The Best Restaurant and Bar in San Jose

I haven't been at home for a birthday since 1995. It's been 15 years of being out of town. Since 2001 Stefania and I have spent the day in New Orleans. It feels a little weird not to be in NOLA right now, but the schedule just didn't work out this year with the day falling on a Tuesday and the mad rush of harvest zooming up on us.

We actually don't go out a great deal any more in San Jose. We do have some great restaurants in town, but now it's maybe twice a month we head out. That's because I think we have the best restaurant and bar in town in our house.

Tonight we're going to start with a cocktail. It will be shaken just right in an ice cold glass just to order. We'll probably have the baseball games on the TVs behind the bar, at least until hockey comes on at 7:30. We may have cigars on the patio next, or maybe we'll save that until after dinner.

Stef already ran out to the store, she's going to make a fresh wedge salad with bacon, and blue cheese dressing. The dressing will be from scratch with Point Reyes blue and a mix of chopped veggies. She's promised some bread made from scratch too and steamed broccoli. She has some rib eyes that I'll do on the grill. For wine we'll pick a bottle or two from our cellar. I''m leaning to our 07 Santa Cruz Mountains Cab, I really like that wine. Or maybe a Cline Mourvedre or a 1998 La Mission Haut Brion. I know our wine list is pretty good!

It's just hard to beat that in a restaurant. We've joked that all we need to do is hire a waitress / dish cleaner and it's the perfect set up. We'd never leave home. Tonight I can't think of a better way to spend by birthday.