Ham, cheese, and dough. Fried. YES SIR.
ROCA Restaurant and Bar in Vicksburg has award-winning chef Jay Parmegiani running the ship over there. (How is he award-winning? Four words: Clash in the Kitchen.) Mr. Jackson and I recently made a trip over to Vicksburg to see how ol’ Jay was doing and to, of course, eat some of his amazing food. Every single bite we took was delicious and different from the ordinary. The one thing we ate that shone a little brighter than everything else was the cheese fritter appetizer. (We like to call standout items like this one The Dish!) The formal name of this Dish is “Bentons Prociutto and Smoked Gouda Fritters with a Rosemary Honey Mustard Sauce.” Saying “awesome cheese fritter” is so much easier! Speaking of easy, these are really easy to eat because they’re SO delicious.
Before we ordered this item, we asked the waitress what she thought about these things. She said they were basically balls of fried dough with cheese and a little ham in them. We are human (and Southern) so of course anything fried with cheese in it is going to grab our attention! We’ll take an order, please ma’am!
These came out looking spectacular. I picked one up, dipped it in the Rosemary Honey Mustard sauce, and took a bite of glory. The sauce was pretty great, but the ball itself was perfection. The crispy outside, the doughy, soft, cheesy inside… This was the best fried ball ever.
Warning: These are filling, as you may imagine. Luckily ROCA has a great atmosphere (and live music on this particular night) so you can get comfortable, let these babies settle for a while, then keep on eating. ROCA is worth devoting a long night to. It’s a little bit of a drive, but once you’re there, it’s a great place to post up for a few hours and just enjoy. The service was A+, the atmosphere was very welcoming and comfortable, but the food wins the gold star for being the best part of the trip. Have you been to ROCA? Next time you venture over, save room for dessert! (It’s free with your EatJxn card!)
Want to see pictures of the whole meal? Jay did an outstanding job of spoiling us!
ROCA Restaurant and Bar
(Located in the Vicksburg Country Club)
127 Country Club Dr
Vicksburg, MS 39180
(601) 638-0800
www.rocarestaurant.com
I told my waiter I can’t eat garlic. I asked to sub corn instead of garlic green beans on my plate. He said it would be &3.oo to substitute. That was utterly ridiculous and unacceptable! Then, I get my meal, which had mashed potatoes on it, and guess what the potatoes were seasoned with?, yep! garlic. Now why didn’t the waiter tell me that? The very idea of charging $3 to spoon a blob of surprise corn on a plate! It’s surprise corn, because it was spicy, and the menu said nothing about it being hotly seasoned. The fried chicken was very good, but I can’t say anything nice about the waiter charging for corn instead of beans, especially for a guest with allergy to garlic. Also, he should have told me about the potatoes being garlic flavored. I enjoyed the breads and honey. Please don’t nickel and dime your customers away, by ridiculous charges.