The evening had been good — entertaining but generally uneventful. Until the question came, "Would you like dessert?"

Having just devoured chicken fried chicken, mashed potatoes, chicken fajitas and a massive bowl of vegetarian chili (plus copious amounts of chips and bean dip), dessert was an unlikely endeavor. But then there it was before us at Cowgirl in New York City: A dessert menu emblazoned with a large tempting picture of the restaurant's signature ice-cream "baked potato."

I was shocked to see the picture — not because of the calories I saw before me. (The dessert consists of scoops of vanilla ice-cream dusted with cocoa powder to resemble a
potato, topped with whipped cream, slabs of lime-sugar "butter" and
chopped pecans dyed green.)

The surprise was there because I took the picture last year for a piece on this blog about Cowgirl's seafood outpost, Cowgirl Seahorse. And there it was, massive and beautiful (if I do say so myself) on this restaurant's menu.

My dear friend John grabbed the menu, squinting as he compared it with the picture on my blog post that we had called up on my iPhone.

 

"The nuts are in the exact same position!" John said.

Our friend Nick took his turn examining the two. "He's right," he said. "Should we say something?"

Ordinarily, I wouldn't care — it's flattering that Cowgirl owner Sherry Delamarter Holmes, who had sent me a lovely email after reading my blog review last year, liked my picture well enough to use it. But this is a picture I'm particularly proud of — it got picked up by other Web sites at the time, including Tastespotting, which is incredibly discerning in choosing the pictures it features.

As lovely as it was to see it on a restaurant menu, it would be nice for A Tiger In The Kitchen to get some credit.

So, Sherry, how about it?

Cowgirl, 519 Hudson Street, 212.633.1133, www.cowgirlnyc.com