Republica on the Plaza shines on opening night of KC Restaurant Week...thru next Sunday, book a meal on OpenTable.com NOW!

Friday was the first night of KC Restaurant Week, which runs thru Sunday, Jan. 24th.  The best week of the food year.  I've found some great new haunts this way.  I try to sample the upper tier restaurants for $33 for dinner or $15 for lunch.  This year I will visit five places in the ten days, then back to my Aldi budget and my low-carb diet.  So I can once again zip up my snakeskin leather slacks.  But not this week!

     

The Country Club Plaza is a mini-me of Barcelona, Spain.  (Miller Nichols came home from vacation, and ordered his architects to recreate the Giralda Tower, etc.)  And now thanks to the fine folks who also brought us Urban Table in Prairie Village, and half a dozen other remarkable restaurants, finally there's a decent Spanish restaurant on the Plaza. You don't need to fly Iberia Airlines for a memorable meal.

SO THERE I WAS, at Republica, the new Spanish tapas restaurant on the Plaza.  4807 Jefferson, where Ingredient used to be.  (Catty corner southeast of Capital Grille.)    For dinner, each diner selects one tapa (hot or cold), one entree and one dessert.  Since tapas are small plates meant for sharing, a smart plan for two people is to order six things and share them all.

A perfect starter, for my tastes, were one cold: the beet salad (with lots of ladidah extras)  and the meatballs.  Some frisky radishes are nestled in.  Never saw that coming.  But it was delish.

For entrees, Julie, my almost sister and I chose swordfish with Northern beans and little bits of some special ham.  Yowser--perfecto.  And grilled Wagyu with green beans.  Since I hate disempowering table talk that can spoil an appetite, I managed to resist making a joke at the table, about Wagyu being the tails of little abandoned puppies.  It's actually like Kobe beef from Japan.  Like buttah.  But of course, now you will be able to remember the name.  

Of course every dish has special Spanish ingredients, fancy cheese in the meatballs, etc.  You may read up on the special menu for 100 local restaurants participating in KC Restaurant Week, when you go to OpenTable.com.  That's the way all restaurants these days want you to book a table.  Rather than bugging the harried greeter at the front desk when she is way too busy, and does not have time or the knowledge to answer any questions about gluten, for God's sake.  People: stop with the gluten obsession, at least for ten days!  Shut up and order.  Eat something without lecturing the world about your gut and your bowels and how Monsanto is poisoning the world.  

For the rest of your lives, you don't need to check your watch.  Never phone any restaurant at rush hour.  Always go to OpenTable (they have an app.)  Pick date and time, and possibly filter for cuisine or neighborhood.  Then the website filters out what reservations are available.  (Bluestem booked up in October for this special week.  Foodies love that place.)  The regular menus are always available, but the website also shows the KCRW specials for lunch and dinner.

Ah but I digress.  

For dessert at Republica, do not go to jail, go straight to heaven.  Skip any other choices and get two helpings of the lemon cake, with rose-flavored whipped cream--heavenly right there--and paired with clove ice cream!

I once dined at a picnic table in Amagansett in the Hamptons, with Paul McCartney.  Just the two of us, for 45 minutes.  But that's for another blog post.  But I had told Sir Paul I was inventing French vanilla cilantro ice cream, and he said it sounded delicious.  

When I shared that story with Patrick, the perfectly attentive and knowledgeable waiter at Republica, he went to the kitchen.  And the chef sent him out with two extra scoops of clove ice cream.  Definitely worth the little upcharge.

There are many theories about life after death.  And about past lives, multiple incarnations, etc.  How would I know?  This time around, I'm just a gal who escaped Iowa and then Wichita and so far have only ventured to Kansas City.  Though I am open to something new.

 I favor the theories of Dr. Brian Weiss of Yale, but who knows.  I am also inspired by the accounts of Esther and Jerry Hicks.  She channels an entity labelled as Abraham.  It's shared as Abraham-Hicks.com.  Ram Dass--another inspiration of late---my friend Rev. Mary Omwake's buddy on Maui.  

And best-selling author Mike Dooley from Tut.com writes about "embracing today", especially the physical, the sensory.  Because even if you experience 10 thousand lives, or sit on the sidelines of non-physical for eons of time, there is nothing that calls one to Earth like the sensations we can taste and feel.

I want to spend the next ten days savoring whatever comes my way.   Because even in 10,000 lifetimes, the meal I ate at Republica, and that clove ice cream, may never return.