Over the weekend we celebrated our 13th wedding anniversary by splurging on a nice dinner at Alux Restaurante in Playa del Carmen.

Alux is definitely a “special occasion” type of place. It’s actually an underground cave / dry cenote – very cool!

Rather than driving or taking the bus, (and since we knew we would be drinking) we hired a driver for the evening. The driver surprised us by having a bottle of champagne in the car waiting for us!

Bubbles – a nice start to the evening!

Once we got to the restaurant, we got a cocktail from the bar, and they welcomed us to walk around and explore the restaurant a bit.

Map of Alux

Wine Cellar

I asked for a wine list, and instead of just bringing me a list, he invited me into the wine cellar, where they had a great selection of wines.

I selected a 2011 Unico Gran Reserva, which was fantastic! Huge nose with hints of leather and mexican chocolate. Discovering new Mexican wines has been really fun.

Some rockin’ good juice!

Dinner

The menu has quite a variety of choices. They have a regular food menu (meat, seafood, pasta, duck, soups, and salads) and then a special Exotic Pleasures menu, which includes rabbit, deer, and pheasant.

Gotta love a place that has Mayan Sacrifice on the menu!

Elizabeth started with an awesome salad (Mix of lettuces with pigweed goat cheese, artichoke,pumpkin, citrus station fruits, caramelized pineapple,jicama, cucumber, carrot, mango, watermelon, shrimp wrapped in serrano ham & slices of fresh tuna), and I had the lobster bisque, which was delicious.

We then shared the Surf & Turf platter for 2.  New York and Flank steak, lobster tails, shrimp and grilled portobellos. With grilled vegetables and mashed potatoes.

It was a lot of food! We didn’t even finish it all (which meant lobster omelettes the next morning!)

Surf & Turf Platter for Two

Flaming Mayan Coffees

To celebrate our anniversary, they offered us a special treat – flaming Mayan coffees!

While we were enjoying our coffees, we pondered dessert, but we were both pretty full at this point, and decided to pass.

Photo Ops Galore

The space is beautiful, with lots of good photo opportunities.

It was the first time I wore pants (as opposed to shorts) since moving to Mexico!

Wrap Up

Alux was a fantastic place for our anniversary dinner. The staff was friendly, and service was excellent. Attentive without being intrusive. The food was excellent. Very good wine selection. And of course the space itself is beautiful. It’s not cheap, but we knew that going in. (their online menus have prices listed).  Definitely a great place for a special occasion dinner.

It was a lovely way to celebrate our anniversary.