Dinner and a Movie

Dinner and a movie.  That is what my six year old wanted to do for her reward night.  She got smiley faces at school for an entire month which warranted a special evening of her choice.  She picked dinner at Cosmo's in Orange Beach and the Justin Bieber movie at The Wharf, though I think my wife secretly is the one who really wanted to go see that particular movie, which is also in Orange Beach.  I asked our six year old, "what about Gnomeo and Juliet?" and my wife chimed in saying "No, she wants to go see Justin Bieber."  Right... and on to dinner.

Dinner was awesome.  We had a Louisiana roll to share as an appetizer.  This is a fully cooked sushi roll consisting of crawfish and tasso salad, celery and scallions. It had a tiny bit of kick to it, but not enough to keep us from polishing it off.  Lindsay, my wife, said that had she remembered how good it was she would have ordered it as her entree.  Next came out their bread basket - always welcomed.  They bring it out with a new unique butter every time.  I asked a waitress once in the past and she informed us that each day someone new gets to whip up a new butter blend before the shift begins.  Last night was a feta cheese, butter and basil blend.  Sounds different, but was actually pretty good.  While nibbling on the bread basket I fed our 7 month old some squashed squash courtesy of Gerber, she ate good too. 

No sooner than me wiping off her face the main course came out.  Lindsay had the fried gulf seafood platter ($18) which is any combo of shrimp, oysters, fish or soft shell crab lightly battered and fried served with french fries and coleslaw.  She asked for double shrimp (not a fan of the other stuff - personal preference) and replaced the coleslaw with asparagus.  I had the blackened triggerfish ($19) served on top of fried green tomatoes and whipped sweet potatoes.  I did not care much for the fried green tomatoes, however the fish was cooked perfectly and the sweet potatoes were amazing.  Our six year old put away a kid's serving of fried chicken tenders and it was about time to go.  As we were tiding up the table a bit, as parents often do at a restaurant, we realized that the movie was due to begin in 20 minutes.  We asked the six year old if she wanted dessert and to miss the previews or to leave without dessert in order to catch the previews.  Obviously being six she opted for dessert.  The girls shared a slice of key lime pie ($5) and I order the banana fritters ($5).  I was expecting a small dessert plate, but was overwhelmed by a dinner sized portion of absolute heaven.  I am not normally a fan of bananas and ice cream together, but this was different.  Cosmo's Banana Fritters are fresh ripe bananas battered, fried, and dusted with cinnamon sugar served with vanilla ice cream and a chocolate banana cream sauce.  It is good all over again just thinking about it.  After dessert we got the bill and made a dash for the car to get to the theater.  BTW, the service was great (thanks Justin - that was the waiter's name, strange coincidence?) and we look forward to going there again.

The Rave movie theater at The Wharf in Orange Beach, AL is just about 5 minutes up the road from Cosmo's.  The girls were afraid that the movie would sell out, so they ordered the tickets online before we went out to dinner.  Just a quick swipe of the credit card and the kiosk spit out the tickets allowing us to skip the long line at the window - good thinking Lindsay.  We made our way into the theater just in time for the movie to begin.  The 7 month old fell asleep with 20 minutes and our 6 year old bounced around dancing and singing for about 45 minutes before she was out too.  I kept looking over at Lindsay to see if she was ready to go, but she was intently glued to the screen so I stuck it out.  A little while later I looked over to see Lindsay snapping pictures of our six year old asleep in the chair one of which she posted to Facebook.  They were goofy.  As the movie began wrapping up Lindsay asked if I was ready to go and I began the process of making our way out to the car.  In short, for me, dinner was the highlight of the evening although the movie wasn't that bad.  I did catch myself tapping my foot once or twice and I think that the girls enjoyed the movie.  Definitely will do it again next month provided it's another month of smileys at school.

Published on Saturday, February 26, 2011