My Hudson County Restaurant Week Experiences

I love the concept of Restaurant Week and love to support it. So, with that in mind, I decided to try Sky Thai, someplace I'd been meaning to go to for a long time. However, once there, the rest of the menu was too tempting and we all ended up ordering off the regular menu. So while that didn't go as planned, (review coming), what I will say is the food was pretty good (some dishes were better than others) and if you do go for RW, rest assured it will be a good deal.

The next day, I decided to go to Bistro La Source, very close to Sky Thai. When I passed by the night before, the outdoor patio was packed and it seemed like a casual but charming restaurant which I found to be true. It does give off a very relaxed bistro feel with a lot of dark wood, a large bar, old mirrors and a spacious but intimate patio. Easily the kind of place where you could linger over a cup of coffee or a few drinks in the afternoon.
Unfortunately, the food didn't quite live up to the expectations set by the space.  I ordered off the RW lunch menu, getting the goat cheese croquette and lamb brochette and jersey peach crumble, also adding the French 75 cocktail ($10).

When I ordered my drink, it seemed to confuse my server. I realized later she was training so it's understandable, but her initial reaction made me think she'd never heard of such a thing and I immediately started worrying about how their cocktails must be if they didnt even know what they were. This was compounded by the fact that there was no bartender on duty, so she asked another server to come over and help her but that one also didn't seem to know. They stood behind the bar for several minutes discussing and as each minute went by, my hopes sank lower and lower.

Eventually, another server and possibly a manager, came over and starting showing them both how to make it. Made with gin, prosecco, lemon juice and garnished with an orange slice and cherry, it was a good summer drink. The prosecco clearly wasn't of the highest quality but I wasn't expecting it to be and while the initial sips tended towards the sour, it quickly came together and became a very light, refreshing drink while being strong enough for me to notice the effects of the alcohol. I really enjoyed it.

When my entree arrived, I was taken aback by how small it was. It's a bit hard to tell from the picture, but the two lamb pieces were quite small and very thin. I'm used to brochette (which basically means cooked kebab style) being more of a cube and this was a thin strip. Additionally, I think it was broiled not grilled, which would be fine, but not what I was expecting, and did result in slightly overcooked meat. Flavorwise, it was pretty good, not overly gamey but could have used some salt and pepper.

The salad and beets were fine. Not spectacular, but certainly fine and pretty much what I'd expect from this kind of salad. I did wish the vinaigrette was a little more acidic or even mustardy - instead it was sweet which was unnecessary with the beets. The goat cheese croquette, on the other hand, was excellent. Perfectly cooked, a nice creamy strong cheese without being overwhelming and stayed warm throughout my meal.  It was definitely the highlight.

As a note, the dessert list offered at the restaurant was different then what I saw online. For me, this worked out well because the peach crumble with vanilla gelato I was leaning towards was still there. It was served in a small ramekin and while I would have expected a slightly larger serving, it was more than enough. I could tell when it was put in front of me that I wasn't going to love it and sure enough, I was right. The crumbs on it were a very pale straw color indicating it wasn't baked long enough so it still had sort of a floury taste and the peaches pieces were very firm and still had the skin attached. While that didn't bother me, I could see it being a problem for other people.

The gelato was actually ice cream and pretty low quality ice-cream at that.  There was about double the amount of the ice cream compared to crumble and where the crumble could have used a little more sugar, this ice cream was overly sweet but the two did not balance out. It was a passable dessert but one that could so easily have been made excellent with a little more cooking time and slightly better ice cream so that was really disappointing.

I'm not sorry I went there but I'm pretty glad I only spent $15 dollars for my meal and that it was two courses....otherwise I'd probably be a lot more upset. If you want to try it, I'd encourage going now during RW so that you can see if you like it without spending a lot.

All in All
There are a lot of other things on the menu I'd be curious to try and I've heard wonderful things about their mussels, but I didn't love the food at Bistro La Source.The space was great, the service was friendly and attentive, so while I'll go again, I'm not going to be rushing back.