#26 Eat at 500 great restaurants

Great restaurant #109 is GG's Earth & Surf in Santa Rosa, CA

I was so happy to have stumbled across this restaurant when we were headed to a brewery for burgers & beer!"

The most amazing thing happened on Saturday night; our restaurant was slow and we were able to go to dinner before 8:00 on a Saturday night!! Opportunities like this only happen about twice a year, so we weighed our options. It wasn't long after that we realized that we had no reservations and the places in town were packed (I just found a perk to having Monday night off). Defeated, we headed to 3rd Street AleWorks after the Russian River Brewing Co. turned out to be a chaotic mess with no apparent hostess. Thank goodness, on our way we came across GG's Earth & Surf. The menu claims to be "earth friendly" with lots of vegetarian, organic and vegan items. I'm not a vegetarian (this girl likes a steak every now and again), but the menu enticing. The prices seemed way too reasonable, I had no idea how they could charge $14 for Halibut, but then the tentative waitress informed us that is was "tapas" style. Fine by us, we love to try a bunch of different things. Food was creative, service was awkward & ambiance was a cross between modern sleek and a cheesy hotel breakfast restaurant.

What I ate and how I liked it:

Crostini of the Day A-

Every day their crostinis rotate. That day the 2 features were: basil ricotta, caramelized onion & smoke steelhead and shrimp, grapefruit & radish.

Pistachio Crusted Goat Cheese on Baby Greens Vanilla vinaigrette B

This salad was nicely done with a variety of fresh greens on the plate. The vanilla vinaigrette was something I had never heard of so I was dying to try it. At first, I love the flavor, but after a few bites it was just odd to have vanilla mixed with vinegar.

Spring Risotto with a Cashew Cream A-
The risotto was nicely cooked, though I didn't taste any cashews in the cream sauce. The variety of fresh herbs that is was topped with added most of the flavor.

Panna Cotta with Lemon Granita A

I didn't care for the presentation of this dessert, but the flavor of the panna cotta together with the granita was tremendous.

Manifesto Cabernet Sauvignon A

I very nice semi-bold wine choice. Many of the wines on their list are organic, though this was not one of them.