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string(6787) "First, I hate brunch. Second, I like conch. Third, I love Belle & Lily’s Caribbean Brunch House.
I could just leave it there, but I feel obligated to explain what is so reprehensible about the average brunch. It is basically a post-coital ritual that’s been around for a century under one name or another. The deal — at least since the 1980s — is that you get drunk Saturday night, fuck someone you don’t know, and then go have an unsightly meal Sunday before 2 p.m. to treat your hangover, make small talk with your new conquest whom you are putting on display to cause envy among your tittering friends at a nearby patio table who are toasting you with their weak mimosas. You join them at their table. Later they will commend you for fucking and feeding someone with Donald Trump’s image tattooed just below the left armpit. Or, maybe, you just stumbled out of church and need a pancake and a huge mimosa to take the edge off all that scary preaching.
Usually the food, calculated to fuel you for breakfast and lunch, has always been eggs, waffles, pancakes, and somewhat more adventurous dishes like grilled hot dogs atop latkes sprinkled with black beans and chopped morels, plus CBD syrup on the side. It is worth mentioning that if you happen to be gay, brunching is a mandatory part of coming out and, when you eventually cease the habit, you will be presumed dead. My first partner Rick, a foodie, dragged me every Sunday to a post-hippie vegetarian brunch place in Augusta. This was the late ‘70s. I’ve been mainly dead since 1980.
Weirdest of all to me has been the emergence of restaurants that only serve brunch all day, every day. I presume this is a marketing ploy for the most part. My annoyance aside, I’ve learned the truth is that in the right hands, brunch can provide a genuinely creative thing. By the “right hands” I mean good chefs, not former line cooks from Waffle House (even though the super-cheap “All Star Special,” upgraded to country ham, is my go-to pig-out breakfast).
So, all of that said and in praise of good chefs, I can’t recommend the fairly new Belle & Lily’s Caribbean Brunch House enough. The restaurant, located in a shopping center not far off I-85 on Chamblee-Tucker Road, is owned by the folks behind Ms. Icey’s Kitchen & Bar and Apt. 4, both upscale Caribbean spots. The leaders of this new venture are Tasha Cyril (nicknamed Belle), and her cousin Aliyah Cyril (Lily), who is executive chef. The restaurant’s marketing notes that it is black-owned and woman-owned. Not to be a pig, but, my god, Belle and Lily are gorgeous.
The dining room, which is small enough to make reservations a good idea, is informal, comfy, and has some elegant features like a wall from which greenery sprouts, as I used to see in every other fine dining spot in Los Angeles. Okay, the plants are plastic here, but it’s still a great effect. I’m also impressed that a bird of paradise bloom, adorns the restaurant’s logo.
The food is, obviously, Caribbean. Not to brag, but before I met the brunch-loving partner mentioned above, I was married briefly to a Cuban woman whose mother was an outrageously good cook. She opened my piehole to a broader investigation of Caribbean cuisine after my five-marriage. What we ate here in Atlanta until relatively recently was mainly jerk this and that, but you could drive to the suburbs and find tiny weekend diners serving more exotic food, unfortunately mainly from steam trays, but it was a start. I learned a lot.
When you take your seat at the restaurant and look around, you’re going to immediately notice how each entrée you see looks beautiful. I’m talking almost mysterious. Meanwhile, though, you’re going to try out the less glamorously presented appetizers. You’ve probably had most before but the flavor here is going to blow you away. My companion Ms. Rose and I ordered a classic Jamaican beef patty and two empanadas. The immediate zap of both apps was the pastry. It was fresh, it had flavor. There’s no way they could have been sitting in some warm-up device for hours. The empanadas were filled with chicken, cheese, and spinach (beef is available) and you could taste everything. By that I mean it wasn’t baby food dominated by a single prosaic seasoning. Ditto for the beef patty, a yellow pillow that I resisted placing against my cheek as I do with most biscuits. There are other compelling appetizers available, like conch fritters, crab and shrimp tostones, and a “half breed” biscuit with passion fruit butter. (I don’t recall Cher eating a biscuit on her horse.)
Belle and Lily’s is not cheap overall, although the sandwiches – Cuban, fried grouper, and jerk chicken — will run you only $13 to $16. Entrees have a broad cost range, but you’re not going to want to eat the more boring stuff, so plan to spend over $20. As I mentioned above, I love conch and I bypassed the conch fritters to order Lambi, described as “St. Lucian style grilled conch with seasoned rice and mesclun salad.” The great problem with conch, of course, is that it can be chewier than a dog toy. I’ve mainly eaten Italian dishes with it and most have avoided that. I agonized with the server about this. She was clear that the conch was somewhat chewy but not invulnerable to teeth. So I ordered it. The conch was cut into small cubes and, well, I’m sorry to say I found it challenging. I loved the buttery but spicy salad and the almost risotto-like rice. And, of course, I was soon chomping on the conch and ate every bit. But be warned: it ain’t tender. You do get violet petals with it!
Ms. Rose ordered a more conventionally brunchy dish: Big Batty Byal, described as “Halal jerk chicken & buttermilk pancakes with ginger hibiscus syrup (dark meat only).” It was strewn with pink petals. It is probably a measure of my avoidance of brunch, that I was shocked by the pancakes. They were super-thick but fluffy. The chicken retained full flavor under its jerk seasonings and the syrup was tangy with the ginger. I love ginger. In fact, I ordered a bottle of their house-made ginger beer. It could become a serious addiction. (I just weaned myself off a shockingly good, very strong, very cheap, but embarrassingly sourced ginger beer.
I look forward to returning to Belle and Lily’s, maybe on a Sunday, when things get quite lively. I thank them from the bottom of my heart for smashing my brunchophobia and restoring the cheerful optimism that I lost on that afternoon in the ‘70s when I announced I was done with alfalfa-sprout burritos and homemade corn flakes. —CL—
Belle & Lily’s Caribbean Brunch House, 3350 Chamblee Tucker Road, 470-294-2900, belleandlilys.com @belleandlilys "
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I could just leave it there, but I feel obligated to explain what is so reprehensible about the average brunch. It is basically a post-coital ritual that’s been around for a century under one name or another. The deal — at least since the 1980s — is that you get drunk Saturday night, fuck someone you don’t know, and then go have an unsightly meal Sunday before 2 p.m. to treat your hangover, make small talk with your new conquest whom you are putting on display to cause envy among your tittering friends at a nearby patio table who are toasting you with their weak mimosas. You join them at their table. Later they will commend you for fucking and feeding someone with Donald Trump’s image tattooed just below the left armpit. Or, maybe, you just stumbled out of church and need a pancake and a huge mimosa to take the edge off all that scary preaching.
Usually the food, calculated to fuel you for breakfast and lunch, has always been eggs, waffles, pancakes, and somewhat more adventurous dishes like grilled hot dogs atop latkes sprinkled with black beans and chopped morels, plus CBD syrup on the side. It is worth mentioning that if you happen to be gay, brunching is a mandatory part of coming out and, when you eventually cease the habit, you will be presumed dead. My first partner Rick, a foodie, dragged me every Sunday to a post-hippie vegetarian brunch place in Augusta. This was the late ‘70s. I’ve been mainly dead since 1980.
Weirdest of all to me has been the emergence of restaurants that only serve brunch all day, every day. I presume this is a marketing ploy for the most part. My annoyance aside, I’ve learned the truth is that in the right hands, brunch can provide a genuinely creative thing. By the “right hands” I mean good chefs, not former line cooks from Waffle House (even though the super-cheap ''[https://www.wafflehouse.com/breakfast-nutritionals/|“All Star Special,”] ''upgraded to country ham, is my go-to pig-out breakfast).
So, all of that said and in praise of good chefs, I can’t recommend the fairly new Belle & Lily’s Caribbean Brunch House enough. The restaurant, located in a shopping center not far off I-85 on Chamblee-Tucker Road, is owned by the folks behind Ms. Icey’s Kitchen & Bar and Apt. 4, both upscale Caribbean spots. The leaders of this new venture are Tasha Cyril (nicknamed Belle), and her cousin Aliyah Cyril (Lily), who is executive chef. The restaurant’s marketing notes that it is black-owned and woman-owned. Not to be a pig, but, my god, Belle and Lily are gorgeous.
The dining room, which is small enough to make reservations a good idea, is informal, comfy, and has some elegant features like a wall from which greenery sprouts, as I used to see in every other fine dining spot in Los Angeles. Okay, the plants are plastic here, but it’s still a great effect. I’m also impressed that a bird of paradise bloom, adorns the restaurant’s logo.
The food is, obviously, Caribbean. Not to brag, but before I met the brunch-loving partner mentioned above, I was married briefly to a Cuban woman whose mother was an outrageously good cook. She opened my piehole to a broader investigation of Caribbean cuisine after my five-marriage. What we ate here in Atlanta until relatively recently was mainly jerk this and that, but you could drive to the suburbs and find tiny weekend diners serving more exotic food, unfortunately mainly from steam trays, but it was a start. I learned a lot.
When you take your seat at the restaurant and look around, you’re going to immediately notice how each entrée you see looks beautiful. I’m talking almost mysterious. Meanwhile, though, you’re going to try out the less glamorously presented appetizers. You’ve probably had most before but the flavor here is going to blow you away. My companion Ms. Rose and I ordered a classic Jamaican beef patty and two empanadas. The immediate zap of both apps was the pastry. It was fresh, it had flavor. There’s no way they could have been sitting in some warm-up device for hours. The empanadas were filled with chicken, cheese, and spinach (beef is available) and you could taste everything. By that I mean it wasn’t baby food dominated by a single prosaic seasoning. Ditto for the beef patty, a yellow pillow that I resisted placing against my cheek as I do with most biscuits. There are other compelling appetizers available, like conch fritters, crab and shrimp tostones, and a “half breed” biscuit with passion fruit butter. (I don’t recall ''[https://youtu.be/Z6E98ZRaU1s|Cher]'' eating a biscuit on her horse.)
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Belle and Lily’s is not cheap overall, although the sandwiches – Cuban, fried grouper, and jerk chicken — will run you only $13 to $16. Entrees have a broad cost range, but you’re not going to want to eat the more boring stuff, so plan to spend over $20. As I mentioned above, I love conch and I bypassed the conch fritters to order Lambi, described as “St. Lucian style grilled conch with seasoned rice and mesclun salad.” The great problem with conch, of course, is that it can be chewier than a dog toy. I’ve mainly eaten Italian dishes with it and most have avoided that. I agonized with the server about this. She was clear that the conch was somewhat chewy but not invulnerable to teeth. So I ordered it. The conch was cut into small cubes and, well, I’m sorry to say I found it challenging. I loved the buttery but spicy salad and the almost risotto-like rice. And, of course, I was soon chomping on the conch and ate every bit. But be warned: it ain’t tender. You do get violet petals with it!
{img fileId="51432|51433" stylebox="float: left; margin-right:10px;" desc="desc" width="500px" responsive="y" button="popup"}
Ms. Rose ordered a more conventionally brunchy dish: Big Batty Byal, described as “Halal jerk chicken & buttermilk pancakes with ginger hibiscus syrup (dark meat only).” It was strewn with pink petals. It is probably a measure of my avoidance of brunch, that I was shocked by the pancakes. They were super-thick but fluffy. The chicken retained full flavor under its jerk seasonings and the syrup was tangy with the ginger. I love ginger. In fact, I ordered a bottle of their house-made ginger beer. It could become a serious addiction. (I just weaned myself off a shockingly good, very strong, very cheap, but ''[https://www.kroger.com/p/kroger-non-alcoholic-ginger-beer/0001111089370|embarrassingly sourced]'' ginger beer.
I look forward to returning to Belle and Lily’s, maybe on a Sunday, when things get quite lively. I thank them from the bottom of my heart for smashing my brunchophobia and restoring the cheerful optimism that I lost on that afternoon in the ‘70s when I announced I was done with alfalfa-sprout burritos and homemade corn flakes. __—CL— __
__''Belle & Lily’s Caribbean Brunch House, 3350 Chamblee Tucker Road, 470-294-2900, belleandlilys.com @belleandlilys '' __"
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I could just leave it there, but I feel obligated to explain what is so reprehensible about the average brunch. It is basically a post-coital ritual that’s been around for a century under one name or another. The deal — at least since the 1980s — is that you get drunk Saturday night, fuck someone you don’t know, and then go have an unsightly meal Sunday before 2 p.m. to treat your hangover, make small talk with your new conquest whom you are putting on display to cause envy among your tittering friends at a nearby patio table who are toasting you with their weak mimosas. You join them at their table. Later they will commend you for fucking and feeding someone with Donald Trump’s image tattooed just below the left armpit. Or, maybe, you just stumbled out of church and need a pancake and a huge mimosa to take the edge off all that scary preaching.
Usually the food, calculated to fuel you for breakfast and lunch, has always been eggs, waffles, pancakes, and somewhat more adventurous dishes like grilled hot dogs atop latkes sprinkled with black beans and chopped morels, plus CBD syrup on the side. It is worth mentioning that if you happen to be gay, brunching is a mandatory part of coming out and, when you eventually cease the habit, you will be presumed dead. My first partner Rick, a foodie, dragged me every Sunday to a post-hippie vegetarian brunch place in Augusta. This was the late ‘70s. I’ve been mainly dead since 1980.
Weirdest of all to me has been the emergence of restaurants that only serve brunch all day, every day. I presume this is a marketing ploy for the most part. My annoyance aside, I’ve learned the truth is that in the right hands, brunch can provide a genuinely creative thing. By the “right hands” I mean good chefs, not former line cooks from Waffle House (even though the super-cheap “All Star Special,” upgraded to country ham, is my go-to pig-out breakfast).
So, all of that said and in praise of good chefs, I can’t recommend the fairly new Belle & Lily’s Caribbean Brunch House enough. The restaurant, located in a shopping center not far off I-85 on Chamblee-Tucker Road, is owned by the folks behind Ms. Icey’s Kitchen & Bar and Apt. 4, both upscale Caribbean spots. The leaders of this new venture are Tasha Cyril (nicknamed Belle), and her cousin Aliyah Cyril (Lily), who is executive chef. The restaurant’s marketing notes that it is black-owned and woman-owned. Not to be a pig, but, my god, Belle and Lily are gorgeous.
The dining room, which is small enough to make reservations a good idea, is informal, comfy, and has some elegant features like a wall from which greenery sprouts, as I used to see in every other fine dining spot in Los Angeles. Okay, the plants are plastic here, but it’s still a great effect. I’m also impressed that a bird of paradise bloom, adorns the restaurant’s logo.
The food is, obviously, Caribbean. Not to brag, but before I met the brunch-loving partner mentioned above, I was married briefly to a Cuban woman whose mother was an outrageously good cook. She opened my piehole to a broader investigation of Caribbean cuisine after my five-marriage. What we ate here in Atlanta until relatively recently was mainly jerk this and that, but you could drive to the suburbs and find tiny weekend diners serving more exotic food, unfortunately mainly from steam trays, but it was a start. I learned a lot.
When you take your seat at the restaurant and look around, you’re going to immediately notice how each entrée you see looks beautiful. I’m talking almost mysterious. Meanwhile, though, you’re going to try out the less glamorously presented appetizers. You’ve probably had most before but the flavor here is going to blow you away. My companion Ms. Rose and I ordered a classic Jamaican beef patty and two empanadas. The immediate zap of both apps was the pastry. It was fresh, it had flavor. There’s no way they could have been sitting in some warm-up device for hours. The empanadas were filled with chicken, cheese, and spinach (beef is available) and you could taste everything. By that I mean it wasn’t baby food dominated by a single prosaic seasoning. Ditto for the beef patty, a yellow pillow that I resisted placing against my cheek as I do with most biscuits. There are other compelling appetizers available, like conch fritters, crab and shrimp tostones, and a “half breed” biscuit with passion fruit butter. (I don’t recall Cher eating a biscuit on her horse.)
Belle and Lily’s is not cheap overall, although the sandwiches – Cuban, fried grouper, and jerk chicken — will run you only $13 to $16. Entrees have a broad cost range, but you’re not going to want to eat the more boring stuff, so plan to spend over $20. As I mentioned above, I love conch and I bypassed the conch fritters to order Lambi, described as “St. Lucian style grilled conch with seasoned rice and mesclun salad.” The great problem with conch, of course, is that it can be chewier than a dog toy. I’ve mainly eaten Italian dishes with it and most have avoided that. I agonized with the server about this. She was clear that the conch was somewhat chewy but not invulnerable to teeth. So I ordered it. The conch was cut into small cubes and, well, I’m sorry to say I found it challenging. I loved the buttery but spicy salad and the almost risotto-like rice. And, of course, I was soon chomping on the conch and ate every bit. But be warned: it ain’t tender. You do get violet petals with it!
Ms. Rose ordered a more conventionally brunchy dish: Big Batty Byal, described as “Halal jerk chicken & buttermilk pancakes with ginger hibiscus syrup (dark meat only).” It was strewn with pink petals. It is probably a measure of my avoidance of brunch, that I was shocked by the pancakes. They were super-thick but fluffy. The chicken retained full flavor under its jerk seasonings and the syrup was tangy with the ginger. I love ginger. In fact, I ordered a bottle of their house-made ginger beer. It could become a serious addiction. (I just weaned myself off a shockingly good, very strong, very cheap, but embarrassingly sourced ginger beer.
I look forward to returning to Belle and Lily’s, maybe on a Sunday, when things get quite lively. I thank them from the bottom of my heart for smashing my brunchophobia and restoring the cheerful optimism that I lost on that afternoon in the ‘70s when I announced I was done with alfalfa-sprout burritos and homemade corn flakes. —CL—
Belle & Lily’s Caribbean Brunch House, 3350 Chamblee Tucker Road, 470-294-2900, belleandlilys.com @belleandlilys Cliff Bostock BELLE & LILY'S: It doesn't get more floral than at this new Caribbean place for brunch 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Wednesday through Sunday. GRAZING: If you hate brunch, you might love Belle & Lily’s "
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GRAZING: If you hate brunch, you might love Belle & Lily’s Article
Wednesday May 4, 2022 03:15 PM EDT
‘Each entrée you see looks beautiful’
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string(11883) "I know I’m in a great restaurant when a server looks me in the eyes with a curled lip that says, “I get your sarcasm, motherfucker.”
I was at Nur Kitchen, the “modern Mediterranean” restaurant on Buford Highway that has caused local dining critics’ pens to pulse and spurt for at least a year. While three of us were perusing the menu, the server dropped a magnificent charred, eviscerated, and stuffed whole eggplant on the very close-by table of two women. We ordered one instantly. When the server lowered it toward our table, I noted: “Wait, their eggplant is much bigger than ours.” He shot a glance at theirs and ours and clunked the plate on the table, smiling, and vanished. When he came back, I resumed my complaint. “You understand that the eggplant is an emoji for the penis, right? You have two women at that table and two men and one woman at this one. For obvious reasons, we deserve the larger eggplant.” That’s when his lip curled. In a world that now seriously pathologizes my first language, sarcasm, I am constantly misunderstood. It felt so good to be understood.
And it felt so good, too, to be fed so well. The chef, Shay Lavi, emigrated here in 2015 from Israel and became quickly popular with his catering. He was raised in Tel Aviv in a family with maternal connections to Libya and Turkey. The label “Mediterranean” is a bit confusing. It refers to the cuisines of all countries that border the Mediterranean where wheat and olive oil reign. Nur’s cooking, although featuring a few notes from France and Greece, is mainly what we usually call Middle Eastern, which is also known as West Asian. The French, by the way, love Middle Eastern food, especially Moroccan, and it was my go-to in Paris after exhausting myself in the spectral companionship of Ms. Julia Child. My favorite Middle Eastern food in Atlanta has been mainly Palestinian. My experience of Turkish food was routinely and maddeningly better during trips to Germany than I sampled during the weeks I spent mainly inland in Turkey (while incubating giardia). It’s complicated. However you locate Lavi’s cooking geographically, the taste is unique.
That eggplant was roasted and charred in a brick oven. A lot of people have become nervous when meat is charred because it can eat you alive with its carcinogens. Veggies are safe, though. A char basically means the vegetable’s natural sugar has caramelized, amping up the sweetness but with a bit of homeopathic bitterness. The eggplant’s succulent interior was largely cut into chunks tossed with tahini, mango dressing, and chopped salad. And that brings up my one complaint about the food here. The tabouli, or chopped salad — mainly cucumbers, tomatoes, onions, and parsley with lemon juice — is ubiquitous. If you order one of the pita sandwiches, the main ingredient is the chopped salad. My mouth and my gut don’t really enjoy raw onions much, but we encountered them repeatedly at our meal. (It’s especially not good if your occupation requires you to listen to anxious people and ask them to follow you in taking some deep breaths).
The three of us ordered pita sandwiches — one with falafel, one with chicken shawarma, and mine with chicken schnitzel. Happily, the flat, crispy schnitzel waved out of the pita interior where hummus and tahini co-existed with the ton of tabouli (chopped salad). It was really delicious and next time I might go for the entrée plate where the schnitzel is liberated from the profusion of salad. My companions Wayne and Rose piped happily about their sandwiches whose primary ingredients were completely invisible. I scored a taste of Wayne’s falafel and it was startling. I mean it had a depth of vegetarian flavor I don’t think I’ve encountered before. Rose’s shawarma, which is available daily in limited quantities, pleased her so much she did not offer me a taste. The golden house-made pita with which these sandwiches are made is thick, somewhat fluffy, and perfumey like none I remember ever encountering.
We also had to order Nur’s mezze platter, an assortment of six to eight tapas-sized vegetable dishes that change frequently. If Chef Lavi knows you — the restaurant is very social, especially during dinner — you might get some more esoteric and complex tastes, according to Wendell Brock of the AJC. For now, I don’t care because most of the classics like hummus, sour eggplant, and baba ghanoush were startling in the clarity of their ingredients, especially when teamed with the unexpected like a puddle of aioli. You tear up pieces of the perfect pita to scoop up the dips and if there are more than two diners at your table, you’ll wonder why you did not receive more than two of the cushiony pita. So order more. Other small plates during our visit included more prosaic dish fillers like olives, pickled onions, and labneh.
The lunch and dinner menus are the same here and include many other dishes, from burgers (lamb or beef) and grilled chicken thighs to mussels (fried or sautéed) and baklava. A large plate of roasted vegetables draws as many approvals as the mezze. A whole roasted fish is available most days. Many items, like the schnitzel, are available as sandwiches or on entrée plates. The charming dining room is festooned with colorful lamps high above that somehow made me Dream of Jeanie and wonder when someone was going to step out of the kitchen to read Rumi aloud in Farsi (the most beautiful language on the globe). The dining room is small and busy enough that reservations are recommended. Definitely go with friends, because this very sensual food is meant to be shared (even though I refused to share my schnitzel). Don’t forget to taunt the server with sarcasm.
!!Shopping
::::
I go to Kroger and Trader Joe’s every week and spend an increasingly ridiculous amount of money on staples alone. Recently, I decided to try out the budget-minded Aldi which has a store near Grant Park. There are annoying aspects like having to insert a quarter in a lock to get a cart. You get the quarter back when you return the cart. Meanwhile, someone might be standing by, asking you for the quarter in your hand. Here ya go, buddy.
Inside, most everything is stacked in boxes instead of being arranged on shelves. Pricing is clear – something Kroger obviously and intentionally avoids. I had conversations with three or four other shoppers there and I was taken aback by everyone’s enthusiasm for the place. A young French student told me it’s the perfect place for “European ingredients.” I didn’t exactly get that until I later read that Aldi and Trader Joe’s have a common European heritage too complicated to describe here.
Savings on produce, including the fruit I’m addicted to, were huge. Much of it is organic, as is much of the meat, if that means anything to you because, frankly, it generally means very little. I bought three varieties of bagged apples, kiwis (which I haven’t eaten in 10 years), mandarin oranges, strawberries, nectarines, grapes, cheeses, chicharrones, a gigantic corned beef, organic chicken breasts, a mesquite-smoked pork loin, wet cat food, and, incidentally, pita bread that cost about $1 and was far better than Kroger’s and Trader Joe’s. By the time I left, I’d spent about $65. I was not totally happy with the bagged apples. They were small and not always crisp. And the pork loin was just weird. I wish I’d found an unseasoned one.
I also visited Hoa Binh, a large Asian market with a Vietnamese name, on Buford Highway. Wayne buys tons of Szechuan pickles and peppers and slimy roots there to put on everything he eats, but I was particularly interested in the fresh Vietnamese specialties wrapped in banana leaves that are sold in the check-out lanes. They are made by the folks who operate a food booth inside the store.
I pride myself on loving Asian foods, but the truth is I have some pretty pathetic boundaries. I don’t like strong fish and shrimp paste, for example. I don’t like organ meats. Honestly, I don’t even like brown sauces with muddled tastes of soy sauce. I tried about four of the Vietnamese items. The only one I really liked a lot was the cha lua or “Vietnamese ham” that is often compared to mortadella. Unwrapping it from the banana leaves and plastic wrap is a chore, but the stuff, a frequent banh mi ingredient, is delicious…at room temperature or slightly cool. I did try it in a few warm noodle dishes and did not find it appetizing. Sliced and plunked on a baguette with some sriracha mayo, it’s perfect.
The most unfamiliar item was two little sweet pyramids, also complexly wrapped in leaves — banh tet chuoi. They are a sticky treat popular during lunar new year (tet). Unwrapping these little beasts was like performing surgery. They had that gummy texture I really don’t like, usually derived from sweetened beans of some type. It’s a funky gummy. I have no idea what the flavors were. I’m guessing the green one was green tea and the brown one was, um, peanut butter? There was mysterious stuff in the core. I also bought two other logs, both of which also turned out to be sweets. The most interesting thing about this experience was detecting the taste of banana leaves. I had no idea they imparted subtle but distinctive flavor. Now I do.
!!Here and there
::::
Dude, I’m so over the Krystal at 626 14th Street and Northside Drive. I’ve wanted to try it out ever since it teamed up with Butter.ATL and the Spice Group to basically create a big piece of urban art that serves sliders and Black culture. I finally decided to give it a go last month. Like three times. Despite its marketing claims and signs, it’s not open 24 hours. While the drive-through was open during two visits, the doors were locked. On my third try, two idle employees came out and explained they weren’t open inside. I told them my story. They looked at one another and groaned. One of them explained that they never knew day to day whether to unlock the doors. “We wait for the call,” he said. “You should call our manager.” I said I’d done that but his phone was disconnected. Seriously…..
Following my second abortive attempt to get me a Krystal, I rushed to Mix’d Up to snag a lamb burger, which they had brought back after taking it off the menu earlier. Nope. Off the menu again and “we’re closed anyway.” I rounded the corner and saw that Estrellita, a Filipino restaurant, was all lit up. I raced inside and asked if they were still serving dinner. “No,” the guy said behind the counter. While I was about to kill myself, he said, “Wait. We have a dinner someone ordered but Uber didn’t come get. You can have it for $5.” Hell yeah. A quarter of a spicy, super crunchy chicken and two Filipino-style egg rolls. Check out their ube -– traditional purple ice cream.
!!Decadently rich
I swear Woods Chapel BBQ makes the most decadently rich Cuban sandwich in our city. It has co-owner Todd Ginsberg’s artistry painted all over it. I’ve written about it before when it was only available one day a week, but it’s on the regular menu now. They’ve also added some weekend specials: I want the Pig n’ Grits: “smoked pork belly, creamy grits, winter veggie slaw, mustard vinaigrette, maple syrup.” —CL—
Nur Kitchen, 7130 Buford Highway, Suite C-100; 678-691-3821; nurkitchenusa.com; @nurkitchenusa
Aldi, 1461 Moreland Avenue (and 7 other locations), 844-476-1058, aldi.us
Hoa Binh Supermarket, 4897 Buford Highway, 770-457-3383.
Estrellita, 580 Woodward Avenue, 404-390-3038, estrellitafilipino.com
Woods Chapel BBQ, 85 Georgia Avenue, 404-522-3000, woodschapelbbq.com, @woodschapelbbq"
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string(12937) "I know I’m in a great restaurant when a server looks me in the eyes with a curled lip that says, “I get your sarcasm, motherfucker.”
