I was looking over the menus that are included for the restaurants to see how good the deal is. However what kept striking my attention is that almost every menu I clicked to view had fairly obvious spelling errors. I would think the Spanish restaurant knows how to spell paella. *shrug*

Misha -

maybe they do know how to spell paella, but only in Spanish. It's the translation to English that's tricky. :)

Touche (missing the accent mark) Doug!

However I'm fairly certain it is not spelled pella in Spanish.

Much like Doug is Doug in Spanish, paella in English is paella. It means a pie that ella made.

I am going to Aldo's and Oceannaire. I have never been to either.

Pella is a character in one of my favourite web comics, and I'm quite sure that if you tried to serve her, you'd end up very dead.

Dwarves are quick with their axes.

oceannaire filed chapter 11. not sure if that was mentioned on the blog. they will of course be operational in the meantime. this might be the last restaurant week that place sees before the location falls into the wolf/foreman empire.

I dined at a reaturant this past weekend,wine cooking charge was included. This occured because one ingredient was wine. Does that charge normanlly included?

maybe it's just me, but it seems like more restaurants are on point this year with putting up their menus on the restaurant week site. perhaps to entice more diners?

it definitely made my chaises easier this year.

Yes, good gravy, Aldo's is an amazing opportunity for RW. The quality is superb during RW, they don't down shift.

Inez, you'll have to identify the restaurant (both name and location) before anybody will be able to comment on your question.

I saw that some restaurants are even offering a complimentary dessert and a cocktail with their Restaurant Week menu.

It seems to me as if some restaurants are trying to do restaurant week on the cheap (understandable but disappointing), with panini as the offering for the main course.

Uh Jason Z and particularly Miachael O'Pecko (wow, what a fake name), give uis some names. Come on, specifics are useful, everyhting else is ... dust in the wind. I don't think a complimentary dessert or drink are some desperate move, they are just part of the package.

People, give us details we can use.

MIchael O'Peck&*, who is offering panini as a main course? Come on, don't tease us with your tiny O'Pecko (report)

Owlie - a quick google search reveals a Michael O'Pecko who is a professor at Towson University (among others.) Why are you so sure it's a fake name? And, Owl Meat Gravy, what's wrong with fake names anyway?

"Bucky"

My apologies to Mr. O'Pecko, I was just playing. It is an odd name, rather Dickensian. It reminds me of my favorite fake Irish name Paddy O'Furniture

I'd wager that Jason Z is referring to Don't Know Tavern.

Frankly, if Jason Z wanted to tell us something about his business, he'd just tell us outright whatever he wanted us to know.

In Mr. O'Pecko's defense (and since Bird did the shoot-from-the-lip thing before I even got here, I get to pretend to take the grownup road and that I didn't giggle when I saw that name! How do ya think Jr Hi went for him??) while I was roaming through the RW menus I saw panini I think it was in the beginning of the alphabetized list.

Moral of this story: Check the website. Not all "deals" are deals you wanna make.

as far as i know the people who run the website and such were asking restaurants for their menus and information back in late may or june! i would also chalk up mispellings and other errors on that site (such as lunch/dinner/weekend availabilities) to the transcription between the restaurants and the website

If you knew my real name Eve, you would know that I have had plenty of name problems since grade 1. There are so many fun made up names that I just assumed it was one of those.

My real point was that people should give us details to help us out, othwerwise the comment has no value to me. Remember the person who gave a long review of her experience at an Annapolis restaurant and never hgave the name?

Constructive criticism gone askew. Sorry.

The first I noticed about the RW site was that the first restaurant listed is "A Germano's Trattoria". LOL. I wonder if that was a fortuitous accident or some fancy footwork by Germano. I think .... :-)

I'm not a big fan of some RW specials. I really don't want three courses often. Some of them are not a deal at all. At some cheaper places you will actually pay more than you normally would because you wouldn't get three courses. If for example you had lasagna, a salad, and a cannoli; that's not a deal at all.

I think it's a great deal for some higher end places. You should really make reservations now for those places because they will fill up.

