We went to Dahlia Lounge for my birthday celebration. With an 8:30pm reservation on a Saturday night, we were not seated until 9pm. The mussel in chowder appetizer had great flavors, and the bread at the bottom of the dish was soaked with all the essence of that dish. I had the Pacific black cod, which was pink in the center when it came. I asked another server who passed by about the pink color. He said with a sorry smile on his face that their cod is usually cooked through and should not be pink. He took the dish back but 10-15 min later I received another cod that was even more pink in the center with very crispy outer skin. I inquired our server about the pink color, and she checked it with the kitchen. The reply I got was the fish was pink because it was very fatty, but it was properly cooked. So I ate the fish, along with the lemon grass and mashed celery root that had great flavors. They did not charge us for the cod at the end. I've never had a white fish that was pink in the center when properly cooked, and as far as I know cod is not very fatty on the fatty fish scale. It felt like very high heat was used to cook the fish, so the outer skin was very crispy but the inside was still pink (not done?). My boyfriend had the medium rare sirloin steak, which was very ""moo"" (rare) when it came. The creme caramel dessert was very dense and tasty. All the dishes had excellent flavors and were very tasty. Granted I do not know if fatty cod should remain pink in the center when properly cooked, but this still poked a hole in the overall dining experience. I probably will not visit Dahlia Lounge again, but will probably try Etta's (another Tom Douglas' restaurant) that is more specialized in seafood. If incident similar to ""pink cod"" happens again, I'll probably not visit any of Tom Douglas' restaurant ever again in the future.
Pros: great flavors
Cons: not seated promtply even with a reservation
more