The Douche Cake Factory
Since being incredibly broke, I haven’t really gone out to eat very much unless someone like my mom was buying. So if I was about to go out to a relatively expensive restaurant, the last place I figured it would be was One Sunset, the desperately trendy tapas restaurant with paintings (yes, paintings) of people like Angelina Jolie and Anna Nicole Smith. But Jackie’s friend Rachel got a $125 gift card to said restaurant, didn’t care to keep it, and handed it over to us. Then we found out that on Tuesday nights they do a $45 per person tasting menu with the option to add a bottle of wine for a single dollar. Plus, Jackie deserves a date. Oh, and she offered to pick up the tip (which I figured was still going to cost more than I’d want to spend on a meal right now). All right. Fine. I’m in.
It’s on Sunset, which is already a problem for me, and valet is nine dollars, so I’m quickly out of my comfort zone and my brain starts doing math (“…that’s one cabeza taco, one lengua taco, one pastor quesadilla, a Mexican coke and an extra three bucks to throw in the tip jar…”).
When I step inside there are cameras set up in the main bar area pointing toward what’s about to literally become an evening of speed dating (“…how’s a guy supposed to pick which fake blonde girl with lots of blue eye makeup he wants to go home with…?”). I find out later that the cameras are there for a PBS documentary. I guess even non-profits sell out during a recession.
Our server arrives and does manage to come off fairly kind and not overly smarmy, despite talking to us while casually leaning against the adjacent table— and looking like he just missed out on a job as Billy Cruddup’s stand-in on his next movie. We order the tasting menu with Jackie’s requisite restrictions (no beef, no pork) and are soon brought our $1 bottle of easily drinkable Vendange sauvignon blanc.
Then a barrage of food arrives. A Greek influenced chopped salad of cucumbers, feta, avocado, cherry tomatoes and hearts of palm. Tuna tartar served on a fluffy tempura eggplant and a miso glazed salmon skewer with black sesame. The food is…perfectly fine. Nothing is an appalling miss.
Next up is a flatbread pizza with brie, arugula, mushrooms and the apparently state-law-required drizzle of truffle oil. We also get a plate of buffalo chicken lettuce wraps. “What do you think of the pizza?” Jackie asks. “Well,” I say, “if somebody brought this out for me at their house while we were all hanging out drinking a glass of wine, I’d be perfectly fine with it.” Maybe not a ringing endorsement, but what do you want from me? It’s a flatbread pizza with mushrooms, arugula, brie and truffle oil.
The buffalo chicken lettuce wraps, though, are a full-fledged man-made disaster. I mean, what did they think would happen when they took a giant hunk of hot, boneless chicken and wrapped it up in cheese and not-so-crisp lettuce? The lettuce wilts, the moisture comes out and the whole thing is a floppy, soggy mess with a bunch of flavors that also happen to not be very good individually or together. And then there’s the thick, rich bleu cheese dip served on the side, whose goal, I think is to suggest comfort while actually causing total taste-bud overload. Here’s what I think happened:
“Hey, man. The owner wants a buffalo chicken lettuce wrap on the menu.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. Just make it terrible so he’ll realize he was wrong.”
“Okay. Great.”
(Two days later.)
“Uh-oh.”
“What?”
“The owner loves it.”
“Fuck.”
Next up? Turkey meatballs with tomato sauce (“…don’t make me come back there and teach you assholes how to make a turkey meatball…”), “tortelloni with overbearing chestnuts, pumpkin, sage and gouda” (okay, maybe I added a word in there) and Main sea scallops with butternut squash, huckleberries and pistachios (“…why didn’t anybody tell me it was the middle of October…”).
Then comes dessert. Two red velvet cupcakes and a mini-vat of bread pudding. Both are totally acceptable.
Okay. So where does that leave us? Did I absolutely hate the meal and was I miserable the entire time? Actually…no. The food, despite a few big miscues, was for the most part…fine. I finished all my plates (other than dessert), I was happy to be out having dinner with my girlfriend and most of the ingredients weren’t totally destroyed. Now, if I’d actually paid full price on a non-prix-fixe menu…all right. I would have been fuming. But it also would have been my fault for expecting anything better than what we got. But with special thanks to the gift card, it was forty bucks out the door including valet parking for all that food, a bottle of wine and a night out while I’m absolutely broke. So yeah. It was good. I had a nice time.
Now obviously, if somebody said “Here’s forty bucks, go have dinner for two,” One Sunset wouldn’t have been my choice. But that’s no reason to be miserable during the whole dinner. I’m happy to have had the experience, checked out the “scene”, and gotten a taste of what people do who are, as far as I can tell, not at all like me. Forty bucks for a lot of courses, two desserts, a bottle of wine, a latte, a cappuccino, an anthropological experiment and a nice night out with my girlfriend? Sign me up. Just not to that same place twice.
One Sunset
8730 W Sunset Blvd
West Hollywood, CA 90069
(310) 657-0111
