Unexpected in Baltimore

My mother, sister and I travelled to Baltimore for a girl's weekend of shopping, relaxing, and eating fancy food. We decided on a relatively pricey Inn in the Fell's Point shopping district (I won't name it, I'll just call it "The Captain Tripped Inn") for the experience of not staying in a cookie-cutter hotel. We splurged on two rooms for two nights, at a hefty price tag.

Upon our arrival, it became clear that we weren't going to get what we expected out of this place. Despite our best efforts, we were generally miserable by 6PM our first day.

The good news is that we decided to skip the second night, and the hotel management saw fit to comp both rooms for the first night. And our Parking. And I think if our cars broke down, they would have fixed them just to get us the heck out of there.

The unexpected disappointment of the hotel did, however, set us up to be dazzled by another aspect of our weekend. Bear with me as I savor that experience.

Sunday morning we walked around the corner to Kali's Court, a pretty little restaurant tucked at an angle away from the street. We were early for our 11:30 reservation, and lucky enough to be seated in a beautiful window alcove with a view of the cobblestone courtyard dotted with lush plants in all manner of urns and plant stands.

We settled down to a four course brunch. It made me realize that in all my years of dining out, I have never eaten truly exceptional food. Oh, sure, a great dish here or there, but this meal was so exquisite, so satisfying, so utterly unexpected that, after the second course, I actually thought I might cry.

And when our attentive-yet-not-overbearing waiter responded to our tale of hotel woe by bringing me my second mimosa with his compliments; well, I think I did actually tear up briefly.

I intended to describe each course in exquisite detail, but words fail me, and the sentiments seem hollow.

The skewered tenderloin and potato appetizer melted in my mouth in waves of flavor.

The Asparagus salad with poached egg was sweet and sharp and suprising. I'd start each bite unsure of the combination, only to be reminded by the end of the mouthful that it was genius.

The grilled salmon sitting in a green sea of pesto sauce? Perfection.

Even better than all of that was the polenta topped with slow roasted plum tomato quarters. Layers of taste and texture so perfect I had to close my eyes against the distractions of the setting and be alone with each bite. I'm told the spices included garlic, salt, thyme and rosemary. To me it just tasted like heaven.

And for dessert, raspberry spongecake with buttercream. So good I actually didn't feel the need to finish it.

We left the restaurant over two hours later, and I felt satiated and content and happy to be alive on such a beautiful spring day.

Two hours after that, my blood sugar was a glorious 127. And I felt as if I had a new understanding of the power and purpose of food.

Not to mention a new definition of 'bolus worthy'.