It was very nice and clean inside. We parked in the side lot and went in the side door - which is apparently the "emergency exit" that's always open. The Plate is in the same location that was the former location of Pop's. That side door used to be the main door when Pop's was there. Now you have to literally walk in the door at the front of the restaurant. It looks completely different inside. New, modern, open. I've watched seasons worth of "Kitchen Nightmares" and consider myself to be a fairly tough critic now. The atmosphere - check. The service - check. The hostess was friendly and let us choose our seat. The waitress was also pleasant and attentive. Coffee - check plus! I forget what brand of coffee it was; I feel like it was a Connecticut brand but either way, it was delicious! The waitresses were constantly refilling your coffee cups. A huge plus! Every time a waitress (even if it wasn't your own) passed your table, your coffee was refilled. There's nothing worse than going out for breakfast than having an empty coffee cup throughout your meal. The menu - semi-check. It wasn't a particularly large menu but in the world of Gordon Ramsay, that's a good thing. He always says that a restaurant should have a decent number of excellent dishes instead of having pages of mediocre or shitty dishes. So, when I first saw the small menu I thought we were in for a good breakfast. Not quite. My mom and I both had the cakes and eggs- two pancakes, two eggs, two strips of bacon or 2 sausage links. I chose the bacon, she chose the sausage. The eggs I ordered scrambled. They were very good. I normally hate scrambled eggs in a restaurant because I like my scrambled eggs to be somewhat loose. (Insert dirty joke) When you make scrambled eggs at home they look like popcorn and they're buttery and delicious. When you order scrambled eggs at restaurant they cook them on a griddle which causes them to spread out flat, dry out, and over cook. I hate the brown burnt string of eggs on the outside. Bleh! These eggs were not like that. They still weren't homemade quality but they were better than a random diner. The bacon was good. The pancakes were horrible.
I'm very particular about my pancakes. I don't use syrup and therefore, I like a very soft, cakey pancake that will soak up all that delicious butter. These pancakes were not at all like that. One side had like that hard top and the underside was soft. My butter was scraping across the top and not melting. The taste wasn't that great. I didn't like them at all. My mom didn't like hers either.
My dad ordered French toast stuffed with apples, which was totally out of character. He didn't like it. He didn't really mention the taste but they only gave him two slices of toast. Pop's gives you three, Sunrise gives you three, so to my dad every place should give you three.
The menu was a little weirdish in the sense that it had fancier type things like avocado benedict eggs. Everything had a little twist. So if you're looking for classic breakfast food, it's probably not your place. They do have a breakfast with sausage gravy and biscuits. I'd like to go back to try that but I will definitely never order the pancakes again. My mom wants to try a breakfast they have with Greek yogurt and bananas. I give The Plate a B-. It was okay. It has potential and maybe I just didn't order the right thing. I would've given it a C but that constant coffee flow gave extra points.
That was breakfast. Now on to dinner. DJ and I never got a chance to go out for Valentine's Day because of the snow. We just ended up getting a little Sing's Kitchen that night. (No Bao's but close to the new house) We were planning on going to Consiglio's but sometimes I just don't feel like going in to New Haven. I wanted to go somewhere comfortable and somewhere that wouldn't make my anxiety act up. We decided to go to Scribner's. Now Scribner's I didn't know existed until like three years ago. My dad was driving me on one of our "cruises" and he just happened to drive by. I never would have imagined a restaurant to be placed where it is. It's like a hidden gem in Woodmont.
DJ made reservations. We weren't sure how busy it would be inside. Turns out we really didn't need reservations but it's my hope that my review will cause that to change. I feel like there are no nice restaurants anymore. People don't celebrate anything anymore. People don't get dressed up for anything. I don't know what has happened to the world. I won't go off on a tangent but I just don't get why people feel the need to be casual all the time. Believe me, I'm happy I can wear my jeans and women don't have to wear dresses everyday but we also don't need to spend our lives in pajama pants and sweats. On a Saturday night you can dress yourself up and go out to eat somewhere nice. Even restaurants are just casual. I know people don't have a lot of money but if the food is worth it, people will come. Think for just a second - where is a fancy restaurant? Don't say anywhere in New Haven. There's no parking, it's a pain to drive to, and every other good restaurant is near a recent shooting. Let's think- Food and Beverage- GONE, Chuck's- GONE, The Gathering- GONE, Captain's Galley- GONE. I can't think of a steakhouse that doesn't have some cattle ranch theme going on. Jimmie's used to be nice but now it's gone way down the drain. It's a candidate for Kitchen Nightmares. I think Scribner's may be the last nice non-chain restaurant in the area. So let me tell you about our night-
We parked in the back, walked around, gave our name, and were lead in to the back dining room. There were several tables open and the waitress gave us our choice. The restaurant was not "fancy" but it had that upscale feeling. The lighting was dim, the walls were wood and red. There were candles and random beach shots and assorted fish hanging on the wall. Our waitress was Wendy. She was very very nice. I had a glass of wine, Deej had a Yuengling. I ordered the chowder, which to my pleasant surprise was Rhode Island. Very hot (temperature) and tasty. To eat I ordered the Scribner's scampi over linguini (Shrimp, fresh tomato, garlic, capers, olive oil, wine). Delicious. DJ ordered the Salmon Woodmont (salmon with a red wine reduction with mushrooms) which came with potatoes and veggies. He said his was delicious as well. Salad comes with your dinner. We had the house- which is a bacon gorgonzola vinaigrette. Very good. We both had coffee and dessert. Wendy refilled our coffee. (Saturday was a good coffee day) I had the rice pudding (a little too al dente for my taste) and DJ had the turtle sundae- brownies, vanilla ice cream, pecans, caramel sauce, and chocolate sauce.
I loved it! I was so overstuffed that I thought I was going to explode all night! I just couldn't stop eating. I want to try many more things- the escargot, the oysters, steaks, sea scallops risotto, etc.!! I plan to be heading back soon. There were several tables open. Let's try to fill those tables. The bar was pretty busy and there was another dining area but let's keep Scribner's around! I have a tendency to "discover" places three weeks before they go out of business. So I'm letting you know - Scribner's is a great spot to go for a date. It's a calm, quiet, and relaxing atmosphere. The food is delicious and the service is great. It's tucked away in the middle of houses at 31 Village Road in Milford.
It may be a while before my next post but I promise to update you as soon as I try some place new! Oh and ps- Carrabba's at the mall - no go.
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