Date Night - Manoli's

We met this fun pair at the Cider Tasting we went to a few weeks ago.  We learned that we all love food and have been to a number of restaurants in Salt Lake City.  Manoli's is a new restaurant on 400 East and 900 South.  It's a super cute place.  The bar was cool and the whole restaurant was spaced out nicely.  It didn't feel too crammed.

None of us had ever been here yet and we thought it would be fun to try something new together.














We all started off with a bowl of Krytharaki.  It is orzo, white cheddar, Parmesan, caramelized onions and breadcrumbs.  It's basically a Greek mac and cheese.  It was rich, cheesy, and just absolutely delicious.

Krytharaki

Next we had the Htapodi.  It is octopus over a warm bean salad.  The octopus was perfectly cooked, not to charred and it wasn't chewy at all.  The bean salad was fine but the octopus is the star of the dish after all.  

Htapodi

Then we had the Branzino.  This came out without the head unlike most places which was perfectly fine because we usually don't eat it.  Branzino is one of those things that you can't really mess up. The fish is mild and clean tasting.  And when cooked correctly, it has a nice buttery flavor.  This lived up to everything that we love about Branzino.  We may have to bring Mama and Papa Pok here to try this!

Branzino

Last, Greek donuts with a honey syrup and sesame seeds.  These were good.  Som wants to come back just for these.  Sothea wants to go back for that mac and cheese!

Overall we loved the food and we were in great company.

Loukoumathes