I was at Nur Kitchen, the “modern Mediterranean” restaurant on Buford Highway that has caused local dining critics’ pens to pulse and spurt for at least a year. While three of us were perusing the menu, the server dropped a magnificent charred, eviscerated, and stuffed whole eggplant on the very close-by table of two women. We ordered one instantly. When the server lowered it toward our table, I noted: “Wait, their eggplant is much bigger than ours.” He shot a glance at theirs and ours and clunked the plate on the table, smiling, and vanished. When he came back, I resumed my complaint. “You understand that the eggplant is an emoji for the penis, right? You have two women at that table and two men and one woman at this one. For obvious reasons, we deserve the larger eggplant.” That’s when his lip curled. In a world that now seriously pathologizes my first language, sarcasm, I am constantly misunderstood. It felt so good to be understood.
And it felt so good, too, to be fed so well. The chef, Shay Lavi, emigrated here in 2015 from Israel and became quickly popular with his catering. He was raised in Tel Aviv in a family with maternal connections to Libya and Turkey. The label “Mediterranean” is a bit confusing. It refers to the cuisines of all countries that border the Mediterranean where wheat and olive oil reign. Nur’s cooking, although featuring a few notes from France and Greece, is mainly what we usually call Middle Eastern, which is also known as West Asian. The French, by the way, love Middle Eastern food, especially Moroccan, and it was my go-to in Paris after exhausting myself in the spectral companionship of Ms. Julia Child. My favorite Middle Eastern food in Atlanta has been mainly Palestinian. My experience of Turkish food was routinely and maddeningly better during trips to Germany than I sampled during the weeks I spent mainly inland in Turkey (while incubating giardia). It’s complicated. However you locate Lavi’s cooking geographically, the taste is unique.
That eggplant was roasted and charred in a brick oven. A lot of people have become nervous when meat is charred because it can eat you alive with its carcinogens. Veggies are safe, though. A char basically means the vegetable’s natural sugar has caramelized, amping up the sweetness but with a bit of homeopathic bitterness. The eggplant’s succulent interior was largely cut into chunks tossed with tahini, mango dressing, and chopped salad. And that brings up my one complaint about the food here. The tabouli, or chopped salad — mainly cucumbers, tomatoes, onions, and parsley with lemon juice — is ubiquitous. If you order one of the pita sandwiches, the main ingredient is the chopped salad. My mouth and my gut don’t really enjoy raw onions much, but we encountered them repeatedly at our meal. (It’s especially not good if your occupation requires you to listen to anxious people and ask them to follow you in taking some deep breaths).
{DIV()}{img fileId="50253" stylebox="float: left; margin-right:25px;" desc="desc" link="" width="300px" responsive="y" button="popup"}{DIV}
The three of us ordered pita sandwiches — one with falafel, one with chicken shawarma, and mine with chicken schnitzel. Happily, the flat, crispy schnitzel waved out of the pita interior where hummus and tahini co-existed with the ton of tabouli (chopped salad). It was really delicious and next time I might go for the entrée plate where the schnitzel is liberated from the profusion of salad. My companions Wayne and Rose piped happily about their sandwiches whose primary ingredients were completely invisible. I scored a taste of Wayne’s falafel and it was startling. I mean it had a depth of vegetarian flavor I don’t think I’ve encountered before. Rose’s shawarma, which is available daily in limited quantities, pleased her so much she did not offer me a taste. The golden house-made pita with which these sandwiches are made is thick, somewhat fluffy, and perfumey like none I remember ever encountering.
{DIV()}{img fileId="50252" stylebox="float: left; margin-right:25px;" desc="desc" link="" width="300px" responsive="y" button="popup"}{DIV}
We also had to order Nur’s mezze platter, an assortment of six to eight tapas-sized vegetable dishes that change frequently. If Chef Lavi knows you — the restaurant is very social, especially during dinner — you might get some more esoteric and complex tastes, according to Wendell Brock of the ''AJC''. For now, I don’t care because most of the classics like hummus, sour eggplant, and baba ghanoush were startling in the clarity of their ingredients, especially when teamed with the unexpected like a puddle of aioli. You tear up pieces of the perfect pita to scoop up the dips and if there are more than two diners at your table, you’ll wonder why you did not receive more than two of the cushiony pita. So order more. Other small plates during our visit included more prosaic dish fillers like olives, pickled onions, and labneh.
The lunch and dinner menus are the same here and include many other dishes, from burgers (lamb or beef) and grilled chicken thighs to mussels (fried or sautéed) and baklava. A large plate of roasted vegetables draws as many approvals as the mezze. A whole roasted fish is available most days. Many items, like the schnitzel, are available as sandwiches or on entrée plates. The charming dining room is festooned with colorful lamps high above that somehow made me Dream of Jeanie and wonder when someone was going to step out of the kitchen to read Rumi aloud in Farsi (the most beautiful language on the globe). The dining room is small and busy enough that reservations are recommended. Definitely go with friends, because this very sensual food is meant to be shared (even though I refused to share my schnitzel). Don’t forget to taunt the server with sarcasm.
!!~~#0000ff:Shopping~~
::{img fileId="50255" desc="desc" styledesc="text-align: left;" width="800px" responsive="y" button="popup"}::
I go to Kroger and Trader Joe’s every week and spend an increasingly ridiculous amount of money on staples alone. Recently, I decided to try out the budget-minded Aldi which has a store near Grant Park. There are annoying aspects like having to insert a quarter in a lock to get a cart. You get the quarter back when you return the cart. Meanwhile, someone might be standing by, asking you for the quarter in your hand. Here ya go, buddy.
Inside, most everything is stacked in boxes instead of being arranged on shelves. Pricing is clear – something Kroger obviously and intentionally avoids. I had conversations with three or four other shoppers there and I was taken aback by everyone’s enthusiasm for the place. A young French student told me it’s the perfect place for “European ingredients.” I didn’t exactly get that until I later read that Aldi and Trader Joe’s have a common European heritage too complicated to describe here.
Savings on produce, including the fruit I’m addicted to, were huge. Much of it is organic, as is much of the meat, if that means anything to you because, frankly, it generally means very little. I bought three varieties of bagged apples, kiwis (which I haven’t eaten in 10 years), mandarin oranges, strawberries, nectarines, grapes, cheeses, chicharrones, a gigantic corned beef, organic chicken breasts, a mesquite-smoked pork loin, wet cat food, and, incidentally, pita bread that cost about $1 and was far better than Kroger’s and Trader Joe’s. By the time I left, I’d spent about $65. I was not totally happy with the bagged apples. They were small and not always crisp. And the pork loin was just weird. I wish I’d found an unseasoned one.
I also visited Hoa Binh, a large Asian market with a Vietnamese name, on Buford Highway. Wayne buys tons of Szechuan pickles and peppers and slimy roots there to put on everything he eats, but I was particularly interested in the fresh Vietnamese specialties wrapped in banana leaves that are sold in the check-out lanes. They are made by the folks who operate a food booth inside the store.
{DIV()}{img fileId="50256" stylebox="float: left; margin-right:25px;" desc="desc" link="" width="500px" responsive="y" button="popup"}{DIV}
I pride myself on loving Asian foods, but the truth is I have some pretty pathetic boundaries. I don’t like strong fish and shrimp paste, for example. I don’t like organ meats. Honestly, I don’t even like brown sauces with muddled tastes of soy sauce. I tried about four of the Vietnamese items. The only one I really liked a lot was the cha lua or “Vietnamese ham” that is often compared to mortadella. Unwrapping it from the banana leaves and plastic wrap is a chore, but the stuff, a frequent banh mi ingredient, is delicious…at room temperature or slightly cool. I did try it in a few warm noodle dishes and did not find it appetizing. Sliced and plunked on a baguette with some sriracha mayo, it’s perfect.
{DIV()}{img fileId="50257" stylebox="float: left; margin-right:25px;" desc="desc" link="" width="300px" responsive="y"}{DIV}
The most unfamiliar item was two little sweet pyramids, also complexly wrapped in leaves — banh tet chuoi. They are a sticky treat popular during lunar new year (tet). Unwrapping these little beasts was like performing surgery. They had that gummy texture I really don’t like, usually derived from sweetened beans of some type. It’s a funky gummy. I have no idea what the flavors were. I’m guessing the green one was green tea and the brown one was, um, peanut butter? There was mysterious stuff in the core. I also bought two other logs, both of which also turned out to be sweets. The most interesting thing about this experience was detecting the taste of banana leaves. I had no idea they imparted subtle but distinctive flavor. Now I do.
!!~~#0000ff:Here and there~~
::{img fileId="50258" desc="desc" styledesc="text-align: left;" width="800px" responsive="y"}::
Dude, I’m so over the Krystal at 626 14th Street and Northside Drive. I’ve wanted to try it out ever since it teamed up with Butter.ATL and the Spice Group to basically create a big piece of urban art that serves sliders and Black culture. I finally decided to give it a go last month. Like three times. Despite its marketing claims and signs, it’s not open 24 hours. While the drive-through was open during two visits, the doors were locked. On my third try, two idle employees came out and explained they weren’t open inside. I told them my story. They looked at one another and groaned. One of them explained that they never knew day to day whether to unlock the doors. “We wait for the call,” he said. “You should call our manager.” I said I’d done that but his phone was disconnected. Seriously…..
Following my second abortive attempt to get me a Krystal, I rushed to Mix’d Up to snag a lamb burger, which they had brought back after taking it off the menu earlier. Nope. Off the menu again and “we’re closed anyway.” I rounded the corner and saw that Estrellita, a Filipino restaurant, was all lit up. I raced inside and asked if they were still serving dinner. “No,” the guy said behind the counter. While I was about to kill myself, he said, “Wait. We have a dinner someone ordered but Uber didn’t come get. You can have it for $5.” Hell yeah. A quarter of a spicy, super crunchy chicken and two Filipino-style egg rolls. Check out their ube -– traditional purple ice cream.
!!~~#0000ff:Decadently rich~~
{DIV()}{img fileId="50259" stylebox="float: left; margin-right:25px;" desc="desc" link="" width="300px" responsive="y"}{DIV}
I swear Woods Chapel BBQ makes the most decadently rich Cuban sandwich in our city. It has co-owner Todd Ginsberg’s artistry painted all over it. I’ve written about it before when it was only available one day a week, but it’s on the regular menu now. They’ve also added some weekend specials: I want the Pig n’ Grits: “smoked pork belly, creamy grits, winter veggie slaw, mustard vinaigrette, maple syrup.” __—CL—__
''Nur Kitchen, 7130 Buford Highway, Suite C-100; 678-691-3821; [https://www.nurkitchenusa.com/|nurkitchenusa.com]; @nurkitchenusa''
''Aldi, 1461 Moreland Avenue (and 7 other locations), 844-476-1058, [https://www.aldi.us/|aldi.us]''
''Hoa Binh Supermarket, 4897 Buford Highway, 770-457-3383.''
''Estrellita, 580 Woodward Avenue, 404-390-3038, [https://www.estrellitafilipino.com/|estrellitafilipino.com]''
''Woods Chapel BBQ, 85 Georgia Avenue, 404-522-3000, [https://www.woodschapelbbq.com/|woodschapelbbq.com], @woodschapelbbq''"
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string(12709) " #1 GRAZ Emoji Exploded 2022-04-07T21:09:21+00:00 #1_GRAZ_Emoji_exploded.jpeg Mediterranean, Middle Eastern, or West Asian — a rose by any other name… #1 GRAZ Emoji Exploded 2022-04-07T20:58:36+00:00 GRAZING: Swole eggplants at Nur Kitchen, Krystal mendacity, strange little pyramids, lovely kiwis jim.harris Jim Harris Cliff Bostock cliffbostock (Cliff Bostock) 2022-04-07T20:58:36+00:00 I know I’m in a great restaurant when a server looks me in the eyes with a curled lip that says, “I get your sarcasm, motherfucker.”
I was at Nur Kitchen, the “modern Mediterranean” restaurant on Buford Highway that has caused local dining critics’ pens to pulse and spurt for at least a year. While three of us were perusing the menu, the server dropped a magnificent charred, eviscerated, and stuffed whole eggplant on the very close-by table of two women. We ordered one instantly. When the server lowered it toward our table, I noted: “Wait, their eggplant is much bigger than ours.” He shot a glance at theirs and ours and clunked the plate on the table, smiling, and vanished. When he came back, I resumed my complaint. “You understand that the eggplant is an emoji for the penis, right? You have two women at that table and two men and one woman at this one. For obvious reasons, we deserve the larger eggplant.” That’s when his lip curled. In a world that now seriously pathologizes my first language, sarcasm, I am constantly misunderstood. It felt so good to be understood.
And it felt so good, too, to be fed so well. The chef, Shay Lavi, emigrated here in 2015 from Israel and became quickly popular with his catering. He was raised in Tel Aviv in a family with maternal connections to Libya and Turkey. The label “Mediterranean” is a bit confusing. It refers to the cuisines of all countries that border the Mediterranean where wheat and olive oil reign. Nur’s cooking, although featuring a few notes from France and Greece, is mainly what we usually call Middle Eastern, which is also known as West Asian. The French, by the way, love Middle Eastern food, especially Moroccan, and it was my go-to in Paris after exhausting myself in the spectral companionship of Ms. Julia Child. My favorite Middle Eastern food in Atlanta has been mainly Palestinian. My experience of Turkish food was routinely and maddeningly better during trips to Germany than I sampled during the weeks I spent mainly inland in Turkey (while incubating giardia). It’s complicated. However you locate Lavi’s cooking geographically, the taste is unique.
That eggplant was roasted and charred in a brick oven. A lot of people have become nervous when meat is charred because it can eat you alive with its carcinogens. Veggies are safe, though. A char basically means the vegetable’s natural sugar has caramelized, amping up the sweetness but with a bit of homeopathic bitterness. The eggplant’s succulent interior was largely cut into chunks tossed with tahini, mango dressing, and chopped salad. And that brings up my one complaint about the food here. The tabouli, or chopped salad — mainly cucumbers, tomatoes, onions, and parsley with lemon juice — is ubiquitous. If you order one of the pita sandwiches, the main ingredient is the chopped salad. My mouth and my gut don’t really enjoy raw onions much, but we encountered them repeatedly at our meal. (It’s especially not good if your occupation requires you to listen to anxious people and ask them to follow you in taking some deep breaths).
The three of us ordered pita sandwiches — one with falafel, one with chicken shawarma, and mine with chicken schnitzel. Happily, the flat, crispy schnitzel waved out of the pita interior where hummus and tahini co-existed with the ton of tabouli (chopped salad). It was really delicious and next time I might go for the entrée plate where the schnitzel is liberated from the profusion of salad. My companions Wayne and Rose piped happily about their sandwiches whose primary ingredients were completely invisible. I scored a taste of Wayne’s falafel and it was startling. I mean it had a depth of vegetarian flavor I don’t think I’ve encountered before. Rose’s shawarma, which is available daily in limited quantities, pleased her so much she did not offer me a taste. The golden house-made pita with which these sandwiches are made is thick, somewhat fluffy, and perfumey like none I remember ever encountering.
We also had to order Nur’s mezze platter, an assortment of six to eight tapas-sized vegetable dishes that change frequently. If Chef Lavi knows you — the restaurant is very social, especially during dinner — you might get some more esoteric and complex tastes, according to Wendell Brock of the AJC. For now, I don’t care because most of the classics like hummus, sour eggplant, and baba ghanoush were startling in the clarity of their ingredients, especially when teamed with the unexpected like a puddle of aioli. You tear up pieces of the perfect pita to scoop up the dips and if there are more than two diners at your table, you’ll wonder why you did not receive more than two of the cushiony pita. So order more. Other small plates during our visit included more prosaic dish fillers like olives, pickled onions, and labneh.
The lunch and dinner menus are the same here and include many other dishes, from burgers (lamb or beef) and grilled chicken thighs to mussels (fried or sautéed) and baklava. A large plate of roasted vegetables draws as many approvals as the mezze. A whole roasted fish is available most days. Many items, like the schnitzel, are available as sandwiches or on entrée plates. The charming dining room is festooned with colorful lamps high above that somehow made me Dream of Jeanie and wonder when someone was going to step out of the kitchen to read Rumi aloud in Farsi (the most beautiful language on the globe). The dining room is small and busy enough that reservations are recommended. Definitely go with friends, because this very sensual food is meant to be shared (even though I refused to share my schnitzel). Don’t forget to taunt the server with sarcasm.
!!Shopping
::::
I go to Kroger and Trader Joe’s every week and spend an increasingly ridiculous amount of money on staples alone. Recently, I decided to try out the budget-minded Aldi which has a store near Grant Park. There are annoying aspects like having to insert a quarter in a lock to get a cart. You get the quarter back when you return the cart. Meanwhile, someone might be standing by, asking you for the quarter in your hand. Here ya go, buddy.
Inside, most everything is stacked in boxes instead of being arranged on shelves. Pricing is clear – something Kroger obviously and intentionally avoids. I had conversations with three or four other shoppers there and I was taken aback by everyone’s enthusiasm for the place. A young French student told me it’s the perfect place for “European ingredients.” I didn’t exactly get that until I later read that Aldi and Trader Joe’s have a common European heritage too complicated to describe here.
Savings on produce, including the fruit I’m addicted to, were huge. Much of it is organic, as is much of the meat, if that means anything to you because, frankly, it generally means very little. I bought three varieties of bagged apples, kiwis (which I haven’t eaten in 10 years), mandarin oranges, strawberries, nectarines, grapes, cheeses, chicharrones, a gigantic corned beef, organic chicken breasts, a mesquite-smoked pork loin, wet cat food, and, incidentally, pita bread that cost about $1 and was far better than Kroger’s and Trader Joe’s. By the time I left, I’d spent about $65. I was not totally happy with the bagged apples. They were small and not always crisp. And the pork loin was just weird. I wish I’d found an unseasoned one.
I also visited Hoa Binh, a large Asian market with a Vietnamese name, on Buford Highway. Wayne buys tons of Szechuan pickles and peppers and slimy roots there to put on everything he eats, but I was particularly interested in the fresh Vietnamese specialties wrapped in banana leaves that are sold in the check-out lanes. They are made by the folks who operate a food booth inside the store.
I pride myself on loving Asian foods, but the truth is I have some pretty pathetic boundaries. I don’t like strong fish and shrimp paste, for example. I don’t like organ meats. Honestly, I don’t even like brown sauces with muddled tastes of soy sauce. I tried about four of the Vietnamese items. The only one I really liked a lot was the cha lua or “Vietnamese ham” that is often compared to mortadella. Unwrapping it from the banana leaves and plastic wrap is a chore, but the stuff, a frequent banh mi ingredient, is delicious…at room temperature or slightly cool. I did try it in a few warm noodle dishes and did not find it appetizing. Sliced and plunked on a baguette with some sriracha mayo, it’s perfect.
The most unfamiliar item was two little sweet pyramids, also complexly wrapped in leaves — banh tet chuoi. They are a sticky treat popular during lunar new year (tet). Unwrapping these little beasts was like performing surgery. They had that gummy texture I really don’t like, usually derived from sweetened beans of some type. It’s a funky gummy. I have no idea what the flavors were. I’m guessing the green one was green tea and the brown one was, um, peanut butter? There was mysterious stuff in the core. I also bought two other logs, both of which also turned out to be sweets. The most interesting thing about this experience was detecting the taste of banana leaves. I had no idea they imparted subtle but distinctive flavor. Now I do.
!!Here and there
::::
Dude, I’m so over the Krystal at 626 14th Street and Northside Drive. I’ve wanted to try it out ever since it teamed up with Butter.ATL and the Spice Group to basically create a big piece of urban art that serves sliders and Black culture. I finally decided to give it a go last month. Like three times. Despite its marketing claims and signs, it’s not open 24 hours. While the drive-through was open during two visits, the doors were locked. On my third try, two idle employees came out and explained they weren’t open inside. I told them my story. They looked at one another and groaned. One of them explained that they never knew day to day whether to unlock the doors. “We wait for the call,” he said. “You should call our manager.” I said I’d done that but his phone was disconnected. Seriously…..
Following my second abortive attempt to get me a Krystal, I rushed to Mix’d Up to snag a lamb burger, which they had brought back after taking it off the menu earlier. Nope. Off the menu again and “we’re closed anyway.” I rounded the corner and saw that Estrellita, a Filipino restaurant, was all lit up. I raced inside and asked if they were still serving dinner. “No,” the guy said behind the counter. While I was about to kill myself, he said, “Wait. We have a dinner someone ordered but Uber didn’t come get. You can have it for $5.” Hell yeah. A quarter of a spicy, super crunchy chicken and two Filipino-style egg rolls. Check out their ube -– traditional purple ice cream.
!!Decadently rich
I swear Woods Chapel BBQ makes the most decadently rich Cuban sandwich in our city. It has co-owner Todd Ginsberg’s artistry painted all over it. I’ve written about it before when it was only available one day a week, but it’s on the regular menu now. They’ve also added some weekend specials: I want the Pig n’ Grits: “smoked pork belly, creamy grits, winter veggie slaw, mustard vinaigrette, maple syrup.” —CL—
Nur Kitchen, 7130 Buford Highway, Suite C-100; 678-691-3821; nurkitchenusa.com; @nurkitchenusa
Aldi, 1461 Moreland Avenue (and 7 other locations), 844-476-1058, aldi.us
Hoa Binh Supermarket, 4897 Buford Highway, 770-457-3383.
Estrellita, 580 Woodward Avenue, 404-390-3038, estrellitafilipino.com
Woods Chapel BBQ, 85 Georgia Avenue, 404-522-3000, woodschapelbbq.com, @woodschapelbbq Cliff Bostock THE EMOJI THAT EXPLODED: Nur Kitchen's "burned eggplant" gives you chunks of creamy, roasted flesh inside charred skin mixed with tahini, chopped salad, and mango dressing. It is a stunning example of Chef Shay Lavi's ability to marry flavors behind carefully crafted chaos. GRAZING: Swole eggplants at Nur Kitchen, Krystal mendacity, strange little pyramids, lovely kiwis "
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GRAZING: Swole eggplants at Nur Kitchen, Krystal mendacity, strange little pyramids, lovely kiwis Article
Thursday April 7, 2022 04:58 PM EDT
Mediterranean, Middle Eastern, or West Asian — a rose by any other name…
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string(9152) "In this time of skyrocketing inflation, chickens continue their fight to push cows into extinction, as Chick-fil-A has urged for years. That company has retained its domination of the sandwich market, only briefly relegated to second place by the debut of Popeyes’ sandwich in 2019. While burgers still retain the majority of the market, chicken sandwich sales have increased 420 percent in the last two years!
As longtime readers of this column know, I’ve been a fanatical consumer of Popeyes chicken for decades. I was ridiculed, spat upon, and dragged through the mud by serious foodies until the likes of Anthony Bourdain confessed his own idolization of the crunchy, spicy, cajun-inspired chicken also long-endorsed by Paul Prudhomme (along with the red beans and rice). When Popeyes’ sandwich almost immediately became a victim of Covid-style supply-chain shortages, I nearly died from an overdose of schadenfreude. I did manage to score a few sandwiches at two different locations and they were perfect.
Alas, that’s apparently changed. Last month, I again checked out the sandwich at two locations. I risked Omicron and ate inside. In both cases, I received sandwiches whose expectedly crispy breasts were basically coated in grainy mush, probably from sitting too long in their foil wrappers. I didn’t complain. I looked out the window of the Boulevard location for someone homeless who might appreciate donation of a mainly uneaten sandwich. Apparently, the homeless have likely learned about the icky crust and moved to the nearby Wendy’s.
It's okay, because I have been addicted to the Super Crunch chicken sandwich at Hero Doughnuts & Buns in Summerhill for well over a year. Honestly, I could easily eat one every day. The downside is that it costs $9.29 compared to Popeyes’ $3.99. Get a combo at Hero and you’ll be spending over $15 with tax and a decent tip, compared to $6.99 at Popeyes. But a true addiction is undeterred by a 50-percent-higher cost. Add a bread pudding donut to smear on your face while driving home and you might spend $20 at Hero.
Now comes a competing, long-anticipated chicken sandwich café, also in Summerhill, How Crispy Express. The idea for it was hatched more than two years ago by Will Sibernagel, former chef at Argosy and Bookhouse Pub. He pulled Ticonderoga Club’s Greg Best and Bart Sasso into the plan. As soon as they got started, their plans were derailed by construction issues at an initially chosen different site. Then they shifted to the Summerhill location and the pandemic slowed things again. Not being chicken-hearted, they persevered and initiated pop-ups, most famously across the street at Halfway Crooks, where sandwiches were lowered in a basket from an upstairs window to the squawking flocks of hungry customers.
I’ve visited the restaurant twice. At this writing there was no seating inside the tiny space, but there’s a patio where you can stand. (Stools for inside seating are on the way.) The restaurant is neighbored by Woods Chapel BBQ, which has a gigantic patio with seating. Since there were very few people there and the weather was fine, I stole a seat there during both visits, as did several other customers, but you shouldn’t do that, of course.
The big difference here is that the sandwiches are made with fried thighs instead of the usual breasts. Don’t worry; they are as huge as the typical white-meat sandwich. I have to admit that I was disconcerted by the thighs, even though that’s typically what I use when I cook chicken at home. The dark meat is definitely richer than the usual white and I even left a few bites of my “classic” sandwich behind. It was slathered with an “herby spread” and layered with lettuce and bread and butter pickles on a “good bun.” To be more honest than I want to be, the severely crunchy sandwich did not make me crow. That herby spread tasted peculiar enough to me that, halfway through eating, I went back inside to ask what was in it. “Mainly dill, tarragon, and lemon,” the cashier told me. “Okay,” I said, reading aloud from my phone’s picture of the menu, “let me try a slice of this Coca-Cola cake with chocolate cream cheese frosting and salted peanuts I saw online.” They didn’t have any. I later waddled across the street to Big Softie for a gigantic ice cream cone, but they don’t open until 3 p.m., which is when How Crispy closes.
There are three other chicken sandwiches on the menu — one with garlic-honey-butter sauce, one with tikka seasonings, and one with Buffalo sauce, which I tried on my second visit. It includes lemon-pepper seasonings along with “super ranch” dressing, “shrettuce,” and bread and butter pickles. I liked it better than the classic and even though it’s described as “wet,” the crunch was still there. That’s not the case at many restaurants. My only complaint: It’s not spicy enough for my mouth full of scar tissue.
There’s also an “herby chickpea patty” sandwich, a plate of six “nuggies,” a “big salad,” and four sides, including a “lil salad,” collards, mac & cheese, and yucca fries. I went for the collards…twice. I would happily quadruple the portion for an entire meal. Prices, by the way, are about the same as Hero’s, down the street — $9 for most sandwiches and $4 for sides.
As I was leaving the patio the first visit, I saw some noisy peckerhead and his chick devouring a pile of the food. I stopped and asked them how they liked it. He ran over to greet a bro and she told me that she “loved, loved, loved” it and had been lining up at popups for a year. She recommended the Buffalo version, which is why I returned. I think her very high opinion is most people’s and the owners are already planning a second, larger restaurant downtown, where they will likely serve fried chicken on the bone as well as in sandwiches. The place screams “Franchise!”
By the way, although co-owner Greg Best has long been regarded as the city’s premier mixologist, there’s no booze at How Crispy, just soft drinks and “Atlanta type chicken,” as an outdoor mural says. It is illustrated with a chicken face with drooping eyelids, who might appear drunk. You can do that across the street at Halfway Crooks.
Do you prefer your chicken grilled? Then head to the new Pollo Supremo in East Atlanta, the latest project of chefs Duane Kulers and Nhan Le, who own Supremo Taco in nearby Grant Park. What’s so supremo about the pollo here? These lucky chickens are spatchcocked (butterflied) and grilled in the style of roadside chefs of Sinaloa, a province of northern Mexico. The chicken there features fairly heavy citric flavors combined with chiles.
The menu is simple. You order a quarter, a half, or whole bird alone for $5 to $18. You can add tortillas, rice, beans, pico de gallo, and salsas for a few dollars more. I ordered a quarter plus another side, esquites, and the same churros they sell at the taqueria. The chicken, grilled a little blacker than I remember eating in Mexico, is spiked with moritas, dried and smoked jalapenos. Like a fresh jalapeno, the morita’s burn can be really mild to fairly scorching. I encountered no heat at all but the red salsa did add a nice burn. The green was perfect — sour and bracing. I tore hunks of the chicken from the bone and placed them in tortillas with the beans, pico, and salsa. Que rico!
