Review: Brasa

Surprised my boyfriend in Durham for the weekend while he was on business. He spoke highly of Brasa from previous business trips and I couldn’t wait to go with him.

The embiance was great – dark, but not too dark. Our waiter was Jay and he was fantastic from the moment we sat down. He was friendly and informative. He put a napkin over my purse, which was on the chair next to me, so “meat juice” would not get on it! I have never seen that kind of attention to detail at any restaurant, ever. Jay constantly made himself available for any questions or new plates or new drinks. He was NOT one of those obnoxious waiters, though. He was in the right place at the right time. Jay had another guy working with him to bring the meats as his partner that night. I don’t remember his name but he was also very polite.

Jay recommended the house drink Caipirinha, which my boyfriend ordered. And I had the Skinny Margarita, which was actually made with fresh squeezed limes/lemons! When I asked for the recipe, Jay went to speak to the bartender and wrote down all the ingredients and directions. I hope this doesn’t get Jay in trouble – it was a bonus for me to be able to replicate this drink at home!

Jay also made wine suggestions and brought a couple for me to try to decide which one I wanted.

The extensive salad and small appatizer bar was huge with a ton of stuff! Salads and shrimp croquettes, guacamole and wild rice…and more. It was all very tasty. It might have even been the best part….

The meat was good but not great. I feel like we missed out on a bunch of different meats for some reason. We had the house special, filet mignon, sausage, and two different styles of chicken. We were offered lamb, but we declined. The meats we had were of average flavor. One delivery was cold, and they promptly brought us new, hot ones, with many apologies.

We has some hazelnut ganache thing and a strawberry tiramisu for dessert. We liked the ganache better- it was pretty freaking awesome.

I have to say that it is Jay and his team, and the salad bar, that really earned all four of my stars. Jay aside, the rest of the staff seemed friendly and polite, like gentleman, considerately stepping out of the way as we walked by, smililng, and saying hello.

I think the flavor of the meats at the Brazilian Steak House in Woburn was much better, honestly. But Brasa won me over with everything else.