What I Ate This Week

A better-than-expected bison burger with a Danish(?)-style beer. Getting a long weekend started right with patio seats perfect for people-watching. (Bluegrass Brewing Company Brewpub, Louisville KY)

Well, it’s good to be home, even if it’s just for a weekend.  It was a tremendous week and a half in Asia (more on this below) but is there anything as good as coming home, especially when the weather here has been really nice (excepting the last few days, of course!).  I got home on Wednesday night after travelling the long way around the world (thanks to a certain volcano) and needed Thursday and Friday to recover mentally, physically, and jet-lagg-ly.  But by Saturday I was ready to go out, and so we did.

Dinner with A View

Last month, I heard about a new restaurant opening up in the Edgecliff Building in E. Walnut Hills near Eden Park.  I’ve known about the building for a while, but hadn’t known about any restaurant space there.  (Does anyone know?)  Anyway, the place opened up a couple of weeks ago and because it’s only a few minutes from my house we were game to give it a try with friends.

The first thing that struck me about View is that it really didn’t seem set up for “destination dining.”  Parking is in a tiny lot in the basement of the building (I was lucky enough to get the last spot), signage is sparse, and by the time you get to the restaurant it seems as likely as anything as you’re about to head into the pool or fitness center of an apartment building.

But the inside is actually quite lovely.  As you enter, the place has a good sense of natural light (save for a separate, very sad looking little room off the lobby that might be good if you had a big party and had it to yourselves) and certainly the first thing you notice is that view.  Not square on downtown, the place looks out over the river more or less straight south from the building.  There’s a patio that would be heaven on a nice night (sadly, we had rain) and the small but diverse draft beer and wine by the glass would make a very nice companion indeed.  (On this day, they had Bud Light, Sierra Nevada, Eliot Ness, and Moerlein’s Doppelganger Bock.)  The last thing I’d note is that the clientele varied in ages from young to old, but skewed a little more strongly “old” than I had suspected (probably building residents?).  And everyone was dressed a lot nicer than the “casual” noted on the website—definitely business casual or better, save for us!

Our (very nice and extremely earnest) server explained that the View concept is “American-inspired.”  Perhaps in a foreign country this would seem a little exotic, but here it is just a touch redundant, no?  The menu is filled with simple “home cooking” style dishes but with a little innovation.  For example, above you’ll find their “stuffed chicken wings”:  Wings stuffed with goetta or duck sausage with maple glaze.  The wings were then cooked then cut cross-wise, meaning there were little horizontal bits of bone in each bite, which made eating them awkward.  The flavor of the wings is decent, although they were not very warm, temperature-wise.  I appreciate the innovation, in any case.  The duck wings tasted like chicken skin and maple syrup; the “heavy hand” of the kitchen on the sweet flavor profile permeated many of the dishes we tried.  The crab mac-n-cheese was better (more balanced) and the warm gorgonzola cheese dip was simple but delicious.

For a main, I tried the meatloaf—it’s a standard-bearer of “American-inspired” restaurants and a good way to tell what a kitchen is up to.  Here’s the menu description:  “Roasted lamb with blueberry glaze, served with bleu cheese mashed potatoes, steamed French green beans and baby carrots.”  Interesting, to be sure.  The dish was beautiful, and the meatloaf itself wasn’t bad—it was surprisingly “loose and crumbly” in texture but did hold together just enough.  The meat was reasonably flavorful, too.  But again with the sweet—the blueberry glaze on top created a slightly off flavor.  Perhaps it’s me—I’m not used to having sweet in my meatloaf, and perhaps I expected a more balanced flavor from the sauce.  The carrots were fine, and the mashed potatoes were good but a bit overloaded with bleu cheese texturally—it was a bit overpowering to be honest.

