Bites Nearby: Let's Do Lunch at Luma

This week’s Great Escape takes us to Luma Restaurant in Mt. Lebanon. Located on Castle Shannon Boulevard, this upscale eatery offers mouthwatering contemporary cuisine that’ll nudge some of those grown-up tastebuds you have been neglecting.

Sure enough, one of the greatest sacrifices that we parents make for our children is giving up fine dining and fine foods. We don’t want to cart our babies, toddlers and young children into fancy food places—and, the patrons usually don’t want us to either.

Even if you have a well-mannered youngster, or are able to temporarily subdue her into culinary compliance, she may still reject a high-end meal because it is something unfamiliar.

That’s why, nine out of ten times, we parents end up at kid-friendly spots—the kind where there are pictures of food on the menus, kids-eat-free specials, run-of-the-mill selections and cheap prices.

I don’t know about you, but sometimes I get a little sick and tired of eating according to my kids’ preferences. Sometimes, Mama wants a more stylish supper.

And, when Mama wants that, Luma Restaurant is the place to go.

Luma’s food can best be described as contemporary American cuisine. The menu selections are carefully crafted by Executive Chef Michael Rudman, who was honored as one of Pittsburgh’s “40 under 40” by Pittsburgh Magazine and PUMP in 2004.

One of Luma’s most popular dishes is its jumbo lump crab cakes, which are broiled and dressed with a drizzle of tangy red onion caper sauce. The crab cakes are simple and straight-forward, and undeniably sophisticated.

The dinner portion of crab cakes includes two crab cakes, and the lunch portion includes one. Luma also offers a single crab cake appetizer and a crab cake salad, which are great additions to any lunch or dinner meal and are perfect selections to accompany one of Luma’s many unique cocktails.

You’ll make the gals from Sex and the City jealous with some of Luma’s cocktail concoctions. The cocktail list includes personalized mojitos, a basil and vodka lemonade, white wine sangria and several Luma signature martinis, including the LumaTini (a citrus, coconut martini), the Luma White Cosmo (featuring white cranberry juice) and the Luma Espresso Martini (a truly adult beverage fusing alcohol and espresso).

Other contemporary cuisine offerings at Luma include duck and apple ravioli, cranberry chicken, and Korean barbecue flank steak. It has an affordable light lunch menu, which includes lunch-sized portions of many of their dinner entrees in addition to an appealing selection of salads and sandwiches.

And, yes, Luma does offer children's menu selections. But, seriously, don’t take the kids. Get a babysitter or work around their activity schedules.

Make your Luma experience be all about you and the food. Let Luma be a date-night destination for you and your hubby, a lunch location for an afternoon with your girlfriends or a relaxing place to enjoy a cocktail.

Whatever you do, treat yourself. You deserve it.

Visit Luma on Wednesdays for Wine Down Wednesdays and enjoy half off wines. Sign up on for updates on their website and you’ll instantly receive a free $10 certificate.