Ail Y’Ail Y’Ail!

Shannon's friend is visiting us for a week. She arrived later than expected tonight because she had to drive some guys she met on the plane to their hotel since they had got drunk along the flight and had already arranged a rental car. We had settled on a Portuguese type grill restaurant, but since we already went to Janos not too long ago, I wanted to go somewhere different. So I hauled them both on a 20 minute walk through the city to find this tiny little place I'd heard good reviews of called Ail Y'ail Y'ail (Garlic Garlic Garlic in French, basically). I was ready to settle for any old grill until I read that you could adjust your personal heat level from jalapeno to habanero, which pushed me over the edge after I was already in the mood for something garlicky. They could've gone somewhere else without me!

The interior and exterior was nothing like I had pictured from what I'd read. I wasn't expecting anything glamorous since it seemed like a bar and grill type place, but the whole restaurant sat maybe 6 or 7 tables and the signage was a simple banner hanging above the single pane window. I tried to decide between several tapas that looked appetizing, but I ended up going with the table d'hote (house special), with "extra spicy" curried shrimp. I wasn't really sure what I was implying by that, but figured they'd make it "extra spicy" somehow without killing me.

Apparently the dinner came with wine, which I hadn't read about, but I'm not going to deny free wine. It was like a sparkling apple sort of thing. I haven't even had a desire for my usual after dinner brandy since my weekend hangover, so I took a sip and passed it off to Shannon, who was already becoming inebriated from a capirihna. Her entree was chorizo sausage which she asked for being "medium spicy". It was "very spicy" and was flambéed in a vodka sauce. I took this as an indicator of how "extra spicy" mine would be and hoped for the best.

I ate my clams in white wine (and garlic, of course), which were very salty; chorizo, which is so much different than what I know chorizo to be like and not nearly as spicy as Shannon's; and some mushroom rice, which was basically mushrooms in rice. Along came the shrimp and I braced myself. There were chunks of a green chili in it. I took a taste of the sauce furthest from the chili and was not immediately scorched, so I popped a whole shrimp in my mouth. The flavor was nice, like a garlicky curry, but it was not particularly spicy. I ate the pepper itself and it was just a jalapeno. So that was a little disappointing and we reckoned that maybe the chorizo spiciness and my shrimp spiciness got mixed up in translation.

I was not altogether that impressed with the restaurant, especially because we expected large portions of grilled meat, which is not what was on the menu. For the price we paid we could've eaten at a much nicer establishment, so I can't imagine ever going back.