We were so full by the time dinner was done—portions are huge—that we passed on dessert and headed back out into the night.  View has a lot of great things going with it—a location convenient to downtown and the East Side, a lovely dining room, an amazing patio, earnest and friendly service, and a menu sure not to offend.  In the meantime, they’ve got some work to do on balancing their flavors and learning a little more about what they really want to be.  I won’t be in a hurry to go back, but I’d be willing to give it a try in a few months once the kinks get worked out.  In the meantime, if anyone goes and has a better experience, let me know.  It’s often the case that menus that have a wide variety of quality of dishes can sometimes improve as they find their “voice.”  Let’s hope it’s the case here!

India Footnote:  Bukhara

And I should just make one note about one last incredible dining experience in New Delhi.  We went to a restaurant called Bukhara which is often considered one of India’s best.  We had a simply amazing meal in a lovely environment.  It sure seems like overseas they’re much better at figuring out the hotel restaurant thing, as meals there can really be exquisite.  Bukhara is in the Sheraton of all things, and it’s simply gorgeous:

The kitchen bustles, serving traditional “frontier” northern Indian dishes, with an open view of the chefs and their skewers of freshly tandoori-cooked meats…

I ordered the Sikandri Raan:  “Whole leg of spring lamb, braised in a marinade of malt vinegar, cinnamon, black cumin, red chili paste, and finished in the Tandoor.”  It.  Was.  Exquisite.

Fall-apart tender, bite-sized pieces rearranged on the bone, with the most incredible flavor on the skin.  I was just so full after a week of eating that I couldn’t finish it all!  And for those of you that are naan-lovers, you may have met your match.  Look at what our neighbors ordered:

Wow!  A great meal to end an exhausting but rewarding trip.  May everyone be as lucky to go once, and may I just advise that you not drink the water. 

Next weekend is my annual trip to Memphis—I’m excited!  More from there soon…

What a difference a week makes, eh?  A week ago, I was writing about a couple of tremendous and interesting meals in Kentucky and Tennessee.  What about now?

I’m laying on a hotel bed in New Delhi, India getting ready to go to bed, stuffed to the gills with some of the best dosas I’ve ever had.  In the past, I’ve really overdone the overseas posts when I go, possibly because this blog is still a bit of an overblown diary/travel memoir via food, so yes I’ve done that mostly for me.  Anyway, it’s been an excellent month for food, regardless of where I’ve eaten it!

It even started on the plane to Singapore from Tokyo, when they served a surprisingly excellent and authentic Japanese meal—the sign of good things to come!

A Voyage to India!

So I’m in New Delhi for work, a piece of good luck I guess—I’m learning tons, about myself and about Indian culture and people.  One of the things I didn’t think I’d need an education on is Indian food, but I’m learning there, too!  But what has been as true as I’d have hoped is that the food has been mind-bendingly good.  In fact, probably my tastiest international trip ever.  Wow!  Even from the breakfast served on the train, which was a Indian-spiced veg patty with accoutrements:

Saturday was spent in the Agra area, home of the Taj Majal (which, by the way, is serious “bucket list” material.  I could have just sat and stared for four or five hours, and might well have if it hasn’t been around 110-114 degrees every day of this trip!)

Anyway, at a roadside restaurant in Agra:

I had some authentic Mughlai cuisine (the original inhabitants of the area)—Murg Batiwala—mutton in a spicy ghee gravy, similar (at least theoretically) to the kind of food you can get in Cincinnati, but richer and with more presence of veggies.  And the naan is the best I have ever had (well, at least so far—I’ve still got two days!).

Today’s lunch was Punjabi, another Northern Indian region of the Delhi area.  Here I couldn’t decide and more or less got the Indian equivalent of the “sampler platter”:

It was all excellent, including the mushroom paneer (3 o’clock on the plate), the lamb rogan josh (11 o’clock), and the dal (1 o’clock) was very tasty.  But it was the tandoori fish (center) and tandoori chicken (6 o’clock) that stopped me mid-bite and caused me to temporarily forget where I was.  I’ve had lots of tandoori—but this was smoky, moist, and… well, perfectly tandoori.  I may have to find my way back here!

