It has been our tradition to celebrate Valentine's Day early, at least the dinner part, which affords us a quieter atmosphere, usually better service, a more relaxed pace, and in general a better time. Since Valentine's Day is on a Tuesday this year we decided to celebrate on Sunday, allowing us to take an earlier dinner than if we waited for me to come home from work. One would assume that deciding on a Sunday would afford us a larger range of times to pick for dinner, and possibly a larger array of locations, since we'd have time to drive to the restaurant. We have made a southern trek to Novak's to enjoy some good Hungarian food a couple of times, and made a northern trek to Gustav's and enjoyed good German fare last year. This year we didn't feel much like spending our afternoon in the car.

Somehow the day was shortened. After going to late service at church we found the day was nearly half over, and it had only just begun. We spent some of our afternoon socializing with some friends over lunch, and then the day really was half over. As Holly had a busy day on Saturday attending a company meeting for her job she really wanted to go home and take a nap, and in the end we were not all that interested in making any trip longer than ten minutes to go out to dinner. As it turns out that was to our favor.

Holly has been wanting to try out a couple of restaurants here in Salem that we have not yet paid a visit to, and likewise I have a couple I would really like to sample. After a fair amount of research we had narrowed down our choices to Davinci's Ristorante, Old Europe Inn, and one of the two McMenamins Pubs. Pub fare, while good, is not really romantic enough for the occasion, so despite Holly's assurance to the contrary I scratched that off my list (though it looks like I might get to go on Tuesday anyway). It turns out Old Europe Inn was closed on Sundays so we made reservations at Davinci's.

The restaurant itself is quite nice. The decor is sophisticated, what you can see of it. It seems they have taken the notion that dim lighting is romantic, and in an effort to be even more romantic dimmed the lights even more, hoping that the ratio to illumination and romance is linear. While this might be true if your date is rather homely, or the food is unappealing, or the silverware is dirty, other than that there is a limit to how dim a place should be; Davinci's was right at that limit. I heard at least one person exclaim they could not read the menu, and I confess I had to squint a couple of times before my eyes adjusted; perhaps 7 more watts to each lamp would have been sufficient to offer that perfect balance of romance and visibility, after all one must be certain of who one is romancing.

As to be expected with fancy restaurants the food menu was limited, while the wine list seemed rather unlimited. As was rather unexpected none of the meals came with anything other than the complimentary and freshly made flat-bread. A twenty dollar meal stands on its own and should you wish a salad be prepared to exchange your green bills for green lettuce at a nearly even exchange. The food itself was quite excellent. I chose the smoked duck breast over noodles, cooked with cherries and port wine, and it was quite good. Holly opted for the seafood pasta and was surprised with prawns descended from Goliath, to which she was quite happy.

We nearly had the restaurant to ourselves, and certainly had our section to ourselves for quite some time, and this was at the usual dinner hour on a Sunday. When we first arrived I feared they were not yet open or just closed as it seemed quite empty. What I did not know was the dining was done on the loft area above, leaving the bottom floor to the bar and the kitchen. This was rather nice actually, and really made for a more private dining experience since we didn't notice the door or any of the traffic outside.

In the end I thought the food was about $5 too expensive per plate. It was good food, good atmosphere, and great service – not once did my water glass even reach half-full. The problem is it was not as good as you have to pay, but nearly so. We'll probably go back, sometime in the future, should they still be in business when we can afford to spend $70 on dinner. As to the romantic atmosphere, it helps if you brush up on your Emily Post before going as you'll feel like you need it, and that might impact the romance of the experience.