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2003 Johannes Egberts
Riesling
Score: 90

An excellent wine. Soft and refreshing, not sryupy or buttery. Peaches and a hint of minerals make this a very light and fun wine, a great wine for summer.

http://www.kresrestaurant.com/

Kres is easy to find in downtown Orlando FL a very easy walk from the Westin hotel ‘to be reviewed later’. A fairly small space, the décor was tasteful and stylish, a bit modern and dark, but inviting and comfortable. Service was prompt and attentive. I was there on a slow weeknight, so it probably much busier on weekends.

The wine suggestion was paired wonderfully with my steak and scallops adding quite a bit to my total enjoyment of the meal. The steak was a little overdone, I ordered Medium Rare, but overall the meal was quite excellent.

I passed on the dessert, I really wanted crème brulee, but they did not have it.

I did see their seafood tower brought out to another table and I admit, the ice sculpture surrounded by delicious looking seafood would be a treat for a table of at least 4.

2001 Steele Sangiacomo Vineyard ‘Carneros’
Pinot Noir
Score: 86

I had this wine at Kres Steakhouse, which I will review in a moment with scallops and steak. The wine was served by the glass for a very reasonable $11 a glass. Smoky with the signature cherry and currant flavors you would expect from a Pinot. The pairing was wonderful as it brought out the steak and vegetables, but did not overwhelm the scallops. Nice finish, not too lingering, again a good thing considering the delicate nature of the scallops.

2003 Argyle Pinot Noir
Pinot Noir
Score: 60

These twist caps had better be a fad. I would rather taste the earthy wood of a cork than the twinge of the metal. A decent wine, but nothing fancy, I like other pinot\’s quite a bit better. Cherry and cinnamon on the nose, which really was much better than tasting, which was flat and only single faceted with a flavor completely muddled and no excitement. Perhaps it needed more aging, we will wait on the second bottle.

1995 Faustino Rioja Gran Reserva I
Tempranillo Blend
Score: 70

My wife would go higher than 70, but this wine was bland and boring. Overpriced at about $50 a bottle, the wine itself is not impressive, and after only about 20 minutes open, the bottle has lost all complexity. Not worth the price! If this bottle was perhaps only $10, then it would be a good deal. Typical Tempranillo characteristics, nothing special. Past its peak, perhaps should have been opened 3 years ago.

If you read here often, you will soon find out I don’’t care what the chef’s family did or who the managing partner is; neither of these trivial facts make a difference if the service is slow and my steak is overdone, or, as in the case of Lanny’s, both.

Lanny’s had a nice atmosphere, cozy but nice, a little too loud to be considered romantic and the couple sitting next to us was sitting NEXT to us.

Tap water served, without asking our preference, something that really irked me considering the money. This would easily be a $150+ meal, the very least a place like this can do is offer us bottled water, just not toss the smell Fort Worth tap at us. I finally requested bottle water and was pleased to see the waitress bring VOSS to the table.

The menu looked quite amazing, the selection a little daunting as I didn’t know where to begin. Jessica took the easy way out and ordered the five course tasting menu, without the wine parings and I took even a more wussy way out and went with the steak, medium rare.

Service was amazingly slow and inattentive, again, for this price point, I expect more. Jessica’s courses came out with little fanfare, and were pretty good overall. Some were a little bland, like the goat cheese potatoes, but they would have been better had she gotten the wine paring with it.

Eventually the entrees arrived, and my steak was medium well. I never got to tell anyone this since we didn’t see our server again until after we had eaten. I didn’t bother informing her since I did eat it, but again, at this price, I would expect it to be right.

I decided to order a desert so I wouldn’t have to watch Jessica eat her crème brûlée, but it didn’t arrive until after she had finished her bland, if perfectly textured, custard. I refused it and sent it back, prompting a visit from the manager who then comped us our drinks. Jessica had a pomegranate margarita and gave it a non-comitial “meh” when asked. I had two vodka martinis but in typical Ryan style they were just vodka with a twist. The check came out to be about 100 even plus a little for tip, but I will admit had the manager not been so generous with the comps, I would have tipped much less than the 18% I did.

Overall, Lanny’s either needs to up the service, or drop the price, but as it is, the entire experience was unbalanced and painful.

I saw a commercial the other day for Hotels.com and thought I would go see what the deal was. They are a local company, I have driven by the building several times and thought if they could save me some money on my trip to Vegas then so be it. I found the hotel I wanted, ‘THEhotel’ and they had rooms available for the right dates, even when last week the hotel’s website was saying they were sold out for a day during our time there. I went ahead and made the reservations on Hotels.com since I had thought it was some deal for them. But just to be sure, I went over to the actual website and checked, and WHOA, they had rooms open for the right week as well, for less money. So I called Hotels.com to cancel or ask for a price adjustment, and here is where the fun begins.

Hotels.com does NOT make the same claim most travel sites do, that they will have the lowest published price. Travelocity, Expedia, and Vegas.com all have this guarantee, but not Hotels.com. And, they expected me to pay a $25 fee, even though the reservation was less than 5 minutes old, and I was under the impression they would match the price. The price on the hotel’s website was quite a bit lower, so I just ate the 25 bucks, happy not to give Hotels.com any money considering the rude customer service I received when asking my questions, and the uncompetitive lack of lowest price guarantee.

In short, when booking for a hotel, always just use their website or a travel agent you trust. Don’t waste your time on the “discount” websites that are just more trouble than they are worth, and not actually a discount.

2003 Ruffino Fonte Al Sole Toscana
Merlot & Sangiovese Blend
Score: 50

I strongly dislike Merlot and this is a blend with strong overtones of the sweet almost sickly smell often found with that grape. If you like Merlot, this could be a good wine to branch into the more complex Italians from, as it is not nearly as complex as a good Super Tuscan, but drinkable. ‘barely’. Must have with food to help offset some of the more ill begotten aspects, but not too bad for a cheap wine. I will not purchase again.

Well, we rearranged the tank and did a massive water change about 3 weeks ago, so Rainbow wanted to get his groove on. Unfortunately for him he’s in a tank of mostly guys, and the two fish that are girls are not his kind; however, that didn’t keep him from trying. He killed Girlie, who was Boss Peacock’s honey ‘they had babies and everything’, and just last night he killed Red, who was the one other for sure girl in the tank. Rainbow was then starting to pick on Blue, who is my favorite, and needless to say, “Homey don’t play that.” We fished *har har* Rainbow out and put him in a breeders net, the equivalent of a cold shower. We do have a smaller tank, but it’s now occupied with Little Bit, Boss Peacock and Girlie’s kid. Hopefully he’ll chill out or back to Petsmart he goes. We have yet to keep a fish that we bought at Petsmart. They always get weird as they age. I think it’s because they aren’t purebreds.

The moral of the story is, don’t buy fish from Petsmart.

I a’m not sure how I feel about this….