I am so blessed to have awesome friends that I spent Valentine’s Day with and got to try out a new restaurant. After Bluephies closed down, two restaurants opened in its place. I had heard good things about Everly, so I was looking forward to this night.

Surprisingly this evening wasn’t overly busy with our 8 pm reservation. I was seated promptly as Andrew had already been shown our table. Nhi and Angie showed up shortly after. Everly was still offering the three-course menu from Restaurant Week, which Nhi and Angie obliged. Andrew and I decided to order off the dinner menu.

As a group, we decided to start with a bottle of Tempernillo. I had mentioned that it was considered a cheap wine according to my best friend’s French father-in-law who loved this particular type of wine. Angie was won over with the fact that it is considered cheap. I love red wine and this one definitely went well with dinner.

I ordered the Curry Samosas for my appetizer. The other appetizer ordered was fried gnocchi cheese. The Curry Samosas were delicious with the mint chutney-like dipping sauce that accompanied it. The fried gnocchi tasted like cheese curds. You could not go wrong with this appetizer. I was very impressed with the appetizers and looked forward to my entrée.

I decided on the Spicy Rigatoni for my main course. The spicy got me of course. It was topped with raw tuna and once mixed, perfectly cooked the tuna. Overall, it was good choice. However, the noodles were not evenly cooked. I had some rigatoni that were hard and trust me, not al dente. I also had to ask for Parmesan. Common its pasta, I shouldn’t have to wait for 5 minutes for my server to return so I could ask for it and she looked taken back when I did. The tomato-based sauce could have used more red pepper flakes because when I see spicy, I expect spicy. I guess this is what I get for ordering pasta from a non-Italian restaurant.

I really wanted a chocolate dessert that night but there wasn’t anything but a Chocolate Gelato, so I settled for that. I enjoyed the gelato and serving size was generous. Nhi had ordered a whipped crumble dessert, I don’t remember what it was called exactly, but it was delicious. The whipped heavy cream was light and airy which balanced out the berry sweetness of the dessert. I really regretted my decision once I had a bit of her dessert.

At the end of the evening, Andrew was kind enough to use a gift card he had received on us ladies. What a sweetheart! I was in great company and the food overall was good with some misses but I can let those go. The ambiance was great and would definitely be a place I would go to again.

https://everlymadison.com