Lidia's Pittsburgh

Welcome to the weekend! Last weekend Miss Kitty and I wanted to do some shopping in the Strip District (get your minds out of the gutter - The Strip is the food market section of Pittsburgh) and decided to treat ourselves to the weekend brunch served at Lidia's. What follows is what I jotted down in my journal after lunch:
12:37pm
Brunch special at Lidia's, 3 courses of perfection with salad-antipasta, choice of entree, choice of dessert and a complimentary mimosa. The 1st course was an imaginative assortment of fresh or grilled greens with egg (and without) and cold sliced meats. I particularly liked the egg with asparagus, just delicious and subtly seasoned.
Next up, MK ordered the stuffed manicotti and I picked the three pasta trio (yes, it is called that, despite the redundancy), a sampling of three very different pasta based dishes. The polenta with braised lamb was so delicious that I wanted to lick the plate, followed by ribbon pasta tossed in a light tomato sauce with pulled pork and chicken livers. I've had this last dish at Lidia's before and I have to say that if there is one plate of pasta that I could eat over and over, this would be it. Absolutely outstanding! The third serving of pasta was a real disappointment. I had been forewarned by our server that there was some sort of problem in the kitchen with that dish, and when they brought it out, I thought, how bad can it be? Bad. Bow-tie pasta with sauteed broccoli and spinach that tasted like a tin can. MK tasted it and we agreed that the spinach must've been scorched or something. Really awful. But given how great the first two servings of pasta had been I wasn't hungry anymore anyway, so I was less upset than if this had been the first thing served to me.
Even though I was stuffed, we visited the dessert table where we both got the almond cake with cream cheese icing. Almost as good as what my mom makes, which is saying a lot because no one bakes the way my mother does.