Although the beans had deep flavor, the rice was nondescript. That seems to be usual everywhere. Does so-called Mexican rice serve any purpose other than filling space on a plate? I actually liked that this wasn’t the usual bright yellow stuff, but it was extremely dry. My handmade tacos refused to include it. There’s also guac and classic chicken soup available.
Esquites — corn off the cob with mayo, cheese, and some clippings of something — was off the mark slightly. I love the stuff. You can’t walk down a street in Mexico without being offered 10 cups of it. Supremo’s was a bit too thick and gooey for my taste. I took half of it home and gave it a few seconds in the microwave. That melted it down more to my liking. Yeah, I’m being too picky. I did love the churros. I love them so much I ordered them again the next week at Supremo Taco. I wish they had a caramel sauce for dipping them. I use fig butter at home.
Pollo Supremo has a few booths inside and a large patio. It was open barely two weeks when I visited and there was a steady stream of customers. I have no doubt it will be a hit. Margaritas are available. Gracias a dios, I did not hear or see a mariachi band. I hear Covid killed them everywhere. —CL—
Popeyes, they’re everywhere, popeyes.com, @popeyes. Avoid the sandwich unless right out of the fryer and enjoy the chicken pieces; check online for great coupons.
Hero Doughnuts and Buns, 33 Georgia Ave, 470-369-6800, herodoughnutsandbuns.com @herodoughnuts
How Crispy Express, 71 Georgia Ave., 678-705-3531, howcrispy.com, @howcrispy
Pollo Supremo, 792 Moreland Ave., 404-748-9082, pollo-supremo.com, @howcrispy "
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As longtime readers of this column know, I’ve been a fanatical consumer of Popeyes chicken for decades. I was ridiculed, spat upon, and dragged through the mud by serious foodies until the likes of Anthony Bourdain confessed his own idolization of the crunchy, spicy, cajun-inspired chicken also long-endorsed by Paul Prudhomme (along with the red beans and rice). When Popeyes’ sandwich almost immediately became a victim of Covid-style supply-chain shortages, I nearly died from an overdose of schadenfreude. I did manage to score a few sandwiches at two different locations and they were perfect.
Alas, that’s apparently changed. Last month, I again checked out the sandwich at two locations. I risked Omicron and ate inside. In both cases, I received sandwiches whose expectedly crispy breasts were basically coated in grainy mush, probably from sitting too long in their foil wrappers. I didn’t complain. I looked out the window of the Boulevard location for someone homeless who might appreciate donation of a mainly uneaten sandwich. Apparently, the homeless have likely learned about the icky crust and moved to the nearby Wendy’s.
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It's okay, because I have been addicted to the Super Crunch chicken sandwich at Hero Doughnuts & Buns in Summerhill for well over a year. Honestly, I could easily eat one every day. The downside is that it costs $9.29 compared to Popeyes’ $3.99. Get a combo at Hero and you’ll be spending over $15 with tax and a decent tip, compared to $6.99 at Popeyes. But a true addiction is undeterred by a 50-percent-higher cost. Add a bread pudding donut to smear on your face while driving home and you might spend $20 at Hero.
Now comes a competing, long-anticipated chicken sandwich café, also in Summerhill, How Crispy Express. The idea for it was hatched more than two years ago by Will Sibernagel, former chef at Argosy and Bookhouse Pub. He pulled Ticonderoga Club’s Greg Best and Bart Sasso into the plan. As soon as they got started, their plans were derailed by construction issues at an initially chosen different site. Then they shifted to the Summerhill location and the pandemic slowed things again. Not being chicken-hearted, they persevered and initiated pop-ups, most famously across the street at Halfway Crooks, where sandwiches were lowered in a basket from an upstairs window to the squawking flocks of hungry customers.
I’ve visited the restaurant twice. At this writing there was no seating inside the tiny space, but there’s a patio where you can stand. (Stools for inside seating are on the way.) The restaurant is neighbored by Woods Chapel BBQ, which has a gigantic patio with seating. Since there were very few people there and the weather was fine, I stole a seat there during both visits, as did several other customers, but you shouldn’t do that, of course.
The big difference here is that the sandwiches are made with fried thighs instead of the usual breasts. Don’t worry; they are as huge as the typical white-meat sandwich. I have to admit that I was disconcerted by the thighs, even though that’s typically what I use when I cook chicken at home. The dark meat is definitely richer than the usual white and I even left a few bites of my “classic” sandwich behind. It was slathered with an “herby spread” and layered with lettuce and bread and butter pickles on a “good bun.” To be more honest than I want to be, the severely crunchy sandwich did not make me crow. That herby spread tasted peculiar enough to me that, halfway through eating, I went back inside to ask what was in it. “Mainly dill, tarragon, and lemon,” the cashier told me. “Okay,” I said, reading aloud from my phone’s picture of the menu, “let me try a slice of this Coca-Cola cake with chocolate cream cheese frosting and salted peanuts I saw online.” They didn’t have any. I later waddled across the street to Big Softie for a gigantic ice cream cone, but they don’t open until 3 p.m., which is when How Crispy closes.
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There are three other chicken sandwiches on the menu — one with garlic-honey-butter sauce, one with tikka seasonings, and one with Buffalo sauce, which I tried on my second visit. It includes lemon-pepper seasonings along with “super ranch” dressing, “shrettuce,” and bread and butter pickles. I liked it better than the classic and even though it’s described as “wet,” the crunch was still there. That’s not the case at many restaurants. My only complaint: It’s not spicy enough for my mouth full of scar tissue.
There’s also an “herby chickpea patty” sandwich, a plate of six “nuggies,” a “big salad,” and four sides, including a “lil salad,” collards, mac & cheese, and yucca fries. I went for the collards…twice. I would happily quadruple the portion for an entire meal. Prices, by the way, are about the same as Hero’s, down the street — $9 for most sandwiches and $4 for sides.
As I was leaving the patio the first visit, I saw some noisy peckerhead and his chick devouring a pile of the food. I stopped and asked them how they liked it. He ran over to greet a bro and she told me that she “loved, loved, loved” it and had been lining up at popups for a year. She recommended the Buffalo version, which is why I returned. I think her very high opinion is most people’s and the owners are already planning a second, larger restaurant downtown, where they will likely serve fried chicken on the bone as well as in sandwiches. The place screams “Franchise!”
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By the way, although co-owner Greg Best has long been regarded as the city’s premier mixologist, there’s no booze at How Crispy, just soft drinks and “Atlanta type chicken,” as an outdoor mural says. It is illustrated with a chicken face with drooping eyelids, who might appear drunk. You can do that across the street at Halfway Crooks.
Do you prefer your chicken grilled? Then head to the new Pollo Supremo in East Atlanta, the latest project of chefs Duane Kulers and Nhan Le, who own Supremo Taco in nearby Grant Park. What’s so supremo about the pollo here? These lucky chickens are spatchcocked (butterflied) and grilled in the style of roadside chefs of Sinaloa, a province of northern Mexico. The chicken there features fairly heavy citric flavors combined with chiles.
The menu is simple. You order a quarter, a half, or whole bird alone for $5 to $18. You can add tortillas, rice, beans, pico de gallo, and salsas for a few dollars more. I ordered a quarter plus another side, esquites, and the same churros they sell at the taqueria. The chicken, grilled a little blacker than I remember eating in Mexico, is spiked with moritas, dried and smoked jalapenos. Like a fresh jalapeno, the morita’s burn can be really mild to fairly scorching. I encountered no heat at all but the red salsa did add a nice burn. The green was perfect — sour and bracing. I tore hunks of the chicken from the bone and placed them in tortillas with the beans, pico, and salsa. Que rico!
Although the beans had deep flavor, the rice was nondescript. That seems to be usual everywhere. Does so-called Mexican rice serve any purpose other than filling space on a plate? I actually liked that this wasn’t the usual bright yellow stuff, but it was extremely dry. My handmade tacos refused to include it. There’s also guac and classic chicken soup available.
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Esquites — corn off the cob with mayo, cheese, and some clippings of something — was off the mark slightly. I love the stuff. You can’t walk down a street in Mexico without being offered 10 cups of it. Supremo’s was a bit too thick and gooey for my taste. I took half of it home and gave it a few seconds in the microwave. That melted it down more to my liking. Yeah, I’m being too picky. I did love the churros. I love them so much I ordered them again the next week at Supremo Taco. I wish they had a caramel sauce for dipping them. I use fig butter at home.
Pollo Supremo has a few booths inside and a large patio. It was open barely two weeks when I visited and there was a steady stream of customers. I have no doubt it will be a hit. Margaritas are available. Gracias a dios, I did not hear or see a mariachi band. I hear Covid killed them everywhere. __—CL—__
''Popeyes, they’re everywhere, popeyes.com, @popeyes. Avoid the sandwich unless right out of the fryer and enjoy the chicken pieces; check online for great coupons.''
''Hero Doughnuts and Buns, 33 Georgia Ave, 470-369-6800, herodoughnutsandbuns.com @herodoughnuts''
''How Crispy Express, 71 Georgia Ave., 678-705-3531, howcrispy.com, @howcrispy ''
''Pollo Supremo, 792 Moreland Ave., 404-748-9082, pollo-supremo.com, @howcrispy ''"
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string(9784) " Lede MAR Graz 2022-03-01T17:17:26+00:00 Lede_MAR_Graz.jpg popeye\'s hero doughnuts and buns how crispy express pollo supremo In the ATL, there is plenty to know Lede MAR Graz 2022-03-01T17:08:45+00:00 GRAZING: ‘You’ve got to know your chicken’ jim.harris Jim Harris CLIFF BOSTOCK cliffbostock (Cliff Bostock) 2022-03-01T17:08:45+00:00 In this time of skyrocketing inflation, chickens continue their fight to push cows into extinction, as Chick-fil-A has urged for years. That company has retained its domination of the sandwich market, only briefly relegated to second place by the debut of Popeyes’ sandwich in 2019. While burgers still retain the majority of the market, chicken sandwich sales have increased 420 percent in the last two years!
As longtime readers of this column know, I’ve been a fanatical consumer of Popeyes chicken for decades. I was ridiculed, spat upon, and dragged through the mud by serious foodies until the likes of Anthony Bourdain confessed his own idolization of the crunchy, spicy, cajun-inspired chicken also long-endorsed by Paul Prudhomme (along with the red beans and rice). When Popeyes’ sandwich almost immediately became a victim of Covid-style supply-chain shortages, I nearly died from an overdose of schadenfreude. I did manage to score a few sandwiches at two different locations and they were perfect.
Alas, that’s apparently changed. Last month, I again checked out the sandwich at two locations. I risked Omicron and ate inside. In both cases, I received sandwiches whose expectedly crispy breasts were basically coated in grainy mush, probably from sitting too long in their foil wrappers. I didn’t complain. I looked out the window of the Boulevard location for someone homeless who might appreciate donation of a mainly uneaten sandwich. Apparently, the homeless have likely learned about the icky crust and moved to the nearby Wendy’s.
It's okay, because I have been addicted to the Super Crunch chicken sandwich at Hero Doughnuts & Buns in Summerhill for well over a year. Honestly, I could easily eat one every day. The downside is that it costs $9.29 compared to Popeyes’ $3.99. Get a combo at Hero and you’ll be spending over $15 with tax and a decent tip, compared to $6.99 at Popeyes. But a true addiction is undeterred by a 50-percent-higher cost. Add a bread pudding donut to smear on your face while driving home and you might spend $20 at Hero.
Now comes a competing, long-anticipated chicken sandwich café, also in Summerhill, How Crispy Express. The idea for it was hatched more than two years ago by Will Sibernagel, former chef at Argosy and Bookhouse Pub. He pulled Ticonderoga Club’s Greg Best and Bart Sasso into the plan. As soon as they got started, their plans were derailed by construction issues at an initially chosen different site. Then they shifted to the Summerhill location and the pandemic slowed things again. Not being chicken-hearted, they persevered and initiated pop-ups, most famously across the street at Halfway Crooks, where sandwiches were lowered in a basket from an upstairs window to the squawking flocks of hungry customers.
I’ve visited the restaurant twice. At this writing there was no seating inside the tiny space, but there’s a patio where you can stand. (Stools for inside seating are on the way.) The restaurant is neighbored by Woods Chapel BBQ, which has a gigantic patio with seating. Since there were very few people there and the weather was fine, I stole a seat there during both visits, as did several other customers, but you shouldn’t do that, of course.
The big difference here is that the sandwiches are made with fried thighs instead of the usual breasts. Don’t worry; they are as huge as the typical white-meat sandwich. I have to admit that I was disconcerted by the thighs, even though that’s typically what I use when I cook chicken at home. The dark meat is definitely richer than the usual white and I even left a few bites of my “classic” sandwich behind. It was slathered with an “herby spread” and layered with lettuce and bread and butter pickles on a “good bun.” To be more honest than I want to be, the severely crunchy sandwich did not make me crow. That herby spread tasted peculiar enough to me that, halfway through eating, I went back inside to ask what was in it. “Mainly dill, tarragon, and lemon,” the cashier told me. “Okay,” I said, reading aloud from my phone’s picture of the menu, “let me try a slice of this Coca-Cola cake with chocolate cream cheese frosting and salted peanuts I saw online.” They didn’t have any. I later waddled across the street to Big Softie for a gigantic ice cream cone, but they don’t open until 3 p.m., which is when How Crispy closes.
There are three other chicken sandwiches on the menu — one with garlic-honey-butter sauce, one with tikka seasonings, and one with Buffalo sauce, which I tried on my second visit. It includes lemon-pepper seasonings along with “super ranch” dressing, “shrettuce,” and bread and butter pickles. I liked it better than the classic and even though it’s described as “wet,” the crunch was still there. That’s not the case at many restaurants. My only complaint: It’s not spicy enough for my mouth full of scar tissue.
There’s also an “herby chickpea patty” sandwich, a plate of six “nuggies,” a “big salad,” and four sides, including a “lil salad,” collards, mac & cheese, and yucca fries. I went for the collards…twice. I would happily quadruple the portion for an entire meal. Prices, by the way, are about the same as Hero’s, down the street — $9 for most sandwiches and $4 for sides.
As I was leaving the patio the first visit, I saw some noisy peckerhead and his chick devouring a pile of the food. I stopped and asked them how they liked it. He ran over to greet a bro and she told me that she “loved, loved, loved” it and had been lining up at popups for a year. She recommended the Buffalo version, which is why I returned. I think her very high opinion is most people’s and the owners are already planning a second, larger restaurant downtown, where they will likely serve fried chicken on the bone as well as in sandwiches. The place screams “Franchise!”
By the way, although co-owner Greg Best has long been regarded as the city’s premier mixologist, there’s no booze at How Crispy, just soft drinks and “Atlanta type chicken,” as an outdoor mural says. It is illustrated with a chicken face with drooping eyelids, who might appear drunk. You can do that across the street at Halfway Crooks.
Do you prefer your chicken grilled? Then head to the new Pollo Supremo in East Atlanta, the latest project of chefs Duane Kulers and Nhan Le, who own Supremo Taco in nearby Grant Park. What’s so supremo about the pollo here? These lucky chickens are spatchcocked (butterflied) and grilled in the style of roadside chefs of Sinaloa, a province of northern Mexico. The chicken there features fairly heavy citric flavors combined with chiles.
The menu is simple. You order a quarter, a half, or whole bird alone for $5 to $18. You can add tortillas, rice, beans, pico de gallo, and salsas for a few dollars more. I ordered a quarter plus another side, esquites, and the same churros they sell at the taqueria. The chicken, grilled a little blacker than I remember eating in Mexico, is spiked with moritas, dried and smoked jalapenos. Like a fresh jalapeno, the morita’s burn can be really mild to fairly scorching. I encountered no heat at all but the red salsa did add a nice burn. The green was perfect — sour and bracing. I tore hunks of the chicken from the bone and placed them in tortillas with the beans, pico, and salsa. Que rico!
Although the beans had deep flavor, the rice was nondescript. That seems to be usual everywhere. Does so-called Mexican rice serve any purpose other than filling space on a plate? I actually liked that this wasn’t the usual bright yellow stuff, but it was extremely dry. My handmade tacos refused to include it. There’s also guac and classic chicken soup available.
Esquites — corn off the cob with mayo, cheese, and some clippings of something — was off the mark slightly. I love the stuff. You can’t walk down a street in Mexico without being offered 10 cups of it. Supremo’s was a bit too thick and gooey for my taste. I took half of it home and gave it a few seconds in the microwave. That melted it down more to my liking. Yeah, I’m being too picky. I did love the churros. I love them so much I ordered them again the next week at Supremo Taco. I wish they had a caramel sauce for dipping them. I use fig butter at home.
Pollo Supremo has a few booths inside and a large patio. It was open barely two weeks when I visited and there was a steady stream of customers. I have no doubt it will be a hit. Margaritas are available. Gracias a dios, I did not hear or see a mariachi band. I hear Covid killed them everywhere. —CL—
Popeyes, they’re everywhere, popeyes.com, @popeyes. Avoid the sandwich unless right out of the fryer and enjoy the chicken pieces; check online for great coupons.
Hero Doughnuts and Buns, 33 Georgia Ave, 470-369-6800, herodoughnutsandbuns.com @herodoughnuts
How Crispy Express, 71 Georgia Ave., 678-705-3531, howcrispy.com, @howcrispy
Pollo Supremo, 792 Moreland Ave., 404-748-9082, pollo-supremo.com, @howcrispy Cliff Bostock ATLANTA CHICKEN WARS?: Contenders for the golden comb, Hero Doughnuts and Buns (left) and How Crispy Express. "Hero Doughnuts and Buns" "How Crispy Express" Popeye's "Pollo Supremo" GRAZING: ‘You’ve got to know your chicken’ "
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GRAZING: ‘You’ve got to know your chicken’ Article
Tuesday March 1, 2022 12:08 PM EST
In the ATL, there is plenty to know
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—CL—"
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!!__Daily Chew__
My favorite lunch in the last month came from this restaurant operated by the zen-nishly named Stop Think Chew, which delivers clean, locally sourced meals. At this new venue, diners can order at a window for takeout or enjoy the recently opened dining room. It’s a cozy informal space with full table service. I’ve sampled two dishes and both were seriously spectacular. One was a pita sandwich stuffed with veriasso smoked salmon with lemon labneh (thick yogurt). Other flavors included onions, capers, dill, sumac, and salad greens. The second dish was a roasted veggie salad (to which I pointlessly added rotisserie chicken). Flavors include salad greens, tahini, cabbage, hummus, pickles, and charred eggplant, which never tasted so good before. — Cliff Bostock
''Daily Chew, 2127 Liddell Dr., 404-600-4155, [https://dailychewatl.com|dailychewatl.com] IG & FB: @dailychewatl''{BOX}
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!!__Nam Phuong__
Vietnamese food is flourishing to a degree it hasn’t since the early ‘80s. Recently, restaurants like Pho Cue have taken the historic, elegant hybrid of Southeast Asian and French cuisine for a ride through Texas bbq pits. If you want to stay true to the original, Nam Phuong is the place to go. At least twice a month, I feast on classic rice noodles topped with shrimp, caramelized pork, pickled carrots, and lettuce. Dump the entire container of fish sauce on the bowl. (I add extra sriracha.) Two spring rolls round out my meal. There is much, much more on the menu. — Cliff Bostock
''Nam Phuong, 4051 Buford Hwy., 404-633-2400, and 5495 Jimmy Carter Blvd., 770-409-8686. [https://tinyurl.com/yaqv85qs|Menu]''{BOX}
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!!__El Tesoro__
Few restaurants have eased the pain of COVID takeout as much as this treasure. There is no indoor seating, but even in winter, people are showing up to graze in the huge open-air dining room. Tequila raises the temperature as much as the six fire pits. I’ve never eaten anything bad here but, then, I haven’t eaten anything but the mulita in the last year or so. It’s basically a quesadilla made of two stacked corn tortillas filled with melted cheese and poblano/onion rajas, plus the meat or vegetarian alternative of your choice. There’s more! The outside of both tortillas is seared with cheese. Then you dribble crema on top. It’s under $10! There’s a lot else I’d like to try here, above all the appropriately twice-cooked carnitas. — Cliff Bostock
''El Tesoro, 1374 Awkright Place, 470-440-5502, [https://eltesoro.com|eltesoro.com] FB, IG, T: @eltesoroatl''{BOX}
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!!__BoccaLupo__
If there’s any restaurant I love that I have been unfaithful to during the last few years, this is it. Chef-owner Bruce Logue reeducated my palate around 2010 when he came from Babbo in New York to work at La Pietra Cucina. He convinced me that Italian-American food was not all a corrupt impersonation of classic Italian cooking but a cuisine of its own. I ate lunch at Pietra weekly for two years. Nothing at BoccaLupo is even mediocre but if you want your tongue to sing, drape it with black spaghetti, hot Calabrese sausage, and red shrimp. You might want to tune up first with marsala glazed octopus with saffron potatoes. — Cliff Bostock
''BoccaLupo, 753 Edgewood Ave., 404-577-2332, [https://boccalupoatl.com|boccalupoatl.com] FB, IG, T: @boccalupoatl''{BOX}
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!!__Masterpiece__
You might remember the War of 10,000 Chinese Chefs about 10 years ago, maybe more. Chefs of legendary skill, fame, and peculiarity appeared and disappeared here like tastebuds poisoned by Sichuan peppercorns. Luckily, Rui Liu, a truly extraordinary chef of mainly Sichuan style, has remained at this restaurant. I’m sorry that it’s located in Duluth, but it’s worth an expedition. Whenever you read about the place, two dishes are immediately mentioned — the dry-fried eggplant and the braised pork belly. The latter comes to the table looking something like a glossy black meatloaf and really does taste like nothing you’ve ever eaten, which is to say that I don’t have adequate adjectives at hand. The eggplant is no silly emoji, but it has all the polarized textures and flavors of man at his complicated best: crackly and a bit salty on the outside but lovingly creamy and a bit fiery-sweet on the inside. Yup. — Cliff Bostock
''Masterpiece, 3940 Buford Hwy., Duluth, 770-622-1191, [https://masterpieceduluth.com|masterpieceduluth.com] ''{BOX}
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!!__The Varsity__
I want you to go here, as I did last year. I was shocked that I loved the onion rings and the fried peach pie. I hated the dawgs and I annoyed someone so much that he sent me an emailed death threat: “Leave the Varsity hot dog alone, asshole. There are more painful ways to put you out of your misery than making you shit too much.” Thanks, bro, I ‘preciate the scatological warnings! I had written: “The hot dog of course was the most revolting thing I’ve put in my mouth since I was potty-trained. The greasy, stinky, yellow-stained chili made with ground-up mystery meat was slimed with hidden slaw from hell and yellow cheese that wouldn’t melt. Somehow, the baloney-tasting hot dog itself and its bun literally broke as if it were crying to be put out of its misery. Two bites and I was done. Sorry, dog.” Go, eat, and tell me I was wrong. — Cliff Bostock
''The Varsity, 61 North Ave., 404-881-1706, [https://thevarsity.com|thevarsity.com] FB: @thevarsity. IG, T: @thevarsity1928''{BOX}
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!!__Little Bear __
When COVID ruined our lives by throwing us into a medieval prison of our own thoughts two years ago, this restaurant had just opened in Summerhill. Chef/owner Jarrett Stieber, well known for his earlier pop-up, Eat Me Speak Me, was forced to limit himself to take-out, which was by far the best and weirdest I’ve eaten ever since the flu pandemic of 1918. Now, the restaurant has reopened its small dining room, takeout has been discontinued, and you can eat at a table like a champ! At this writing, you’ll encounter dishes whose menu descriptions add up to a free-form poetic food fight: “chicken liver custard winter citrus gelee, greasy pickles, chocolate strange flavor sauce, gem lettuce cups.” Go ahead and “treat yo’self! Add caviar yogurt” to your root-veg latke. You can order a la carte or drop $48 per person for a prix fixe, four-course meal. — Cliff Bostock
''Little Bear, 71-A Georgia Ave., 404-500-5396, [https://littlebear.com|littlebear.com] IG, T: @littlebearatl''{BOX}
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!!__Supremo Taco__
This taqueria with a walk-up window and a small patio for dining-while-standing is adjacent to Grindhouse Killer Burgers’ parking lot. You probably didn’t know there is intense competition in our city — sort of — to create a perfect rendition of southern California’s Chicano street food. This is the winner! I absolutely love the tacos here, especially the lamb barbacoa with consommé, the al pastor, and the chicken mole. But I gotta be honest. I made a pact with myself after ordering takeout four or five times to always eat on the premises, even if it meant squatting in the parking lot. The reason is that they were piling way too much in the same takeout containers. By the time I’d get home — which isn’t far — I’d have a gooey mess. On the very rare occasion I do takeout, I order the fried quesadilla or choriqueso only, maybe some churros. They withstand the journey. Above all, I discourage you from ordering online, because you likely won’t be getting something as fresh as when you order at the window. — Cliff Bostock
''Supremo Taco, 701-B Memorial Dr., 404-965-1446, [https://supremotaco.com|supremotaco.com] IG, FB: @supremoguey''{BOX}
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!!__Chattahoochee Food Works__
Food halls, formerly known as food courts, have evolved into something like surreal upscale carnival binge-a-ramas. This latest and greatest is part of The Works, a warehouse development on the West Side, repurposed into another mixed-use golden ghetto. The food hall, with seriously pedigreed designers, maintains a human scale despite its 22,000 square feet. It is a step way above the echo chambers of the Valhallas of Krog Street and Ponce de Leon. You can find some fab food here — from South African and Vietnamese to noodles, cupcakes, and Lebanese barbecue. There are 31 booths and areas that allow you to sit back and chill instead of wolfing down, oh, six kimchi corn dogs and fleeing to a restroom for a moment of silence.—Cliff Bostock
''Chattahoochee Food Works, 1235 Chattahoochee Ave., [https://chattahoocheefoodworks.com|chattahoocheefoodworks.com] IG, FB: @chattahoocheefoodworks''{BOX}
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!!__Big Softie__
For years, I’ve been addicted to the Toffee-Coffee Arctic Swirl at most Zestos. Now, at last, I have found an alternative in Grant Park. Big Softie! True story: I heard about it from a friend’s mother who was dying in a hospital north of the city. She said soft-serve ice cream would be a perfect last meaI and I offered to pick up something rich, creamy, cold, and confusing. She swooned — in a good way, not a death-rattle way. My go to: vanilla ice cream, pink praline, toasted coconut, and a caramel coating — Cliff Bostock
''Big Softie, 66 Georgia Ave. (no phone), [https://bigsoftieatl.com|bigsoftieatl.com], IG, FB: bigsoftieatl''{BOX}
__—CL—__"
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—CL— Cliff Bostock THE VARSITY: The chili-cheese dog shrinks in broken inferiority beside a cluster of towering onion rings tingling with grease and a fried peach pie that prepares to unsheath itself and submit to teeth. 0,0,18 GRAZING: Eating the world over in the ATL "
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GRAZING: Eating the world over in the ATL Article
Thursday February 3, 2022 04:18 PM EST
Our food critic eats to the beat
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more...
