Journey to Mars 2112

This evening we traveled to Times Square to visit the space-themed restaurant Mars 2112. Certainly one doesn't go to a place like this for the food; in fact anyone not accompanying male children under the age of 12 should automatically be barred at the door as a preemptive measure to prevent any misunderstandings related to the labeling and signage that indicates this is in any way related to the traditional meaning of "restaurant & bar."

Instead, this is of course an entertainment complex that happens to subsidize the cost of the various novelty decor, television displays, and pseudo entertainers in martian costumes through sales of food and beverage items. On this particular night it was my goal to entertain our six-year-old son, and having done some research on the place beforehand I was fully aware of the prospects going in. Thus expectations on the food front were low.

My rule in situations like these is to stick with the most basic items that are hard to mess up, and so we ordered the chicken fingers and a cheeseburger with swiss cheese and mushrooms for he and I respectively.

I always find the handling of a burger order to be a revealing indicator of the quality of a restaurant operation, specifically with regard to how thoroughly the meat is cooked. One option for the restaurant is not to ask and simply serve the burger well-done, which is the safest and hardest to botch from a safe food handling or competent preparation standpoint.

A restaurant that fancies itself a notch above fast food or entry-level family restaurant will ask the diner how they prefer the burger cooked. This gives the diner the impression that the kitchen is more sophisticated and accommodating, and if done correctly can result in a higher degree of customer satisfaction. On the other hand, going this route can is not without risk for the restaurant since they will have to ensure that a) the quality of the ingredients along with their handling and preparation are sufficient to ensure that the desired temperature can be achieved without making the diner violently ill, given that medium-rare and below precludes cooking the meat to the FDA-recommended 160F and b) the line cooks have the skill actually to come close to the requested temperature consistently. For me the worst is when I am asked how I want it (as long as I don't see any obvious warning signs I wil ask for medium-rare) and then have it delivered well done. Better not to ask than to set expectations and not deliver.

In this case I asked for medium-rare and the delivered product was a solid medium, which was a pleasant surprise given my expectations. The rest of the food on both our places (fries, chicken tenders) was competently deep-fried, and so we finished our meal without a major disappointment.

The most negative thing I found about the place was that the A-1 steak sauce on the table was clearly stretched very thin through and showed substantial dilution. I expect that kind of thing from a public school cafeteria, but it should be absolutely forbidden in commercial restaurant operation.

On the whole, I would probably avoid eating there again, but doing so wouldn't be the worst thing in the world (or on mars).