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The Cayman Islands Restaurant & Dining Reviews
Mezza 09/30/2003
Reviewers Rating:  Excellent
We discovered Mezza while picking up a bottle of champagne at Big Daddy's liquor. It is right on the main strip of SMB and very convenient to all of the resorts and hotels. We just kind of happened by, checked out the menu and decided to go back later that night. We are most pleased that we did.
The place is really quite nice. Dimly lit so kind of romantic with funky lights everywhere and candles on the tables in shades of dark blue and red to compliment the booths and table linens. It was clean, open and inviting (ohhh, and did I say CLEAN...clean is good!).
The service was wonderful! The greeter (possibly one of the owners) got us a booth immediately (although it was the off season and we were only the 3rd couple in the place!!). Our waiter was also fantastic. He went over the specials and a few items not available that night. He made recommendations. And here is the big thing - he was not put off that I don't drink with dinner and that my husband only drinks generally two beers. Something I noticed in more than a few places in Grand Cayman is that the service can drop to virtually nothing if they don't think you are going to run up a tab of alcohol (that was our experience at 3 restaurants...one very well known one that I will review later). Anyway, regardless of this, he provided top notch service the whole time and we really appreciated his efforts.
We ordered a lobter and artichoke dip for an appetizer. I thought it was good although lacking salt. It was served with what seemed like freshly fried white, green and blue tortilla chips. They also give you thinly sliced french bread with a scallion-lemon butter both before and then again during dinner. We were impressed that they didn't just throw down the obligatory basket of rolls and call it a day. They took away the old basket with still a piece in it and our bread plates/knives and returned with a fresh, warm basket of bread and clean plates/knives just before dinner arrived. It was a nice touch.
My dinner was a cheddar mashed potato topped with freshly sauteed vegetables and chicken breast stuffed with spinach and cranberries. It had a sauce, which I was not particularly fond of, but another thing I noticed about Cayman was that almost everything came in a sauce (I'm not particularly fond of sauces...at least not the kinds we were getting down there). And I thought my chicken was a little dry and tough, but like I mentioned in another review, for some reason every chicken dish I had while there seemed dry and tough. I wonder if it might just be the kind of chicken they import or maybe that they just focus more on seafood or maybe it is just me. My husband had a sesame noodle dish topped with mahi mahi. I only tried the noodles, which were very good, but he said the whole thing was really good.
We decided all in all, this was our favorite dinner on the island. The location, service and atmosphere certainly get 4+ stars from us. I would probably only give the food 3 stars, but my overall rating is still 4 stars because some of the things I didn't like about the food might just be my personal tastes. I would still go back to this place in a heartbeat (let me add that I would certainly go here over The Grand Old House any day!!).
One appetizer (a US $14 one!), 2 entrees and 2 beers (too full for dessert) plus an approximate 23% tip came to US $80 making this place also quite the bargain for Grand Cayman, in my opinion! We highly recommend it.
Happy travels!
Cindy
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