I’m not gonna lie. This is the hardest blog post I have ever had to write. Why? Because I am literally holding myself back from eating my laptop screen. Reliving all the food I sampled from Rebel House‘s fall menu has me salivating so hard that I’m afraid I’ll cause water damage to my keyboard. Trying to decide my favorite dish is like Sophie’s Choice but with a happy ending, since I did get to experience them all.

Any meal that starts off with popcorn is a meal that seems tailor-made for me – I’m a popcorn addict and I’m not afraid to admit that I am powerless over it. Any dish that might be an entree elsewhere is perfectly crafted in to a flavored popcorn at Rebel House – think tacos or pizza, to anything sweet like cinnamon and sugar. It took everything I had not to take the machine and dump it out all over me as “Pour Some Sugar On Me” plays in the background. But enough about things I list on my vision board daily. On to the meal.

Rebel House presents food that is anything but ordinary – our first dish was a Cauliflower Hummus, adorned with roasted cauliflower, grape, pine nuts, urfa pepper vinaigrette and dill. Dipping the warm Naan bread into this savory sweet roasted pile of goodness is the definition of fall comfort. It screams, “the holidays are upon us and the party is in my mouth!”

There are few things besides fried chicken that you can put in a salad that will actually make me excited to eat it, and The Rebel Salad has literally ALL of them: beets, Pink Lady apples, honey roasted kobacha squash, goat cheese, pumpkin seed granola, and topped with a dressing packed with flavor: pomegranate balsamic vinaigrette. All those indulgent but healthy ingredients, and the funky presentation is just the icing on the non-existent cake. (Side note if anyone ever develops a salad dressed with icing, sign me up to try it).

The next dish is a contender for one of my FAVORITES – and I’m not just talking about favorite at Rebel House, I’m talking favorite EVER. The Curried Cauliflower “Risotto” uses cauliflower as the understudy for actual risotto, and not only does it make this dish a million times healthier, it allows it to steal the show. It’s blended with flavors of India, coconut milk, black lime cilantro and pickled grapes. Being that I have currently ordered Indian food at least twice a week from Uber Eats for the past 3 months, it’s safe to say that my palette has quite an obsession with the exotic flavors of India, so this dish really blew my mind. I’m also a cilantro freak and a pickle freak, so it’s no freak accident that these flavors combined made me want to hoard everyone’s leftovers. Which I did because ain’t no shame in my game. Side note, the only reason there were any leftovers of this incredible dish was because we are professional bloggers and we knew we would be served approximately 27.5 other dishes and needed to save room for that plus the flowing wine. It’s not our first rodeo. It’s tough being professional, but someone’s gotta do it.

This stunning dish you see above you is also in the running for favorite dish – again, not just from Rebel House, but for LIFE. Here’s a riddle for ya: what’s better than fried rice? How about FRIED fried rice?!? You KNOW that we here at Fashionably French Fried live by the motto “It’s better fried,” or “if it’s fried, it’s gonna get eaten,” so this dish felt like it was made for us. (IDK why I suddenly started talking as if multiple people run this blog. As if anyone else would be insane enough to put up with me daily). The official name of the dish is the “Paella Fried Rice a La Plancha,” and this beauty is made with house dried chorizo, papas bravas, shishito peppers (yessssssssssss squeeeeeeeee!!!!), piquillo pepper puree, saffron aioli and topped with a quail egg. Just like the Rebel Salad, this dish has so many of my foodie buzz words included (could you sense the excitement over the my new craze, the shishito peppers??). I was taken behind the scenes to the meat fridge where I saw how the house dried chorizo is made, and from farm to fridge to plate, this slice of meat is made with all of the love and tender care – all if it, and I could taste it. Between the saltiness of the meat and the crunch of the rice, to the tangy piquillo pepper puree, added in with the fact that I truly believe that any dish can be made better when topped with an egg (fries, tacos, pizza, peanut butter sandwiches, any form of leftovers, the scrapings from cleaning off a dirty grill, your cat’s food, your cat’s litter box, you get the idea), everything about this dish is a home run. Seriously, if you want to impress out-of-town friends, the uniqueness of these dishes (plus the decor but I’ll show that off a bit later) will do the trick!

Everyone should be so lucky as to have the biggest stress in their life be which dish of a multi-course meal is your favorite. Although, maybe the only reason I can handle this stress better than you is because I am a professional. I’ve been training for this ish my whole life. Meat the final contestant, hailing all the way from some ocean somewhere, the Shrimp Scampi Cannelloni. Let me preface this entry by saying that at all times, I have a bottle of scampi sauce in my fridge that I slather on anything it will taste good with (because I’m too cheap to buy the shrimp). I loooooooooove scampi sauce. The thing that I found extra special about this dish is the way that the shrimp meat was rolled in sausage form into the pasta. It’s then doused in roasted garlic puree, Chardonnay butter, grana padano (a cheese comparable to parmagiano reggiano) and lemon gremolata (which gave it an extra zest). Not only was the sauce heavenly, but this is one of those dishes that you love because of the consistency. It might be weird to say (but what blog of mine hasn’t had at least a few off-beat comments), but it’s just something that you enjoy chewing. You’ll want to sink your teeth in to this one for many reasons!

You’ll have to excuse me for my memory loss, it’s not easy being served wine almost every night of the week and trying to retain brain cells, but have I mentioned that Rebel House does everything with an extremely unique touch? You can already tell from the presentation alone that the above is no ordinary Burrata. The Brooklen Burrata is served with plum, speck ham, a buttermilk biscuit biscotti (aka carb heaven), sea grape honey, and topped with opal basil vinaigrette. Plum. PLUM. Seriously, when was the last time you had plum anything? It’s like the Devon Sawa of fruits – you’ve totally forgotten about it’s existence, but it’s just as good as you remember.

The final dish we were served fit perfectly into the fall and winter season – Honey & Spice Glazed Duck Breast, topped with a duck skin crumble and sweet & sour cranberries, and served alongside a kabocha squash & mushroom  gratin. The festive look of the duck just screams “Crap it’s December 29th and I still haven’t done my Christmas shopping!” I’m not the biggest fan of duck and although I enjoyed the flavors immersed in the meat, the breast was a bit fatty for me – however, that mere fact would certainly delight duck lovers. The gratin as with any potato dish was immediately devoured by me. You’ll love the crunch on top, and the comfort you feel from those warm, savory flavors.

“Cant Adult Today” Shirt by Fifth Sun via Target

Of course, no dinner would be complete without french fries, especially not at Rebel House. These crispy on the outside, mushy on the inside, perfectly salted with just enough potato skin left on babies have earned the number one spot in Boca Raton for french fries for me (in terms of plain, not dressed up fries). You know that praise that high coming from me is the real deal. Also, how freaking cool is their decor? Told you.

I don’t show vulnerability, like, ever; I prefer sarcasm over sadness. But when I do show it, it’s over desserts like the Chocolate Chess Pie. Holy chocolate moly. Get this: a fudge brownie surrounded by a hazelnut shortbread crust and topped with salted caramel chow (think cereal pieces) and mocha ice cream. This reminds me a bit of my signature party dish, Slutty Brownies (layer of cookie dough, layer of Oreos, layer of caramel, layer of brownie) in its decadent, over-the-top indulgence. I’m literally shedding tears over the joyousness that is this brownie concoction. My new goal, over everything else in my life, is to face plant straight in to a whole pie of this. Because I’m a Rebel, and I intend to act like one.

***I received complimentary noms in exchange for this post, however, you cannot bribe me with food, so all opinions are my own.