I also ate at Central on Saturday night (May 9th). I went with a friend who says that Central might be her favorite restaurant in the city (and she knows what she is talking about). I, however, had been once and was slightly underwhelmed although obviously willing to try again. This experience was heads and shoulders above my last visit, and I think it had a lot to do with where we were seated. Somehow, extremely luckily, we were seated at a huge 2-top right next to the open kitchen. Sitting here is much less noisy than the main dining room, with a great view of the kitchen, and the wine cellar, etc. - next time I visit, I will request a table in this section. It made such a huge difference in my opinion of the place.
We started with the salmon and tuna carpaccio, which was fresh and light and perfect for kind of a muggy night. The fish had what we thought was jicama on it, which added a nice textural crunch to the fish.
My friend ordered the fried chicken which was out of the world good. Easily the best fried chicken I've ever had. I definitely had order envy! The crispy outside was so tasty and light, almost like a panko breadcrumb but less greasy, if that is possible. The chicken itself was light and juicy and moist. The mashed potatoes are more like a potato puree which are very garlicky and delicious! But far and away the best part of this dish is the horseradishy tasting ranch-ish dipping sauce. Oh. my. god. Slather worthy.
I on the other hand got the lobster burger, which I thought was good but not outrageous. It is true that the burger itself is made up of big chunks of juicy lobster, so that was enjoyable. However the bottom bun was not substantial enough to stand up to the burger and the sauce and the tomato. It was all soggy by the time I was through with about a fourth of the burger. The sauce seemed tasty, but there wasn't enough on the sandwich itself; I wished they had offered a little extra on the side for dipping. I actually think that if I hadn't had the fish burger (also available in mini versions, called fish cakes) at Westend Bistro a couple of weeks ago, I would have been more impressed with the lobster burger than I was. The fish burger is heavenly, and it set my expectations really high for the lobster burger, which weren't exactly met.
All of this we enjoyed with a bottle of the Ferrari-Carano chardonnay, which was incredibly good and went well with the chicken and the lobster. That is such a great bottle of wine. And of course we ended our meal with the chocolate bar - not to be missed!!! The service was attentive though not over the top. We actually had two waiters, one male and one female. The female was smiley and nice, and the male, although nice seemed like he was either bored or sad. I could have used a smile from him too. All in all a really enjoyable meal, which again I credit in large part due to our V.I.P. seating! Still not sure how we scored that table.