Wish me luck!

So it seems like I live in Atlantic City these days...

Within the past two months, i've been to atlantic city twice, some type of casino establishment 3 times (yes 3 weekends in a row) and now i'm going back this weekend (tomorrow) to Borgata for father's day (my dad is making me!.. sort of)

Alright, my gambling habits are awful- but hey at least out of the bad habit, I gain a good habit of eating good food? I mean, how can you not go down to AC when you get free rooms at Borgata and the Water Club??? You can't resist it.

So two weekends ago, Eric and I decided to go back to Borgata to use our abundant amount of comps (and free room offers). We ate lots of good food and guess what- all of it was free!

Although, I will publish our dinner adventure at SeaBlue in another post, I thought I'd make this a post of two places I went to during my time in Atlantic City- Izakaya at the Borgata and Trattoria Il Mulino at the Taj Mahal.

So besides the huge gambling loss that weekend, I would have to say it was a great weekend with Eric. We got to go to the boardwalk, play some carnival games and pretend that we weren't addicted gamblers! Really, we had a great time.

Last time, with Shaman and BJ, we didn't do anything but stay at the BJ tables, so I was really happy to get out- and go to the Taj Mahal. Oh the memories that place brings back! My family used to go to AC every other weekend (you wonder where I get my gambling habits from) and i met my first boyfriend when i was 2 years old here- yes he was a white blonde boy- coincidence?

On our tour of the grand Taj Mahal, we thought we'd stop by and grab some lunch at Trattoria Il Mulino (really, i just wanted the corndogs they were selling on the boardwalk outside, but Eric forced me to eat here).. and i'm not really sure if I'm happy I came here or not...

The place was empty. Maybe it was the weird timing (2:30pm) but there was nobody in the restaurant and we were a bit hesitant to even go in- but they saw us.. so we had to :(

The menu was a bit limited for lunch so I got the items off the pre-fix menu while Eric got a caprese salad and farfalle pasta.

For my appetizer, I got some type of egg, spinach soup- i forget the name.. but it's really not that important because it wasn't that good.

As for my entree, I got the seabass sauteed in a light garlic caper sauce with a side of spinach. Surprisingly (after my mediocre soup) this dish was pretty good. The portion of fish was huge and the spinach was great! I didn't end up finishing my entree, but that was mainly because I was eating off of Eric's plate.. i can't help it.. I love pasta..

His farfalle dish was also good, but it really isn't hard to mess up pasta with garlic and olive oil. The vegetables were actually overcooked and really made the dish unappetizing.. next time, we're staying at the Borgata honey (... and i'm pretty sure my corn dog would have been better)

Soup

Sea Bass

Farfalle with Garlic and Olive Oil

Alright, so our meal at Trattoria Il Mulino wasn't that impressive- but I would have to say that the service was friendly... don't mistake that for 'good service'. I really liked the servers there.. but mostly because they liked booboofuku- the 60 dollar stuffed animal Eric won for me.. :)

I'd give this place an overall B.

And now on to Izakaya.

So Eric and I ventured to Izakaya, a Japanese restaurant at the Borgata around 11:30PM. We wanted a late night snack and were suprised by the number of people still waiting to be seated! We were excited for a quick roll or two at a seemingly good restaurant and hoped to get back to the tables in half an hour or so!

Eric and I decided to get two rolls to share and leave it at that. We 'stayed safe' with a shrimp tempura roll and he got the dragon roll (tuna, salmon, yellowtail roll with spicy tuna and avocado on top)

What a disappointment. Not only did we leave there way later than we wanted to, the food was not good.

Maybe it was because we got there so late into the night, but the rolls were not very good and were extremely pricey! (Thank goodness we got this meal for free- thank you comp dollars). My shrimp tempura roll smelled. Yes, smelled. It smelled like overcooked, rotting asparagus.. which i feel like is what they used in the roll. The taste wasn't appetizing at all and I made Eric finish the rest.

Eric's roll was a little better, but nothing too impressing. The fish wasn't necessarily the freshest (ok, again, we went at 11:30PM) but really, this place sucked. Not only did we not get our waters filled.. the server didn't even get us soy sauce! We waited for a good 10 minutes for some soy sauce but eventually I had to convince Eric to run over to another table and grab theirs.. boo.

I would have to say that Izakaya was a disappointment and they will be getting a C+ from me.. at least for this experience. Hopefully next time (if there is a next time) will be better for me.. but as for now, i'm sticking to Bobby Flay.

And that's it for me now.. will have more to report on this weekend when I go back!!! Wish me luck!