A friend from back east was in town on business, so we met for dinner near her hotel at Rigoletto’s Café, 10305 100 Avenue.  The atmosphere was comfortably informal, the service was good, and so was the food.  And, significant in this week of wind chill warnings, the dining room is warm enough and free of drafts.

I started with an Italian salad, which was garnished with anchovy slices and olives and came with a piece of herb toast.  My dining companion had a Caesar salad and I forgot to ask her how it was because I was too busy eating.

For a main course, I asked about ordering the beef tenderloin on the menu but with the honey jalapeno glaze offered for the “bronzed” rib eye steak on the menu, because this combination had been strongly recommended to me by my hairdresser.  The server was willing to order this variation, but she suggested that if I liked steak with fat marbled through it, I’d probably prefer the rib-eye, so I took her recommendation.  My steak came with some ordinary lightly-steamed vegetables, some gnocchi, and the aforementioned honey-jalapeno sauce.  That wasn’t a combination of tastes and textures that I would have expected to go well with steak, but it did.  I ordered my steak rare and it came closer to medium-rare, but it was tender and savoury, and the leftovers were really great in a sandwich the next day.  My friend had penne pasta with chicken and portabello mushrooms.  She was kind enough to let me snag a few noodles.  The penne, one of those pasta shapes that’s not sensitive to overcooking, was a suitable vehicle for a simple sauce of heavy cream, tasting of garlic, pepper, and the mushrooms.

We didn’t have room for dessert.