Last Saturday Stanley and I took the train to Belmar to visit our friends Janice and Eric, and we had dinner at Skratch. The menu combines Italian with Cajun. It was generally excellent, with only one misstep. Stanley had a fig appetizer which he liked a lot. I had artichoke hearts coated with goat cheese and lemon, wrapped in prosciutto and grilled. That was the only disappointment, as the goat cheese was overpowering and the prosciutto too salty.

For mains, I had shrimp and grits and he had a pork loin special. Both very good, and we took half home for another dinner.

Janice and Eric shared fried calamari (a massive plate) and both had a scallop special. They enjoyed all of it. We took a couple bites of their pistachio tiramisu, which was impressive.

Skratch is a bring your own restaurant, so you can save some money by bringing a nice wine.

https://www.skratchkitch.com/

Thanks to Ziggy on Hungry Onion we tried Bananas last week, and it was a wow. The rare restaurant week menu that actually offers good value, and plenty of choices.

We ordered one menu and an additional main course, for the 2 of us to share. It was plenty of food. The menu begins with 2 starters, shrimp chips with shrimp dip, and chicken on a pancake. We chose the char siu pork with caramelized bananas and garlic rice, and for the second main course (not on the RW menu), we got the shrimp and shrimp wonton etouffe. For dessert we chose the frozen banana and they brought out one for each of us.

Wine is pricey but we enjoyed a bottle of a Hungarian white. Overall good value and the food is delicious.

Service was excellent too, and it turned out the hostess knew us from Do Wha, our favorite Korean restaurant which unfortunately closed several years ago.

https://www.bananasrestaurant.com/