Average Food Guy's Blog: The Melting Pot

It has been a while since the wife and I went out to a nice meal. We were invited to celebrate the anniversaries of the Brother with his girlfriend and our friends Tim & Missy. This was our second trip to The Melting Pot in Darien, CT and I was very excited about it. Our last trip to this restaurant was to celebrate Valentine's Day last year with the Brother and his better half.

Upon entering the establishment we were greeting by a smiling host who I later discovered was the owner/manager James. He had been our host during our prior visit as well. We waited for our table in the bar with our previous bartender Neil. The bar is an elegant long room with a black granite bar top and backed by large windows overlooking the quaint streets of Darien. After our first round or two we were informed that our table was going to take a little longer than expected and if we didn't mind waiting drinks were on James. So we waited. And drank.

We were eventually seated at a booth in the dining room. The set up of the restaurant is very unique as it is split up into several smaller dining rooms with only a handful of tables in each. The smaller rooms and the dark wood decor give the feeling of being in an exclusive private dining club. In the center of our table were two flat top burners. We glanced over the menu and all three couples quickly decided on the "Big Night Out", an all inclusive four course meal for two. Since we had two burners we were able to choose two different flavored pots for each course. Our waiter Joe was very attentive to our requests and explained everything in great detail.

The appetizers we decided on were the Fiesta and Wisconsin Trio. Our waiter Joe came over to our table with double boiler pots, cranked up the heat, and retreated back to the kitchen to retrieve the ingredients for our first course. When he returned he created our cheese fondue right at our table. The fiesta pot was a mix of beer, salsa, jalapenos, and a cheese mixture. It was slowly turned in the hotpot until it was melted down into a smooth bubbling mixture. The Wisconsin Trio was constructed in a similar fashion with Fontina, Butterkase, Buttermilk Bleu, white wine, scallions and a hint of sherry. To dip into all of this were we given tortilla chips, chunks of white and pumpernickel bread, sliced Granny Smith apples and crudités.

Shortly after we finished with our cheese we were served our salads. I love a good salad, but it was not the highlight of this meal. I ordered a Caprese salad and a few others got the Caesar salad. Both were good, but unless my salad is my main course it’s usually nothing to write home about. So, moving on…

Following the clearing of our appetizers Joe returned with two fondue pots filled with steaming broths, placed them on the burners and raised the temperature to a higher level. We had ordered two different pots to cook our main course in. The first was the Mojo Style which we had tried during our last visit. This flavor is a Caribbean style broth with just the right quantity of garlic and citrus flavors. In my opinion it was best with seafood and pork but not heavy enough to impact the flavor of beef. The other pot was a Coq au Vin style broth with fresh herbs, garlic, mushrooms and burgundy wine. This was a much heavier broth and paired perfectly with the meats although it was a bit overpowering for the light seafood. The Coq au Vin pot is pictures below.

I mentioned previously that our meal was an “all inclusive” meal and that is not a stretch. We did not have to choose what type of meat we wanted to eat as we got a plate with it all. The Melting Pot offered three levels of main course for their Big Night Out. Two couples ordered the Fondue Fusion which consisted of a single split lobster tail, Filet Mignon Florentine, Limoncello Balsamic Sirloin, Shrimp Diablo, Sun-Dried Tomato Chicken, Orange Fennel Pork, and Porcini & Portabella Sacchetti. This was the middle option. The higher option included a second lobster tail and the lower version did not include the tail at all. All three came with a plate of vegetables which included mushrooms, squash and potatoes. Every piece of meat was meticulously trimmed to the perfect size for fondue cooking and there was not a trace of unwanted fat to be seen.

To put it simply, everything was delicious. As I mentioned before my favorite pairings were the lobster, shrimp and pork in the lighter Mojo style broth and the beef and chicken in the Coq a Vin. Not to say the chicken wasn’t tasty in the Mojo style, because it was. And the mushroom sacchetti went well with both. The method is simple. As Joe explained to us, everyone is given two color coded fondue forks. Stab your desired piece of food, place it in the pot, and wait approximately two minutes. Vegetables and shrimp take a little less time than beef and pork do. Once your food is cooked you place it on your plate, stab your next piece of dinner and enjoy the cooked morsel while waiting for the next to cook. We were also offered a plethora of dipping sauces including a curry yogurt and sweet and sour (both great on chicken and pork), a teriyaki and a bleu cheese sauce (perfect for the red meat), herb melted butter for the seafood, and something called Green Goddess for our vegetables. The last one was a mixture of cream cheese and fresh chopped herbs if I heard Joe right.

If you’re not drooling yet, you will be soon. Because after dinner we decided that we all wanted our own dessert pots. Since we were limited to two burners at our table we asked Joe is we could move to the bar for dessert. He made arrangements for that to be set up and we moved our party back to Neil.

Everything on the dessert menu sounded extremely decadent. Milk chocolate, white chocolate, half and half, all mixed with various liqueurs. The wife and I chose the pick your own of milk chocolate and Chambord. My brother and his girlfriend ordered the milk chocolate with Kahlua and our friends ordered the Bananas Foster, white chocolate with bananas, brown sugar and cinnamon. These were all mixed right in front of us. All the desserts were served with an assortment of sweets to dip including strawberries, bananas, Rice Crispy squares, cheesecake, brownies, and marshmallows covered with toasted coconut and chocolate crumbs. I doubt I need to explain how good all this was. The chocolate was silky smooth with the hinted flavor of the liqueur. Paired with a glass of my favorite cordials (DiSarrono on the rocks) it was the perfect ending to one of the most unique, mouth-watering, and memorable meals I’ve had in a long time.