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{imagefloatright imageid="46689" wdthval="300px"}__Poco Loco__
This breakfast takeout joint in Kirkwood gives full expression to the wacky imagination and humor of its owner, Nick Melvin. Three fat, perfectly rolled breakfast burritos are offered daily – one for carnivores, one for ovo-lacto-vegetarians, and one for kids. Just as compelling are daily-changing provisions in a case next to the cash register. You’ll find, for example, Atlanta’s realest carnitas, sauces, soups, and other entrees for home heating. — Cliff Bostock
''Poco Loco, 2233 College Ave., open 7:30 a.m.-1 p.m. Thursday-Friday and 8 a.m.-1 p.m. Saturday, no phone. Find the week’s menu and place advance orders on the website, pocolocoatl.com, IG & FB: @pocolocoatl''
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{imagefloatleft imageid="46688" wdthval="300px"}__Pho Cue__
Vietnamese cuisine, wildly popular in the late ‘80s and ‘90s, has surged again and even been upgraded with Texas BBQ here. That means lots of juicy, house-smoked brisket (as well as chicken and pork) to add to the A+ pho or fries with typical pickled and fresh veggies. There are frequent specials that respect your redneck tongue’s refusal to eat foreign food — chili-cheese dogs and bacon-cheese burgers, for example. The regular menu’s smoked wings are extremely popular. — Cliff Bostock
''Pho Cue, 925 Garrett St., 404-549-7595, eatphocue.com, IG & FB: @eatphocue ''
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{imagefloatright imageid="46681" wdthval="300px"}__Che Butter Jonez__
You know your mouth starts salivating when you see a burger named “That Shit Slambing.” That shit is actually a delicious smashed lamb burger that got its start on the owners’ food truck before they opened this brick-and-mortar location just south of the airport. The shrimp fries are also deservedly popular, as is the ever evolving and dissolving Who Let Mookie Make the Pasta. Obviously, owners Malik Rhasaan and wife Detric Fox-Quinlan have a sense of humor that comes with a political sensibility that made Malik a leader in the Occupy Hood movement. I mean, who names their restaurant after Che Guevara and shea butter? Best advice: Don’t head here unless you check out the day’s often irregular hours on social media or their website. — Cliff Bostock
''Che Butter Jonez, 757 Cleveland Ave., 404-919-4061, chebutterjonez.com, FB & IG: @chebutterjonez ''
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{imagefloatleft imageid="46691" wdthval="300px"}__Tum Pok Pok__
This restaurant’s doorway became a place for food critics to genuflect throughout 2021. It’s Thai but unique in its emphasis on the quite spicy cuisine of the country’s northeast area, Isan. The simple shredded papaya salad (somtum) will instantly remind you that you once dreamed of becoming a fire eater in a carnival sideshow. Ditto for the larb. Besides these Isan specialties, Tum Pok Pok has a menu of street food popular throughout Thailand yet still rare in our city. Try the stir-fried crispy pork in a basil sauce. Pray over the pad Thai pok pok. — Cliff Bostock
''Tum Pok Pok, 5000 Buford Hwy., 404-990-4688, tumpokpok.com, IG: @tum_pok_pok, FB: @TPPUSA ''
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{imagefloatright imageid="46680" wdthval="300px"}__Carrot Dog__
If you dislike hot dogs and find carrots boring, you need to try this vegan pop-up at the Window outside the MET. Kemi Benning brines hefty carrots in spicy brews and nestles them in grilled buns with a variety of toppings. My fave has been the Southern Santa Fe topped with chopped romaine lettuce, sliced avocados, smoked chipotle mayo, chopped onions, and vegan bacon. — Cliff Bostock
''Carrot Dog, 680 Murphy Ave. (outside the MET), 404-447-8451, 12-4 p.m. Saturdays only, kemibenning.com. Call or check IG — @foodforthoughtvegancafe — to make sure they are open.''
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{imagefloatleft imageid="46678" wdthval="300px"}__Bomb Biscuits__
Are you looking for a new substance addiction? Go to this former pop-up now in Irwin Street Market for Erika Council’s buttermilk biscuits. Specifically go for the breakfast sandwiches. Most people love the fried chicken breast, especially good when drenched in hot honey, but my favorite is the country ham. By all means follow the menu’s suggestion to add the house-made pimento cheese. You won’t believe it. Erika is also making cinnamon buns. — Cliff Bostock
''Bomb Biscuits, 660 Irwin St., 678-949-9439. Open 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Thurs. & Fri. and 9 a.m.-2 p.m. Sat. & Sun. Order online only at bombiscuital.com, IG: @bombbiscuitatl.com''
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{imagefloatright imageid="46683" wdthval="300px"}__El Viñedo Local__
Another restaurant that opened just in time for the pandemic’s reduced hours, this South American café in Midtown is now serving breakfast, lunch, and dinner. The menu includes especially well made arepas, empanadas and sandwiches, plus plates like ceviche and fried fish. There are also bracing coffees and South American wines available. Favorites include the ceviche and the empanada filled with finely chopped beef, green olives, and boiled eggs. — Cliff Bostock
''El Viñedo Local, 730 Peachtree St., 404-596-8239, elvinedolocal.com, IG & FB: @elvinedolocal''
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{imagefloatleft imageid="46679" wdthval="300px"}__Botica__
If you’re looking for Mexican food partly spiked with Italian, Spanish, and Lebanese flavors in a restaurant with countless sports-watching screens and an awesome patio, this is your best destination. Opened by Chef Mimmo Alboumeh, the former owner of Red Pepper Taqueria, the restaurant’s best choice by far is the paella served at dinner on Wednesdays. Among the best tacos are lamb birria and the pork pibil. If you want a starter to share, consider the gigantic and dramatic tamales coated in white crema, sitting in a pool of salsa morita. You can drink a lot here. — Cliff Bostock
''Botica, 1820 Peachtree Road, 404-228-6358, eatbotica.com, IG: @boticaatl, FB: @eatbotica''
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{imagefloatright imageid="46690" wdthval="300px"}__Rodney Scott’s Whole Hog BBQ__
Charleston chef Rodney Scott is one of America’s royal pit masters, having won the James Beard award for best chef in the Southeast in 2018. He published a long awaited cookbook last year and also opened a restaurant here across from the MET on the Westside. The big deal here is that the restaurant smokes “whole hogs” over wood fires and your barbecue plate or sandwich includes pulled meat from different body parts. Call it “snout to tail ‘cue.” Personally, I found it a little dry, but adding Scott’s vinegar-based sauce quickly remedies that problem. Don’t miss the hushpuppies and the honey-butter. The menu is huge and includes plenty of other Southern favorites to feed sacrilegious diners who don’t like barbecue. — Cliff Bostock
''Rodney Scott’s Whole Hog BBQ, 668 Metropolitan Parkway, S.W., 678-855-7377, rodneyscottsbbq.com ''
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{imagefloatleft imageid="46685" wdthval="300px"}__Kura Revolving Sushi Bar__
Have you ever eaten sushi on a ferris wheel? That’s kinda what the experience at this restaurant is like. Countless plates of sushi skitter by on a conveyor belt and your task is to grab them before they get beyond your reach. An upper conveyor belt delivers a broader menu of food specifically ordered via a tableside device. I have to say you get what you pay for here — inexpensive medium-grade sushi — but it’s fun. And fast. — Cliff Bostock
''Kura Revolving Sushi Bar, 6035 Peachtree Rd., Doraville, 480-255-2071, kurasushi.com/locations/doraville-ga/''
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{imagefloatright imageid="46677" wdthval="300px"}__The Abby Singer__
You’re always looking for food with a Midwestern twang, right? Find it at this rather peculiar gastropub inside the Pratt Pullman Yard, where the gigantic “Van Gogh: The Immersive Experience” was located for about six months (and will be reopening elsewhere in Atlanta in March). The big deal here is the Juicy Lucy, a half-pound burger stuffed with cheese, but I was more smitten by the fried cheese curds that Canadian and Wisconsin fugitives cry for constantly. Get a seat at the bar and chat with the bartender Abby — not ''the'' Abby — who pastors a church and is fluent in liberation theology and boozeology. — Cliff Bostock
''The Abby Singer, 225 Rogers St. N.E., #11 in the Pratt Pullman District, secondmeal-llc.com. IG: @the.abby.singer, FB & Twitter: @theabbysinger''
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{imagefloatleft imageid="46686" wdthval="300px"}__Mercer Street Meals__
The pandemic has brought about some long-needed changes in the dining industry. One of those is access to quality restaurant food for takeout at reasonable prices. The leader in Atlanta is this operation by Lance Gummere, one of our city’s chefs expert at tweaking Southern comfort food into something special. Plates with entrees, sides, and dessert cost only $25 for two. A typical meal is coq au vin with cavatappi pasta, arugula and baby kale salad, and bread pudding. — Cliff Bostock
''Mercer Street Meals, 404-713-6001, order online at mercerstreetmeals.com, FB & IG: @mercerstreetmeals''
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{imagefloatright imageid="46684" wdthval="300px"}__Elsewhere Brewing__
It’s well known that there’s a large population of Italians in Argentina and that’s one theme here. You can find a mash-up of flavors in Argentinian-style milanesa napolitana and empanadas filled with mozzarella and wild mushrooms. The hybridization broadens with chimichurri hummus and beer-glazed Amish chicken with oregano. Craving a sandwich? Try the super-rich choripan. It’s a soft, house-made white roll layered with grilled, locally made chorizo sausage, served with a bracing chimichurri sauce and a salsa criolla made with mild red peppers (put both on the sandwich). It’s located in the Beacon development in Grant Park. — Cliff Bostock
''Elsewhere Brewing, 1039 Grant St., 770-727-0009, elsewherebrewing.com, IG: @elsewherebrewing, FB: @elsewherebrewingco''
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{imagefloatleft imageid="46687" wdthval="300px"}__OK Yaki__
Are you obsessed with the okonomiyaki? I am sick of that word, “obsessed,” but if you have to use it, apply it to this Japanese pancake that has been a “thing” everywhere for quite a while. OK Yaki describes it this way: “Japanese savory pancake made by mixing a rich batter with cabbage, green onions, pickled ginger, tenkasu and nagaimo. Fired on both sides and topped with okonomi sauce, Kewpie mayo, seaweed flakes, bonito flakes and one topping.” I like the pork belly topping. There are other dishes, including noodles and small plates for sharing here. If you eat inside, you’re going to have to prove vaccination proof. There is a large patio where you can breathe easy. Did I mention that it’s really cheap? — Cliff Bostock
''OK Yaki, 714 Moreland Ave. 404-999-9254, okyakiatl.com, IG &FB: @okyakiatl''
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{imagefloatright imageid="46682" wdthval="300px"}__Cremalosa__
Here’s the place I haven’t been that I most want to visit. It’s operated by Meridith Ford, formerly dining critic for the ''AJC''. It’s already won just about every “best of” competition around. The shop churns out 9 or 10 gelato flavors daily and two seasonal sorbets. I want to put my head in a gigantic vat of the Mascarpone and Caramelized Fig but I wouldn’t pass on the Butterscotch Macadamia Brittle. — Cliff Bostock
''Cremalosa, 2657 East College Avenue, Decatur, 404-600-6085, cremalosa.com, IG: @cremalosa_gelato, FB: @cremalosaatlanta''
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GRAZING - January 2022 Article
Tuesday January 4, 2022 04:25 PM EST
Cliff Bostock's January 2022 Grazing Recommendations
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string(8709) "First of all: Merry Christmas. Now that I’ve gotten that over with, I must make my annual plea to boycott any restaurant playing Christmas music. The Yuletide noise pollution has decreased in the last 30 years and we don’t want to give restaurateurs any encouragement to resume Christian torture of our auditory nerves. Please report offenders to me. Thank you.
Second of all: Send me lunch money. In typical American fashion, the more the “booming economy” expands, the more the rich get richer and the poor get starved by inflation. The cost of dining out, like any other act of consumption, has increased remarkably. There are many reasons why and, understand, I’m not including restaurateurs among those who have made cosmetic surgery and space travel their hobbies. They are struggling to maintain a five percent profit margin and have, after a decade of intense competition, finally been left with no alternative to passing on more of their costs to customers.
But still … Fortunately, I’ve never been attracted much to “fine dining” because, honestly, it’s rarely been within my financial reach but, more important, I just prefer so called exotic cuisines that offer an adventure rather than refinement. (For a writer, the former is about stories and the latter is about adjectives.) So, imagine my surprise when I discovered that Buford Highway is no longer predictably a bargain-basement safari. My friend Rose and I have often headed out that way merrily, with our pockets full of coins. But we were stunned recently by a meal at Mamak, one of my longtime favorites for Malaysian cuisine. My memory was that lunch specials cost about $10. However, we were handed paper menus on which those specials had been slashed out of existence. Long story short, our lunch cost us $57 including tax and tip.
The food was as delicious as ever. We shared rendang beef simmered in coconut milk with mild spices and “walnut shrimp,” which I’d never noticed on the menu before. It’s jumbo shrimp fried in a light batter, tossed in a sweetened mayonnaise sauce, and garnished with candied walnuts. I confess it was nostalgic curiosity that led me to order it. I used to eat a similar dish frequently for brunch at Hong Kong Harbour (R.I.P.). You could argue that the dish requires something sharper than beef drowned in coconut milk to offset the sweetness, but we managed. The shrimp, by the way, actually had flavor like they lived in the sea at some time. We also ordered roti canai, the flatbread served with a curried sauce for dipping. Don’t miss it. Your $5 will get you one small single piece of the bread. Just to be clear, the rendang is, at $20, the most expensive item on the menu. You can order rice and noodle dishes for significantly less. Or you could go down the road a bit and dine at Mamak Vegan Kitchen. I love the sambal okra there.
On to affordable, fat portions: While restaurants are reopening, sales have yet to get anywhere near their pre-pandemic level. Thus (maddeningly) abbreviated hours and an emphasis on takeout are likely to continue for a long time. A perfect formula is offered by Chef Lance Gummere, who created Mercer Street Meals after leaving Bantam & Biddy, which he co-founded in 2012. Before then, he was chef at The Shed at Glenwood, where I dined weekly for a couple of years. One night a week, he prepared a menu of sliders imaginative enough to be served at the Mad Hatter’s tea party. The rest of the week his imagination took refuge in tweaking Southern comfort food.
Lance now cooks at home where wife Gracie enjoys his full-time assistance in raising their two sons. They have two large dogs that licked the cat saliva off my hands on the front porch of their home on Mercer Street, which, quaintly enough, is a gravel road in Ormewood Park. Every Wednesday morning, they post the week’s available meals on their website, where customers purchase their choices. Usually, two different meals are available each week, but not on the same day. Thus, if you want both meals, you’ll have to make two trips to pick them up. It’s worth it. In fact, it’s probably the best bargain in the city. Meals are $25 for two and $45 for four. Yep, that’s $12.50 or less per person for a meal that includes an entrée, two sides, and dessert. And portions are large, really large.
My only meal so far has been baked salmon with wild rice, Brussels sprouts, and chocolate pavlova. I was frankly worried about it. Fish is not typically a takeout food I choose since it’s usually overcooked and completely dry by the time it’s on the table, especially if it requires reheating. Lance brings the food out his front door, packed in loosely wrapped aluminum containers and still warm enough that I had no need to reheat it. The salmon, in honey butter with a few scallions, was juicy and flaky. Wild rice was an exotic favorite of my mother — to the degree that I quit eating it around, oh, 1975. Lance outdid her by adding toasted pecans and a lot of green onions. Maybe my favorite was the roasted Brussels sprouts with bacon and cipollini onions. If I have any complaint, it was the profuse oniony flavors, especially in the rice’s raw green onions. But the dessert, pavlova, cleaned the breath in the way orgasm cleans the depraved mind. It was creamy, chewy, fruity, chocolatey, and, best of all, there was a ton of it. Check out their website for forthcoming meals, which range at this writing from bridge-club-fancy (crab mornay with a “Green Goddess crunch sandwich,” chicken noodle soup, and brownies) to after-church-piggy (chicken fried steak, garlic mashed potatoes, green beans smothered with onions, and pecan pie).
Last month, I wrote about the then-unopened Pho Cue in Glenwood Park. It’s up and going! The restaurant, which started as a pop-up, blends Vietnamese cuisine with Texas-style barbecue. I was mystified. Vietnamese, which is my favorite cuisine, is for the most part super-healthy, with fresh herbs and vegetables, mainly lean meats, and spikes of pickled and hot flavors. Smoky Texas barbecue on the other hand is not exactly what cardiologists recommend. I could not imagine, say, a Vietnamese sandwich (banh mi) squooshy with fatty brisket. So, does it work? Mainly. Owners Julian Wissman and Brian Holloway were at this writing still tampering with their menu, but I enjoyed most everything I sampled (and I sampled a lot).
My favorite by far has been the pho, the Vietnamese soup that is everywhere these days. Pho Cue’s is an extra-rich beef broth, thanks to the brisket smoked on the premises, with the usual noodles and herbs. Squirt the lime and squeeze the sriracha. As with other dishes here, you have the choice of adding sliced brisket, pulled pork, smoked chicken, or portabella mushrooms. Since the intense broth is made from brisket, the best meat choice is likewise brisket. The meat’s fat floats and shimmers on the surface of the bowl. Stir it up or sip it straight up with a spoon. The kitchen will split a bowl of the pho into two portions and you can share a banh mi with it. I liked my brisket banh mi, ordered without pho, but I honestly found the meat piled too heavy for exactly the reason I feared – that it would overwhelm the sandwich’s veggies. On my second try, I picked the savory pulled pork, which was less overwhelming, but I missed the damn brisket.
I found a solution! The menu also includes “bahn fris,” an absurdist concoction of the bahn mi’s salad contents, with your choice of meat, over fries. Again, I chose the brisket (because I lived in Houston two years and can never get enough). There was a ton of it but I was freer to pick and choose. The portion, like most here, was gigantic and I took half of it home for dinner the next day. A night in the fridge and very brief microwaving caramelized much of the fat and turned the potatoes into glazed, creamy treats my cat liked as much as me. More pickled veggies, please. I’ve also enjoyed the pulled pork dumplings and brisket eggrolls. Diners recommended we try the wings, but they’re without the Viet seasoning I craved.
The restaurant is inexpensive, especially considering the portions, with a café ambiance. One of the best side dishes is the owners’ goofy humor which you can see more of on their Instagram page and by the bathroom door. Don’t piss yourself. —CL—
!!Quick Bites
Mamak, 5150 Buford Hwy, 678-395-3192, mamak-kitchen.com
Mercer Street Meals, 404-713-6001, order online at mercerstreetmeals.com, FB & IG: @mercerstreetmeals
Pho Cue, 925 Garrett St. 404-549-7595. eatphocue.com FB & IG: @eatphocue"
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string(9231) "First of all: Merry Christmas. Now that I’ve gotten that over with, I must make my annual plea to boycott any restaurant playing Christmas music. The Yuletide noise pollution has decreased in the last 30 years and we don’t want to give restaurateurs any encouragement to resume Christian torture of our auditory nerves. Please report offenders to me. Thank you.
Second of all: Send me lunch money. In typical American fashion, the more the “booming economy” expands, the more the rich get richer and the poor get starved by inflation. The cost of dining out, like any other act of consumption, has increased remarkably. There are many reasons why and, understand, I’m not including restaurateurs among those who have made cosmetic surgery and space travel their hobbies. They are struggling to maintain a five percent profit margin and have, after a decade of intense competition, finally been left with no alternative to passing on more of their costs to customers.
But still … Fortunately, I’ve never been attracted much to “fine dining” because, honestly, it’s rarely been within my financial reach but, more important, I just prefer so called exotic cuisines that offer an adventure rather than refinement. (For a writer, the former is about stories and the latter is about adjectives.) So, imagine my surprise when I discovered that Buford Highway is no longer predictably a bargain-basement safari. My friend Rose and I have often headed out that way merrily, with our pockets full of coins. But we were stunned recently by a meal at Mamak, one of my longtime favorites for Malaysian cuisine. My memory was that lunch specials cost about $10. However, we were handed paper menus on which those specials had been slashed out of existence. Long story short, our lunch cost us $57 including tax and tip.
The food was as delicious as ever. We shared rendang beef simmered in coconut milk with mild spices and “walnut shrimp,” which I’d never noticed on the menu before. It’s jumbo shrimp fried in a light batter, tossed in a sweetened mayonnaise sauce, and garnished with candied walnuts. I confess it was nostalgic curiosity that led me to order it. I used to eat a similar dish frequently for brunch at Hong Kong Harbour (R.I.P.). You could argue that the dish requires something sharper than beef drowned in coconut milk to offset the sweetness, but we managed. The shrimp, by the way, actually had flavor like they lived in the sea at some time. We also ordered roti canai, the flatbread served with a curried sauce for dipping. Don’t miss it. Your $5 will get you one small single piece of the bread. Just to be clear, the rendang is, at $20, the most expensive item on the menu. You can order rice and noodle dishes for significantly less. Or you could go down the road a bit and dine at Mamak Vegan Kitchen. I love the sambal okra there.
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On to affordable, fat portions: While restaurants are reopening, sales have yet to get anywhere near their pre-pandemic level. Thus (maddeningly) abbreviated hours and an emphasis on takeout are likely to continue for a long time. A perfect formula is offered by Chef Lance Gummere, who created Mercer Street Meals after leaving Bantam & Biddy, which he co-founded in 2012. Before then, he was chef at The Shed at Glenwood, where I dined weekly for a couple of years. One night a week, he prepared a menu of sliders imaginative enough to be served at the Mad Hatter’s tea party. The rest of the week his imagination took refuge in tweaking Southern comfort food.
Lance now cooks at home where wife Gracie enjoys his full-time assistance in raising their two sons. They have two large dogs that licked the cat saliva off my hands on the front porch of their home on Mercer Street, which, quaintly enough, is a gravel road in Ormewood Park. Every Wednesday morning, they post the week’s available meals on their website, where customers purchase their choices. Usually, two different meals are available each week, but not on the same day. Thus, if you want both meals, you’ll have to make two trips to pick them up. It’s worth it. In fact, it’s probably the best bargain in the city. Meals are $25 for two and $45 for four. Yep, that’s $12.50 or less per person for a meal that includes an entrée, two sides, and dessert. And portions are large, really large.
My only meal so far has been baked salmon with wild rice, Brussels sprouts, and chocolate pavlova. I was frankly worried about it. Fish is not typically a takeout food I choose since it’s usually overcooked and completely dry by the time it’s on the table, especially if it requires reheating. Lance brings the food out his front door, packed in loosely wrapped aluminum containers and still warm enough that I had no need to reheat it. The salmon, in honey butter with a few scallions, was juicy and flaky. Wild rice was an exotic favorite of my mother — to the degree that I quit eating it around, oh, 1975. Lance outdid her by adding toasted pecans and a lot of green onions. Maybe my favorite was the roasted Brussels sprouts with bacon and cipollini onions. If I have any complaint, it was the profuse oniony flavors, especially in the rice’s raw green onions. But the dessert, pavlova, cleaned the breath in the way orgasm cleans the depraved mind. It was creamy, chewy, fruity, chocolatey, and, best of all, there was a ton of it. Check out their website for forthcoming meals, which range at this writing from bridge-club-fancy (crab mornay with a “Green Goddess crunch sandwich,” chicken noodle soup, and brownies) to after-church-piggy (chicken fried steak, garlic mashed potatoes, green beans smothered with onions, and pecan pie).
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Last month, I wrote about the then-unopened Pho Cue in Glenwood Park. It’s up and going! The restaurant, which started as a pop-up, blends Vietnamese cuisine with Texas-style barbecue. I was mystified. Vietnamese, which is my favorite cuisine, is for the most part super-healthy, with fresh herbs and vegetables, mainly lean meats, and spikes of pickled and hot flavors. Smoky Texas barbecue on the other hand is not exactly what cardiologists recommend. I could not imagine, say, a Vietnamese sandwich (banh mi) squooshy with fatty brisket. So, does it work? Mainly. Owners Julian Wissman and Brian Holloway were at this writing still tampering with their menu, but I enjoyed most everything I sampled (and I sampled a lot).
My favorite by far has been the pho, the Vietnamese soup that is everywhere these days. Pho Cue’s is an extra-rich beef broth, thanks to the brisket smoked on the premises, with the usual noodles and herbs. Squirt the lime and squeeze the sriracha. As with other dishes here, you have the choice of adding sliced brisket, pulled pork, smoked chicken, or portabella mushrooms. Since the intense broth is made from brisket, the best meat choice is likewise brisket. The meat’s fat floats and shimmers on the surface of the bowl. Stir it up or sip it straight up with a spoon. The kitchen will split a bowl of the pho into two portions and you can share a banh mi with it. I liked my brisket banh mi, ordered without pho, but I honestly found the meat piled too heavy for exactly the reason I feared – that it would overwhelm the sandwich’s veggies. On my second try, I picked the savory pulled pork, which was less overwhelming, but I missed the damn brisket.
I found a solution! The menu also includes “bahn fris,” an absurdist concoction of the bahn mi’s salad contents, with your choice of meat, over fries. Again, I chose the brisket (because I lived in Houston two years and can never get enough). There was a ton of it but I was freer to pick and choose. The portion, like most here, was gigantic and I took half of it home for dinner the next day. A night in the fridge and very brief microwaving caramelized much of the fat and turned the potatoes into glazed, creamy treats my cat liked as much as me. More pickled veggies, please. I’ve also enjoyed the pulled pork dumplings and brisket eggrolls. Diners recommended we try the wings, but they’re without the Viet seasoning I craved.
The restaurant is inexpensive, especially considering the portions, with a café ambiance. One of the best side dishes is the owners’ goofy humor which you can see more of on their Instagram page and by the bathroom door. Don’t piss yourself. __—CL—__
!!Quick Bites
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''Mamak, 5150 Buford Hwy, 678-395-3192, mamak-kitchen.com''
''Mercer Street Meals, 404-713-6001, order online at mercerstreetmeals.com, FB & IG: @mercerstreetmeals''
''Pho Cue, 925 Garrett St. 404-549-7595. eatphocue.com FB & IG: @eatphocue''"
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string(9343) " #1 LUNCH FOR TWO Reduced 2021-12-08T22:22:47+00:00 #1_LUNCH_FOR_TWO_reduced.jpeg Texas-Vietnam mash up, plus a bargain among rising food prices #1 LUNCH FOR TWO Reduced 2021-12-02T22:20:00+00:00 GRAZING: Pho Cue and banh mi, Mercer jim.harris Jim Harris Cliff Bostock cliffbostock (Cliff Bostock) 2021-12-02T22:20:00+00:00 First of all: Merry Christmas. Now that I’ve gotten that over with, I must make my annual plea to boycott any restaurant playing Christmas music. The Yuletide noise pollution has decreased in the last 30 years and we don’t want to give restaurateurs any encouragement to resume Christian torture of our auditory nerves. Please report offenders to me. Thank you.
Second of all: Send me lunch money. In typical American fashion, the more the “booming economy” expands, the more the rich get richer and the poor get starved by inflation. The cost of dining out, like any other act of consumption, has increased remarkably. There are many reasons why and, understand, I’m not including restaurateurs among those who have made cosmetic surgery and space travel their hobbies. They are struggling to maintain a five percent profit margin and have, after a decade of intense competition, finally been left with no alternative to passing on more of their costs to customers.
But still … Fortunately, I’ve never been attracted much to “fine dining” because, honestly, it’s rarely been within my financial reach but, more important, I just prefer so called exotic cuisines that offer an adventure rather than refinement. (For a writer, the former is about stories and the latter is about adjectives.) So, imagine my surprise when I discovered that Buford Highway is no longer predictably a bargain-basement safari. My friend Rose and I have often headed out that way merrily, with our pockets full of coins. But we were stunned recently by a meal at Mamak, one of my longtime favorites for Malaysian cuisine. My memory was that lunch specials cost about $10. However, we were handed paper menus on which those specials had been slashed out of existence. Long story short, our lunch cost us $57 including tax and tip.
The food was as delicious as ever. We shared rendang beef simmered in coconut milk with mild spices and “walnut shrimp,” which I’d never noticed on the menu before. It’s jumbo shrimp fried in a light batter, tossed in a sweetened mayonnaise sauce, and garnished with candied walnuts. I confess it was nostalgic curiosity that led me to order it. I used to eat a similar dish frequently for brunch at Hong Kong Harbour (R.I.P.). You could argue that the dish requires something sharper than beef drowned in coconut milk to offset the sweetness, but we managed. The shrimp, by the way, actually had flavor like they lived in the sea at some time. We also ordered roti canai, the flatbread served with a curried sauce for dipping. Don’t miss it. Your $5 will get you one small single piece of the bread. Just to be clear, the rendang is, at $20, the most expensive item on the menu. You can order rice and noodle dishes for significantly less. Or you could go down the road a bit and dine at Mamak Vegan Kitchen. I love the sambal okra there.
On to affordable, fat portions: While restaurants are reopening, sales have yet to get anywhere near their pre-pandemic level. Thus (maddeningly) abbreviated hours and an emphasis on takeout are likely to continue for a long time. A perfect formula is offered by Chef Lance Gummere, who created Mercer Street Meals after leaving Bantam & Biddy, which he co-founded in 2012. Before then, he was chef at The Shed at Glenwood, where I dined weekly for a couple of years. One night a week, he prepared a menu of sliders imaginative enough to be served at the Mad Hatter’s tea party. The rest of the week his imagination took refuge in tweaking Southern comfort food.