And dinner tonight was also excellent—South Indian.  We went to a neighborhood place here in New Delhi and learned it was a chain – VERY popular with the locals – that has about 20 locations around India and a couple of international locations including in the U.S. (NYC, CA, Atlanta, I think):

The place was packed full of families and daters, a refreshing sight as I don’t think I’ve ever seen a full vegetarian non-alcohol restaurant in the U.S. with any more than a few people in it (let alone a pile of people outside waiting, putting their name on the queue, U.S.-style).

South Indian food is substantially less represented in American-Indian food culture.  We couldn’t have it all, so we focused our eating on dosas, thin, almost crepe-like rice pancakes with delectable fillings and tremendous sauces.  We started with the “tiffin box” appetizer:

The dosa was in the middle and was surrounded by some dal (3 o’clock) and a variety of sauces.  The dosa was filled with “masala,” which in this case meant a potato & veg combination in a pale yellow sauce.  We each also got our own dosa, here’s mine:

When you break it open, there are lots of small-dice veggies here, sauteed in butter.  Theoretically healthy, I just need to not think about all the butter!

Anyway, tremendous.  Tremendous.  Several other things I want to try and I’ve got until Tuesday.  Who knows, maybe longer if this Icelandic ash doesn’t clear up in Europe!

P.S. A Step Back in Time at the Waterfront

In my sadly-brief time in Cincinnati between these two trips, we had a nice dinner out.  Our goal was to go someplace fun, birthday-celebration-worthy (as the purpose of the trip), and someplace none of us had been.  A fun challenge!  We settled on Jeff Ruby’s Waterfront, kind of a cop out as Ruby’s food is pretty darn reliable (save my last experience at Precinct, which I wrote about), but the view was worth getting the reservation in for.

The food was great, like always.  I was most impressed with S’s Surf and Turf.  It was pricey, but not as much as it could have been, and I think it might be the best lobster tail I’ve ever had-juicy, not over-buttered, and tasting of the water.  Awesome.  The steaks and sides were of course excellent.  Given the low light and the general unnecessary-ness of photographing steaks, there are no food pictures.  But there is one thing…

What is with the 80’s styling here?  It would be kitchy if it wasn’t so in-your-face.  It was almost too much.  Big hair, tuxes, art-deco fonts, and all that neon.  I guess there’s a crowd that’s into that, but let’s be clear—there’s nothing about that style I find endearing in a modern classy restaurant.  Waterside dining needn’t be dated!  And given that Cincinnati’s now got a dearth of excellent waterfront restaurants, they could do so much more with the place!  I won’t purport to understand Mr. Ruby’s plan—he’s plenty successful enough without me – but I think he shouldn’t just let this jewel in his crown slowly fade!

Anyway, off to bed.   Next weekend, I’m sure I’ll have something to say about my last 48 hours in India, but until then save some cool weather for me!

When we last left our intrepid explorers, we had enjoyed a decadent Hot Brown from the source in Louisville.  Although we’re back home now (albeit with me about to head out of town again for a week or so), the balance of our trip to the mid-South was just plain excellent.  We had a number of good strong meals (perhaps the Loveless Cafe being the most memorable), but then, we also had two additional tremendous “local specialties”—consider this the “Travel” section of your local paper, which usually focuses on your hometown but gets you out every once in a while.

Nashville Hot Chicken @ The Scoreboard (Nashville/Music Valley, TN)

So here’s a local food that you might not be aware of if you haven’t spent much time in middle Tennessee:  Nashville Hot Chicken.  Of course, you’ll find fried chicken pretty near everywhere in the south, and Nashville’s as good a place as any to find it.  But hot chicken is a very special kind, and only a small handful of establishments—almost entirely made up of dives that specialize in the stuff— make it.  But locals swear by it.  Consider it Nashville’s equivalent of the “Night Market,” making stuff you can’t believe people actually eat!

We were out and about, peeking into the ridiculous over-grand Opryland Hotel, when lunchtime hit.  Sure, you could eat at one of the hotel’s 14 restaurants, but about half a mile away lay this little gem—the Scoreboard.