Bird, my real name has nowhere near the potential of Mr O'Pecko's but I have been made more than aware of the tedium of other people's perceived wit. So, you took the show-you-all-by-being-the-smartest path to revenge, huh? I took another direction on that one.

I assumed that Tony Germano used his given name.

What is panzanella? My meager facility with languages leads me to the conclusion that it's a panini/mozzarella cross. Or, am I doing Abacrombie a disservice?

So, you took the show-you-all-by-being-the-smartest path to revenge, huh?

Huh? Revenge? I'm not that complex or motivated. Jeez, let it go already. I was just goofing around. Talk about tedious. No need to get all Sue Hopper on me.

I assumed that Tony Germano used his given name.

Who the hell is Tony Germano? LMAO.

Germano's first name is ... wait for it ... wait for it ... Germano. Not all Italians are named Antney. ;-P

Iy would be most useful if in the future establishments informed us as to whether the regular bill of fare is also available diuring RW. Thank you.

Went to Oceanaire last winter for restaurant week. Service was horrible, very rushed (brought our main dishes out 2 minutes after they brought the appetizers-we told them take it back, and they were clearing the table while we were still eating and then wanted our dessert orders before we finished)and they charged us extra to get a side dish with our one piece of fish! I'm not surprised they are in Chapter 11. I wouldn't go back there!!!

Eve--Here's Wikipiedia on Panzanella: Panzanella or panmolle is an Italian dish originating in the regions of Tuscany, Umbria, Marche and Lazio. The dish is a bread salad popular in the summer months. It includes sliced bread and fresh tomatoes, flavored with basil, olive oil, and vinegar, often with salt and pepper. The bread used should be day- to week-old saltless Tuscan bread made in a wood oven.
Sometimes thought of as a "leftover salad," additional panzanella ingredients vary widely, and include lettuce, white wine, capers, anchovies, celery, carrots, red wine, red onion, cucumber, tuna, parsley, boiled eggs, mint, bell peppers, lemon juice, and garlic.

I guess when I looked at the menus (Sammy's Trattoria, Pazza Luna, etc.), I may have looked only at their lunch menus 'cause I'm having trouble finding panini as the main course). But I do exist, Owl Meat, and am a professor at Towson University, though I will confess that O'Pecko is one of those Ellis Island names. Who are you?

Lunch sucks. I hate bounded experiences. I gotta let my soul breathe. I did meet my third wife at an Indian lunch buffet in Dubrovnik, sadly it didn't last, INS wouldn't give a 16 year old a visa

Michael O'Pecko asks, of Owlie: Who are you?

Hang around long enough and you will be asking, "Who aren't you?"

I was startled by all the comments about my name last night and reread them this morning. I have a few comments to make.

Owl Meat - you say you were just playing - but making yourself look witty at other people's expense as a mild form of bullying. And Eve, your snide "defenses" of me were no better. The two of you have succeeded in making me self-conscious, for the first time in my sixty-two years, self-conscious about my name. You should be ashamed of yourselves.

B>(

Professor O'Pecko, I won't apologize again since you don't have the grace to accept an apology. This is a blog where nobody's identity is known for sure. Some people post anonymously (boo), some use part or all of their real name, some use nicknames, and some have really cool nom de blogs like YumPorchetta, Dahlink or "stacy". My grandmother's name was O'Hanlon, I have the complexion of a winter potato, and a fondness for John Jameson's product. I know Irish names. Forgive me for thinking that yours was a clever and interesting fiction. It took you 62 years to realize that it's an interesting and uncommon name?

Loosen your collar, put down your shame wand and join the party dude. This is for fun, no grades are assigned or accepted.

School's out forever!

I do have the grace to accept your apology and do so here and I thank you for it.

I've always thought of my name as interesting and unusual and even incongruous, but never as ludicrous.

Boo, Owlie making people feel self-conscious about their names....Boo.

Boo...Owlie

Oooh oooh oooh--Owlie said my "nom de blog" was cool. Made my day! ;->

RoCK, that was too funny. The upside of Freedom of Speech. It's enough to make me rethink my Libertarian leanings.

