I wrote recently about the one year anniversary of my angioplasty and about how my life has changed in the past 12 months. Although it wasn’t intended as such, the Morton’s steak house chain gave me a gift for that anniversary. It promoted Aug. 13 as national fillet mignon day and offered mini-fillets for $1.
I didn’t expect much for $1, but I’m not supposed to eat more than six ounces of red meat a week anyway, so I was just happy to be able to walk into a restaurant at lunchtime and order something beside salad. The special was only available at the bar, so that’s where I sat. I also spent $4.75 for a diet Coke. I asked the bartender how much the minis weighed and she just shrugged and so I ordered four to start, thinking they might be an ounce each.
You judge from the photo, each came on a sliced piece of Italian bread and was basically two pieces of steak, done rare as I requested. I left most of the bread since white bread is off my diet these days but indulged myself with two pieces of it.
As goofy as they were, and with the memory of the two-pound prime rib I had on my 50th birthday 10 years ago as a counter-point, I still loved them. It was nice to be sitting in the bar of an upscale steak house feeling like one of the normal people again. So thank you Morton’s. I’ve held a warm spot for you ever since my 23rd birthday when my grad school classmates took me to the original Morton’s in Chicago for a steak dinner. It was nice to be back for a day.
John
