I was really excited to try Noca after hearing so many good things about it. I bought the groupon for it as it was the only way I could afford this place and wanted to go for a late V day dinner with the BF. So we got there and, as others have said, it's in a strip mall, but it looks nice enough inside. We were seated and got the big bottle of water. They brought out an amuse bouche to start which was a blue cheese, apple, and nut... thing (hard to describe) and it was good despite neither of us being blue cheese fans. So I ordered the clam chowda soup to start and it was not so great. It didn't taste like any clam chowder I've ever had. It just kind of tasted like paprika.. and the potatoes were all thin and looked cute in the bottom of the bowl, but had no flavor as they would have had if they were cooked in the chowder. After the soup they brought a little taste of a parsnip soup. This was the best thing we had all night.... mmmm. For mains I ordered the hangar steak with carrots, broccolini, polenta, and some kind of wine reduction and the BF ordered a pork chop with rice, greens, and celery root puree. My food was good, the steak had good seasoning and the polenta was really good (when often it isn't that good). The broccolini tasted kind of weird though... like it was a little burnt. The bfs on the other hand was not so good. The pork chop tasted good at the beginning, but as he got closer to the bone it was basically raw. Like mushy and pink... not gonna eat that. Also the rice tasted dirty and weird. The puree was really good though. So then they brought out the cotton candy which was fine, but not necessary. For dessert we ordered sticky toffee pudding at the waiter's recommendation, and it was good. Very different than most desserts, so we appreciated that. So overall the service was really good, creepily good, our water was always full, but the food just didn't impress, especially for the price. \n\n\nThe BF picked up Filibertos on the way home... ha.
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