Day 55: Cartoon Review, circa 2009

I went to Circa today for the last of my Tuesday lunches with Steinberg (who just started his own blog!). I was greeted warmly by the management there and we chatted for a bit about their various offerings. They told me that the new Circa will be opening on Sept 1st with a salad bar, pizza bar, pasta bar, sandwiches etc, so those of you who work downtown should look out for that in the Fall. Circa had a split pea soup today, so I tasted it. It was pretty good, but I decided that it was too hot out for a soup lunch. Steinberg and I both opted for pastas – I got the whole wheat penne ala vodka from the Make-Your-Own-Pasta bar, and Steinberg ordered the penne-al-fredo with tomato sauce from the Entrées, which came with his choice of side dish (mashed potatoes in this case). We also split a side order of roasted sweet potatoes and butternut squash. I noticed that while Steinberg’s pasta had the benefit of coming with a side dish, my plate seemed more overflowingly full. And my order was cheaper. So if you really like variety, the entrée pasta with a side is a good choice, but if you can handle only straight up pasta with no add-ons, the pasta bar is a better value. The roasted veges were very tasty. I preferred the sweet potato but Steinberg liked the squash better. I think the potato was a bit sweeter (figures), but ‘berg thought that the squash had a little “somethin’-somethin’ ”. He always likes that little somethin’-somethin’.