Okay, guys, I apologize for the tone of my last post.
I am a newcomer to the group and felt sucker-punched, being told that my post was inadequate and my name was a joke, and I needed to vent this morning.
If I ever post again, I’ll do my best to hit the right tone (and probably do it under a pseudonym).
I enjoy this blog and hope to feel welcome reading it in the future.

It's all good Michael. I just thought you were one of the regulars goofing around. We love new people and hope you come back whatever name you use. Venting is allowed here. We all need to sometimes.

Let me say that as chairman of the rush committee, I was terribly remiss in not greeting you properly ... Owl Meat Gravy, damn glad to meet you. Your new Delta Tau Chi name is .... Tilapia.

Mr. O'Pecko, perhaps you would be so kind as to address Owl Meat's original substantive comment. If you claim that some restaurants are doing RW on the cheap, you should name them. There are more than 120 participants' menus on the RW website. If you don't identify the alleged panini palaces, your comment is the equivalent of saying "Go fish." (The reference is to the card game, not to the food.)

Good point hmpstd. I forgot that there was an original point to all this. I was a little annoyed because it was like Professor O'Pecko was giving us homework and I told there would be no homework or math. hmpstd, you're new Delta Tau Chi name is ... Lake Trout

When I looked at the menus for restaurants that interested me before making my original post, I found that a lot of the restaurants didn’t have menus up yet, and I now think that some of them had uploaded just lunch menus, but not yet labeled them as such – or maybe I was just reading superficially and didn’t scroll down far enough. So, as I mentioned in an earlier post, I really did find panini as the main course, but on the LUNCH MENU at places like Luca’s Café, the Taverna Corvino, and Sammy’s Trattoria (I like Mediterranean/Italian food in case you can’t tell). I made the mistake of generalizing from a few misunderstood menus, BUT I WAS REALLY DISAPPOINTED AT THE TIME!

I withdraw my shallow comment about establishments doing restaurant week on the cheap and hereby return all Baltimore restaurants’ escutcheons to their deservedly unbesmirched state.

PS. You don’t have to call me Professor O’Pecko – I like Michael just fine.

We like playing with names here (see the many variations on YumPorchetta, porcine minxy delight). Just be grateful that Lord Marmalade hasn't been seen lately.

I looked at Taverna Corvino's RW lunch menu. In their defense I think the vegetable panino is a nice gesture to vegetarians who complain about the lack of options for them.

That being said, I'm not sure it's worth $20 for soup, panino and tiramisu. My beef with RW is that I never want three courses. I'm not a dessert person. Some places wisely offer a glass of wine in place of dessert.

This blog dealt with duplicate first names in the past (e.g., the members of the League of Roberts) by resorting to nicknames, which then morphed into acronyms in responses. (The unmarried Robert became Robert the Single One, or RtSO; the Robert from Cross Keys became Robert of Cross Keys, or RoCK; etc.)

We already have Michael A. Gray, who gets replies addressed to MAG. As you're another Michael, Mr. O'Pecki, how about MO'P (which comes off better than a plain MOP)?

Thanks, hmpstd, for what feels like an invitation to be a full-fledged member of the group, but I think that I'll be going underground around sundown today, maybe to emerge someday with a new moniker and a fresh start - or maybe I'll just go into the Witness (Witless?) Protection Program and stay there.

I will agree with MOP, RW is done on the cheap.

I'll use Petit Louis as the example. And Petit Louis is one of my favorite places, but I won't go there for RW.

Ok, for $30 you get three courses.

The first course is vichyssoise or a mesculun salad. These items are available off the menu at $6.

The second course is duck confit, salmon or bistro steak. These items are available off the menu for $19 for the duck to $22 for the steak.

The dessert is either mousse or fruit, which can be had off the menu for $7 or $6, respectively.

Ok, so if you try and maxamize your dollars by ordering the highest a la carte items (soup or salad, steak and mousse) , you would save $5. If you do the opposite (soup or salad, duck and fruit) you would save $1.

Are you getting some kind of a break? Sure, but it's not that big of a deal, and it is not worth dealing with the crowds.

You can run but you can't hide MOP. You know you love it here; you may wish you could quit us but it ain't gonna happen.

Spam at 10:04 pm.