Category : JP, New Bridge Cafe, Review, Rockport, Roy Moore
OU's bye week, so in what's becoming sort of a tradition we took Saturday off from college football and went to Rockport for some lobster.
Roy Moore
Our first review of Roy Moore can be found here. I can say nothing has changed in one year. $12 for one lobster is a great bargain. We got one a piece and went onto their back deck and went to town. 
I've gone lobster crazy in the past year. Basically since I've been to Roy Moore for the first time, I've just been wanting lobster, lobster, lobster. I'm amazed that I used to think lobster was overrated and too much work. Now I know how to pick clean a lobster in just a few minutes. Good stuff. Roy Moore's is one of the top 5 destination for anyone visiting New England.
Blacksmith Restaurant
After the lobsters, we were still kinda hungry so we walked around to find a a spot that had a nice view and decent prices. We walked up into the Blacksmith, which seemed promising due to some nice lunch specials under $10. The mainly empty dining room was wide open with large windows lining the entire wall. This gave a great view of the ocean. Because it was lunch we had to order at the front and sit down while we wait for our meal. This is fine, but the fact that she told us to sit down first seemed odd. We probably could have just looked at the menu then and there and ordered. I noticed a group that came in later had issues with this ordering system. They sat down with their menus and were loudly complaining that the waitress was not coming to them. Eventually the waitress informed them they had to order up front. Again, not the biggest of deals to us, but I can see how it can be confusing.
Abby went with the blackened Haddock and I went with the fried shrimp box. Both comes with french fries. Abby also got the Lobster Ale from Shipyard and I got a kolsch style ale. Both beers were $6, so not the greatest of bargain there. The fried shrimp were pretty good, the light batter coming apart slightly when touched with a fork. The fries were handcut fries with the skin still on and were good and salty. I just wished they would have let the fries rest a bit after they were in the fryer to drain some of the oil because only a few fries were crunchy and the rest slightly soggy. Abby liked her haddock very much, but was not a fan of the lettuce and tomato that was in the sandwich.
I probably wouldn't make it a point to come here again, since there are other places I'd like to try in the area, but it wasn't a bad lunch at all. I'm sure the prices are a little bit more during high season, but the lunch specials weren't badly priced at all. I give the Blacksmith Restaurant a 3 out of 5.
The Blacksmith does have a very nice and clean bathroom, which must have been common knowledge because I witnessed no less than 4 people who walked in from the street just to use the restroom.
New Bridge Cafe
The famous New Bridge Cafe in Chelsea. The famous steak tips. I was given a recipe for steak tips a couple of years ago and when I googled steak tips recipes to find out if it's common to use Coca Cola in the marinade I found out that this was the basis of the secret New Bridge Cafe recipe. So I tried it out and DAMN was it incredible on the steak tips. Driving home along Route 1 we decided to hit up the famous restaurant for dinner.
We arrive and this place is a dive on the outside and a dive on the inside. (Not that that is a bad thing...in fact we were hoping it would be a dive.) We parked on the street and walked in to a bar area that leads to the receptionist area. And the receptionist is one of those cool, old, angry, surly women that you see in older diners and cafes. Immediately a good sign. It took a while for her to get our name because she was running around getting bread and utensils to other tables, but once we got our name in (and by this time there were at least 5 other groups lined up behind us waiting to do the same) it only took about 5 minutes or so before our table was ready. Quick turn around means another good sign.
There was no question on what we were ordering. I got my steak tips with the salad and Abby got hers with the french fries. We also ordered the home made root beer. (Diet for Abby.) It did take a while for our food to arrive, but this gave us time to look around at the other diners and the cafe itself. Multiple TVs with the game on and tons of Pats, Red Sox, Bruins and Celtics memorabilia around. There was a table setup for 6 behind us with only 2 people sitting there waiting for their friends. As the veteran receptionist walked by to clean and setup other tables she kept giving them looks of pure evil. And I can understand why. I mean, you show up without your whole party and you take up a table that can be sat and cleared by the time your late friends even arrive is clearly a justifiable reason why the waiters and receptionist are giving you ice dagger looks every time they are near you. (We were done with our meal and were leaving right when their final friend showed up.)
Anyway, while we were waiting on our dinner, we picked at the bread. As you can tell, the bread is nothing special and no plates came out with the basket...and again, this was perfectly fine by us. We already know what type of place this is once we walked through those doors, no need for them to change and give us plates. The root beer was pretty good and sweet and we couldn't tell any noticeable difference between the diet and regular.
Our dinners arrive and Abby gets the biggest french fry wedges of all time. We get about 6 or 7 tips along with pretty big sides. I ordered mine medium rare and the wife goes for medium. However, after our first few bites, we noticed that it didn't really matter how we ordered them. Each tip we had were all different temperatures. Medium, rare, medium well. None were well done though, and all were still very juicy and nicely cooked with some good charred bits. I noticed this on the menu: 
If the pic is too small, it says "Not responsible for well done orders." And I love it! No one should ever order anything well done. Bourdain talks about how restaurants will give the scrap meat leftover from butchering the nicer cuts to the well done ordering customers since they are just going to fry/bake/broil the hell out of it into a disgusting brown/black piece of crap. Even the New Bridge Cafe adheres to this rule.
Overall the steak tips were very good. Juicy with fantastic flavors that were similar to my own steak tips but with that added "something" that makes it restaurant style more than home style. The salad was a typical salad, but large in portion with a very nice homemade dressing. I did get a couple of pieces of steak that were gristly, but that didn't stop me from devouring it. Other menu items include Italian favorites and chicken or lamb tips in the same marinade. And the portions are huge. A couple next to us received Italian entrees big enough to feed families.
New Bridge Cafe is a local favorite and well known throughout New England as the place to get steak tips. This is a very deserving title. I will be back here. I give New Bridge Cafe a 4 out of 5.
