Kona Grill - 11410 Century Oaks Terrace Austin, TX

(C+)

4/16/2012 - Kona Grill, a chain restaurant, is nicely decorated, although somewhat dark inside.  I went on a Monday afternoon for lunch.  I was seated near the entrance, not far from the sushi bar where you can watch the sushi chef make some amazing sushi.  The restaurant is decked out like a night club and has several booths, a bar area and a seating area on the terrace overlooking traffic coming into and out of the Domain shopping center.

The waitress came to the table and I ordered an iced tea.  When she returned to take my order, I ordered regular edamame (steamed, salted soybeans - they also offer it spicy), the Sunshine Roll (salmon and avocado topped with salmon and a thinly sliced piece of lemon), Spicy Tuna Roll and Octopus Nigiri.

One of my pet peeves is when a waiter or waittress comes to take your order and doesn't write anything down.  My waittress returned after giving her my order and asked, "Did you order the Houston Roll or the Dragon Roll?".  I replied, "Neither one."  So, I had to repeat my order to her again.  I do have to hand it to her, though, when she came over, she pointed out several nice specials and offerings from the auxiliary menu. 

The steamed edamame arrived first.  It was served hot in a covered bowl and seasoned with Kosher Salt just right.  The sushi arrived after about 10 minutes or so.  The Sunshine Roll was excellent and the lemon is the perfect accompaniment to the salmon.  The Spicy Tuna Roll is pretty much the same Spicy Tun Roll you would get at any sushi restaurant.  nothing really remarkable, but still quite good. 

The octopus, however, was a different story.  Octopus is very difficult to get "right" and this wasn't quite right.  It was still quite chewy, which is normal, but it was sliced very thick and not scored along it's length to make it easier to eat.  Sushi is really supposed to be a "one bite" morsel, meaning each piece is consumed whole as a single bite.  I nearly choked on the first one.  It was a giant piece of rubber on top of rice.  The chef really should have sliced the octopus much more thinly, or at least made some scored cuts on the underside of the slices so they would break down in your mouth more easily.  Clearly they're trying to be generous with the slices, but this is one where you probably don't want the chef to be quite that generous.  The last thing any restauranteur needs is to do the Heimlich Maneuver on a customer because your "one bite" sushi was too thick.

The waittress returned after the meal and I was convinced to try to the small Key Lime Pie (apparently, they have a large one!).  As an ex- Floridian, this would be hard to beat, but they did a good job serving it in a square creme brulee dish with whipped cream, a raspberry and mint sprig for a garnish.  It was very tart, had a smooth texture and a graham cracker crust.  I must say it was one of the better Key Lime Pies I have had outside of the State of Florida.

Damage for this meal was some $43 with the tip.  Expensive, but I would say it was worth it.  Overall, the restaurant is a little too dark for my taste and the waitstaff maybe a little mentally pre-occupied, but the food was excellent and the timing for this lunchtime meal was right on target.

Unfortunately, on another visit  (later, 6/18/2012), when I gave the waiter my order of a Sunshine Roll and a Spider Roll, he returned with a Spider Roll and a Rainbow Roll instead. Again, the waiter did not write down the order and entered it from memory.  This seems to be a prevalent issue among their wait staff. He argued that I did say Rainbow Roll, then asked me to remove the Spider Roll from the plate as he returned the Rainbow Roll to the Sushi Chef. Which leads me to wonder...now that my hands were physically all over that plate, what did they do with the Rainbow Roll?...throw it away, serve it to another customer later? The whole process was just "wrong" on many levels and really lowers my impression of this restaurant entirely. I have MAJOR questions and concerns about their cleanliness, decision making, and the potential recycling of food to customers at this point. As a result, I must lower my rating of this restaurant one entire grade to C+.

Longhorn Steakhouse - 2702 Parker Rd. Round Rock, TX

(C-)

4/15/2012 - I've been to several Longhorn Steakhouses over the years; Dulles Virginia, Concord North Carolina, and now Round Rock, Texas.  Longhorn is usually quite consistent with their food, but this is a new one and I'm not quite sure they have all the kinks out just yet.  I was seated in a booth in the main dining area.  When the hostess seated us, she removed two of the four place settings and bread plates, pretty normal.  She happened to leave two bread plates, one of which was dirty with food attached to the plate.  When our waiter came over to offer drinks and bread, he began to pick up the dirty plate to have it replaced, only to find that the plate underneath it looked like someone had vomited food all over the bread plate.  It was really disgusting.  He noticed me grimmacing and took them both away to replace them immediately.  Definitely a good move.  Apparently, if plates went unused on the table, they were not picked up and instead left for the next customers.  Not a good start to the meal.

So, this gross out definitely called for a top shelf Margarita.  It was a good one.  No salt, served cold and with a shaker that basically fills the glass a couple of times.

I ordered the 12 Oz Prime Rib, Medium (which they claim is still a little pink inside, it wasn't), caesar salad, a baked potato with butter and chives (if you don't specify, then they load it with EVERYTHING...cheese, sour cream, butter, etc.).  The meal was served warm and the steak was seasoned quite well, but the prime rib was fairly chewy. This is unusual since I have eaten here before and the steaks are usually quite tender.  This was an aberration.  One thing I have found they consistently do is overcook the prime rib.  Medium here has typically turned out to be Medium-Well.  I thought about this before ordering this time, but I wanted to see if it was going to be the same as last time (overcooked) or not.  It was.  The seasoning was excellent however, and I never needed to reach for the salt or pepper. 

One unexpected addition to the meal was when the waiter came out with a lobster tail (which we didn't order) and offered it to us as complimentary because the chef had cooked one too many this evening and they didn't want it to go to waste.  The lobster tail was split down the back andd roasted with some mild seasoning.  It was done quite well.

The damage for a steak dinner with a lobster-stuffed baked potato, the prime rib plate above, an iced tea and a top shelf margarita came to about $65 after tip.  In this area, that's a reasonable price for this meal and it was generally OK.  Strikes for sanitation and overcooking, but the seasoning and the wait staff were good.  Overall, this is an OK place to eat, but I wouldn't go out of my way to eat here.