Dining (and Spilling) In The Dark--Opaque

So I had a milestone birthday on the horizon and I knew that I wanted to do something memorable for dinner. As I searched for options, I stumbled onto the Opaque restaurants. There are three locations: San Francisco, Chicago and Los Angeles. The concept is that with all of the visual sensory overload--an hour or two eating in the complete dark gives you a completely different dining experience focusing on taste, touch and sound. And when they say dining in the dark, we are talking pitch black, you can't see your hand in front of your face. So accompanied by a few close friends who only agreed to the concept in honor of my birthday, we plunged into darkness and a very unique dining situation. The Opaque in SF shares its kitchen with INDIGO Restaurant located in Hayes Valley. This means your food is prepared and plated in a full-functioning and lit kitchen. After sticking my hand in the butter dish (3 times), I managed to fortunately get most bites of my Baby Greens tossed in a White Balsamic Vinaigrette. I then gave up on the fork and knife and used my hands to eat my Grilled Beef Tendorloin cooked to a perfect medium rare, at least the texture and taste were perfect as I couldn't see it. The food is served assembly line from the end of the table, take one and pass it down. Given the lack of lighting our party of seven only dropped one salad on the floor. Not too bad, and no wine was spilled only drank. This restaurant was a great experience, not one that I need to do more than once, but I definitely had a memorable birthday, thanks to the company and the restaurant. One thing to note, one of my friends is a bit claustrophobic and it was not quite as enjoyable for her. The meal is one that lingers, they don't rush you and we were there enjoying the event for over two hours.