Appetizers??

Since My Beloved and I began cutting down on portion sizes, I have started ordering lunch from the appetizer menu when we go out, rather than from the entrée section. It's a good strategy. It doesn't always work because I don't always want the kinds of rich foods that tend to live on that part of the menu, but I give it a glance anyway, just in case.

A case in point: lunch at The Baltic in Point Richmond. My Beloved wanted to stroll down to the village for lunch, taking Cora with us. It was a glorious day, almost 70 degrees and brightly sunny. There are only two restaurants in our town that welcome dogs on their back decks, and the Baltic is one of those. The Baltic specializes in German food, not always a favorite, but any reason to sit outdoors was going to win on this lovely day.

We decided to split an order of garlic shrimp served over mashed potatoes as our appetizer - if only because we had never heard of such a combination. And I ordered mac and cheese from the appetizer menu, as well.

Either of these plates would have made a full meal, and it would take a serious trencherman to have polished either one of them off and then gone on to an entree! I'd hate to see what the entree portion of mac and cheese would have looked like - it must have been gigantic!

When you get the hungries, we can recommend the Baltic.  The shrimp dish was absolutely delicious with a strongly garlicky, creamy sauce that might have been too rich if it hadn't been sprinkled with capers, which cut through the richness and tickled the tongue with a touch of sour. There were six jumbo shrimp, too, no skimping on the expensive part of the dish. And the spuds underneath were soft and a little lumpy - just the way we like them.

The mac and cheese was really spaetzle and cheese, homemade, quirky, uneven noodles cloaked in a very cheesy sauce and studded with rounds of bratwurst. I loved that it wasn't bright orange - clearly, they used undyed cheddar cheese and plenty of it. It was easily a portion big enough for a dinner, much less a lunch appetizer, and it was made more interesting by the uneven shapes of the handmade spaetzle. Another bonus.

We are blessed in our little town with lots of restaurants and with so much competition the poor Baltic has been through many hands in the years we have lived here, but I think this time they have come up with a winning recipe for success.  

But those are NOT appetizers, they are full meals.