Test Template: The Dish - a taste of Edmonton's comfort food?

In light of my previous post on comfort food in Vancouver, I would say that The Dish Bistro could very well be a good choice for comfort food in Edmonton. Dan and I brought our friends to The Dish one saturday evening as they wanted to walk down the 'food' side of Edmonton and experience a place with great food. They were not to be disappointed.

We started with an appetizer based on the recommendation of Edmonton's Avenue magazine article "25 Best Things to Eat in Edmonton 2010" - pear and cambozola triangles.

True to it description, the oven baked flatbread was crispy, aesthetically pleasing with its toppings of sweet carmelized red onions, sautéed sliced fresh pears, thyme, and melted cambozola cheese. However, it was quickly finished as there was only one piece per person. We also found it difficult to taste the pear as we felt that the onion and cheese overpowered any fruit taste the pear was to provide. Nevertheless, it may have been adequate that the appetizer was portioned smaller, as our main courses turned out to be fairly heavy.

Dan and my friend S ordered the Spanakopita with the house soup. He found that the crispy phyllo pastry with its accompanying yogurt sauce (reminiscent of tsatsiki) to be excellent. Crispy, flavourful with a hint of dill. The house soup, on the other hand, that D ordered was slightly on the interesting side. It reminded us of an asian beef stew, with a hit of spice for good measure. S' husband ordered the Sheppard pie with an accompanying side of fresh greens (perhaps the healthier order of the night). S and I both had the creamy tomato soup topped with croutons and heavy cream as a garnish. My soup worked nicely with my multi-layer quiche, jammed packed with cheese. This of course, was probably not a wise decision for me since I've found that I can be lactose intolerant at times. But, I cannot say 'no' to cheese! Especially cheese in my soup and in my quiche. Admittedly, the cream and cheese combination in mine and S' tomato soup was found to be on the heavy side. Added with the cheese in the quiche, I was fastly approaching cheese overload. On the other side of the table, I suspect S' husband thoroughly enjoyed his Sheppard's pie (also topped with baked cheese) as he had a big grin on his face throughout the meal.

After such a filling meal, I'm not sure what warranted our desire to have two orders of dessert. I'm banking on the fact that the dessert presentation was too irresistible to ignore (dessert options are presented on a dessert tray). Thankfully, we didn't commit dessert gluttony and order our original plan of four desserts. Sharing their warm toffee cake topped with vanilla ice cream, and a slice of carrot cake with a scoop of blackberry gelato (the gelato was my slight tweak in their dessert presentation as I really wanted a fruit gelato and not whipped cream) was probably the best way to end our meal at The Dish.