What's the best meal (or meals) you've ever had?

[icedoverfire]

Aside from my mom's cooking, two of the best meals I've ever had were both Cuban breakfasts ha ha.

1. Pan y cafe: buttered cuban bread with a shot of cuban coffee (strong cuban espresso + sweetened condensed milk). I was with a group and we hadn't gotten much sleep for the last couple of nights.... Such a lifeline!
2. Cuban breakfast sandwich: Was with my family on vacation in Puerto Rico and we didn't want to pay the hotel's exorbitant brunch prices so we found this little mom-and-pop place down the road from the hotel... You could taste the work the cook put into his food.

others?

 

[82R100]

Rijsttafel in Amsterdam on vacation with my family many years ago.

 

[icon]

Hard to say, but I'm convinced that good company is more important than what you are eating

 

[mikromicke]

I remember having a Beef tenderloin flambéed in cognac with a morel sauce and Idaho potatoes that were first baked and then shortly deep fried. This with a nice glass of red wine (and my girlfriend, later my wife, as company) stands out as one of many very nice meals

 

[TacoBell]

Most recently was this delight. Sweetbreads....Taillevent just last month...had an extraordinary white burgundy...too bad I can't remember which

 

[johnnytruant]

Not strictly a meal, but the best thing I've ever put in my mouth are couture ganaches from Artisan du Chocolat

TV's Gordon Ramsey described them as "the Bentley of chocolates", which is a reasonable description. Stupidly expensive, but worth every penny.

 

[michiganlover]

Chicken Pad Thai purchased from a little hole in the wall Thai food restaurant (called The Rice Paddy) located in Marquette, Michigan (in the Upper Peninsular for all of you non-Michiganders) of all places.

The restaurant is a tiny little place with seating for two people, and not much bigger than the kitchen overall. It also looked like it had seen no updates since the early 1970's.

2nd place would go to Crabmeat Ragoons made with real crab meat that I found in Maine. It was packed full of crabmeat too, not just the usual small specs.

 

[SliceOfLife]

Usually I am very inebriated when I find places that serve awe inspiring food... then when I sober up, I only have a vague notion of where and what it was.

Ever see Beer-fest? It's like that.

 

[Luc]

Cochinita Pibil or any Italian dish with fresh pasta

 

[barracudamagoo]

1. Biscuits and gravy.
2. Pinapple curry from the Thai joint down the road.

 

[professorchaos]

Too many to pick just one! A few contenders are the Roast Veal Marrow at St. John's in London, the Chili Glazed Pork Belly at Herbsaint in New Orleans or the Pot au Feu at Campton Place in San Francisco (when it was run by Todd Humphries).

 

[airplanedoc]

Man, its tough to choose my top 3

Prime Rib with Cottage Cheese and Scotch with my dad once or twice a year when my mom would be gone to something.

Crawfish Etoffee, bananas foster, and ice cold beers from a little hole in the wall cajun place right on the Mississippi, humid August night with my college roommate and our 2 girlfriends

Roast loin of black forest wild boar, gravy, potatoes in a little brau haus looking over Bodensee near where the hindenburgh and graf zepplin were built.

 

[Stubblefield]

Pretty much any meal involving Marinated Tri-Tip.

 

[Clockwork John]

My top two would have to be the carne asada tacos I had in Ensenada, and sauteed mushroom something-or-other in wine sauce I had at a French street market in Edinburgh, Scotland.

 

[elalan]

I like a lot of my own cooking, basic soft tacos to more complicated fish soups. For purposes of this thread...

1. Best non-overated, exceeded expectations meal: Roast duck at NOLA (Emeril Lagasse's New Orleans restaurant (pre-Katrina))

2. Best and most unique (for me at least): Warthog loin at Monsoon's in Accra, Ghana (great restaurant!)

 

[RazorPete]

The best meal I can recently remember was a multiple course meal consisting of a variety of fugu (blowfish) dishes at a traditional style restaurant in Fukuoka Japan last December. Fugu sashimi, fugu tempura, fugu testicles, liver of some deep sea fish from deep in the Mariana trench, uni(sea urchin) all washed down with warm sake infused with fugu fins. It was quite good and a memorable experience. On another dayinFukuoka I had dome Haraka Ramen on member Jim's recommendation and that was excellent too.

 

[danparker77]

Place in Champaign, IL (U of I) Called Merry Ann's. Go there get a "diner stack"! Eggs any way, bacon, sausage, biscuits, hash browns, all smotherd in gravy. MMMM So hungry!

 

[DFrancis]

Recently it would have to be the lamb I did up last week. A giant de-boned leg with a fat-cap that just melted into it. Rubbed with an olive oil/garlic/rosemary/thyme mixture. Roasted up alongside spuds and carrots.

 

[CCMphysician]

In order of preference (I am not even remotely kidding):

-CCM

 

[johnmrson]

My wife and I had a meal at a little restaurant in Bayeux, France when we were their a couple of years ago visiting the D-Day beaches that was truely stunning. Started with snails in garlic and herb butter. Followed by a bowl of bouillabaisse that was fantastic. Next was lamb noisette and we finished with a cheese and fruit platter. The French cheese is just heaven, especially their soft cheeses. Each course came with a matched glass of wine. The cheese platter came with glass of Normandy Calvados which is a local apple brandy. Wow. I think I managed to finish off most of the bottle. The restaurant was called Le Rapier. It was a combination of location, food and company that made it such a special meal.