Lance now cooks at home where wife Gracie enjoys his full-time assistance in raising their two sons. They have two large dogs that licked the cat saliva off my hands on the front porch of their home on Mercer Street, which, quaintly enough, is a gravel road in Ormewood Park. Every Wednesday morning, they post the week’s available meals on their website, where customers purchase their choices. Usually, two different meals are available each week, but not on the same day. Thus, if you want both meals, you’ll have to make two trips to pick them up. It’s worth it. In fact, it’s probably the best bargain in the city. Meals are $25 for two and $45 for four. Yep, that’s $12.50 or less per person for a meal that includes an entrée, two sides, and dessert. And portions are large, really large.
My only meal so far has been baked salmon with wild rice, Brussels sprouts, and chocolate pavlova. I was frankly worried about it. Fish is not typically a takeout food I choose since it’s usually overcooked and completely dry by the time it’s on the table, especially if it requires reheating. Lance brings the food out his front door, packed in loosely wrapped aluminum containers and still warm enough that I had no need to reheat it. The salmon, in honey butter with a few scallions, was juicy and flaky. Wild rice was an exotic favorite of my mother — to the degree that I quit eating it around, oh, 1975. Lance outdid her by adding toasted pecans and a lot of green onions. Maybe my favorite was the roasted Brussels sprouts with bacon and cipollini onions. If I have any complaint, it was the profuse oniony flavors, especially in the rice’s raw green onions. But the dessert, pavlova, cleaned the breath in the way orgasm cleans the depraved mind. It was creamy, chewy, fruity, chocolatey, and, best of all, there was a ton of it. Check out their website for forthcoming meals, which range at this writing from bridge-club-fancy (crab mornay with a “Green Goddess crunch sandwich,” chicken noodle soup, and brownies) to after-church-piggy (chicken fried steak, garlic mashed potatoes, green beans smothered with onions, and pecan pie).
Last month, I wrote about the then-unopened Pho Cue in Glenwood Park. It’s up and going! The restaurant, which started as a pop-up, blends Vietnamese cuisine with Texas-style barbecue. I was mystified. Vietnamese, which is my favorite cuisine, is for the most part super-healthy, with fresh herbs and vegetables, mainly lean meats, and spikes of pickled and hot flavors. Smoky Texas barbecue on the other hand is not exactly what cardiologists recommend. I could not imagine, say, a Vietnamese sandwich (banh mi) squooshy with fatty brisket. So, does it work? Mainly. Owners Julian Wissman and Brian Holloway were at this writing still tampering with their menu, but I enjoyed most everything I sampled (and I sampled a lot).
My favorite by far has been the pho, the Vietnamese soup that is everywhere these days. Pho Cue’s is an extra-rich beef broth, thanks to the brisket smoked on the premises, with the usual noodles and herbs. Squirt the lime and squeeze the sriracha. As with other dishes here, you have the choice of adding sliced brisket, pulled pork, smoked chicken, or portabella mushrooms. Since the intense broth is made from brisket, the best meat choice is likewise brisket. The meat’s fat floats and shimmers on the surface of the bowl. Stir it up or sip it straight up with a spoon. The kitchen will split a bowl of the pho into two portions and you can share a banh mi with it. I liked my brisket banh mi, ordered without pho, but I honestly found the meat piled too heavy for exactly the reason I feared – that it would overwhelm the sandwich’s veggies. On my second try, I picked the savory pulled pork, which was less overwhelming, but I missed the damn brisket.
I found a solution! The menu also includes “bahn fris,” an absurdist concoction of the bahn mi’s salad contents, with your choice of meat, over fries. Again, I chose the brisket (because I lived in Houston two years and can never get enough). There was a ton of it but I was freer to pick and choose. The portion, like most here, was gigantic and I took half of it home for dinner the next day. A night in the fridge and very brief microwaving caramelized much of the fat and turned the potatoes into glazed, creamy treats my cat liked as much as me. More pickled veggies, please. I’ve also enjoyed the pulled pork dumplings and brisket eggrolls. Diners recommended we try the wings, but they’re without the Viet seasoning I craved.
The restaurant is inexpensive, especially considering the portions, with a café ambiance. One of the best side dishes is the owners’ goofy humor which you can see more of on their Instagram page and by the bathroom door. Don’t piss yourself. —CL—
!!Quick Bites
Mamak, 5150 Buford Hwy, 678-395-3192, mamak-kitchen.com
Mercer Street Meals, 404-713-6001, order online at mercerstreetmeals.com, FB & IG: @mercerstreetmeals
Pho Cue, 925 Garrett St. 404-549-7595. eatphocue.com FB & IG: @eatphocue CLIFF BOSTOCK LUNCH FOR TWO: Beef rendang, rice, and shrimp in a sweetened mayo sauce with walnuts at Mamak on Buford Highway. With one piece of roti canai and a tip, that'll be $57. Please bring back the lunch specials! 0,0,10 GRAZING: Pho Cue and banh mi, Mercer "
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GRAZING: Pho Cue and banh mi, Mercer Article
Thursday December 2, 2021 05:20 PM EST
Texas-Vietnam mash up, plus a bargain among rising food prices
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string(9886) "“It’s a miracle!” I shouted, looking into the pan atop my antique stove. There, simmering in their own fat and turning crispy, were chunks of pork — the authentic Mexican carnitas I have complained about being unable to find in Atlanta restaurants for 30 years. Lightly aromatic with chiles, garlic, and citrus, the carnitas begged to be folded into tortillas with salsa verde and pico de gallo. Unfortunately, I had not bothered to prepare those because, quite honestly, I did not expect the carnitas to be more than the usual soft roasted pork and planned to just throw them on a plate with some black beans and rice. Pathetically, I did heat some pita bread. It has no talent for impersonating tortillas.
These perfect carnitas were in a small container from Poco Loco, a fairly new burrito joint in Kirkwood. I bought them while ordering a burrito but began blithering about how I could never find actual, real, crispy carnitas in Atlanta. Owner-chef-cashier Nick Melvin tried to interrupt my rant, but I kept going. Finally he said, “If you will listen, I promise you that these will become crispy. The pork has been cured and cooked. All you have to do is put them in a pan and let them cook in the remaining fat” — I interrupted again, “Fine, OK, I’ll try them …” They were $15 for a pound, which seemed a bit pricey, but not really. They fed two of us that night.
My reason for visiting Poco Loco, which means “a little crazy” was to try out the breakfast burritos, a Tex-Mex specialty that I used to pick up on the way to work every weekday when I lived in Houston. Like the carnitas, the burrito I sampled was perfect. Each week, Melvin prepares one with meat, one ovo-lacto vegetarian, and one for kids with eggs and cheese only. There are also different frozen varieties available. The adult ones are dubbed with names that are indeed un poco loco. The week I visited, you could choose to eat fitness freaks Jess Sims or Cody Rigsby. Robin Arzon was available frozen.
The Jess Sims I chose was described as “green chile beef shoulder, Moore’s Farm eggs, home fries, roasted peppers and onions, pickled jalapenos, and American cheese in a house made flour tortilla, with salsa verde.” The burrito — medium-size compared to many — was rolled tight, wrapped in tinfoil, and easy to eat without spilling a drop. I know the ingredients sound like a kitchen-sink concoction. I balked at the home fries, for example, but they were a perfect complement to the creamy scrambled eggs. The sour green sauce was a nice way to wake up my body that morning.
There is no indoor seating here, although there are picnic tables out front on a patio that, in honor of Halloween, was more than poco loco itself. There was a steady flow of people picking up orders. During my meal, only two other people chose table seating. I noticed that the guy at the table across from mine was devouring two burritos. I, not being shy since my brain began its descent into Alzheimer’s, said, “Wow man, you actually eat two of those? Is that the Cody Rigsby?” The man looked at me blankly, said “yes,” looked down, and took another bite. That burrito mixed the eggs with “cauliflower adobo.” I have to be honest. I used to love cauliflower. But I’m sick of it now, people. You finally pulled back a little from the kale. How about not turning cauliflower into meat?
The burrito I sampled has me wanting to go back, but the “provisions” case of the store that holds the carnitas and other weekly specials insures my return. Among those when I visited were a buffalo-chorizo dip, pineapple-citrus agua fresca, salsa verde, black bean and corn salad, smoked pork charros, sweet pickled jalapeños, fermented sweet chile sauce, house-made tortillas, and “frozen sicker-doozie dough.” The following week included carne asada marinated in salsa macha, chile-lime hummus, jerked black beans, and fermented poblano hot sauce.
Chef-owner Melvin was most recently in the kitchen at Fox Bros. Bar-B-Q. He like, so many others, found himself derailed by the pandemic. The derailment turned out, as it also did for many others, to be a gift of sorts. He started Poco Loco as a pop-up operating out of his home with so much success that he was motivated to rent the space vacated by Dish Dive, located next to Molasses Barber and Beauty. “It’s a dream come true,” he told me.
Pop-ups are erratic and hard to keep track of, but they are producing some of the most interesting cuisine in the city now. Without the high overhead, chefs are freer to experiment and create unique niches for themselves. If successful, they may go on, like Melvin, to tie themselves to their own brick-and-mortar locations. One example I can’t wait to try is maybe a little more loco than Poco Loco, at least in its name: Pho Cue. If you know that “pho” is correctly pronounced “fuh,” you know you can’t wait to buy their merch.
The restaurant, not open at this writing, is scheduled to start serving by the first week of November. Located in Glenwood Village, it will be serving a menu of Vietnamese and barbecue dishes. Some, like the pho and a rack of ribs, adhere fairly strictly to their separate origins in Vietnam and Texas. Others, like smoked brisket eggrolls, are hybrids. The owners are Brian Holloway, a food truck manager, and Julian Wissman, a pitmaster from — guess where — Fox Bros. Bar-B-Q, where Nick Melvin also worked. Thanks, Fox Bros., for the talent!
Another pop-up that’s gained significant attention is Humble Mumble. Owner-chef Justin Dixon has an impressive resume, starting in 2007 when he worked at Pano’s and Paul’s. Most recently, he’s run the kitchens at the Shed at Glenwood, Bully Boy, and Wonderkid. Yes, his pop-up’s name is borrowed from the Outkast song, and his website includes a virtual manifesto that weaves together themes of social activism, humility, fairness, music, and food.
Humble Mumble pops up now and then for lunch at the Pig and the Pearl in Atlantic Station, but mainly for dinner at places like Parlor, Dead End Drinks, and Full Commission, which I visited on a Friday night. I liked Dixon’s somewhat kinky cooking at Wonderkid but, to be honest, my meal at Full Commission fell short. I had the feeling I was eating food that had been prepared and plated well in advance. A funny take on Campbell’s canned SpaghettiOs ($1.50 or less at a Publix near you) included the pasta rings, a tomato sauce, and a ton of manchego cheese — all perfect for my inner kid. But my less inner adult was tempted by the fat lamb meatballs, not good for a ridiculous reason. As I told my inquiring server, “Uh-oh, my SpaghettiOs’ meatballs are unheated.” The meat was also too finely ground for my taste.
My other dish was similarly a throwback to the fairly old South — an appetizer of glutinous pimento cheese served with tasteless slices of flimsy radishes, spears of carrots and lifeless squash, sliced dill pickles, a stalk of weirdly pickled okra, and some crackers. Images of my mother’s kitchen counter kept bouncing in my head, so the humble allusions were spot-on, but the mumbling ingredients bumbled the dish.
I have enjoyed Chef Dixon’s food at his earlier gigs, so I have no explanation for this disappointment.
Speaking of pimento cheese, I’m sure you often hallucinate a perfect buttermilk biscuit layered with it and a slice of fried green tomato. That is one of the breakfast sandwiches Erika Council of Bomb Biscuits creates. Council became well known for her prepandemic pop-ups around town and is now operating out of Irwin Street Market, whose mission is to help aspiring chefs build their business. Council is part of a Southern family of renowned biscuit bakers and restaurateurs. She’s also a skilled food writer.
I visited recently to try out the bacon-cheddar and the country ham biscuits and to fetch six not-so-plain buttermilk beauties for later consumption. I’ve not stopped thinking about them since and ended up hunting down biscuits at other venues. I admit that I yanked the bacon-cheddar one out of the box and ate it so fast in the market’s patio that I forgot to photograph it. I also admit that the country ham biscuit just wasn’t my thing. That biscuit was made with cornmeal. I know it’s not actually a sacrilege, but it defies my family’s tradition. My uncle cured country hams, and every Christmas morning we ate the ham, still my ultimate comfort food, with red-eye gravy and biscuits my mother made. So, the cornmeal just slapped me in the face even as I ate every crumb. The ham, by the way, was the real thing. The other biscuits, which you will want to press against your cheeks after warming, got eaten later with fig butter and honey. They are available for home delivery, shipping, and takeout. The market counter is only open a few hours on Friday and Saturday.
Alright, I have one other thing to admit. I picked up the biscuits after my visit to Poco Loco. Yes, that’s right. I ate a burrito, three biscuits, and a pile of carnitas on the same day with plenty of other stuff. Timing is everything when you’re visiting these postpandemic, post-pop-up venues with limited hours. I encourage you to check their websites and Instagram pages for hours before setting out. But do go. —CL—
Poco Loco, 2233 College Ave. Open 7:30 a.m.-1 p.m. Thurs.-Fri. and 8 a.m.-1 p.m. Satur. Find the week’s menu and place advance orders on the website, pocolocoatl.com @pocolocoatl
Pho Cue, 925 Garrett St. 404-549-7595. eatphocue.com @eatphocue
Humble Mumble. humblemumbleatl.com @humblemumbleatl, @issablackchef
Bomb Biscuits, 660 Irwin St. Open 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Fri. and 9 a.m. until sold out Sat. Order online only at bombiscuital.com @bombbiscuitatl.com, #bombbiscuits "
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string(10592) "“It’s a miracle!” I shouted, looking into the pan atop my antique stove. There, simmering in their own fat and turning crispy, were chunks of pork — the authentic Mexican carnitas I have complained about being unable to find in Atlanta restaurants for 30 years. Lightly aromatic with chiles, garlic, and citrus, the carnitas begged to be folded into tortillas with salsa verde and pico de gallo. Unfortunately, I had not bothered to prepare those because, quite honestly, I did not expect the carnitas to be more than the usual soft roasted pork and planned to just throw them on a plate with some black beans and rice. Pathetically, I did heat some pita bread. It has no talent for impersonating tortillas.
These perfect carnitas were in a small container from Poco Loco, a fairly new burrito joint in Kirkwood. I bought them while ordering a burrito but began blithering about how I could never find actual, real, crispy carnitas in Atlanta. Owner-chef-cashier Nick Melvin tried to interrupt my rant, but I kept going. Finally he said, “''If you will listen'', I promise you that these will become crispy. The pork has been cured and cooked. All you have to do is put them in a pan and let them cook in the remaining fat” — I interrupted again, “Fine, OK, I’ll try them …” They were $15 for a pound, which seemed a bit pricey, but not really. They fed two of us that night.
My reason for visiting Poco Loco, which means “a little crazy” was to try out the breakfast burritos, a Tex-Mex specialty that I used to pick up on the way to work every weekday when I lived in Houston. Like the carnitas, the burrito I sampled was perfect. Each week, Melvin prepares one with meat, one ovo-lacto vegetarian, and one for kids with eggs and cheese only. There are also different frozen varieties available. The adult ones are dubbed with names that are indeed ''un poco loco''. The week I visited, you could choose to eat fitness freaks Jess Sims or Cody Rigsby. Robin Arzon was available frozen.
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The Jess Sims I chose was described as “green chile beef shoulder, Moore’s Farm eggs, home fries, roasted peppers and onions, pickled jalapenos, and American cheese in a house made flour tortilla, with salsa verde.” The burrito — medium-size compared to many — was rolled tight, wrapped in tinfoil, and easy to eat without spilling a drop. I know the ingredients sound like a kitchen-sink concoction. I balked at the home fries, for example, but they were a perfect complement to the creamy scrambled eggs. The sour green sauce was a nice way to wake up my body that morning.
There is no indoor seating here, although there are picnic tables out front on a patio that, in honor of Halloween, was more than poco loco itself. There was a steady flow of people picking up orders. During my meal, only two other people chose table seating. I noticed that the guy at the table across from mine was devouring two burritos. I, not being shy since my brain began its descent into Alzheimer’s, said, “Wow man, you actually eat two of those? Is that the Cody Rigsby?” The man looked at me blankly, said “yes,” looked down, and took another bite. That burrito mixed the eggs with “cauliflower adobo.” I have to be honest. I used to love cauliflower. But I’m sick of it now, people. You finally pulled back a little from the kale. How about not turning cauliflower into meat?
The burrito I sampled has me wanting to go back, but the “provisions” case of the store that holds the carnitas and other weekly specials insures my return. Among those when I visited were a buffalo-chorizo dip, pineapple-citrus agua fresca, salsa verde, black bean and corn salad, smoked pork charros, sweet pickled jalapeños, fermented sweet chile sauce, house-made tortillas, and “frozen sicker-doozie dough.” The following week included carne asada marinated in salsa macha, chile-lime hummus, jerked black beans, and fermented poblano hot sauce.
Chef-owner Melvin was most recently in the kitchen at Fox Bros. Bar-B-Q. He like, so many others, found himself derailed by the pandemic. The derailment turned out, as it also did for many others, to be a gift of sorts. He started Poco Loco as a pop-up operating out of his home with so much success that he was motivated to rent the space vacated by Dish Dive, located next to Molasses Barber and Beauty. “It’s a dream come true,” he told me.
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Pop-ups are erratic and hard to keep track of, but they are producing some of the most interesting cuisine in the city now. Without the high overhead, chefs are freer to experiment and create unique niches for themselves. If successful, they may go on, like Melvin, to tie themselves to their own brick-and-mortar locations. One example I can’t wait to try is maybe a little more loco than Poco Loco, at least in its name: Pho Cue. If you know that “pho” is correctly pronounced “fuh,” you know you can’t wait to buy their merch.
The restaurant, not open at this writing, is scheduled to start serving by the first week of November. Located in Glenwood Village, it will be serving a menu of Vietnamese and barbecue dishes. Some, like the pho and a rack of ribs, adhere fairly strictly to their separate origins in Vietnam and Texas. Others, like smoked brisket eggrolls, are hybrids. The owners are Brian Holloway, a food truck manager, and Julian Wissman, a pitmaster from — guess where — Fox Bros. Bar-B-Q, where Nick Melvin also worked. Thanks, Fox Bros., for the talent!
Another pop-up that’s gained significant attention is Humble Mumble. Owner-chef Justin Dixon has an impressive resume, starting in 2007 when he worked at Pano’s and Paul’s. Most recently, he’s run the kitchens at the Shed at Glenwood, Bully Boy, and Wonderkid. Yes, his pop-up’s name is borrowed from the Outkast song, and his website includes a virtual manifesto that weaves together themes of social activism, humility, fairness, music, and food.
Humble Mumble pops up now and then for lunch at the Pig and the Pearl in Atlantic Station, but mainly for dinner at places like Parlor, Dead End Drinks, and Full Commission, which I visited on a Friday night. I liked Dixon’s somewhat kinky cooking at Wonderkid but, to be honest, my meal at Full Commission fell short. I had the feeling I was eating food that had been prepared and plated well in advance. A funny take on Campbell’s canned SpaghettiOs ($1.50 or less at a Publix near you) included the pasta rings, a tomato sauce, and a ton of manchego cheese — all perfect for my inner kid. But my less inner adult was tempted by the fat lamb meatballs, not good for a ridiculous reason. As I told my inquiring server, “Uh-oh, my SpaghettiOs’ meatballs are unheated.” The meat was also too finely ground for my taste.
My other dish was similarly a throwback to the fairly old South — an appetizer of glutinous pimento cheese served with tasteless slices of flimsy radishes, spears of carrots and lifeless squash, sliced dill pickles, a stalk of weirdly pickled okra, and some crackers. Images of my mother’s kitchen counter kept bouncing in my head, so the humble allusions were spot-on, but the mumbling ingredients bumbled the dish.
I have enjoyed Chef Dixon’s food at his earlier gigs, so I have no explanation for this disappointment.
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Speaking of pimento cheese, I’m sure you often hallucinate a perfect buttermilk biscuit layered with it and a slice of fried green tomato. That is one of the breakfast sandwiches Erika Council of Bomb Biscuits creates. Council became well known for her prepandemic pop-ups around town and is now operating out of Irwin Street Market, whose mission is to help aspiring chefs build their business. Council is part of a Southern family of renowned biscuit bakers and restaurateurs. She’s also a skilled food writer.
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I visited recently to try out the bacon-cheddar and the country ham biscuits and to fetch six not-so-plain buttermilk beauties for later consumption. I’ve not stopped thinking about them since and ended up hunting down biscuits at other venues. I admit that I yanked the bacon-cheddar one out of the box and ate it so fast in the market’s patio that I forgot to photograph it. I also admit that the country ham biscuit just wasn’t my thing. That biscuit was made with cornmeal. I know it’s not actually a sacrilege, but it defies my family’s tradition. My uncle cured country hams, and every Christmas morning we ate the ham, still my ultimate comfort food, with red-eye gravy and biscuits my mother made. So, the cornmeal just slapped me in the face even as I ate every crumb. The ham, by the way, was the real thing. The other biscuits, which you will want to press against your cheeks after warming, got eaten later with fig butter and honey. They are available for home delivery, shipping, and takeout. The market counter is only open a few hours on Friday and Saturday.
Alright, I have one other thing to admit. I picked up the biscuits after my visit to Poco Loco. Yes, that’s right. I ate a burrito, three biscuits, and a pile of carnitas on the same day with plenty of other stuff. Timing is everything when you’re visiting these postpandemic, post-pop-up venues with limited hours. I encourage you to check their websites and Instagram pages for hours before setting out. But ''do'' go. __—CL—__
''Poco Loco, 2233 College Ave. Open 7:30 a.m.-1 p.m. Thurs.-Fri. and 8 a.m.-1 p.m. Satur. Find the week’s menu and place advance orders on the website, pocolocoatl.com @pocolocoatl''
''Pho Cue, 925 Garrett St. 404-549-7595. eatphocue.com @eatphocue ''
''Humble Mumble. humblemumbleatl.com @humblemumbleatl, @issablackchef ''
''Bomb Biscuits, 660 Irwin St. Open 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Fri. and 9 a.m. until sold out Sat. Order online only at bombiscuital.com @bombbiscuitatl.com, #bombbiscuits ''"
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string(10646) " #1 MORE HEAT 2021-11-05T03:28:44+00:00 #1_MORE_HEAT_.jpg #1 MORE HEAT 2021-11-01T08:00:00+00:00 GRAZING: Atlanta is a post-pandemic, post-pop-up dining paradise jim.harris Jim Harris CLIFF BOSTOCK cliffbostock (Cliff Bostock) 2021-11-01T08:00:00+00:00 “It’s a miracle!” I shouted, looking into the pan atop my antique stove. There, simmering in their own fat and turning crispy, were chunks of pork — the authentic Mexican carnitas I have complained about being unable to find in Atlanta restaurants for 30 years. Lightly aromatic with chiles, garlic, and citrus, the carnitas begged to be folded into tortillas with salsa verde and pico de gallo. Unfortunately, I had not bothered to prepare those because, quite honestly, I did not expect the carnitas to be more than the usual soft roasted pork and planned to just throw them on a plate with some black beans and rice. Pathetically, I did heat some pita bread. It has no talent for impersonating tortillas.
These perfect carnitas were in a small container from Poco Loco, a fairly new burrito joint in Kirkwood. I bought them while ordering a burrito but began blithering about how I could never find actual, real, crispy carnitas in Atlanta. Owner-chef-cashier Nick Melvin tried to interrupt my rant, but I kept going. Finally he said, “If you will listen, I promise you that these will become crispy. The pork has been cured and cooked. All you have to do is put them in a pan and let them cook in the remaining fat” — I interrupted again, “Fine, OK, I’ll try them …” They were $15 for a pound, which seemed a bit pricey, but not really. They fed two of us that night.
My reason for visiting Poco Loco, which means “a little crazy” was to try out the breakfast burritos, a Tex-Mex specialty that I used to pick up on the way to work every weekday when I lived in Houston. Like the carnitas, the burrito I sampled was perfect. Each week, Melvin prepares one with meat, one ovo-lacto vegetarian, and one for kids with eggs and cheese only. There are also different frozen varieties available. The adult ones are dubbed with names that are indeed un poco loco. The week I visited, you could choose to eat fitness freaks Jess Sims or Cody Rigsby. Robin Arzon was available frozen.
The Jess Sims I chose was described as “green chile beef shoulder, Moore’s Farm eggs, home fries, roasted peppers and onions, pickled jalapenos, and American cheese in a house made flour tortilla, with salsa verde.” The burrito — medium-size compared to many — was rolled tight, wrapped in tinfoil, and easy to eat without spilling a drop. I know the ingredients sound like a kitchen-sink concoction. I balked at the home fries, for example, but they were a perfect complement to the creamy scrambled eggs. The sour green sauce was a nice way to wake up my body that morning.
There is no indoor seating here, although there are picnic tables out front on a patio that, in honor of Halloween, was more than poco loco itself. There was a steady flow of people picking up orders. During my meal, only two other people chose table seating. I noticed that the guy at the table across from mine was devouring two burritos. I, not being shy since my brain began its descent into Alzheimer’s, said, “Wow man, you actually eat two of those? Is that the Cody Rigsby?” The man looked at me blankly, said “yes,” looked down, and took another bite. That burrito mixed the eggs with “cauliflower adobo.” I have to be honest. I used to love cauliflower. But I’m sick of it now, people. You finally pulled back a little from the kale. How about not turning cauliflower into meat?
The burrito I sampled has me wanting to go back, but the “provisions” case of the store that holds the carnitas and other weekly specials insures my return. Among those when I visited were a buffalo-chorizo dip, pineapple-citrus agua fresca, salsa verde, black bean and corn salad, smoked pork charros, sweet pickled jalapeños, fermented sweet chile sauce, house-made tortillas, and “frozen sicker-doozie dough.” The following week included carne asada marinated in salsa macha, chile-lime hummus, jerked black beans, and fermented poblano hot sauce.
Chef-owner Melvin was most recently in the kitchen at Fox Bros. Bar-B-Q. He like, so many others, found himself derailed by the pandemic. The derailment turned out, as it also did for many others, to be a gift of sorts. He started Poco Loco as a pop-up operating out of his home with so much success that he was motivated to rent the space vacated by Dish Dive, located next to Molasses Barber and Beauty. “It’s a dream come true,” he told me.
Pop-ups are erratic and hard to keep track of, but they are producing some of the most interesting cuisine in the city now. Without the high overhead, chefs are freer to experiment and create unique niches for themselves. If successful, they may go on, like Melvin, to tie themselves to their own brick-and-mortar locations. One example I can’t wait to try is maybe a little more loco than Poco Loco, at least in its name: Pho Cue. If you know that “pho” is correctly pronounced “fuh,” you know you can’t wait to buy their merch.
The restaurant, not open at this writing, is scheduled to start serving by the first week of November. Located in Glenwood Village, it will be serving a menu of Vietnamese and barbecue dishes. Some, like the pho and a rack of ribs, adhere fairly strictly to their separate origins in Vietnam and Texas. Others, like smoked brisket eggrolls, are hybrids. The owners are Brian Holloway, a food truck manager, and Julian Wissman, a pitmaster from — guess where — Fox Bros. Bar-B-Q, where Nick Melvin also worked. Thanks, Fox Bros., for the talent!
Another pop-up that’s gained significant attention is Humble Mumble. Owner-chef Justin Dixon has an impressive resume, starting in 2007 when he worked at Pano’s and Paul’s. Most recently, he’s run the kitchens at the Shed at Glenwood, Bully Boy, and Wonderkid. Yes, his pop-up’s name is borrowed from the Outkast song, and his website includes a virtual manifesto that weaves together themes of social activism, humility, fairness, music, and food.
