Went to the Casa Santo Domingo last night for dinner.  Stunning.  Beyond gorgeous.  The food was mediocre but, really, value was there in spades after the service, ambiance and the setting was factored in.  OMYGAWD!  It was absolutely beautiful.

Entrance to Casa Santo Domingo

CSD was originally a convent, built back in the 1600’s.  The walls are as thick as European castles, at least three feet and, in some places four feet.  Made of stone, of course.  I guess those nuns needed keeping in or the locals needed keeping out.  Whatever – the convent was clearly built to be a silent fortress.  Different levels, spaces, inner courtyards, gardens, rooms, galleries, hallways, fountains and inviting places everywhere.

Of course, now CSD is a restaurant, hotel and bar but the spaces are so historic and generous, so magnificently flowered, landscaped and decorated and so nicely lit with ancient art and sculpture that it is an exceptional hotel, even if compared on a world scale.

An interesting point on the service………the abuelos are a bit more sensitive to the cold and, tho the climate is mild, it gets a smidge chillier in the evening.  Maybe it was 66.5 F last night.  And there was a gentle breeze bringing with it a windchill factor.  It felt like 65.5F.

Sal asked the waitress for the warmest part of the room.  The woman looked a bit taken aback and slowly wandered us down the massive mostly open room wondering ‘how the hell am I to find the warmest part of a colonial ruin?’

I could see her mentally shrug as she seated us roughly in the middle of a room that was at least 75 feet long, 40 feet wide and 25 feet high with  five large arched openings to the outdoors.  In keeping with the ‘ruins’  decor only half the roof was intact.  We all felt for ‘drafts’ and sat the abuelos where we thought would be best for them.  And we carried on.

Brazier

A few minutes later an attendant showed up with what looked like an antique metal wheel on it’s side with a metal bucket welded in the place of the hub.  The bucket was about 16 inches deep and maybe a foot in diameter.  There, in the middle of it, glowing brightly, was a couple of burning coconut husks giving off a remarkable amount of heat.  No smoke.  Somehow, within minutes of our arrival, a little rustic, in-keeping-with-the-ambience ‘private’ heater was employed.

That’s pretty good.

The thing about some fancy restaurants is that they are pretentious.  CSD was not.  It was the ‘real thing’.  But, of course, the food was ridiculous. So it was pretentious in that sense.

This was one of those places where they use three dishes to present a single strawberry with a drizzle of berry sauce on it like it was the Hope diamond.  I have suffered such parsimony-wrapped-in-fancy before and am not amused.  I have a significant girth to maintain and there is no substitute for volume.  These dorks didn’t seem to get it.

The worst we have ever encountered was at La Lumiere in Vancouver.  Sal’s main course there was a single scallop sitting atop a stack of four or five layered dishes.  It was stupid.  And good ol’ Sal just burst out laughing! That was the best commentary and one shared by everyone around us.

After dropping a week’s income for the ‘experience’, we stopped at the White Spot on the way home for a burger.

CSD was not quite that bad.  But, pulleez, don’t serve me a radish on two plates surrounded by rose petals and a curl of something and expect sustenance to be achieved.  Can’t be done.  On every scale they were a ten out of ten.  But not on calories.

Fortunately I have a considerable reserve in store.  I could go a long, long time without suffering from lack of calories.  Decades maybe.  Why?  Because one never knows when one might have to face such a dire situation.

Be prepared, I say.  You never know.  You might end up in a convent some day with nothing more than radishes in berry sauce!  It has happened to us.