulty getting too excited about salad, but it was good. The greens were fresh and crispy, and the dressing was yummy.

For our entree’ we had several choices for fondue. We chose the red wine infused fondue, which was an excellent choice. Our fondue was brought along with lobster tail, filet-mignon, ginger chicken, sea scallops, shrimp, pork veggies and red skin potatoes, all of which was uncooked and pre-sliced so as to be ready for dipping. We were instructed to skewer the food and leave it in the fondue for about two minutes to let it fully cook. We were also brought sauces for dipping: a mustard, ginger teriyaki, plumb sauce, potato everything sauce (all the stuff you might put on a baked potato in one sauce) butter and lemon for the lobster. This experience was amazing! Simply dip your food in, get it cooked and infused with yummy fondue, and enjoy. It was delicious and fun all at the same time.

Finally, we come to dessert. Our selections for the evening were white chocolate key lime pie or thin mint chocolate. We chose the latter and were VERY happy with it. Our fondue was brought out along with an amazing assortment of dippers including strawberries, bananas, rice krispy treats, marshmallows, brownies, pound cake and cheesecake. I am probably forgetting something but you get the idea. The fondue got even better once it was warm, as we dipped each item in the gooey goodness until it was all gone and we were completely full.

We had a great night, with a good movie, an excellent dinner, and best of all time spent with just me and my sweetie, just getting to be a couple for a while.