Humble Mumble pops up now and then for lunch at the Pig and the Pearl in Atlantic Station, but mainly for dinner at places like Parlor, Dead End Drinks, and Full Commission, which I visited on a Friday night. I liked Dixon’s somewhat kinky cooking at Wonderkid but, to be honest, my meal at Full Commission fell short. I had the feeling I was eating food that had been prepared and plated well in advance. A funny take on Campbell’s canned SpaghettiOs ($1.50 or less at a Publix near you) included the pasta rings, a tomato sauce, and a ton of manchego cheese — all perfect for my inner kid. But my less inner adult was tempted by the fat lamb meatballs, not good for a ridiculous reason. As I told my inquiring server, “Uh-oh, my SpaghettiOs’ meatballs are unheated.” The meat was also too finely ground for my taste.
My other dish was similarly a throwback to the fairly old South — an appetizer of glutinous pimento cheese served with tasteless slices of flimsy radishes, spears of carrots and lifeless squash, sliced dill pickles, a stalk of weirdly pickled okra, and some crackers. Images of my mother’s kitchen counter kept bouncing in my head, so the humble allusions were spot-on, but the mumbling ingredients bumbled the dish.
I have enjoyed Chef Dixon’s food at his earlier gigs, so I have no explanation for this disappointment.
Speaking of pimento cheese, I’m sure you often hallucinate a perfect buttermilk biscuit layered with it and a slice of fried green tomato. That is one of the breakfast sandwiches Erika Council of Bomb Biscuits creates. Council became well known for her prepandemic pop-ups around town and is now operating out of Irwin Street Market, whose mission is to help aspiring chefs build their business. Council is part of a Southern family of renowned biscuit bakers and restaurateurs. She’s also a skilled food writer.
I visited recently to try out the bacon-cheddar and the country ham biscuits and to fetch six not-so-plain buttermilk beauties for later consumption. I’ve not stopped thinking about them since and ended up hunting down biscuits at other venues. I admit that I yanked the bacon-cheddar one out of the box and ate it so fast in the market’s patio that I forgot to photograph it. I also admit that the country ham biscuit just wasn’t my thing. That biscuit was made with cornmeal. I know it’s not actually a sacrilege, but it defies my family’s tradition. My uncle cured country hams, and every Christmas morning we ate the ham, still my ultimate comfort food, with red-eye gravy and biscuits my mother made. So, the cornmeal just slapped me in the face even as I ate every crumb. The ham, by the way, was the real thing. The other biscuits, which you will want to press against your cheeks after warming, got eaten later with fig butter and honey. They are available for home delivery, shipping, and takeout. The market counter is only open a few hours on Friday and Saturday.
Alright, I have one other thing to admit. I picked up the biscuits after my visit to Poco Loco. Yes, that’s right. I ate a burrito, three biscuits, and a pile of carnitas on the same day with plenty of other stuff. Timing is everything when you’re visiting these postpandemic, post-pop-up venues with limited hours. I encourage you to check their websites and Instagram pages for hours before setting out. But do go. —CL—
Poco Loco, 2233 College Ave. Open 7:30 a.m.-1 p.m. Thurs.-Fri. and 8 a.m.-1 p.m. Satur. Find the week’s menu and place advance orders on the website, pocolocoatl.com @pocolocoatl
Pho Cue, 925 Garrett St. 404-549-7595. eatphocue.com @eatphocue
Humble Mumble. humblemumbleatl.com @humblemumbleatl, @issablackchef
Bomb Biscuits, 660 Irwin St. Open 10 a.m.-2 p.m. Fri. and 9 a.m. until sold out Sat. Order online only at bombiscuital.com @bombbiscuitatl.com, #bombbiscuits CLIFF BOSTOCK MORE HEAT, PLEASE: This is pop-up Humble Mumble’s take on SpagettiOs at the Full Commission recently. Everything was copacetic — the pasta rings, the manchego cheese, the tomato sauce — until the encounter with tepid (at best) and excessively ground lamb meatballs. Considering chef Justin Dixon’s talent, it was a shock, unfortunately not redeemed by another dish. 0,0,10 GRAZING: Atlanta is a post-pandemic, post-pop-up dining paradise "
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GRAZING: Atlanta is a post-pandemic, post-pop-up dining paradise Article
Monday November 1, 2021 04:00 AM EDT
“It’s a miracle!” I shouted, looking into the pan atop my antique stove. There, simmering in their own fat and turning crispy, were chunks of pork — the authentic Mexican carnitas I have complained about being unable to find in Atlanta restaurants for 30 years. Lightly aromatic with chiles, garlic, and citrus, the carnitas begged to be folded into tortillas with salsa verde and pico de gallo.... |
more...
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string(12091) "Sushi revives the walking dead. Let me explain. In the mid ’80s, I moved to Houston to edit a huge glossy magazine for people with too much money. It was the most soul-sucking job of my life. I became so good at doing something horrible, I received an unsolicited job offer from Architectural Digest to write about kitchens and culinary crap. I knew the offer meant something had gone very wrong with my life. So, I began to tamper with Buddhism in quest of … something. I met a Japanese-American roshi — a spiritual teacher who taught Zen meditation, which amounted to sitting on a pillow and staring at a wall. I constantly told Roshi that I felt like I was dying. This was when all my friends really were dying from AIDS and, as I said, my soul was suffocating.
Roshi told me that, yes, I was in fact dying, that we are all dying. Whatever! Then for the next few weeks, we drove to a huge cemetery and set up camp in a luxuriously gardened section for very wealthy corpses. Our mission was to meditate beside freshly dug graves awaiting their tenants. It was actually edifying for many reasons and, I later learned, a classic practice. I guess there’s value to being at peace with death, even for 30 seconds out of an hour spent distracted by worms, ants, and the conspicuous excesses of the one percent’s dead people. The magazine I was editing was all about beauty, which I value, but it was, like the cemetery, largely focused on material beauty. I didn’t want to die feeding rich consumers.
A breakthrough occurred when I joined three other students for the famous tea ceremony. Everything about it reveals — perceptually more than intellectually — the natural beauty in which we are always present. Before you sip the shared green tea (made with matcha), you eat a few sweet pastries that contrast with the tea’s bitterness, effectively piercing the binary cluelessness that can seriously fuck up much of life. All of the ceremony’s implements, like raku pots, were beautiful but not ornate to my eye. There is great value in this ceremony when taken seriously. Once COVID isn’t so much an issue, find one. I’m sure the Atlanta Soto Zen Center can help you out.
So, one day, our teacher told us we were going to have a few snacks before the ceremony began. The snacks were small plates of nigiri sushi, which he prepared. Although a longtime foodie, thanks to my mother, I’d never eaten sushi more than a few times and had found it pretty grim. But the roshi’s fish gleamed with absolute clarity of appearance, flavor, and texture that was heightened by contrasting rice. It incorporated everything I was trying to learn. Is it odd that this culinary experience paradoxically told me to decline that job I’d been offered? It didn’t really matter since the low-ranking editor told me, “That’s good. We were going to withdraw the offer anyway. We found out you don’t drink.” Sobriety is so generous.
My experience is not particularly unique. My friend Rose, who lived on a boat for a few years, is addicted to sushi and has told me her three-minute enlightenment occurred when she encountered the highly prized uni sushi. Although everyone says uni is sea urchin roe, the authentic stuff is actually the creature’s sex organs. If anything on the planet can meld the literal physical sensations of the ocean with Freud’s interpretation of “oceanic feeling” as an unbounded experience of the world, it’s uni. I know that sounds fishy, but trust me.
Since it was Rose’s birthday last month, Wayne Johnson and I decided sushi — uni or uni-less — had to be her birthday meal. We weren’t sure where to go. I asked around, and a friend proposed a place I found irresistible and had wanted to visit for the few years of its existence here: Kura Revolving Sushi Bar. Basically, the deal here is that you sit next to a constantly moving conveyor belt loaded with sushi on green-swirled plates within clear domes. In other iterations, the sushi can be conveyed in little boats or trains. The temptation is to assume this method of service is silly American commercial theatrics — but no. There are over 400 Kura Sushi Bars alone, mainly in Taiwan and Japan where the style first appeared in 1958. Called kaitenzushi restaurants, their purpose is completely practical. It is fast-food sushi — cheap with pared-down service, and, just as Ronald McDonald does not serve the very highest grade of beef, the kaitenzushi’s sushi is not sublime. Good sushi, as you know, is expensive wherever you are in the world, so the kaitenzushi style’s most lucrative periods have been during economic downturns, like the present. Kura is one of many restaurants, including the delectable Snackboxe Bistro and Shoya Itzakaya, in the gargantuan H Mart complex in Doraville and was by far the busiest there on a Sunday night.
::::
We luckily hit a pause in the lineup to the wait-list kiosk just inside the door. If you are one of those people who still cannot easily buy a ticket from a parking meter, you might find the kiosk daunting. No worries — the slightest hesitation will cause an employee to barge in front of you and push the right buttons. That was a strong indicator of what was to come. We were rushed to a table, and the system was explained at the speed of an auctioneer. When the guy was done, the three of us were stupidly staring at one another, heads bobbing. He demanded to know what we wanted to drink and ran off before we could ask further questions. I made my first note about the place on my phone: “Roshi sushi is dead. No enlightenment foreseen.”
During the server’s rather lengthy absence, we looked around. Basically, there are two seating areas. One is a bar where you sit side-by-side. The larger area is all booths that are perpendicular to the conveyor belts, meaning that if there are more than two of you, fetching the sushi plates requires a group effort. The server came back and pointed at a tablet slightly above the table. “You can order there too.” Huh? Bye. It turned out that you can indeed order sushi as well as some cooked dishes via the tablet. They are propelled to your table via a separate conveyor belt above the main one. We figured this out just before we left, so we didn’t eat anything much besides nigiri and rolls. I strongly suggest you take that route.
We watched the globes containing the plates briskly pass our table. I begged a server to explain the process again. She said to press a lever on the globe and pull out the plate. After you eat the sushi, you deposit the plate in a slot which contains some means of keeping track of your bill. Every plate on the conveyor belt costs $2.60. Fine. It was all good because I was by this time in a complete state of disassociation — exactly the opposite of Ram Dass’s demand to Be Here Now. I had no idea what we were doing, and the task of removing the sushi from the belt was left to the most voracious of us, Rose. She — we — repeatedly missed the lever to pop open each globe and would yank the whole thing off the belt, as the server said we could. Nobody told us that each globe was attached to a second globe. You don’t have to also eat what’s in the second globe because you are going to return the linked pair to the belt. Are you following me? At this point, I made another salient note: “Ethel and Lucy attempt to wrap chocolates on a conveyor belt.” That’s a reference to an episode of the I Love Lucy TV series.
Well, what about the sushi itself? This inspired my third note: “Bleach sparkling.” I will not name names, but there used to be a high-volume sushi bar in town whose fish was so on the verge of spoiling that it was allegedly rinsed in a solution containing bleach that guaranteed the fish would have, at best, no taste. Kura’s sushi was certainly better than that, but I can say with no hesitation that both Kroger and Publix sell a better product. I rapidly gave up any effort to identify each plate of sushi that Rose pulled from the conveyor belt. I did notice salmon skin. I love salmon skin sushi. I mean I used to love it. I noticed a plate of conch coming our way and demanded Rose grab it. I love conch. It’s all about weird umami of the sea and a hopefully only slightly chewy texture. Oh well. My next note: “Bullet.” If you were about to have your arm amputated with no anesthesia and there was no bullet around for you to bite on, this conch would work as well. There’s more! How about nigiri featuring a tiny slice of wagyu? My note: “Mysterious and elite Spam.”
Was anything good? Yes. Stick to basics like tuna and salmon in rolls or nigiri, and you’ll be okay. But even then, you’re going to encounter that slightly grainy texture that whispers, “We are all dying.” I think our experience was greatly affected by our seating. The long conveyor belts are perpendicular to the kitchen. We were seated in the booth farthest from it. That meant most of the containers rolling by us were empty. If you’re familiar with sushi, you know you can spot the good stuff much of the time. We were getting the other diners’ rejects. Ask to be seated closer to the kitchen. If that doesn’t work, use the tablet above your table to order. You’ll spend a bit more, but you’ll be happier.
We left in search of sweets, but the shop where I’ve usually grazed on sugar there was closed. It wasn’t Rose’s happiest birthday dinner — there was no uni — but I’ll stop by MF Sushi on my way to see her next time … or Publix. —CL—
Kura Revolving Sushi Bar, Unit A107-A110, 6035 Peachtree Rd, Doraville, GA 30360. kurasushi.com/locations/doraville-ga @kurasushidoraville
!!Quick Bites
!!!Botica
::::
Chef/owner Mimmo Alboumeh prepares a paella special every Wednesday at Botica on Peachtree in south Buckhead. As far as I can tell, there is no cheating in the dish’s traditionally long prep time. It brought back a tidal wave of nostalgia for all the time I spent in Spain two decades ago. I happened to score the dish at a late lunch, but it’s officially only available at night. I suggest you call ahead (404-228-6358) to make sure it’s available — the type varies — but you’ll not be disappointed, whatever you order here. This “serving for one” was $20 and feeds at least two normal human beings — and I am sometimes told I am not normal. Eat the flower.
!!!Dosa
::::
I really hate the way everyone now substitutes the words “I like...” with “I’m obsessed with...” but I’m obsessed with Masti in Toco Hills. I had my first meal there in a couple of years recently and this dosa keeps coming to mind. Rip off pieces of the thin rice-flour pancake and scoop up the perfect butter chicken under it. The menu at Masti, which means “fun,” is playful to say the least. Some dishes marry forms and flavors — try a burger — and hardly anything fails. Our server, btw, was a funny young guy from Nepal who spoke perfect English. Like most dumb Americans, I presumed he had immigrated here to find a better life. “No, no. I will return to Nepal. Of course.”
!!!Jenchan
::::
The Cabbagetown restaurant, which specializes in take-out and delivery meals, also now operates
Justacos, 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Tuesday- Saturday. I tried three tacos recently. The juicy fried oysters was my fave,
followed by the deliciously seasoned, crunchy pork belly. The server talked me into the third, a hard-shell taco
that the menu describes as “Taco Bell-ish.” I told him I hate hard shell tacos but, as it turned out, I would have really liked this one if the filling were left out. It’s that stinky-seasoned ground beef stuff that resembles the Varsity’s chili. That’s not to say you won’t love it, but I’m going for the fried shrimp, the Vietnamese pork, and the Kung Pao next visit. The tacos are $4 (oysters are $4.50) and they’re kind of small. Just pretend you’re delicate. 186 Carroll St., 404-549-9843, justacosatl.com."
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string(15278) "Sushi revives the walking dead. Let me explain. In the mid ’80s, I moved to Houston to edit a huge glossy magazine for people with too much money. It was the most soul-sucking job of my life. I became so good at doing something horrible, I received an unsolicited job offer from ''Architectural Digest'' to write about kitchens and culinary crap. I knew the offer meant something had gone very wrong with my life. So, I began to tamper with Buddhism in quest of … something. I met a Japanese-American roshi — a spiritual teacher who taught Zen meditation, which amounted to sitting on a pillow and staring at a wall. I constantly told Roshi that I felt like I was dying. This was when all my friends really were dying from AIDS and, as I said, my soul was suffocating.
Roshi told me that, yes, I was in fact dying, that we are all dying. Whatever! Then for the next few weeks, we drove to a huge cemetery and set up camp in a luxuriously gardened section for very wealthy corpses. Our mission was to meditate beside freshly dug graves awaiting their tenants. It was actually edifying for many reasons and, I later learned, a classic practice. I guess there’s value to being at peace with death, even for 30 seconds out of an hour spent distracted by worms, ants, and the conspicuous excesses of the one percent’s dead people. The magazine I was editing was all about beauty, which I value, but it was, like the cemetery, largely focused on material beauty. I didn’t want to die feeding rich consumers.
{img fileId="42742" stylebox="float: left; margin-right: 25px;" width="300px" desc="THAT’S HOW WE ROLL: The plates of sushi slide by in their domes, along with signs that identify their contents. Depending on your eye-hand coordination, popping open the domes and extracting the plates can be easy or hard. You are allowed to grab the entire dome (which is always linked to another), plop it on your table, and then return it. Really, what most complicates the procedure is your tablemates shrieking at you, sitting closest to the contraption, to grab a particular plate.. Photo by Cliff Bostock." styledesc="font-family: sans-serif;"}
A breakthrough occurred when I joined three other students for the famous tea ceremony. Everything about it reveals — perceptually more than intellectually — the natural beauty in which we are always present. Before you sip the shared green tea (made with matcha), you eat a few sweet pastries that contrast with the tea’s bitterness, effectively piercing the binary cluelessness that can seriously fuck up much of life. All of the ceremony’s implements, like raku pots, were beautiful but not ornate to my eye. There is great value in this ceremony when taken seriously. Once COVID isn’t so much an issue, find one. I’m sure the Atlanta Soto Zen Center can help you out.
So, one day, our teacher told us we were going to have a few snacks before the ceremony began. The snacks were small plates of nigiri sushi, which he prepared. Although a longtime foodie, thanks to my mother, I’d never eaten sushi more than a few times and had found it pretty grim. But the roshi’s fish gleamed with absolute clarity of appearance, flavor, and texture that was heightened by contrasting rice. It incorporated everything I was trying to learn. Is it odd that this culinary experience paradoxically told me to decline that job I’d been offered? It didn’t really matter since the low-ranking editor told me, “That’s good. We were going to withdraw the offer anyway. We found out you don’t drink.” Sobriety is so generous.
{img fileId="42744" stylebox="float: left; margin-right: 25px;" width="300px" desc="ROLL WITH THIS: Generally, I found the rolls tastier than the nigiri at Kura, probably because of the mix of flavors. I think you can see, though, that either the knife work or the condition of the fish itself don’t present the meaty slices you get at a conventional sushi bar like, say, Publix. That was mean. I remind you that this is regarded as fast food.. Photo by Cliff Bostock." styledesc="font-family: sans-serif;"}
My experience is not particularly unique. My friend Rose, who lived on a boat for a few years, is addicted to sushi and has told me her three-minute enlightenment occurred when she encountered the highly prized uni sushi. Although everyone says uni is sea urchin roe, the authentic stuff is actually the creature’s sex organs. If anything on the planet can meld the literal physical sensations of the ocean with Freud’s interpretation of “oceanic feeling” as an unbounded experience of the world, it’s uni. I know that sounds fishy, but trust me.
Since it was Rose’s birthday last month, Wayne Johnson and I decided sushi — uni or uni-less — had to be her birthday meal. We weren’t sure where to go. I asked around, and a friend proposed a place I found irresistible and had wanted to visit for the few years of its existence here: Kura Revolving Sushi Bar. Basically, the deal here is that you sit next to a constantly moving conveyor belt loaded with sushi on green-swirled plates within clear domes. In other iterations, the sushi can be conveyed in little boats or trains. The temptation is to assume this method of service is silly American commercial theatrics — but no. There are over 400 Kura Sushi Bars alone, mainly in Taiwan and Japan where the style first appeared in 1958. Called kaitenzushi restaurants, their purpose is completely practical. It is fast-food sushi — cheap with pared-down service, and, just as Ronald McDonald does not serve the very highest grade of beef, the kaitenzushi’s sushi is not sublime. Good sushi, as you know, is expensive wherever you are in the world, so the kaitenzushi style’s most lucrative periods have been during economic downturns, like the present. Kura is one of many restaurants, including the delectable Snackboxe Bistro and Shoya Itzakaya, in the gargantuan H Mart complex in Doraville and was by far the busiest there on a Sunday night.
::{img fileId="42741" stylebox="margin: 25px;" width="600px" desc="HAVE A SEATING STRATEGY: All rows lead to the kitchen window, near which the plates of sushi are loaded on the conveyor belt. That seems to mean the closer to the window you are, the more choices you’re going to have. If you’re dining as a couple, you might prefer the bar on the right where limited seating and social distancing likely improve selection, whereas the booths increase competition. In any case, you can order directly from a tablet, which increases the menu to include prepared dishes like ramen and more complex sushi. Got that? Photo by Cliff Bostock." styledesc="font-family: sans-serif; text-align: left;"}::
We luckily hit a pause in the lineup to the wait-list kiosk just inside the door. If you are one of those people who still cannot easily buy a ticket from a parking meter, you might find the kiosk daunting. No worries — the slightest hesitation will cause an employee to barge in front of you and push the right buttons. That was a strong indicator of what was to come. We were rushed to a table, and the system was explained at the speed of an auctioneer. When the guy was done, the three of us were stupidly staring at one another, heads bobbing. He demanded to know what we wanted to drink and ran off before we could ask further questions. I made my first note about the place on my phone: “Roshi sushi is dead. No enlightenment foreseen.”
During the server’s rather lengthy absence, we looked around. Basically, there are two seating areas. One is a bar where you sit side-by-side. The larger area is all booths that are perpendicular to the conveyor belts, meaning that if there are more than two of you, fetching the sushi plates requires a group effort. The server came back and pointed at a tablet slightly above the table. “You can order there too.” Huh? Bye. It turned out that you can indeed order sushi as well as some cooked dishes via the tablet. They are propelled to your table via a separate conveyor belt above the main one. We figured this out just before we left, so we didn’t eat anything much besides nigiri and rolls. I strongly suggest you take that route.
We watched the globes containing the plates briskly pass our table. I begged a server to explain the process again. She said to press a lever on the globe and pull out the plate. After you eat the sushi, you deposit the plate in a slot which contains some means of keeping track of your bill. Every plate on the conveyor belt costs $2.60. Fine. It was all good because I was by this time in a complete state of disassociation — exactly the opposite of Ram Dass’s demand to [https://www.amazon.com/Be-Here-Now-Ram-Dass/dp/0517543052|Be Here Now]. I had no idea what we were doing, and the task of removing the sushi from the belt was left to the most voracious of us, Rose. She — we — repeatedly missed the lever to pop open each globe and would yank the whole thing off the belt, as the server said we could. Nobody told us that each globe was attached to a second globe. You don’t have to also eat what’s in the second globe because you are going to return the linked pair to the belt. Are you following me? At this point, I made another salient note: “Ethel and Lucy attempt to wrap chocolates on a conveyor belt.” That’s a reference to an [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NkQ58I53mjk|episode] of the ''I Love Lucy'' TV series.
{img fileId="42743" stylebox="float: right; margin-left: 25px;" width="300px" desc="HYPNOTIC SUSHI: The swirling green pattern of the sushi plates hypnotically commands you to eat more and more. Quality is not always good. I don’t doubt that this designated “real crab” is real, but if I could do it over, I would avoid it as I would any other shredded, salty flesh with a strong taste of the afterlife. But — WTF, man? It’s $2.60 a plate, and you might score the taste of satori, the flash of enlightenment, on the next plate. Keep going. Slide the plates into a slot where they are counted and your absurdly cheap bill is computed. Photo by Cliff Bostock." styledesc="font-family: sans-serif;"}
Well, what about the sushi itself? This inspired my third note: “Bleach sparkling.” I will not name names, but there used to be a high-volume sushi bar in town whose fish was so on the verge of spoiling that it was allegedly rinsed in a solution containing bleach that guaranteed the fish would have, at best, no taste. Kura’s sushi was certainly better than that, but I can say with no hesitation that both Kroger and Publix sell a better product. I rapidly gave up any effort to identify each plate of sushi that Rose pulled from the conveyor belt. I did notice salmon skin. I love salmon skin sushi. I mean I used to love it. I noticed a plate of conch coming our way and demanded Rose grab it. I love conch. It’s all about weird umami of the sea and a hopefully only slightly chewy texture. Oh well. My next note: “Bullet.” If you were about to have your arm amputated with no anesthesia and there was no bullet around for you to bite on, this conch would work as well. There’s more! How about nigiri featuring a tiny slice of wagyu? My note: “Mysterious and elite Spam.”
Was anything good? Yes. Stick to basics like tuna and salmon in rolls or nigiri, and you’ll be okay. But even then, you’re going to encounter that slightly grainy texture that whispers, “We are all dying.” I think our experience was greatly affected by our seating. The long conveyor belts are perpendicular to the kitchen. We were seated in the booth farthest from it. That meant most of the containers rolling by us were empty. If you’re familiar with sushi, you know you can spot the good stuff much of the time. We were getting the other diners’ rejects. Ask to be seated closer to the kitchen. If that doesn’t work, use the tablet above your table to order. You’ll spend a bit more, but you’ll be happier.
We left in search of sweets, but the shop where I’ve usually grazed on sugar there was closed. It wasn’t Rose’s happiest birthday dinner — there was no uni — but I’ll stop by MF Sushi on my way to see her next time … or Publix. __—CL—__
''Kura Revolving Sushi Bar, Unit A107-A110, 6035 Peachtree Rd, Doraville, GA 30360. kurasushi.com/locations/doraville-ga @kurasushidoraville''
!!Quick Bites
!!!__Botica__
::{img fileId="42746" stylebox="margin: 25px;" width="1000px" desc="BEST MEAL IN MONTHS: Botica. Photo by Cliff Bostock." styledesc="font-family: sans-serif; text-align: left;"}::
Chef/owner Mimmo Alboumeh prepares a paella special every Wednesday at Botica on Peachtree in south Buckhead. As far as I can tell, there is no cheating in the dish’s traditionally long prep time. It brought back a tidal wave of nostalgia for all the time I spent in Spain two decades ago. I happened to score the dish at a late lunch, but it’s officially only available at night. I suggest you call ahead (404-228-6358) to make sure it’s available — the type varies — but you’ll not be disappointed, whatever you order here. This “serving for one” was $20 and feeds at least two normal human beings — and I am sometimes told I am not normal. Eat the flower.
!!!__Dosa__
::{img fileId="42747" stylebox="margin: 25px;" width="400px" desc="QUICK BITES: Dosa. Photo by Cliff Bostock." styledesc="font-family: sans-serif; text-align: left;"}::
I really hate the way everyone now substitutes the words “I like...” with “I’m obsessed with...” but I’m obsessed with Masti in Toco Hills. I had my first meal there in a couple of years recently and this dosa keeps coming to mind. Rip off pieces of the thin rice-flour pancake and scoop up the perfect butter chicken under it. The menu at Masti, which means “fun,” is playful to say the least. Some dishes marry forms and flavors — try a burger — and hardly anything fails. Our server, btw, was a funny young guy from Nepal who spoke perfect English. Like most dumb Americans, I presumed he had immigrated here to find a better life. “No, no. I will return to Nepal. Of course.”
!!!__Jenchan__
::{img fileId="42748" stylebox="margin: 25px;" width="1000px" desc="QUICK BITES: JenChan. Photo by Cliff Bostock." styledesc="font-family: sans-serif; text-align: left;"}::
The Cabbagetown restaurant, which specializes in take-out and delivery meals, also now operates
Justacos, 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Tuesday- Saturday. I tried three tacos recently. The juicy fried oysters was my fave,
followed by the deliciously seasoned, crunchy pork belly. The server talked me into the third, a hard-shell taco
that the menu describes as “Taco Bell-ish.” I told him I hate hard shell tacos but, as it turned out, I would have really liked this one if the filling were left out. It’s that stinky-seasoned ground beef stuff that resembles the Varsity’s chili. That’s not to say you won’t love it, but I’m going for the fried shrimp, the Vietnamese pork, and the Kung Pao next visit. The tacos are $4 (oysters are $4.50) and they’re kind of small. Just pretend you’re delicate. 186 Carroll St., 404-549-9843, justacosatl.com."
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string(12598) " Grazing Kura Restaurant 2021-10-07T17:27:07+00:00 Grazing---Kura-Restaurant.jpg Kura is a revolving door of tastes Grazing Kura Restaurant 2021-10-07T17:19:19+00:00 GRAZING: If you are dead, eat sushi ben.eason Ben Eason CLIFF BOSTOCK cliffbostock (Cliff Bostock) 2021-10-07T17:19:19+00:00 Sushi revives the walking dead. Let me explain. In the mid ’80s, I moved to Houston to edit a huge glossy magazine for people with too much money. It was the most soul-sucking job of my life. I became so good at doing something horrible, I received an unsolicited job offer from Architectural Digest to write about kitchens and culinary crap. I knew the offer meant something had gone very wrong with my life. So, I began to tamper with Buddhism in quest of … something. I met a Japanese-American roshi — a spiritual teacher who taught Zen meditation, which amounted to sitting on a pillow and staring at a wall. I constantly told Roshi that I felt like I was dying. This was when all my friends really were dying from AIDS and, as I said, my soul was suffocating.
