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Tuesday, March 29, 2011

The Dancing Bears Lounge - Lake Placid

We traveled up (although it is actually south of us) to Lake Placid yesterday so that my fiance could look at venues for our wedding in 2012.  We had lunch at the Dancing Bears lounge which is adjacent to the High Peaks resort.  The main objective was to check out the quality of the food served at the hotel, as it is a top contender for a wedding venue.  While we know the food at the restaurant for lunch would be nothing like wedding food, one would assume that if they are able to do lunch well, they have a better chance at having good wedding food.

As is my favorite thing to do - we shared!  We started with what they call Baked Onion Soup - which is really just your traditional  french onion soup - done well, don't get me wrong, but certainly not unique, although some traditional foods are just not to be messed with.  Personally, I don't think you can ever go wrong with melted Gruyere cheese.

For a main course, we shared a lobster roll (the fiance's first ever) and the baby back ribs.  I started with the lobster roll, and it certainly remained true and any New Englander would not be disappointed.  Buttery roll grilled to be crispy on the outside and really well cooked lobster (no rubbery or chewy morsels here) with celery and onion which provided a really nice crunch.  The one comment I have, and this is really just me, is that there was too much dressing.  And this is really because I am not a mayonnaise person.  The dressing was light and certainly a necessary part of the lobster roll equation, but I did think it was a bit much and made the roll almost wet.  The roll came with a side of fries - and let me tell you, these fries were so good, my fiance was definitely interested in seeing if they could be served at the wedding.  If I had said yes, I think that would have sealed the deal for that decision in his mind.

Our other entree was the baby back ribs.  Again, the fiance was impressed - neatest and easiest ribs to eat EVER.  They were fall off the bone tender, easily eaten with a knife and fork.  They were supposedly covered in a mango BBQ sauce, which while it did have a slight sweet flavor which I liked, was lacking in volume.  This definitely should have come with a side of sauce or at least some additional sauce poured over the top.  The small amount of sauce did result in some of the meal tasting a bit under seasoned.  The other highlight of this meal was the side of coleslaw.  Again, on the same theme of not liking mayonnaise, I don't traditionally like coleslaw, and my fiance isn't a huge fan of it either.  He, however, raved about this coleslaw.  He felt that the cabbage and carrots were nice and crisp, and that they were the star of the show and not over powered by the dressing.  We felt the same way about the side of fresh vegetables that we ordered.  Fresh broccoli, squash, peppers and red onions, simply seasoned and allowing the natural flavors of the vegetables to shine.  They weren't over cooked as is the main downfall of vegetable sides.


We were planning on getting dessert...  but we were simple too stuffed from the meal to even remember this aspect of our plan.  I guess that in and of itself if saying something about the food as I do always try to "save room for dessert".

As there are so many wonderful places in Placid I want to try still, I am not sure The Dancing Bears is going to a place we go for every visit into the Adirondacks, but we'd be happy to eat there again.

Dancing Bears on Urbanspoon

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