We’ve all heard the assumptions people make about our lives as chef wives or significant others . . . well last night many of them were true.  While it doesn’t happen often, last night I had the privilege of being spoiled by my chef/husband and his staff at Palisade.

I love to eat at my husband’s restaurant (well he doesn’t own it, but runs the kitchen.  So you know what I mean.)  However, with 3 kids and a 1+ hour drive to get there (without traffic) it doesn’t happen as often as I’d like.

Last week the restaurant rolled their new summer menu.  So tonight, I got a babysitter for the kids and headed up to Seattle with a friend for dinner.

First of all, for those of you with kids, you understand how exciting it is to get a babysitter for the evening.  It’s so nice to have a break and to enjoy a meal without having to help someone cut their food or having to remind them to use an inside voice.  In the car on the way there I didn’t need to have the talk about not yelling Daddy across the restaurant.  (I wasn’t too worried about my friend doing that.)  The car ride there, the meal, the car ride home . . . peace and quiet.  Ahhhh!!  Let’s just think about that for a moment, shall we?

OK, moving on . . .

After enjoying the view for a few minutes, we were escorted to our table.  For the first few minutes our waiter didn’t know I was married to the chef.  (I always love that.)  Then he asked if we were there for a special occasion, to which I replied, “Only to taste your new menu.”  Then it was obvious I was the chef’s wife.

My husband came over to the table and we started talking about what we should order.  He really was not very helpful.  After 5 minutes I was overwhelmed and needed to try everything (or almost everything) on the menu.

So of course I asked in my sweet wife voice, “Can’t you just go back in the kitchen and make us some sample plates so we can try a bunch of things?”

I expected his answer to be no.

However, he stood up, looked at the kitchen and said, “Sure.”

The waiter came back a few minutes later and jokingly said he was told to take our menus since we wouldn’t be needing them.

Perfect!!

The evening progressed with entirely too much amazing food. Of course I took pictures of all the food.  That’s what everyone does when they go out, right?  (I already have 800 pictures of each menu item on the computer.  But I took the pictures anyways!!  I really need another food photograph (or another recipe) like a need a hole in the head – lol.)

My favorites for the evening were actually 2 sides:  the roasted spring vegetables and the rainbow potato salad.  They were AMAZING!!

As we were finishing up dessert my chef/husband came out and apologized for not coming back out during our meal.  Apparently there had been an unexpected Sushi rush during that time and they made about a weeks worth of sushi in that one hour.  Maybe it’s National Sushi day and none of us knew it??  🙂  (And his chef coat from last night had such a nice seafood aroma to it as I was cleaning it.  His response – “Forgot to wear an apron.  Sorry.”) #chefwifeproblems (Can I use a hash tag in a blog post?)

As I sit here thinking about the nice evening I had – the great food, wonderful conversation, the quiet moments in the car, I am truly grateful that my husband is a chef.  I am spoiled that I am married to a chef.  Yes, it’s not very often.  But it was very nice to be taken care of for the evening.

I’m also laughing at myself a little.  For some reason I don’t really think about the fact that my chef/husband is around amazing food all day.  It’s really surprising he eats my cooking without complaining.  It is truly no where close to what I enjoyed this evening.  Maybe that’s why he eats Top Ramen so often.

Have you been spoiled by your chef/husband or significant other at their restaurant?  How often do you eat there?

From one chef’s wife to another,