Distraction: Restaurants

Ate at Cubano's in Silver Spring this weekend with an old friend from NYC. Here's my two cent review...

Good Stuff:

• Service was excellent, polite, and promt. It also had a family-owned feel to it, which is always a plus.
• The food was good, though nothing astounding. I had the garlic chicken, my friend had some sort of pulled pork dish. Both were tender and tasty, and came with sides of beans and rice.
• Prices were moderate. Dinner for two with desserts and drinks was $60.
• Decor was nice but not formal. Suitable for a business lunch, date, or dinner with the family if you leave the children that scream at home.

Bad stuff:

• The sangria was lousy. It tasted like cheap merlot, had no fruit in it, and was warm. However, a carafe of it got me buzzed enough to make the Fantastic Four movie enjoyable afterwards.
  
• It was too warm in the restaurant as well, and they had several fans trying to make up for it (but failing). Message to management: The DC area is a swamp in the summer. Plan for it.
• While quite good, the food had a blandish, non-authentic taste to it. It might be our menu choices, but it also might be that the restaurant is in Silver Spring, and not Columbia Heights or Brooklyn.

Overall I reccomend the aptly named (or stereotypically named) Cubano's.

As a side note, to anyone who hasn't been to Silver Spring lately, you should go. I lived there for a while four years ago, and the changes have been dramatic. There are now dozens of restaurants, movie theatres, stores, apartments, clean streets, the works. Some of it has that antiseptic Bethesda like feel to it (for instance, the corporate Borders bookstore next to the Ben and Jerry's, next to the paid parking lot, etc.) But for the most part, the changes have been hugely positive and well planned. Check it out.