Restaurant week comes to a close today, and by all accounts, it was well-attended. I participated twice this week: dinner at Harvest Wednesday evening, and lunch at Ocean Grill Thursday afternoon.

Between the five of us out for dinner Wednesday evening, we covered most of the $25 prix fixe menu at Harvest, except the minestrone option in the first course. The green salad was a mix of tender greens and a well-balanced walnut vinaigrette dressing. The marinated squid, citrus, and black olive salad was surprising and unique, combining tangy seafood with fennel, grapefruit and salty black olives. The main courses were elegantly presented and, while not terribly adventurous, were well-executed. The herb-roasted chicken breast was almost dry, but was a very pretty cut and was served with deliciously tangy roasted vegetables and a creamy potato puree. The slow-roasted beef shortribs were also served with the puree and veggies, and we all wished for more on our plate. The beef was a little heavy on the red wine jus, and was borderline too salty, but was incredibly tender and moist. The house-made tagliatelle pasta was served with a very attractive mushroom ragout and locally-made stravecchio cheese. While stravecchio upped salt content substantially, the mushrooms and pasta balanced it out. For dessert, the espresso ice ream was the most popular at our table and was very creamy, without any detectable espresso nibs. The chocolate-almond cake (with crème anglaise, caramel sauce and crème chantilly) was devoured before I remembered to ask for a bite. I understand it was tasty. I ordered the vanilla panna cotta with blood orange compote. I was especially excited about the compote, but when the plate arrived, it was nowhere to be seen. I asked our server and learned the restaurant had to substitute regular oranges slices and zest. I would have liked to have known beforehand, however, the oranges were ripe and sweet and it was the kind of experience that will haunt me when I peel yet another juiceless, tasteless rock from the supermarket.

My friend Beth and I made reservations for 12:30 Thursday at Ocean Grill. Little did we suspect the restaurant would be packed when we arrived. We waited about 10 minutes for our table, which seemed like a short amount of time given that every seat in the house, including the bar, was occupied when we walked in. Ocean Grill offered a lunch version of their restaurant week dinner menu for $15, along with their regular lunch menu. For her first course, Beth ordered the flash-fried calamari with a chipotle-plum glaze and spicy peanut dipping sauce. The calamari was crispy, but not as bright-tasting as I would have hoped. It seemed to get lost in the glaze (which wasn’t actually that noticeable) and the sauce (which was thick and spicy). The meat itself had a good texture, especially considering the thousand mile trek it invariably took from ocean to plate in Madison, Wisconsin. It was a satisfying start, and was generously portioned for lunch. I chose the warm goat cheese plate served with port-soaked fig and apple slices, and drizzled with a perfumed honey. The cheese was dusted with brazil nuts and was served slightly warm. The online menu found at the Madison Magazine web site listed crostini instead of apple slices, but I enjoyed the tartness of the apples and didn’t miss the salt involved in crostini. Overall, the goat cheese was the more elegant plate. It takes a lot to elevate fried food from diner status to cuisine, and the calamari almost made it, but was just a little too heavy to be elegant enough.

For our entrees, Beth chose the ginger-crusted salmon, and I chose the grilled ahi tacos. Beth’s salmon was a generous piece of fish layered with a bright green horseradish relish and served with wasabi mashed potatoes and candied green beans. The relish added a very pleasant kick to the slighty sweet spiced salmon, and the green beans were deliciously crunchy with just a hint of candied sugar. The potatoes, however, were not noticeable at all. They were all but hidden under the fish and had no heat to speak of. My tuna taco was a crispy flour tortilla rolled into a cone around the grilled tuna and pineapple-mango salsa, and looked like a cornucopia spilling fruit chunks onto a garnish of baby greens. There was plenty of tuna to fill the taco and the salsa was a good balance of sweet and tart. Overall, it was on the bland side (I wish the salsa were spicy and the tuna blackened, or something), but it made for a tasty lunch. For dessert, Beth chose the tart, a rich chocolate cake with a candied ginger center, served warm with fresh blueberries and drizzled with chocolate and caramel sauce. We never found the ginger center, but we weren’t broken-hearted. I had the gateau au vin blanc, a very light cake made with white wine and served with fresh whipped cream and blackberries, drizzled with a berry compote. The berries were almost too tart compared to the rest of the dessert, and I found myself avoiding them. The berry compote, however, was a wonderful addition. It cut the heft of the whipped cream and added depth to the otherwise very subtle cake. We rounded out the meal with a single espresso each – which was served lukewarm and without crema. I couldn’t even get my sugar cubes to melt. I realize the restaurant was still very busy, and Madison is not a global center for espresso consumption, but I was disappointed.

We called Harvest a day ahead of time to make reservations for Wednesday, and for five people the only time they had left was 5:15. A little early for my taste, but I sucked it up, left work at 4:45 and nearly got into a serious accident on a seriously icy John Nolan Drive. Luckily, it was just me who fishtailed in a Mazda at 35 miles per hour and ended up facing the wrong way at the Willy Street intersection. And luckily the only thing I bumped into was the median. I don’t bring this up as a comment on Madison’s perpetually slick streets, but rather as an illustration of just how badly I wanted a cocktail when I arrived at Harvest. Four out of the five of us arrived at 5:15 and were seated at the back of a nearly empty dining room. We were given cocktail menus. We looked at them, made our decisions, and waited 25 minutes for our waitress to show up. She didn’t make an appearance until our (admittedly late) fifth person arrived. Granted, we weren’t all seated right away, but compared to the packed house at Ocean Grill Thursday afternoon where the service was impressively timely, friendly and engaging, I was a little concerned that such a highly regarded restaurant – or any restaurant for that matter – with an empty dining room and a single fixed menu would ignore a chance to run up a drink tab. Kudos to the staff at Ocean Grill. Not only did you have to work with two different menus and cater to a dining room full of Capital Square Businesspeople, you did so with charm, finesse, and humor. I would have expected at least that much from Madison’s New York Times-lauded, must-visit restaurant.