Roshi told me that, yes, I was in fact dying, that we are all dying. Whatever! Then for the next few weeks, we drove to a huge cemetery and set up camp in a luxuriously gardened section for very wealthy corpses. Our mission was to meditate beside freshly dug graves awaiting their tenants. It was actually edifying for many reasons and, I later learned, a classic practice. I guess there’s value to being at peace with death, even for 30 seconds out of an hour spent distracted by worms, ants, and the conspicuous excesses of the one percent’s dead people. The magazine I was editing was all about beauty, which I value, but it was, like the cemetery, largely focused on material beauty. I didn’t want to die feeding rich consumers.
A breakthrough occurred when I joined three other students for the famous tea ceremony. Everything about it reveals — perceptually more than intellectually — the natural beauty in which we are always present. Before you sip the shared green tea (made with matcha), you eat a few sweet pastries that contrast with the tea’s bitterness, effectively piercing the binary cluelessness that can seriously fuck up much of life. All of the ceremony’s implements, like raku pots, were beautiful but not ornate to my eye. There is great value in this ceremony when taken seriously. Once COVID isn’t so much an issue, find one. I’m sure the Atlanta Soto Zen Center can help you out.
So, one day, our teacher told us we were going to have a few snacks before the ceremony began. The snacks were small plates of nigiri sushi, which he prepared. Although a longtime foodie, thanks to my mother, I’d never eaten sushi more than a few times and had found it pretty grim. But the roshi’s fish gleamed with absolute clarity of appearance, flavor, and texture that was heightened by contrasting rice. It incorporated everything I was trying to learn. Is it odd that this culinary experience paradoxically told me to decline that job I’d been offered? It didn’t really matter since the low-ranking editor told me, “That’s good. We were going to withdraw the offer anyway. We found out you don’t drink.” Sobriety is so generous.
My experience is not particularly unique. My friend Rose, who lived on a boat for a few years, is addicted to sushi and has told me her three-minute enlightenment occurred when she encountered the highly prized uni sushi. Although everyone says uni is sea urchin roe, the authentic stuff is actually the creature’s sex organs. If anything on the planet can meld the literal physical sensations of the ocean with Freud’s interpretation of “oceanic feeling” as an unbounded experience of the world, it’s uni. I know that sounds fishy, but trust me.
Since it was Rose’s birthday last month, Wayne Johnson and I decided sushi — uni or uni-less — had to be her birthday meal. We weren’t sure where to go. I asked around, and a friend proposed a place I found irresistible and had wanted to visit for the few years of its existence here: Kura Revolving Sushi Bar. Basically, the deal here is that you sit next to a constantly moving conveyor belt loaded with sushi on green-swirled plates within clear domes. In other iterations, the sushi can be conveyed in little boats or trains. The temptation is to assume this method of service is silly American commercial theatrics — but no. There are over 400 Kura Sushi Bars alone, mainly in Taiwan and Japan where the style first appeared in 1958. Called kaitenzushi restaurants, their purpose is completely practical. It is fast-food sushi — cheap with pared-down service, and, just as Ronald McDonald does not serve the very highest grade of beef, the kaitenzushi’s sushi is not sublime. Good sushi, as you know, is expensive wherever you are in the world, so the kaitenzushi style’s most lucrative periods have been during economic downturns, like the present. Kura is one of many restaurants, including the delectable Snackboxe Bistro and Shoya Itzakaya, in the gargantuan H Mart complex in Doraville and was by far the busiest there on a Sunday night.
::::
We luckily hit a pause in the lineup to the wait-list kiosk just inside the door. If you are one of those people who still cannot easily buy a ticket from a parking meter, you might find the kiosk daunting. No worries — the slightest hesitation will cause an employee to barge in front of you and push the right buttons. That was a strong indicator of what was to come. We were rushed to a table, and the system was explained at the speed of an auctioneer. When the guy was done, the three of us were stupidly staring at one another, heads bobbing. He demanded to know what we wanted to drink and ran off before we could ask further questions. I made my first note about the place on my phone: “Roshi sushi is dead. No enlightenment foreseen.”
During the server’s rather lengthy absence, we looked around. Basically, there are two seating areas. One is a bar where you sit side-by-side. The larger area is all booths that are perpendicular to the conveyor belts, meaning that if there are more than two of you, fetching the sushi plates requires a group effort. The server came back and pointed at a tablet slightly above the table. “You can order there too.” Huh? Bye. It turned out that you can indeed order sushi as well as some cooked dishes via the tablet. They are propelled to your table via a separate conveyor belt above the main one. We figured this out just before we left, so we didn’t eat anything much besides nigiri and rolls. I strongly suggest you take that route.
We watched the globes containing the plates briskly pass our table. I begged a server to explain the process again. She said to press a lever on the globe and pull out the plate. After you eat the sushi, you deposit the plate in a slot which contains some means of keeping track of your bill. Every plate on the conveyor belt costs $2.60. Fine. It was all good because I was by this time in a complete state of disassociation — exactly the opposite of Ram Dass’s demand to Be Here Now. I had no idea what we were doing, and the task of removing the sushi from the belt was left to the most voracious of us, Rose. She — we — repeatedly missed the lever to pop open each globe and would yank the whole thing off the belt, as the server said we could. Nobody told us that each globe was attached to a second globe. You don’t have to also eat what’s in the second globe because you are going to return the linked pair to the belt. Are you following me? At this point, I made another salient note: “Ethel and Lucy attempt to wrap chocolates on a conveyor belt.” That’s a reference to an episode of the I Love Lucy TV series.
Well, what about the sushi itself? This inspired my third note: “Bleach sparkling.” I will not name names, but there used to be a high-volume sushi bar in town whose fish was so on the verge of spoiling that it was allegedly rinsed in a solution containing bleach that guaranteed the fish would have, at best, no taste. Kura’s sushi was certainly better than that, but I can say with no hesitation that both Kroger and Publix sell a better product. I rapidly gave up any effort to identify each plate of sushi that Rose pulled from the conveyor belt. I did notice salmon skin. I love salmon skin sushi. I mean I used to love it. I noticed a plate of conch coming our way and demanded Rose grab it. I love conch. It’s all about weird umami of the sea and a hopefully only slightly chewy texture. Oh well. My next note: “Bullet.” If you were about to have your arm amputated with no anesthesia and there was no bullet around for you to bite on, this conch would work as well. There’s more! How about nigiri featuring a tiny slice of wagyu? My note: “Mysterious and elite Spam.”
Was anything good? Yes. Stick to basics like tuna and salmon in rolls or nigiri, and you’ll be okay. But even then, you’re going to encounter that slightly grainy texture that whispers, “We are all dying.” I think our experience was greatly affected by our seating. The long conveyor belts are perpendicular to the kitchen. We were seated in the booth farthest from it. That meant most of the containers rolling by us were empty. If you’re familiar with sushi, you know you can spot the good stuff much of the time. We were getting the other diners’ rejects. Ask to be seated closer to the kitchen. If that doesn’t work, use the tablet above your table to order. You’ll spend a bit more, but you’ll be happier.
We left in search of sweets, but the shop where I’ve usually grazed on sugar there was closed. It wasn’t Rose’s happiest birthday dinner — there was no uni — but I’ll stop by MF Sushi on my way to see her next time … or Publix. —CL—
Kura Revolving Sushi Bar, Unit A107-A110, 6035 Peachtree Rd, Doraville, GA 30360. kurasushi.com/locations/doraville-ga @kurasushidoraville
!!Quick Bites
!!!Botica
::::
Chef/owner Mimmo Alboumeh prepares a paella special every Wednesday at Botica on Peachtree in south Buckhead. As far as I can tell, there is no cheating in the dish’s traditionally long prep time. It brought back a tidal wave of nostalgia for all the time I spent in Spain two decades ago. I happened to score the dish at a late lunch, but it’s officially only available at night. I suggest you call ahead (404-228-6358) to make sure it’s available — the type varies — but you’ll not be disappointed, whatever you order here. This “serving for one” was $20 and feeds at least two normal human beings — and I am sometimes told I am not normal. Eat the flower.
!!!Dosa
::::
I really hate the way everyone now substitutes the words “I like...” with “I’m obsessed with...” but I’m obsessed with Masti in Toco Hills. I had my first meal there in a couple of years recently and this dosa keeps coming to mind. Rip off pieces of the thin rice-flour pancake and scoop up the perfect butter chicken under it. The menu at Masti, which means “fun,” is playful to say the least. Some dishes marry forms and flavors — try a burger — and hardly anything fails. Our server, btw, was a funny young guy from Nepal who spoke perfect English. Like most dumb Americans, I presumed he had immigrated here to find a better life. “No, no. I will return to Nepal. Of course.”
!!!Jenchan
::::
The Cabbagetown restaurant, which specializes in take-out and delivery meals, also now operates
Justacos, 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Tuesday- Saturday. I tried three tacos recently. The juicy fried oysters was my fave,
followed by the deliciously seasoned, crunchy pork belly. The server talked me into the third, a hard-shell taco
that the menu describes as “Taco Bell-ish.” I told him I hate hard shell tacos but, as it turned out, I would have really liked this one if the filling were left out. It’s that stinky-seasoned ground beef stuff that resembles the Varsity’s chili. That’s not to say you won’t love it, but I’m going for the fried shrimp, the Vietnamese pork, and the Kung Pao next visit. The tacos are $4 (oysters are $4.50) and they’re kind of small. Just pretend you’re delicate. 186 Carroll St., 404-549-9843, justacosatl.com. Cliff Bostock PRETTY: Lovely to look at, lovely to hold, but if you eat it, consider it old! Come on, Kura, amp up the quality! 0,0,10 GRAZING: If you are dead, eat sushi "
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GRAZING: If you are dead, eat sushi Article
Thursday October 7, 2021 01:19 PM EDT
Kura is a revolving door of tastes
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more...
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string(10392) "With the exception of fried chicken, nothing Southerners put in their mouths evokes as much nostalgia as barbecue. It doesn’t matter where I sit down to eat it, I remember road trips around North Carolina with my father, stopping at one ’cue shack after another. I remember waking up every Friday morning to the smoke of roadside barbecue pits fired up for the weekend throughout rural Georgia where I edited weekly newspapers in my early twenties. I remember moving to Houston and reeling when all the barbecue seemed to be brisket. (Who knew you could barbecue corned beef?) There was and always will be the horror — the horror! — of barbecue sauce that is ketchup doctored with an eyedropper of vinegar and a cup of sugar.
We would all be happier if we could just sit down to a plate of barbecue like the Buddha — put aside our memories and eat with curiosity, sampling each bite as if it were our first ever, om-ing while we nom nom. I hoped I could do that when I headed to Rodney Scott’s Whole Hog BBQ a few weeks after it opened in the West End, across from the MET complex, but I already knew too much. Scott’s original restaurant is in Charleston, South Carolina, and he won the James Beard award for best chef in the Southeast in 2018. He just published Rodney Scott’s World of BBQ: Recipes and Perspectives from the Legendary Pitmaster with co-writer Lolis Eric Elie. Both achievements are part of the very late recognition of the primary role of Black chefs in the formation of America’s general culinary culture as well as its barbecue fixation. (Last month I wrote about Netflix’s series on this subject, High on the Hog, hosted by Atlantan Stephen Satterfield. It has been renewed for a second season.)
The new restaurant is an open, airy, windowed space far from the cliché of the Southern ramshackle joint with wood walls decorated with cartoon portraits of happy pigs bound for slaughter and jigsaw portraits of Jesus (although I admit liking the latter at the old Harold’s). There are two dining rooms and a porch, a bar, a view of the kitchen and its unusual air-conditioned pit area. There’s a front counter where you order, although there’s a full staff of educated servers, meaning they can explain the worth of the barbecue gold they are putting on your table.
The menu surprised me. It goes way beyond barbecue and includes fried catfish and chicken tenders, wings, burgers, a steak sandwich, big salads, and loaded baked potatoes, here called “tater trucks.” Go ahead and order any of that — it all gets good reviews at the other two restaurants in Birmingham and Charleston — but your attention should really be directed to the pit-cooked meats that have made Scott a superstar. There are sandwiches and plates of pork, chicken, turkey, spareribs, and brisket. The go-to choice is of course the whole hog pork sandwich or plate. But why?
Understand that when you order barbecue at the average restaurant, you’re usually getting meat smoked for a long period from a particular cut of the pig. Scott pit-cooks the entire pig for hours more, just as his family did at their restaurant in Hemingway, South Carolina, where he worked for 25 years, starting when he was 11. The process is very much like the one I observed frequently in rural Georgia in the ’70s. The splayed pigs were dry-rubbed but also basted with each pitmaster’s personally concocted sauce. The coals or wood were moved around, sometimes splashed with water, to distribute the heat at different intensities while the lard dripped constantly. The skin was charred. The most amazing thing to me was that when you stepped up to order, you were usually given a choice of which meat of the pig you wanted, and it would be pulled from the pig as you watched. Usually, I ordered mixed meat and begged for some of the crisp skin. (Meanwhile the crew also cooked chickens whose feet they sold. I refused to believe anyone ate them.)
I’ve only tried the pulled whole-hog pork at Scott’s. I ordered the plate, instead of the open-face sandwich because I wanted two sides instead of one. The sandwich comes topped with pig skins and I was disappointed that the plate’s meat did not. The pulled pork itself was, I’ll admit, a bit on the dry side. I’m happiest when barbecue doesn’t depend too much on heavy shots of sauce at the table because they can rob the meat of its own flavor. Then again, I was anxious to sample Scott’s four sauces. The original, “Rodney’s Sauce,” was by far my favorite, made principally with vinegar and spicy seasonings — the kind I grew up with in North Carolina. We had lots of family in South Carolina, and I was surprised not to find any of the mustard-based sauce I remember eating there. The next two sauces amp up the sweet factor. The “Other” is made with apple-cider vinegar and adds a natural, but not too overt, sweetness. The next, “Kathy’s,” exhausted me. It’s ketchupy, tomato-based, and way too sweet for my bitter mouth. My server told me Scott was “experimenting” with it because, um, well, that’s what a lot of people like around here. I’d call it Kansas City style. The fourth sauce is an Alabama-style white. I’ve never understood this stuff. It tastes like homemade Thousand Island salad dressing to me.
I got two sides — collards and hushpuppies. The former were mild, slippery, and country-good; I resisted hitting them with the vinegar sauce. The hushpuppies were stunning, semi-sweet orbs of crunchy cornmeal. My server told me I needed to put honey-butter on them. She asked me if I’d ever tried it there before. I said no and she said, “Well, I’m going to stand here and watch the look on your face when you taste it.” I smiled as best I know how to, which is not well, but the overall sweetness was enough to completely derail my earlier plans to order the banana pudding.
It is difficult to express again, like last month, how personally affected I am by this country’s reckoning with racism. When I lived in Elberton during my five-year stint inside a Faulkner novel, my boss dragged me nearly every Friday to a barbecue joint in the woods whose walls were covered with photos and campaign literature in support of Alabama governor George Wallace’s openly racist presidential bid. Black customers were not allowed inside, but, incredibly, they nonetheless lined up at a takeout window. Back at the paper, I asked our only Black employee — the janitor, of course — how to explain that. He laughed and said, “I guess they like the barbecue.” I said, “You mean it’s just the way it’s always been.” He smiled. About 10 years later, I took Larry Ashmead, the executive editor of HarperCollins, on a road trip to the three towns where I worked those five years. I was most anxious for him to see the barbecue joint. We walked in and the man at the counter was Black. He was now the owner of the place. I told him what I had seen there 10 years ago. He said plaintively, “Things change.” It’s true, but for many, racism just got politer and now has resurfaced in all its brutal forms. Rodney Scott and countless others are exhibiting the futility of hate.
MORE ‘CUE: Speaking of barbecue, the Collier Road favorite, DAS BBQ, has opened a second location on Memorial Drive in Grant Park. The pandemic has crushed most restaurants, especially new ones, and I know this second location will improve, but it’s got a ways to go. I’ve been twice. The most disconcerting thing has been the pulled pork sandwich. You order at the counter and the sandwich instantly appears, already wrapped, pulled from a bank of refrigerator-sized warming cabinets. Both visits, the sandwiches have been super dry with the meat glued to the bread. The brisket was fatty-good the first visit, but dry as hell on the second. Sides have been mainly good, although, the Brunswick stew, yet again, was distressingly dry. Collards were homey, and the cheesy creamed corn was rich. My dining companion actually managed to spend $40 on his meal of brisket and a couple of sides. Weirdly, the restaurant was out of single serving containers, and we ended up with pint-sized ones priced with bad math. On the way out of the building — through the smokers — an employee asked how our meal was and we complained. He immediately fell into apology and said he was going to give us a coupon. We said “no.” He raced away to fetch it, and we raced to the car. The sauces here are intriguing. There’s a mustard-based one that contains peaches and a more conventional red spiked with espresso but mainly presents strong notes of Worcestershire sauce. I’m most mystified why a new barbecue joint would open next to Daddy D’z. … I’ve been addicted to Wednesday’s Cuban sandwich special at Wood’s Chapel BBQ for the last few months. Happily, it’s on the regular menu now. Unfortunately, the last two times I’ve gone to get one, they’ve not had any. When I asked why the second time, a staffer told me, “We ran out.” I resisted saying, “Make more,” and ordered some cornbread. “Sorry we ran out.” The good news is that they’ve opened a second location at Krog Street Market.
FOOD MEDIA: Do you hate Twitter? I have a reason for you to love it. Christiane Lauterbach (@xianechronicles), the longtime Atlanta Magazine dining critic and publisher of Knife & Fork, has been tweeting prolifically there. I’m talking 7,811 comments in a year. Sometimes, she’ll fire off five or six a day and not just about food. That’s the good part. Christiane is hilarious and smart, and Twitter gives you a bigger taste of her. … Jennifer Zyman (@JenniferZyman) continues hosting her podcast, The Food that Binds (available everywhere). I especially loved her June 23 episode about Anthony Bourdain. She is joined by her father Sergio Zyman. They pay homage to Bourdain, but it’s also moving to hear her chatting with her super-foodie father, giving a perfect example of the meaning of her podcast name. And, speaking again about barbecue, she interviewed the Fox Bros. on June 24. —CL—
Rodney Scott’s Whole Hog BBQ, 588 Metropolitan Parkway, 678-855-7377, rodneyscottsbbq.com
Das BBQ, 350 Memorial Dr., 404-850-7373, dasbbq.com
Wood’s Chapel BBQ, 85 Georgia Ave., 404-522-3000, woodschapelbbq.com"
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We would all be happier if we could just sit down to a plate of barbecue like the Buddha — put aside our memories and eat with curiosity, sampling each bite as if it were our first ever, ''om''-ing while we ''nom nom''. I hoped I could do that when I headed to Rodney Scott’s Whole Hog BBQ a few weeks after it opened in the West End, across from the MET complex, but I already knew too much. Scott’s original restaurant is in Charleston, South Carolina, and he won the James Beard award for best chef in the Southeast in 2018. He just published ''Rodney Scott’s World of BBQ: Recipes and Perspectives from the Legendary Pitmaster'' with co-writer Lolis Eric Elie. Both achievements are part of the very late recognition of the primary role of Black chefs in the formation of America’s general culinary culture as well as its barbecue fixation. (Last month I wrote about Netflix’s series on this subject, ''High on the Hog'', hosted by Atlantan Stephen Satterfield. It has been renewed for a second season.)
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The new restaurant is an open, airy, windowed space far from the cliché of the Southern ramshackle joint with wood walls decorated with cartoon portraits of happy pigs bound for slaughter and jigsaw portraits of Jesus (although I admit liking the latter at the old Harold’s). There are two dining rooms and a porch, a bar, a view of the kitchen and its unusual air-conditioned pit area. There’s a front counter where you order, although there’s a full staff of educated servers, meaning they can explain the worth of the barbecue gold they are putting on your table.
The menu surprised me. It goes way beyond barbecue and includes fried catfish and chicken tenders, wings, burgers, a steak sandwich, big salads, and loaded baked potatoes, here called “tater trucks.” Go ahead and order any of that — it all gets good reviews at the other two restaurants in Birmingham and Charleston — but your attention should really be directed to the pit-cooked meats that have made Scott a superstar. There are sandwiches and plates of pork, chicken, turkey, spareribs, and brisket. The go-to choice is of course the whole hog pork sandwich or plate. But why?
Understand that when you order barbecue at the average restaurant, you’re usually getting meat smoked for a long period from a particular cut of the pig. Scott pit-cooks the entire pig for hours more, just as his family did at their restaurant in Hemingway, South Carolina, where he worked for 25 years, starting when he was 11. The process is very much like the one I observed frequently in rural Georgia in the ’70s. The splayed pigs were dry-rubbed but also basted with each pitmaster’s personally concocted sauce. The coals or wood were moved around, sometimes splashed with water, to distribute the heat at different intensities while the lard dripped constantly. The skin was charred. The most amazing thing to me was that when you stepped up to order, you were usually given a choice of which meat of the pig you wanted, and it would be pulled from the pig as you watched. Usually, I ordered mixed meat and begged for some of the crisp skin. (Meanwhile the crew also cooked chickens whose feet they sold. I refused to believe anyone ate them.)
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I’ve only tried the pulled whole-hog pork at Scott’s. I ordered the plate, instead of the open-face sandwich because I wanted two sides instead of one. The sandwich comes topped with pig skins and I was disappointed that the plate’s meat did not. The pulled pork itself was, I’ll admit, a bit on the dry side. I’m happiest when barbecue doesn’t depend too much on heavy shots of sauce at the table because they can rob the meat of its own flavor. Then again, I was anxious to sample Scott’s four sauces. The original, “Rodney’s Sauce,” was by far my favorite, made principally with vinegar and spicy seasonings — the kind I grew up with in North Carolina. We had lots of family in South Carolina, and I was surprised not to find any of the mustard-based sauce I remember eating there. The next two sauces amp up the sweet factor. The “Other” is made with apple-cider vinegar and adds a natural, but not too overt, sweetness. The next, “Kathy’s,” exhausted me. It’s ketchupy, tomato-based, and way too sweet for my bitter mouth. My server told me Scott was “experimenting” with it because, um, well, that’s what a lot of people like around here. I’d call it Kansas City style. The fourth sauce is an Alabama-style white. I’ve never understood this stuff. It tastes like homemade Thousand Island salad dressing to me.
I got two sides — collards and hushpuppies. The former were mild, slippery, and country-good; I resisted hitting them with the vinegar sauce. The hushpuppies were stunning, semi-sweet orbs of crunchy cornmeal. My server told me I needed to put honey-butter on them. She asked me if I’d ever tried it there before. I said no and she said, “Well, I’m going to stand here and watch the look on your face when you taste it.” I smiled as best I know how to, which is not well, but the overall sweetness was enough to completely derail my earlier plans to order the banana pudding.
It is difficult to express again, like last month, how personally affected I am by this country’s reckoning with racism. When I lived in Elberton during my five-year stint inside a Faulkner novel, my boss dragged me nearly every Friday to a barbecue joint in the woods whose walls were covered with photos and campaign literature in support of Alabama governor George Wallace’s openly racist presidential bid. Black customers were not allowed inside, but, incredibly, they nonetheless lined up at a takeout window. Back at the paper, I asked our only Black employee — the janitor, of course — how to explain that. He laughed and said, “I guess they like the barbecue.” I said, “You mean it’s just the way it’s always been.” He smiled. About 10 years later, I took Larry Ashmead, the executive editor of HarperCollins, on a road trip to the three towns where I worked those five years. I was most anxious for him to see the barbecue joint. We walked in and the man at the counter was Black. He was now the owner of the place. I told him what I had seen there 10 years ago. He said plaintively, “Things change.” It’s true, but for many, racism just got politer and now has resurfaced in all its brutal forms. Rodney Scott and countless others are exhibiting the futility of hate.
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__MORE ‘CUE:__ Speaking of barbecue, the Collier Road favorite, __DAS BBQ__, has opened a second location on Memorial Drive in Grant Park. The pandemic has crushed most restaurants, especially new ones, and I know this second location will improve, but it’s got a ways to go. I’ve been twice. The most disconcerting thing has been the pulled pork sandwich. You order at the counter and the sandwich instantly appears, already wrapped, pulled from a bank of refrigerator-sized warming cabinets. Both visits, the sandwiches have been super dry with the meat glued to the bread. The brisket was fatty-good the first visit, but dry as hell on the second. Sides have been mainly good, although, the Brunswick stew, yet again, was distressingly dry. Collards were homey, and the cheesy creamed corn was rich. My dining companion actually managed to spend $40 on his meal of brisket and a couple of sides. Weirdly, the restaurant was out of single serving containers, and we ended up with pint-sized ones priced with bad math. On the way out of the building — through the smokers — an employee asked how our meal was and we complained. He immediately fell into apology and said he was going to give us a coupon. We said “no.” He raced away to fetch it, and we raced to the car. The sauces here are intriguing. There’s a mustard-based one that contains peaches and a more conventional red spiked with espresso but mainly presents strong notes of Worcestershire sauce. I’m most mystified why a new barbecue joint would open next to Daddy D’z. … I’ve been addicted to Wednesday’s Cuban sandwich special at __Wood’s Chapel BBQ__ for the last few months. Happily, it’s on the regular menu now. Unfortunately, the last two times I’ve gone to get one, they’ve not had any. When I asked why the second time, a staffer told me, “We ran out.” I resisted saying, “Make more,” and ordered some cornbread. “Sorry we ran out.” The good news is that they’ve opened a second location at Krog Street Market.
{imagefloatleft imageid="41343" wdthval="150px"}__FOOD MEDIA:__ Do you hate Twitter? I have a reason for you to love it. __Christiane Lauterbach__ (@xianechronicles), the longtime ''Atlanta Magazine'' dining critic and publisher of ''Knife & Fork'', has been tweeting prolifically there. I’m talking 7,811 comments in a year. Sometimes, she’ll fire off five or six a day and not just about food. That’s the good part. Christiane is hilarious and smart, and Twitter gives you a bigger taste of her. … __Jennifer Zyman__ (@JenniferZyman) continues hosting her podcast, ''The Food that Binds'' (available everywhere). I especially loved her June 23 episode about Anthony Bourdain. She is joined by her father Sergio Zyman. They pay homage to Bourdain, but it’s also moving to hear her chatting with her super-foodie father, giving a perfect example of the meaning of her podcast name. And, speaking again about barbecue, she interviewed the Fox Bros. on June 24. __—CL—__
''Rodney Scott’s Whole Hog BBQ, 588 Metropolitan Parkway, 678-855-7377, rodneyscottsbbq.com''
''Das BBQ, 350 Memorial Dr., 404-850-7373, dasbbq.com''
''Wood’s Chapel BBQ, 85 Georgia Ave., 404-522-3000, woodschapelbbq.com''"
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string(10950) " GRAZ #1 Resized 2021-08-31T20:58:34+00:00 GRAZ_#1_resized.jpg grazing Rodney Scott’s Whole Hog is just that! GRAZ #1 Resized 2021-08-31T20:55:46+00:00 GRAZING: Barbecue on my mind jim.harris Jim Harris CLIFF BOSTOCK cliffbostock (Cliff Bostock) 2021-08-31T20:55:46+00:00 With the exception of fried chicken, nothing Southerners put in their mouths evokes as much nostalgia as barbecue. It doesn’t matter where I sit down to eat it, I remember road trips around North Carolina with my father, stopping at one ’cue shack after another. I remember waking up every Friday morning to the smoke of roadside barbecue pits fired up for the weekend throughout rural Georgia where I edited weekly newspapers in my early twenties. I remember moving to Houston and reeling when all the barbecue seemed to be brisket. (Who knew you could barbecue corned beef?) There was and always will be the horror — the horror! — of barbecue sauce that is ketchup doctored with an eyedropper of vinegar and a cup of sugar.
We would all be happier if we could just sit down to a plate of barbecue like the Buddha — put aside our memories and eat with curiosity, sampling each bite as if it were our first ever, om-ing while we nom nom. I hoped I could do that when I headed to Rodney Scott’s Whole Hog BBQ a few weeks after it opened in the West End, across from the MET complex, but I already knew too much. Scott’s original restaurant is in Charleston, South Carolina, and he won the James Beard award for best chef in the Southeast in 2018. He just published Rodney Scott’s World of BBQ: Recipes and Perspectives from the Legendary Pitmaster with co-writer Lolis Eric Elie. Both achievements are part of the very late recognition of the primary role of Black chefs in the formation of America’s general culinary culture as well as its barbecue fixation. (Last month I wrote about Netflix’s series on this subject, High on the Hog, hosted by Atlantan Stephen Satterfield. It has been renewed for a second season.)
