Ten Tables

Overview: Ten tables is a small restaurant in the Boston neighborhood of Jamaica Plain. The dining room is small and meant to have the feel of a small dinner party. The dinner menu focuses on local, sustainable and affordable, while the bar menu focuses on snacks, bites and boards. The bar also features a great selection of local beer and craft cocktails.

Medium Dead: Every time I go to Ten Tables I sit progressively closer to the bathroom. Since I can't get any closer, next time I am going to request a private table in there. It is, after all, bigger than the bar area. Regardless of the proximity to the bathroom I really enjoy the food at Ten Tables and will continue to eat here. Our most recent adventure to Ten Tables was for the Monday burger special. A better deal than the half price burgers at Radius, Ten Tables serves the burger with potato salad and a beer for $15 every Monday night. The deal is so good its worth the drive from Brighton to JP.

The burger itself isn't the best burger in Boston, but its worth the price. The beef is humanely raised (I am convinced you can taste the difference) at Meyers Ranch, served on a sesame brioche bun with Farmhouse Cheddar, lettuce, A10 Sauce, bacon aioli, and pickles. The bacon aioli is great I just wish it was the dominant sauce on the burger. The A10 sauce (Ten Tables version of A1) is very good but its over powering. The bread and butter pickles make the difference on this burger they stand up to the sharp cheddar, juicy beef, enormous roll and strong barbecue sauce. I tasted them from the first bite. I love the potato salad too. The potatoes are cooked just right so they cooked through but still crisp. There is the perfect amount of mayo and the celery was big enough that I could eat around it.

Medium Well:  This burger tastes like a sloppy joe.  Sure the deal is compelling, but $15 can be better spent elsewhere.  Like at Aquataine... or Radius... or Garden at the Cellar.  If you do go to Ten Tables, go for one of the other weekly specials they offer.  On Wednesday's, Ten Tables offers three courses for $33, and on Tuesdays serves up four courses and four glasses of wine for $42. 

The Verdict: The burger is good but the local beer and cheese board are the reason enough to visit Ten Tables.

Blue Ridge

Overview: Blue Ridge, in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington DC, specializes in cuisine created with locally sourced seasonal ingredients. The decor is trendy farmhouse, the bartender is a hipster and the craft cocktails are strong.

Medium Well: I was eager to dine at Blue Ridge so I could support one of the few restaurants that thrives on local and sustainable ingredients. As much as I love to sink my teeth into a juicy burger on the weekends, I would much rather eat local, organic and sustainable foods every other day of the week. Why? Local, sustainable and organic food tastes better and does something that most people have forgotten that food is supposed to do - it nourishes your body. I truly believe baby carrots (they don't actually grow this small), winter tomatoes, Purdue chicken breasts and anything made by the fast food industry are to blame for the picky palettes and health problems in America. Don't believe me? I dare you to eat a tomato that was ripened by a Labor Day sun in your backyard and tell me it tastes the same as the garnish on your TGI Friday's burger. Even though the Blue Ridge burger is not nearly as good as the other burgers we had in DC, the high quality ingredients make it far superior to the sad examples of burgers served in most restaurants.

Medium Dead: I love that more and more restaurants are beginning to serve local sustainable produced food. This is the very reason we were so excited to eat at Blue Ridge. This is a great idea for a restaurant, but it fell short to my expectations. The pork rillettes were bland and tasted like chicken salad, the chicken liver mousse was too salty and the broiled oysters were cooked just a little too long.

In the end Blue Ridge wasn't my favorite meal of the weekend, but the burger was still excellent. The locally raised beef makes all the difference. There is a freshness in this beef you can't taste in factory produced beef that travels hundreds of miles to the kitchen.

The Verdict: At Blue Ridge the goods definitely out weigh the bad. The plate of local cheeses was absolutely incredible, and the brawn (head cheese) was speckled with chives and was the best thing we ate that night.