The Refectory Restaurant and Bistro

This is how you know Boyfriend desperately wishes he were a 50-year-old rich dude: The Refectory is his favorite restaurant. We've only been there once, since it's a much nicer, fancier, and more expensive restaurant than two twenty-somethings really have the right to eat at regularly. Our one Refectory experience was late last summer, during restaurant week when we could take advantage of the prix fixe menu.

It's probably one of the most beautiful and elegant restaurants I've ever been to, and certainly has the best service. Every time you stand up and leave the table to go to the restroom or to...I don't know, whatever else people do that causes them to stand up and leave the table...one of the waiters picks up your napkin and re-folds it and places it back on the table. We started out with cocktails in the bistro/lounge area and later moved to a booth for dinner. I deviated from the prix fixe menu and ordered the swordfish, because swordfish is one of my very favorite meals but I've sworn to myself to only eat it on a very limited number of occasions in my life, since it's so over-fished. So that's how you know eating at The Refectory was a special occasion: I ate the endangered fish.

Even during restaurant week, it's hard to get a cheap meal at The Refectory. We were, needless to say, the youngest people in the room by about twenty years. Our restaurant companions were mostly older couples and middle-aged businessmen having fancy business dinners. I'll admit to being a little intimidated. It was kind of like being a twelve-year-old trying to crash the grown-up table at Thanksgiving. I mean, I'm pretty sure I was the only one who giggled whenever the waiter folded my napkin.

Nevertheless, it was one of the most delicious meals of my life. And for the non-50-year-old-rich-dudes of the world, if you can't make it during restaurant week, the bistro part of The Refectory now offers a lighter menu that isn't as much of a sticker shock.