My great-aunt Flora loved good food. She grew up in Center City Philadelphia, in a household that kept a Chinese cook. Both her parents were physicians and when Flora was old enough, she too went to medical school (she would have preferred to be an anthropologist). Though she did learn to cook, she preferred restaurants to her home kitchen.

By the time I was old enough to dine with Flora, she’d been married three times, was retired from her psychiatry practice and no longer went out in the evenings. However, that didn’t stop her from eating good food. It just meant that she frequented any fine dining establishment that served lunch.

Thanks to this early conditioning, I see nothing wrong with taking the time to eat well at lunch. And so, when I got an offer to come and try the new lunch time “Plates” menu at The Capital Grille, I was thrilled to accept.

The idea behind the “Plates” menu is that busy working folks want to occasionally have a nice lunch, but are nearly always pressed for time. With this three-item fixed price menu, you can easily have a lovely lunch and still get back to the office within an hour.

You choose between three soups/salads, three sandwiches and three sides that change seasonally. While we were there, the first course options were a green salad (that’s what I ordered) a roasted red pepper soup (Scott picked that one) and clam chowder.

For the second course, we chose between a tenderloin sandwich (that was my pick), a Wagyu cheeseburger with a drippy fried egg (Scott got that) and a lobster roll (it was hard to decide!). Sides were truffled fries (Scott), crisp green beans (mine) and roasted root vegetables (they sounded good, but I was going for green).

We ended up also getting dessert, though that was not included in the $18 fixed price. We got the creme brulee and the cheesecake and both were dreamy. Other extras we tried were the housemade fruit sodas (grapefruit! mint lemonade!), fresh mozzarella wrapped in prosciutto and nibbles from the bread basket. Delicious, all of them.

I was entirely impressed by the meal at The Capital Grille. It’s a chain and in a city so full of wonderful independent restaurants, I rarely consider the chains when looking for a place to eat. However, from service to food, this experience was so pleasant. Both Scott and I would be happy to go back again in the future.

Disclosure: The Capital Grille comped our meal from beginning to end. However, my opinions remain entirely my own.