Happy Anniversary- 8 years

So on August 21st Stan and I celebrated our wedding anniversary of 8 years!! That has gone by so fast and I am happy to say I really lucked out marrying him. I married Stan fast and furious with nothing on either of our resumes. He turned out to be an Oxford graduate, a fantastic father, and an ever dotting husband. Which is funny because I am NOT a romantic and sometimes I feel like Stan may be under-appreciated with all his genuine efforts to show his affection.

This picture gets me every time, it says "faithful until death" and we took it while dating and I never thought anything about it until after we were married and I saw it! Cute hu!

Anyway, to celebrate we ate out at Tetsuya's. Always a top 10 and sometimes a top 5 best restaurant in the world. It only serves degustation (which take 4 hours) and there are 11-13 courses. We were given a gift card from work (Stan was floored) and finally had an event big enough to use it! This was probably the nicest place I have ever eaten and there was a big difference between this restaurant and other nice ones that I have eaten at.

The experience was completely effortless. For instance, the restaurant was gated. When we drove up, the gates opened up and our car was immediately taken to valet parking. We told them our name and while walking into the restaurant we were greeted by about 7-13 people lined along the wall of the restaurant. They all knew who we were (greeting us by name) and that we were celebrating our anniversary. We were taken to the corner area, quite secluded, overlooking the Japanese gardens. This picture is no good, we were there at night and it was all light up and we could see into the coy pond over that mini pagoda.

It was very romantic. Each course was brought to us by a different waiter who told us the name and all the ingredients. We were then brought a menu with our name on it which also read "Happy Anniversary" and a list of everything we got to eat (we got to take this home with us). The menu also included a complimentary dessert made for us due to this special event.

When we were done eating, they brought the bill and when they saw we were paying with a gift card they made the valet parking, drinks and anything additional from what the gift card covered complementary. We were shocked! When we told them we were finished eating, again, everything was effortless. On our way out we were again greeted by the staff by name, given our coats and our car was waiting for us. All within a minute (or less) from leaving our table.

Aside from the ease of dinning, the food was amazing! The first course was a chestnut soup, which I can still taste in my mouth. Stan and I still talk about it. The lady in the table behind us was almost in tears while talking to the waitress about how AMAZING the food was (but I guess you would have to be to make top 5 in the world). The dishes were truly artistic let alone the placement of every herb and sauce etc... Here are some pictures I found online but they don't do the experience justice!

Since Tetsuya's is Japanese, we had about 5 courses of fish (most cooked, some raw) and it was amazing because none of it ever tasted fishy. I am not a fish person and I could eat everything easily! The butter dish had truffles mixed with it (which I LOVE) and I kept thinking (don't get full on bread, there are 13 courses...but then the butter tasted so good I kept buttering every bite).

All I can say is, if you ever get a chance GO. It is a once in a lifetime thing to do (mostly because it is so expensive) http://www.tetsuyas.com/ Everyone gets the same thing (it's not like you pick something off the menu and get something different next time), it is just degustation.Iit is booked three months in advance and up to 6 months for weekends so plan ahead have HIGH expectations! Can't wait for next anniversary, love you STAN!