At Samba grill- like most of the Brazilian Steakhouse chains, there is an indicator on your table that tells the servers when you are ready for more meat, and when you do not want any more meat. At Samba, there is a light on your tabletop. It is clear, or neutral when you have not begun your main course yet (i.e. when you are eating from the Salad Bar), green when you are ready for more meat, and red when you want to stop. There is a little switch on it to push to change colors. A great system!
While we were waiting for our drinks, the dancer stopped by. She asked if either of us wanted to learn the Samba! Actually if I had been less hot and in more comfortable shoes, I might have gone for it, but I declined. She did pose for a picture though! Some tables did take her up on the lessons, just a short little combination of footwork she spent about 5 minutes per table teaching it. A nice touch!
Our drinks came out shortly. They did have iced tea here- (I expected they would, as the Solarium Bistro does also by day). We also both ordered a Caipirinha- which is the Brazilian National Drink, made of limes, sugar, and sugarcane rum. We had never had them before but were trying to be authentic with our experience. I expected it to be quite sweet, but on the contrary it was tangy, sour and quite boozy. Neither of us cared much for it, but we drank it anyway.
Our server- who actually turned out to be our assistant server/our Gaucho explained to us the process and invited us to visit the salad bar. Oh, that salad bar! Do your best not to fill up at it, because so much more is awaiting you, but it is really an amazing selection:
Bread & Cheese:
Salad:
Deli Meats:
Salmon on the left and the delicious little Garlic Toasts on the right (served with olive and mushroom tapenades).
Seafood:
Desserts:
My appetizer plate. Ron warned me not to fill up on that stuff and I scoffed.
(Yeah, he was totally right!!!)
After we finished our appetizer plates, we turned the green light on and the carnivore feast began!
First out came the sauces, seen in the picture below on the left. The top (green) one was Chimichurri which had a savory herb pesto type flavor, the middle coarse Sea Salt, and the bottom (red) one was Tomatilla (rich tomatoey flavor). These could be used with any of the meats you wished, but our Gaucho was sure to suggest which sauces properly complemented each of the meat options.
In the center of this picture you can see a plate of grilled veggies which consisted of corn, onion, squash, eggplant, and of course- the ever present RCCL halved tomatoes (EVERYWHERE!) LOL!
Also brought out was a serving of fries and fried plantains to share. Frankly we didnt waste much time or belly space on the veggies or starches
because
.
Here comes the meat!!!
This first cut of meat was the Picanha. This is top sirloin and is billed as Samba Grills signature cut of meat. I did think it was delicious. It was juicy and quite flavorful. Our Gaucho paid close attention to how we liked our meat (Ron Med to Med-Rare and me Med-Well), and he would always bring out a skewer with meat that had one side uncut so I could have the outside cut of meat, and one side cut closer down for Ron to also have it cooked to his preference. Great service!
Be sure to have your little tongs ready and grab the piece of meat before it falls to the plate. I let my first few cuts fall before I realized I was supposed to be all up in there with my tongs.
Tongs, dont be shy!
More, please!
The next cut was Fraldinha, which is bottom sirloin. This was delicious as well, but we both preferred the Picanha that came before it.
Next up is the Frango, tender wrapped chicken breast in bacon. To die for!
I was ALREADY getting so full! We are not even halfway done, here folks!!!
Here comes the Cordeiro (Lamb Chops) I passed this up since I was closing in on my limit, but Ron had two of these and said they were fantastic!!!
Next out was the Beef Tenderloin. Along with the Frango (chicken), this was my favorite. So tender I could cut it with my spoon, smooth, creamy texture, just enough spice encrusting it. It literally melted in my mouth. If I wasnt already SO FULL I would have had more..And MORE!
At this point my Red light was permanently on. I could take no more. Our table light stayed green for Ron though, since there were several more types of meat to sample!
Next came the Costelo, fall off the bone, juicy beef ribs. Ron thought these were spectacular. I love ribs, but not enough to split my stomach in two so I didnt try them.
Following the ribs was the Alcarta- more top sirloin. Ron said it tasted much like the rest of the sirloin. He wanted more lamb & ribs, LOL!
Then out came the Lombo: Parmesan cheese and herb crusted pork loin. Im sorry I was too bloated to even pick up the camera at this point! Haha! Ron said it was good!
Did you think we were finally done?? Of COURSE not, silly! Finally the Linguigo- Brazilian style cured pork sausage came to our table.
(Will it stop now? I surrender already!!!)
But no, our beloved skewer brandishing Gaucho wanted to know if there were any particular cuts of meat wed like more of (and to gently chide us to leave room for dessert. Hey dude, thanks, but its a little too late for that now!) Ron did take a little more of his three favorites: the lamb, ribs, and tenderloin.
Please no more!
Dessert selections were soon presented to us. There was a flan (a lot of flan on this boat. And tomatoes!), a Passion fruit Mango mousse (if I recall correctly) and a Chocolate Torte. We were brought one of each, which was more than enough. I didnt even try the flan, which Ron said tasted better than the one the evening before at Ritas. The passion fruit mousse was good, but after one bite we saved the rest for later. The only dessert item we really dug into was the chocolate torte- which was delicious. It was such a shame I was too full to eat more than a bite or two.
We were also offered an after dinner shot (at an extra cost, I think $5) called a Make Me Happy. It had a chocolate/caramel/ Kahlua flavor and was quite good.
I was beginning to think that they would have to roll us out of this restaurant like Violet Beauregard after she turned into the blueberry in Willy Wonka, but somehow we managed to make it out under our own power. What a fantastic meal! Completely worth the $25 cover in our opinion and a steal at the discounted price of $12.50 each that we paid. Absolutely outstanding!!
Up Next: The Stuff We Did, and the Stuff We Didn't