I am not particularly fanatical about food. I am surrounded by culinary whizzes of all sorts, but generally I eat for purely utilitarian reasons. I am, on the other hand, fanatical about good restaurant service and atmosphere. And if those are your criteria for a good meal, it doesn't get any better than Five Fifty-Five.Actually, no matter what your criteria for a good meal, Five Fifty-Five is the best Portland has to offer. Most of Portland's high-end restaurants are loud and bistro-like, with tables too close together for the servers to do their jobs.
If you're going to drop more than $100 per each on dinner, the servers should not be tripping over themselves, the person at the next table (who is inevitably either your boss or someone from high school you would rather forget) should not be close enough to touch, and you should be able to hear the words coming out of your dinner companions' mouths, rather than just refining your lip reading skills. None of these problems befall diners at Five Fifty-Five.
For an added bonus, Five Fifty-Five's servers are also well-educated about wine and make helpful suggestions about food selections. They use several servers and come to your table with all the plates at once and place them down at the correct person's spot, rather than auctioning off your meal. Heck, they even have a crumb scraper between courses. Now those of you who have lived in big cities recently may not find any of this remarkable. But in Portland, Maine, it's worth saying that you don't get service like this every day.
And then there's the food. It's enough to make even a gustatory grouch like me admit that there are some things that are simply delightful to eat. The mussels at Five Fifty-Five fit in this category. They are done in a creamy, buttery sauce with pickled cherry peppers for a tiny bit of pop. The sauce left in the pan is so good, you have to ask for more bread to mop it all up (or, if you're like my dinner companions, you just reach for your spoon). I had a salad of amazingly fresh greens with just the right light touch of salt, pepper, and oil to let the taste of the greens come through. And then there were the scallops. Pepper-encrusted with a vanilla butter sauce and fennel whipped potatoes. Oh, my. Maybe I do like food after all. Our server's recommendation of the "creamsicle" (orange panna cotta and meringue) over the much-to-rich-for-the-end-of-such-a-good-meal chocolate profiteroles was brilliant. The wine was excellent, though the lady's portrait on the label was remarkably ugly. You don't get good food like this every day either, folks (even when you live as charmed a culinary existence as I do).
The great friends, on the other hand, I am blessed to have every day. Thanks for dinner, Sweenfords!
7 comments:
Here here! A fun night had by all. It was our first experience at 555 and everything LB just said is so true. The food, wine, service and atmosphere was refreshingly elegant. Who doesn't love the holidays?
mmmmm. five-fifty-five. so good. it's my sister's favourite place. we went there for her graduation dinner a few years ago. it was unbelievable.
Funny, but my 'big city' experience has often been that the more crowded, loud, and tripping-over-themselves the restaurant, the better the food. Of course, you're at little risk of sitting next to your former principal, so it doesn't really matter. But certainly, elbow room comes to quickly represent pretentiousness and sterility. Maybe that's just because I worked in a hotel restaurant?
Glad to know there's someone doing it right in Portland. Syncronized service is tough to beat!
That wine label, however, is not tough to beat. Just leave the bottle blank, please. Atrocious.
er... synchronized.
Rian... my point is that since I don't care about the food exactly, it's the service that counts. (And at 555, the food is reshnockulously good to boot.) Since my gifted and talented hubby can generally cook better food than Fore Street, the question is really how nice is the atmosphere in which I'm eating. 555 is still warm and busy... it's not like eating in a silent, desserted hotel restaurant. It's just not TOO loud.
Point totally gotten. :-)
I think the point I meant to make (and failed) was that I've grown to forget how nice it is when the atmosphere and service are perfect. You know, like all my customers experience. *ahem*
Anyway, I wish I had been there. If only to hear you say the word "reshnockulously" out loud, there, Stuart Scott.
Also, I stand by my statement about the label.
"Loud Bistro Chic" is the New Snob to me. "We're too good to be a good experience." Though sometimes that's just the experience I want!
The label. Oof. Yeah, she brought the thing to the table and Sean sez something like "Who's the ugly lady on the label supposed to be?" to the waitress.
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