Autre Monde

We finally went to dinner at Autre Monde in Berwyn.  We had heard about it from friends a while ago and then it was featured on Check Please last year.

Most of its menu consists of shared smaller plates.  So we ordered a few.

Roasted Cauliflower with raisins and pine nuts.  There was a sauce that covered this that was a little spicy.

Roasted Cauliflower

Scallop Spiedini - 2 scallops with broccoli rabe and grapefruit.  It was an interesting combination to have these ingredients together.  We were not expecting the grapefruit but the flavor of the fruit offset the saltiness of the broccoli.

Mushroom and Ricotta Tagliatelle

Mushroom and Ricotta Tagliatelle - This was our favorite dish of the night since we both love this type of pasta and this is a classic dish.

Duck Sausage Flatbread - with Manchego cheese, smoked tomato and basil oil.  This had a little kick to it as well.

Scallop Spiedini

We were pretty full after these 4 dishes so we didn't order dessert but it did seem like several people were ordering dessert around us.

Duck Sausage Flatbread

Final thoughts on Autre Monde:
Food - It was all great.  We were happy we got to try a few things - that is what we like about tapas style restaurants

Service - The food got out to us fairly quickly.  Pretty good service overall.

Atmosphere - It is a fairly small restaurant so it probably could get pretty packed on the weekends. We were there on a weeknight so it wasn't completely full.

El Tapeo

We went to dinner at El Tapeo in Oakbrook at Le Meridien hotel. This restaurant opened about 6 months ago and we had heard good things about it.  It is mostly a tapas restaurant but does have some entree size dishes as well.  We decided to go with a bunch of small plates so we could try a bunch of stuff.

Pan con Tomate - spanish style toast with tomato jam and spanich olive oil, with manchego cheese. There were a few pieces of toast with the tomato jam on top.  It was sweeter  than we thought but good.  We wish there had been a little more grated manchego cheese on top because there was an up charge for this.

Pan con Tomate

Pimientos - blistered shishito peppers, with lemon zest and sea salt.  This was definitely the best deal of the bunch. When it came to the table it seemed like a very large amount of peppers. We were thinking there would only be about half as many.  Nick liked the peppers but thought they would be a bit more charred given the description.  Natalie thought there should have been a sauce to go with them.  She ended up dipping them in the leftover sauces from the other dishes.

Mushroom Fritters

Datiles - bacon wrapped medjool dates stuffed with marcona almonds.  This was Nick's favorite dish.  He is a sucker for bacon wrapped dates. They satisfied his need for both a sweet and savory bite.

Croquetas de Setas - cremini mushroom fritters and cilantro yogurt.  This was Natalie's favorite dish - little mushroom bundles that had a lot of flavor to them.

Pimientos

Patatas Bravas - fingerling potatoes with a spicy tomato sauce, creme fraiche and scallions. Nick just thought this dish was okay but Natalie liked it.  These were served warm and the sauce wasn't too spicy. Because this was a potato dish it made us think of one of our favorite potato tapas dishes - the garlic potato salad served at both Meson Sabika and Emilio's. No potato dish will ever compare to that one.

Bacon wrapped dates

Sopa de Calabasa - roasted butternut squash bisuqe with granny smith apples, serrano ham and mahon cheese.  This is the only soup on their menu.  It was a nice and creamy soup.  The apples, ham and cheese were cut into little cubes and were sitting on a floating crouton in the middle of the dish.  We wish there could have been a bit more of those cubes or bigger pieces of them.

Patatas Bravas

Salpicon Cangrejo de Mar - lump crab salad, avocado and blood orange gelle over toast points.  The presentation was interesting - the crab salad was topped with a layer of avocado and then a circular layer of the orange jelle.  Combined it tasted very interesting.  We wish there had been a couple more pieces of the toast so we didn't have to pile so much on the toast we had.

Final thoughts on El Tapeo:

Butternut Squash Bisque

Food - the food was good.  Certainly the small plates sounded a bit more interesting to us than the entrees and that way we got to try a little more of the menu options. Maybe because we are so used to the tapas options at other tapas restaurants we probably would choose those places over El Tapeo.  But that isn't to say this food wasn't good just that maybe we have just had those so often we are more familiar and comfortable with those options.

Lump Crab Salad

Service - there weren't that many customers there on a weeknight.  The service was good but there were a couple of times when we thought the server could have gotten to us a little quicker. We ordered the food in 2 batches, but maybe we should have less in more batches because 5 small plates came to us at once. Luckily there were small and could fit on the table but maybe that could have been paced better.

Atmosphere - El Tapeo is located on the 9th floor of Le Meridien Hotel, so it is a neat setting. It is located near most of the other restaurants at Oak Brook Mall, so probably most of the other patrons were staying at the hotel.