Restaurant Review--Dressler's

I admit when a friend forwarded a coupon for Dressler's to me a few weeks ago, I totally wrote it off. I thought an eatery at the Metropolitan was a little too pretentious for me. Oh, will I ever learn to get over myself?!
With Charlotte Restaurant Week we decided to treat ourselves (thanks to a gift card) to dinner. We were trying to decide between a long time favorite, Melting Pot, or this new one, Dressler's. Since Melting Pot only had a 3pm or 10pm reservation, we went with Dressler's. Oh and aren't we so glad we tried something new!
This place is delicious. Hands down every thing we ate was divine. That might sound dramatic, but it's true. We started with our appetizer selections of Thai Calamari and Goat Cheese & Garlic dip. Adam loves calamari and said it was the best he'd ever had, so I had to see for myself. Wow. Tender and full of flavor with the Thai and wasabi. This stuff was actually fork tender! Not that rubbery tentacly stuff you get at most places. And the Goat Cheese came hot with roasted garlic cloves to spread on pita points. Yum. The marriage of roasted garlic and warm goat cheese is a party in your mouth. We added a wedge salad to our fixed menu because we love wedges. And theirs is called the "wedgie." Gotta love a fancy restaurant that calls their salad a Wedgie. Lots of bacon and blue cheese to satisfy our pallet. Onto the main course. I chose the Maryland Style Crap cakes that came with a weak mescalin mix on the side. Not sure if it was a garnish or I should eat it. But the pecan remoulade was delicious and the cakes were meaty. So who cares about the lettuce on the side. Adam's Ribeye was a "Blackened Heart of Ribeye" that was thick like a filet but had all the good qualities of a Ribeye, served with asparagus and mashed potatoes. We finished off this meal with creme brulee and homemade carrot cake. I always think I don't like creme brulee, but I'm always surprised by the smoothie creaminess and crusted sugar. Apparently the owner's mom makes the carrot cake and it was pretty legit.

One thing I liked about this place was the location. There was live music out on the patio and it overlooked the Charlotte skyline. Something about it made me feel like we weren't in Charlotte but in some hip big city. Maybe we live in a big hip city and I don't even know it. I highly recommend this place. It's definitely pricey, and since Restaurant Week is over, you may have to save it for a special occasion.