Welcome to Tampa - Edison Food + Drink Lab!

It's not that often that I find myself extremely excited about the opening of a restaurant and I usually give it a good month before I visit a new venue. Not the case with Edison Food + Drink Lab in Tampa. I went with a group of foodies on the second night of it being opened.

Here is why I love going to dinner with foodies - foodies share food. There were 5 of us in total. Leslie, Abigail, Matt and Zach. We each picked items on the menu that looked good and interesting to us and we shared them family style.

Starting off with the appetizers, we split Cracked conch and bacon fritters, Duck confit foie gras tacos, Goat cheese truffles, Potato crusted oysters and Meyers tenderloin tartare with kim chee.

Top L-R Cracked Conch Fritters, Duck Confit Tacos. Bottom L-R Goat cheese truffles, Potato crusted oysters

Of the five the oysters and the tacos were my stand out favorites but the tartare was more photogenic so it got the alone shot.

After raving over the appetizers, we had a longer than normal wait for our entrees. This is to be expected with a brand new restaurant though. We decided to grab four entrees and three side dishes. The three sides chosen were Chick Pea fries, glazed baby roots and caramelized brussels sprouts with lamb bacon. The Chick Pea fries were TO. DIE. FOR. I am not commenting on the roots and the sprouts as I didn't give them much attention. I encourage anyone to go to get these bad boys:

Chick Pea Fries

The four entrees selected were Lobster gazpacho, Corn flake sweet corn crusted yellow eye snapper, Huevos rancheros with grilled house chorizo and Sous vide + buttermilk fried organic chicken (a/k/a chicken and waffles). The Chicken and waffles had to be the best I have ever tasted. It was drizzled with truffle honey and was simply out of this world. The girls really liked the Huevos rancheros. All in all, the entire table seemed to really enjoy everything we tried. 

Top L-R Lobster Gazpacho, Corn Flake crusted yellow eye snapper. Bottom - Huevos rancheros

Try not to drool on your keyboard:

Sous vide + buttermilk fried organic chicken.

Here's the kicker - I have wanted to go to a place that has molecular gastronomy enhanced milkshakes for quite sometime. I missed out in Atlanta at Flip Burger. Well they have them at Edison. I was determined to try the peanut butter chicory N2 shake. That didn't happen (blame the large amounts of food consumed above).

I will be returning to Edison. They have yet to receive their liquor license but they had a nice wine list. We were told by our server they will have a full bar within a few weeks and I am curious to see if they will be competing with the specialty drinks of Side Berns. Congrats Chef Jeannie Pierola, you look to have a winner with Edison.