Sure, it’s not much to look at (unless you’re a Packer Backer!), but it’s the place where you can find the hot chicken specialty, and one of the only places making an authentic version that’s open on a Monday!  You can get it in five spice levels:  sissy, mild, medium, hot, and I forget the last one but I’m sure there was an expletive attached to it.  Having done my homework, I confidently ordered “mild.”

It comes out as a single, large breast of fried chicken with the appropriate sides, some bread to soak it up (which plays an important role!) and some pickles on top.  Now, you won’t find any “hot” sides to go with it, because the chicken is (more than) all you’ll need.  You see, this isn’t just fried chicken with hot sauce on top.  This is chicken where the hot is in the flour.  See, let’s get a closer look:

This is HOT STUFF.  But the surprising and (initially) pleasant thing was it was heat with flavor.  You can taste the chilies—it actually was far more complex and interesting than Tabasco (which I don’t care to put on pretty much anything).  It had a deep and rich flavor.  The heat is all in the skin, so after a few bites when my mouth started to smoke a bit, I left the skin aside and went for the chicken.

Know what’s interesting?  This stuff hits you later!  I actually was about halfway through my chicken breast and feeling just fine when I started to notice a bit of a residual heat at the back of my throat and lips.  To be honest, it’ was almost debilitatingly hot toward the end, but the flavor was so good!  Anyway, I’ll admit that the stuff is hotter than I could eat on a regular basis (I had some kind of mild but persistent heartburn for the rest of the night… and this was lunch!), but the flavor is intoxicating.  I’ll be back through town next month, and I might just need to make another stop!

World’s Capital of Barbeque?  Not sure about that, but it is Kentucky’s (Moonlite Bar-B-Q, Owensboro, KY)

Now folks, that’s quite a boast, and it’s safe to admit it’s not exactly true.  But Owensboro is one of what I consider the regional “standards of excellence” in barbeque (along with, say Austin, Memphis, Lexington NC and the like).  And Moonlite is where it is at.  So on our way home, we ventured an hour or so west out of our way to see what this gem of a spot had for us.

It’s not much to speak of—not touristed at all (being in Owensboro helps) and pretty much just a cafeteria style diner to serve the local community.  But they’ve got a specialty, and do they ever:

Mutton.  Sheep.  Whatever you want to call it, it’s Moonlite’s (and western Kentucky’s) barbeque specialty.  It’s served chopped, sliced, and stewed, in Kentucky’s most famous one-pot meal:  burgoo.

I’ll say this—Moonlite is an EXCELLENT establishment.  Very friendly service, a very comprehensive barbeque buffet, and interesting choices.  Mutton wasn’t something I thought I’d enjoy, but I was wrong.  The burgoo was tender, flavorful, and… well, just plain interesting.  It was a bit like a chili without heat.  Good winter, warm-you-up kind of food.

The mutton itself was more flavorful—and had less of an aftertaste—than most of my other experiences with lamb (which, to be honest, are mostly about Indian dishes and rack of lamb than anything).  The long slow cook certainly helps, as the meat was delightfully tender.  In the end, the chopped pork was my favorite, not surprisingly, but it was all very, very good.  The sauce was also interesting—it was more tomato-based than molasses or vinegar, so it was a bit like a delicious fancy ketchup.  It blended nicely with the mutton but more than did enough service for the pork.  I bought a jar to bring home to see how versatile it might be!

Anyway, folks… if you find yourself down in Kentucky and Tennessee, don’t opt for the hotel restaurant, Friday’s, or Shoney’s.  Go local, and try one of the regional dishes—they know ‘em best!  Let me know if you get a particularly good hot brown, hot chicken, or hot mutton—spread the tips!

And now back to your regularly scheduled programming!

Quality AND quantity! Delicious food and a lovely, care-worn ambiance that makes the gruff service seem appropriate… Well, almost. (Tankburger at Tank’s, downtown Dayton, near UD)