Parallel Wine Bistro - Brambleton, VA

Ahhh, wine bistros.  Self-service wine by credit card.  Ya gotta love it.  I've been to a few Wine places that allow self service wine and have always been pleased.  When the coupon came across my screen for Parallel, I looked forward to heading back there for some wine, a nice meal and a new review!  Parallel is located just off the greenway in the newish shopping area in Brambleton or you can cut through Ashburn on Waxpool and avoid the 14 dollar toll.

Unfortunately, my return trip to Parallel was not nearly as enjoyable as the first one.  Let's start with the first phase of the meal; seating and introduction to our server.  Parallel has a really, really nice patio so we requested to sit outside.  When I say nice, it is stocked with expensive patio furniture, different table settings and for Ashburnites, is a great setting for a Happy Hour or a late night winefest with friends.  Be warned, like most outdoor patio's, smoking is allowed.  The unfortunate part of our seating was, no server was anywhere to be found.  At some point, I had to give an evil eye to one of the other servers who then came by to apologize for the guy who was supposedly assigned to us. He eventually came out and offered another apology.  No problem.  Just hook us up with a winecard, bro!

After paying 7 and 9 dollars for a miniscule taste of a nice French Bordeaux and something else red and wet, my friend and I settled into a half-glass of something reasonable and headed back to our table.  Minutes later, the waiter trotted out with ALL FOUR dishes we had ordered at the same time! There was barely even room on the table for all four items.  I gently asked the guy, do you normally bring out every single thing all at once?  He mumbled something back to me about the kitchen just does it like that but seemed taken aback at the concept of staggering delivery of food so half the food isn't cold before starting to eat it.  When it clicked in his head that I may be a bit annoyed, he started to take dishes away.  Now I don't know about you folks, but when amateur waiters do this, it makes a lot of people squeamish at the concept.  A) because many friends of mine are paranoid that annoyed waiters go back and desecrate your food before bringing it back and B) because most times they just stick the food under a heat lamp and bring it back which is also no-bueno!  So I said, no, no, we'll just make the best of it.

We proceeded to dive into our four dishes.  I was starving so I dove into almost all of them before remembering to take photos for the Blog. So I apologize for the half-eaten picture in advance :) The first thing I wanted to try was the Pork Belly.  On my first visit to Parallel, I was blown away by the pork belly.  It was a large piece and cooked to perfection.  I've found that Pork Belly must be a fairly complex piece of meat to cook well.  Cook it too little and it is incredibly fatty and disgusting (unless you are like some of my Asian friends who salivate for fatty meats).  Cook it too long and it turns into bacon.  This particular piece was a quivering pile of fat.  Really.  I trimmed off a bit of the caramelized crunchy edges which were delicious, but I truly couldn't stomach eating another bite.  It's one of the few times I've been actually repulsed by a piece of meat.

Essentially, a Tuna Tartare

I am a big fan of warm Brie.  I've never had a bad experience with the stuff.  I'm sure it is really awful for you because it tastes divine.  I did some major damage to the melted piece they put in front of me, with some slathered apple butter and cracker to go with each bite.  They also throw some walnut/raisan compote in, as well, but I focused on the butter/cracker/brie combo that was working for me.  The other two courses were a Tuna tartar/cracker medley with assorted greens on top that lacked flavor and a soggy Blackened Shrimp flatbread... which was still good enough to eat.  Most flatbreads I've had were like eating a thin-crust pizza and this particular one was very "doughy".  It wasn't that it was awful, it was just that I think they missed the mark when they cooked it.  I'd be curious to hear from the owner or chef if this is the desired texture they are hoping for.

Blackened Shrimp Flatbread

The waiter made up for the earlier part of the meal by comp'ing the Pork Belly when he saw the massacred, uneaten parts on my plate.  Or maybe it was the face I made when he took it away, which looked something like a person afraid that the Pork Belly would turn into a zombie and eat into my body through my stomach to rejoin with the pieces I had cut off and eaten.

I've been to Parallel before and my positive experience may have had something to do with the fact that I went with good friends of the owner who gave us personal attention.  My negative experience this time may have had something to do with having a rookie waiter, who knows.  But if you want a nice wine hangout, hit their patio up this summer for some live music (which they provide from time to time) and the chance to hang out with some of Ashburn's white-collar middle-class suburbanites.

Rating - 2.5 out of 5 stars.