The new restaurant is an open, airy, windowed space far from the cliché of the Southern ramshackle joint with wood walls decorated with cartoon portraits of happy pigs bound for slaughter and jigsaw portraits of Jesus (although I admit liking the latter at the old Harold’s). There are two dining rooms and a porch, a bar, a view of the kitchen and its unusual air-conditioned pit area. There’s a front counter where you order, although there’s a full staff of educated servers, meaning they can explain the worth of the barbecue gold they are putting on your table.
The menu surprised me. It goes way beyond barbecue and includes fried catfish and chicken tenders, wings, burgers, a steak sandwich, big salads, and loaded baked potatoes, here called “tater trucks.” Go ahead and order any of that — it all gets good reviews at the other two restaurants in Birmingham and Charleston — but your attention should really be directed to the pit-cooked meats that have made Scott a superstar. There are sandwiches and plates of pork, chicken, turkey, spareribs, and brisket. The go-to choice is of course the whole hog pork sandwich or plate. But why?
Understand that when you order barbecue at the average restaurant, you’re usually getting meat smoked for a long period from a particular cut of the pig. Scott pit-cooks the entire pig for hours more, just as his family did at their restaurant in Hemingway, South Carolina, where he worked for 25 years, starting when he was 11. The process is very much like the one I observed frequently in rural Georgia in the ’70s. The splayed pigs were dry-rubbed but also basted with each pitmaster’s personally concocted sauce. The coals or wood were moved around, sometimes splashed with water, to distribute the heat at different intensities while the lard dripped constantly. The skin was charred. The most amazing thing to me was that when you stepped up to order, you were usually given a choice of which meat of the pig you wanted, and it would be pulled from the pig as you watched. Usually, I ordered mixed meat and begged for some of the crisp skin. (Meanwhile the crew also cooked chickens whose feet they sold. I refused to believe anyone ate them.)
I’ve only tried the pulled whole-hog pork at Scott’s. I ordered the plate, instead of the open-face sandwich because I wanted two sides instead of one. The sandwich comes topped with pig skins and I was disappointed that the plate’s meat did not. The pulled pork itself was, I’ll admit, a bit on the dry side. I’m happiest when barbecue doesn’t depend too much on heavy shots of sauce at the table because they can rob the meat of its own flavor. Then again, I was anxious to sample Scott’s four sauces. The original, “Rodney’s Sauce,” was by far my favorite, made principally with vinegar and spicy seasonings — the kind I grew up with in North Carolina. We had lots of family in South Carolina, and I was surprised not to find any of the mustard-based sauce I remember eating there. The next two sauces amp up the sweet factor. The “Other” is made with apple-cider vinegar and adds a natural, but not too overt, sweetness. The next, “Kathy’s,” exhausted me. It’s ketchupy, tomato-based, and way too sweet for my bitter mouth. My server told me Scott was “experimenting” with it because, um, well, that’s what a lot of people like around here. I’d call it Kansas City style. The fourth sauce is an Alabama-style white. I’ve never understood this stuff. It tastes like homemade Thousand Island salad dressing to me.
I got two sides — collards and hushpuppies. The former were mild, slippery, and country-good; I resisted hitting them with the vinegar sauce. The hushpuppies were stunning, semi-sweet orbs of crunchy cornmeal. My server told me I needed to put honey-butter on them. She asked me if I’d ever tried it there before. I said no and she said, “Well, I’m going to stand here and watch the look on your face when you taste it.” I smiled as best I know how to, which is not well, but the overall sweetness was enough to completely derail my earlier plans to order the banana pudding.
It is difficult to express again, like last month, how personally affected I am by this country’s reckoning with racism. When I lived in Elberton during my five-year stint inside a Faulkner novel, my boss dragged me nearly every Friday to a barbecue joint in the woods whose walls were covered with photos and campaign literature in support of Alabama governor George Wallace’s openly racist presidential bid. Black customers were not allowed inside, but, incredibly, they nonetheless lined up at a takeout window. Back at the paper, I asked our only Black employee — the janitor, of course — how to explain that. He laughed and said, “I guess they like the barbecue.” I said, “You mean it’s just the way it’s always been.” He smiled. About 10 years later, I took Larry Ashmead, the executive editor of HarperCollins, on a road trip to the three towns where I worked those five years. I was most anxious for him to see the barbecue joint. We walked in and the man at the counter was Black. He was now the owner of the place. I told him what I had seen there 10 years ago. He said plaintively, “Things change.” It’s true, but for many, racism just got politer and now has resurfaced in all its brutal forms. Rodney Scott and countless others are exhibiting the futility of hate.
MORE ‘CUE: Speaking of barbecue, the Collier Road favorite, DAS BBQ, has opened a second location on Memorial Drive in Grant Park. The pandemic has crushed most restaurants, especially new ones, and I know this second location will improve, but it’s got a ways to go. I’ve been twice. The most disconcerting thing has been the pulled pork sandwich. You order at the counter and the sandwich instantly appears, already wrapped, pulled from a bank of refrigerator-sized warming cabinets. Both visits, the sandwiches have been super dry with the meat glued to the bread. The brisket was fatty-good the first visit, but dry as hell on the second. Sides have been mainly good, although, the Brunswick stew, yet again, was distressingly dry. Collards were homey, and the cheesy creamed corn was rich. My dining companion actually managed to spend $40 on his meal of brisket and a couple of sides. Weirdly, the restaurant was out of single serving containers, and we ended up with pint-sized ones priced with bad math. On the way out of the building — through the smokers — an employee asked how our meal was and we complained. He immediately fell into apology and said he was going to give us a coupon. We said “no.” He raced away to fetch it, and we raced to the car. The sauces here are intriguing. There’s a mustard-based one that contains peaches and a more conventional red spiked with espresso but mainly presents strong notes of Worcestershire sauce. I’m most mystified why a new barbecue joint would open next to Daddy D’z. … I’ve been addicted to Wednesday’s Cuban sandwich special at Wood’s Chapel BBQ for the last few months. Happily, it’s on the regular menu now. Unfortunately, the last two times I’ve gone to get one, they’ve not had any. When I asked why the second time, a staffer told me, “We ran out.” I resisted saying, “Make more,” and ordered some cornbread. “Sorry we ran out.” The good news is that they’ve opened a second location at Krog Street Market.
FOOD MEDIA: Do you hate Twitter? I have a reason for you to love it. Christiane Lauterbach (@xianechronicles), the longtime Atlanta Magazine dining critic and publisher of Knife & Fork, has been tweeting prolifically there. I’m talking 7,811 comments in a year. Sometimes, she’ll fire off five or six a day and not just about food. That’s the good part. Christiane is hilarious and smart, and Twitter gives you a bigger taste of her. … Jennifer Zyman (@JenniferZyman) continues hosting her podcast, The Food that Binds (available everywhere). I especially loved her June 23 episode about Anthony Bourdain. She is joined by her father Sergio Zyman. They pay homage to Bourdain, but it’s also moving to hear her chatting with her super-foodie father, giving a perfect example of the meaning of her podcast name. And, speaking again about barbecue, she interviewed the Fox Bros. on June 24. —CL—
Rodney Scott’s Whole Hog BBQ, 588 Metropolitan Parkway, 678-855-7377, rodneyscottsbbq.com
Das BBQ, 350 Memorial Dr., 404-850-7373, dasbbq.com
Wood’s Chapel BBQ, 85 Georgia Ave., 404-522-3000, woodschapelbbq.com CLIFF BOSTOCK YOUR SHARE OF A WHOLE HOG: Great taste, a little dry, but a sauce will take care of that. Don't miss the hushpuppies with honey-butter, unless you plan to have dessert. Collards rock. 0,0,2 grazing GRAZING: Barbecue on my mind "
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GRAZING: Barbecue on my mind Article
Tuesday August 31, 2021 04:55 PM EDT
Rodney Scott’s Whole Hog is just that!
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string(10664) "If you don’t think the pandemic will have a longtime effect in the United States, arrange a culinary tour of new restaurants in Atlanta. You’ll immediately notice a few things they have in common. The dining rooms are smaller. Patio dining, often covered, has expanded. Takeout remains robust. Counter service is everywhere. The accent is often on international and regional cuisine. Many restaurants host kinky pop-ups that help new chefs get established. Staffs are smaller but fear not. Even though prices have increased significantly, if you want a job that pays enough to qualify you for food stamps, there are plenty available.
Maybe the most noticeable change that accommodates all of this is an explosion of so-called food halls. This was of course already happening with places like Ponce City Market and Krog Street Market, just to name two of the original intown behemoths. I wrote about Chattahoochee Ford Works last month. Considering inflated real estate costs, it makes sense to locate in these developments which repurpose often abandoned or downgraded industrial spaces.
One of the latest and most interesting is the Pratt Pullman District in Kirkwood, a 27-acre redevelopment of a former fertilizer plant and railyard into a “creative city within a city” — or something. The name is totally confusing. The development has historically been referred to as the Pullman Yard. Its current URL is pullmanyards.com but the name on that site is Pullman. On their Facebook page, where they like to refer to themselves as “epic,” it is Pratt Pullman District. Whatever, it has mainly been the site of film production since 2017 when Atomic Entertainment acquired it. With COVID’s relative evaporation, it’s become popularly known for hosting “Van Gogh: The Immersive Experience,” an interactive digital exhibition which allows you to fully soak up Vincent’s vibe and maybe cut your ear off on your way outside for food.
Food? Supposedly the enormous grounds outside the Van Gogh exhibition are home to multiple “mobile dining” operations. Not during my visit on a sprinkly weekday afternoon. After parking a football field or two away and getting complicated instructions on how to pay, I found only Kamayan ATL’s Filipino food truck and a stall selling pastries from Gabriel’s and coffee from Apotheos Roastery. I had heard Supremo Taco and another coffee shop were operating fulltime there, but every employed person I asked about them shrugged and said they knew nada. Luckily, the brick-and-mortar Abby Singer, was open. After trying to explain the name of the development, I’m not going to do the same with the restaurant. Do your own research.
Abby is a gastropub open for lunch and dinner, with a very limited menu for the present. Business partners Mike Horn and chef Jeffrey Peterson moved here from Minneapolis in 2019 with other plans that were, of course, blown up by the pandemic. They landed at Pratt Pullman and set up operation in one of the site’s smallest buildings to give Atlanta cocktails and cheese curds. Yes, cheese curds, the chewy delicacies for which displaced Canadians wail when they need their poutine. Midwesterners likewise demand their “squeaky cheese,” most popularly in fried form, and I think they’ll be happy with Abby’s. If you’re not drinking, the portion is adequate for four. If you’re drinking, you’ll want a second order just for yourself.
The big deal here is the Minneapolis obsession, the Juicy Lucy burger. It’s a half pound of grilled ground beef stuffed with American cheese that erupts like yellow lava inside a bun layered with charred, lightly caramelized onions and dill chips. Mine was delicious, but I have to say it didn’t really seem to adhere to the classic configuration. The cheese seemed to be simply placed between two patties instead of buried like treasure in one giant patty. You can also order a portobello “burger,” tots, chicken tenders, and a grilled-cheese sandwich. There are kids and brunch menus. Specials pop up now and then on their Facebook and Instagram pages. Recently, they offered a full menu for the debut of the development’s 45-piece Pullman Pops orchestra.
The Abby Singer had no indoor seating apart from the bar the day I visited, although there were plenty of picnic tables — some covered — outside. Since I don’t drink, I don’t talk much to bartenders, but I met my favorite ever at Abby’s. Have you ever met a bartender who is a former public school teacher with a master’s degree in theology from Emory who also pastors a church and has authored a book? How often do you get to use your useless PhD to discuss liberation and queer theology with your barkeep? Her name is Abby. Tip her big. You might be spared eternity in hell for the sin of drinking too much.
I should add that the Kamayan Filipino venue features excellent food that I’ve sampled elsewhere. I’m also excited about the plans to host a regular chefs market where customers can buy prepared dishes. It sounds like a great opportunity for new chefs to introduce their cooking.
I’m really hopeful Pratt Pullman succeeds. Creating a “creative city” is greatly ambitious, and I keep remembering when the Ponce City Market redevelopment was announced. The press releases frequently claimed it was sure to attract successful people with high IQs. That was an obvious failure, but artistic people are so much more open-minded than nerds.
BIRTHDAY DINING: Wayne Johnson, Rose D’Agostino, and I have a long history of celebrating birthdays together. It was Wayne’s turn in July, and we went to one of his favorite restaurants, Nam Phuong, probably the best overall Vietnamese restaurant in the city. Being three highly skilled eaters, we passed on the dinner for three and ordered the dinner for four, which includes seven dishes. Just in case it was not enough — we had no birthday cake — we added one of Wayne’s favorites, the slightly crispy crepe filled with shrimp, pork, and bean sprouts served with herbs and lettuce for wrapping. This was probably my favorite of the eight dishes, only four of which could comfortably sit on the table at a time.
The reason we actually went for the larger dinner was to get Wayne his shaking beef. I have stopped ordering this dish just about everywhere. My first experiences with it in New York and at the wonderful spot in Midtown Promenade many years ago featured exceedingly tender steak, filet mignon typically, lightly marinated and served classically with salt and lime. In the years since then, I’m always presented overcooked or frankly inappropriate cuts like flank steak, typically heavily sauced. The version at Nam Phuong was in that vein. It wasn’t repulsive and maybe the effectively low price requires lower grade beef, but it’s not a favorite.
The table also included a lotus salad, salt and pepper squid, summer rolls, spare ribs, sweet and sour soup with shrimp, and a green Jell-O dessert that reminded me of those complicated congealed salads of my suburban youth. The real reason we ordered the seven-course dinner was to avoid reading the ridiculously enormous menu. You should be more patient, because there are much better dishes available than the “banquet” standards. Service, as always, was perfect and fun.
::::
FOOD MEDIA: Please watch the Netflix four-part series “High on the Hog: How African-American Cuisine Transformed America.” It features Atlantan Stephen Satterfield, the food writer and chef who founded Whetstone, the nation’s only Black-owned food magazine. There is much about the series to love. Principally, what Satterfield does is demonstrate the way storytelling creates history — cultural and personal. It is immensely difficult but possible for anyone, as Satterfield does, to untangle the formation of a cultural narrative to discern the truth, which is almost always quite different from the story we’ve been told, especially if we’re unhappy.
Satterfield’s passion, obviously, is food, and the lens through which he was told to view his life is the one that Black people were handed by a society founded on racism. It doesn’t matter how enlightened or privileged he was. We all internalize systemic cultural stories. In this Netflix series, Satterfield shatters the lens. He goes in search of the story of Black people’s role in American foodways and discovers the massive, indisputable lies of American racism. He finds that American food is fundamentally African-American food. Ultimately, he realizes that African-Americans have basically created popular culture for 200-plus years. This probably sounds impossible to you, but watch the series.
Watching the series brought back rather embarrassing memories that I don’t think I’ve ever publicly shared. Before I was 10, I used to climb into the attic of our house in Charlotte. It was stacked with countless books that my mother had taken from her parents’ home after their deaths. My grandparents operated a former family cotton plantation in South Carolina that had been home to more than 100 slaves. They lost the land and much more in the Depression. Among the books in the attic were many written to educate freed slaves. While their intention may have been superficially positive, the leather-bound, gilt-edged books were horrifying. I remember the illustrations that basically depicted Black people as animals and provided instructions on bathing, dining, and general etiquette. Some directly addressed the former slaves. Most were written for their white owners to facilitate liberation. One of those images has stuck in my head my entire life. When I hear white people disparaging critical race theory’s assertion that you can’t grow up in America without internalizing systemic racism, I use that image that haunts me as a metaphor for that process. The only way I could neutralize the hateful image was to acknowledge its presence in my head.
“High on the Hog” offers inspiration to stop reflexively denying what we believe about ourselves and ask ourselves instead, “What if everything Stephen Satterfield has disclosed is true?” I keep repeating in my head one line he speaks in the first episode when he visits Benin, where people were enslaved and shipped abroad: “It was strange to come home to a place I’d never been.” If only we all could do that. —CL—
The Abby Singer, 225 Rogers St. N.E., #11 in the Pratt Pullman District, secondmeal-llc.com.
Nam Phuong, 4051 Buford Hwy. N.E., 404-633-2400, skiplinow.com/shop/-M2dIWvR0BGxCo2qRbK0/site/"
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string(11040) "If you don’t think the pandemic will have a longtime effect in the United States, arrange a culinary tour of new restaurants in Atlanta. You’ll immediately notice a few things they have in common. The dining rooms are smaller. Patio dining, often covered, has expanded. Takeout remains robust. Counter service is everywhere. The accent is often on international and regional cuisine. Many restaurants host kinky pop-ups that help new chefs get established. Staffs are smaller but fear not. Even though prices have increased significantly, if you want a job that pays enough to qualify you for food stamps, there are plenty available.
Maybe the most noticeable change that accommodates all of this is an explosion of so-called food halls. This was of course already happening with places like Ponce City Market and Krog Street Market, just to name two of the original intown behemoths. I wrote about Chattahoochee Ford Works last month. Considering inflated real estate costs, it makes sense to locate in these developments which repurpose often abandoned or downgraded industrial spaces.
One of the latest and most interesting is the Pratt Pullman District in Kirkwood, a 27-acre redevelopment of a former fertilizer plant and railyard into a “creative city within a city” — or something. The name is totally confusing. The development has historically been referred to as the Pullman Yard. Its current URL is pullmanyards.com but the name on that site is Pullman. On their Facebook page, where they like to refer to themselves as “epic,” it is Pratt Pullman District. Whatever, it has mainly been the site of film production since 2017 when Atomic Entertainment acquired it. With COVID’s relative evaporation, it’s become popularly known for hosting “Van Gogh: The Immersive Experience,” an interactive digital exhibition which allows you to fully soak up Vincent’s vibe and maybe cut your ear off on your way outside for food.
Food? Supposedly the enormous grounds outside the Van Gogh exhibition are home to multiple “mobile dining” operations. Not during my visit on a sprinkly weekday afternoon. After parking a football field or two away and getting complicated instructions on how to pay, I found only Kamayan ATL’s Filipino food truck and a stall selling pastries from Gabriel’s and coffee from Apotheos Roastery. I had heard Supremo Taco and another coffee shop were operating fulltime there, but every employed person I asked about them shrugged and said they knew nada. Luckily, the brick-and-mortar Abby Singer, was open. After trying to explain the name of the development, I’m not going to do the same with the restaurant. Do your own research.
Abby is a gastropub open for lunch and dinner, with a very limited menu for the present. Business partners Mike Horn and chef Jeffrey Peterson moved here from Minneapolis in 2019 with other plans that were, of course, blown up by the pandemic. They landed at Pratt Pullman and set up operation in one of the site’s smallest buildings to give Atlanta cocktails and cheese curds. Yes, cheese curds, the chewy delicacies for which displaced Canadians wail when they need their poutine. Midwesterners likewise demand their “squeaky cheese,” most popularly in fried form, and I think they’ll be happy with Abby’s. If you’re not drinking, the portion is adequate for four. If you’re drinking, you’ll want a second order just for yourself.
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The big deal here is the Minneapolis obsession, the Juicy Lucy burger. It’s a half pound of grilled ground beef stuffed with American cheese that erupts like yellow lava inside a bun layered with charred, lightly caramelized onions and dill chips. Mine was delicious, but I have to say it didn’t really seem to adhere to the classic configuration. The cheese seemed to be simply placed between two patties instead of buried like treasure in one giant patty. You can also order a portobello “burger,” tots, chicken tenders, and a grilled-cheese sandwich. There are kids and brunch menus. Specials pop up now and then on their Facebook and Instagram pages. Recently, they offered a full menu for the debut of the development’s 45-piece Pullman Pops orchestra.
The Abby Singer had no indoor seating apart from the bar the day I visited, although there were plenty of picnic tables — some covered — outside. Since I don’t drink, I don’t talk much to bartenders, but I met my favorite ever at Abby’s. Have you ever met a bartender who is a former public school teacher with a master’s degree in theology from Emory who also pastors a church and has authored a book? How often do you get to use your useless PhD to discuss liberation and queer theology with your barkeep? Her name is Abby. Tip her big. You might be spared eternity in hell for the sin of drinking too much.
I should add that the Kamayan Filipino venue features excellent food that I’ve sampled elsewhere. I’m also excited about the plans to host a regular chefs market where customers can buy prepared dishes. It sounds like a great opportunity for new chefs to introduce their cooking.
I’m really hopeful Pratt Pullman succeeds. Creating a “creative city” is greatly ambitious, and I keep remembering when the Ponce City Market redevelopment was announced. The press releases frequently claimed it was sure to attract successful people with high IQs. That was an obvious failure, but artistic people are so much more open-minded than nerds.
__BIRTHDAY DINING:__ Wayne Johnson, Rose D’Agostino, and I have a long history of celebrating birthdays together. It was Wayne’s turn in July, and we went to one of his favorite restaurants, Nam Phuong, probably the best overall Vietnamese restaurant in the city. Being three highly skilled eaters, we passed on the dinner for three and ordered the dinner for four, which includes seven dishes. Just in case it was not enough — we had no birthday cake — we added one of Wayne’s favorites, the slightly crispy crepe filled with shrimp, pork, and bean sprouts served with herbs and lettuce for wrapping. This was probably my favorite of the eight dishes, only four of which could comfortably sit on the table at a time.
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The reason we actually went for the larger dinner was to get Wayne his shaking beef. I have stopped ordering this dish just about everywhere. My first experiences with it in New York and at the wonderful spot in Midtown Promenade many years ago featured exceedingly tender steak, filet mignon typically, lightly marinated and served classically with salt and lime. In the years since then, I’m always presented overcooked or frankly inappropriate cuts like flank steak, typically heavily sauced. The version at Nam Phuong was in that vein. It wasn’t repulsive and maybe the effectively low price requires lower grade beef, but it’s not a favorite.
The table also included a lotus salad, salt and pepper squid, summer rolls, spare ribs, sweet and sour soup with shrimp, and a green Jell-O dessert that reminded me of those complicated congealed salads of my suburban youth. The real reason we ordered the seven-course dinner was to avoid reading the ridiculously enormous menu. You should be more patient, because there are much better dishes available than the “banquet” standards. Service, as always, was perfect and fun.
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__FOOD MEDIA:__ Please watch the Netflix four-part series “High on the Hog: How African-American Cuisine Transformed America.” It features Atlantan Stephen Satterfield, the food writer and chef who founded ''Whetstone'', the nation’s only Black-owned food magazine. There is much about the series to love. Principally, what Satterfield does is demonstrate the way storytelling creates history — cultural and personal. It is immensely difficult but possible for anyone, as Satterfield does, to untangle the formation of a cultural narrative to discern the truth, which is almost always quite different from the story we’ve been told, especially if we’re unhappy.
Satterfield’s passion, obviously, is food, and the lens through which he was told to view his life is the one that Black people were handed by a society founded on racism. It doesn’t matter how enlightened or privileged he was. We all internalize systemic cultural stories. In this Netflix series, Satterfield shatters the lens. He goes in search of the story of Black people’s role in American foodways and discovers the massive, indisputable lies of American racism. He finds that American food is fundamentally African-American food. Ultimately, he realizes that African-Americans have basically created popular culture for 200-plus years. This probably sounds impossible to you, but watch the series.
Watching the series brought back rather embarrassing memories that I don’t think I’ve ever publicly shared. Before I was 10, I used to climb into the attic of our house in Charlotte. It was stacked with countless books that my mother had taken from her parents’ home after their deaths. My grandparents operated a former family cotton plantation in South Carolina that had been home to more than 100 slaves. They lost the land and much more in the Depression. Among the books in the attic were many written to educate freed slaves. While their intention may have been superficially positive, the leather-bound, gilt-edged books were horrifying. I remember the illustrations that basically depicted Black people as animals and provided instructions on bathing, dining, and general etiquette. Some directly addressed the former slaves. Most were written for their white owners to facilitate liberation. One of those images has stuck in my head my entire life. When I hear white people disparaging critical race theory’s assertion that you can’t grow up in America without internalizing systemic racism, I use that image that haunts me as a metaphor for that process. The only way I could neutralize the hateful image was to acknowledge its presence in my head.
“High on the Hog” offers inspiration to stop reflexively denying what we believe about ourselves and ask ourselves instead, “What if everything Stephen Satterfield has disclosed is true?” I keep repeating in my head one line he speaks in the first episode when he visits Benin, where people were enslaved and shipped abroad: “It was strange to come home to a place I’d never been.” If only we all could do that. __—CL—__
''The Abby Singer, 225 Rogers St. N.E., #11 in the Pratt Pullman District, secondmeal-llc.com. ''
''Nam Phuong, 4051 Buford Hwy. N.E., 404-633-2400, skiplinow.com/shop/-M2dIWvR0BGxCo2qRbK0/site/''"
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string(11205) " ABBY 2 Web 2021-08-06T13:33:44+00:00 ABBY_2_web.jpg grazing Abby Singer, Nam Phuong, and ‘High on the Hog’ ABBY 2 Web 2021-08-06T13:09:49+00:00 GRAZING: The longtime effect and indisputable lies jim.harris Jim Harris CLIFF BOSTOCK cliffbostock (Cliff Bostock) 2021-08-06T13:09:49+00:00 If you don’t think the pandemic will have a longtime effect in the United States, arrange a culinary tour of new restaurants in Atlanta. You’ll immediately notice a few things they have in common. The dining rooms are smaller. Patio dining, often covered, has expanded. Takeout remains robust. Counter service is everywhere. The accent is often on international and regional cuisine. Many restaurants host kinky pop-ups that help new chefs get established. Staffs are smaller but fear not. Even though prices have increased significantly, if you want a job that pays enough to qualify you for food stamps, there are plenty available.
Maybe the most noticeable change that accommodates all of this is an explosion of so-called food halls. This was of course already happening with places like Ponce City Market and Krog Street Market, just to name two of the original intown behemoths. I wrote about Chattahoochee Ford Works last month. Considering inflated real estate costs, it makes sense to locate in these developments which repurpose often abandoned or downgraded industrial spaces.
One of the latest and most interesting is the Pratt Pullman District in Kirkwood, a 27-acre redevelopment of a former fertilizer plant and railyard into a “creative city within a city” — or something. The name is totally confusing. The development has historically been referred to as the Pullman Yard. Its current URL is pullmanyards.com but the name on that site is Pullman. On their Facebook page, where they like to refer to themselves as “epic,” it is Pratt Pullman District. Whatever, it has mainly been the site of film production since 2017 when Atomic Entertainment acquired it. With COVID’s relative evaporation, it’s become popularly known for hosting “Van Gogh: The Immersive Experience,” an interactive digital exhibition which allows you to fully soak up Vincent’s vibe and maybe cut your ear off on your way outside for food.
Food? Supposedly the enormous grounds outside the Van Gogh exhibition are home to multiple “mobile dining” operations. Not during my visit on a sprinkly weekday afternoon. After parking a football field or two away and getting complicated instructions on how to pay, I found only Kamayan ATL’s Filipino food truck and a stall selling pastries from Gabriel’s and coffee from Apotheos Roastery. I had heard Supremo Taco and another coffee shop were operating fulltime there, but every employed person I asked about them shrugged and said they knew nada. Luckily, the brick-and-mortar Abby Singer, was open. After trying to explain the name of the development, I’m not going to do the same with the restaurant. Do your own research.
Abby is a gastropub open for lunch and dinner, with a very limited menu for the present. Business partners Mike Horn and chef Jeffrey Peterson moved here from Minneapolis in 2019 with other plans that were, of course, blown up by the pandemic. They landed at Pratt Pullman and set up operation in one of the site’s smallest buildings to give Atlanta cocktails and cheese curds. Yes, cheese curds, the chewy delicacies for which displaced Canadians wail when they need their poutine. Midwesterners likewise demand their “squeaky cheese,” most popularly in fried form, and I think they’ll be happy with Abby’s. If you’re not drinking, the portion is adequate for four. If you’re drinking, you’ll want a second order just for yourself.
The big deal here is the Minneapolis obsession, the Juicy Lucy burger. It’s a half pound of grilled ground beef stuffed with American cheese that erupts like yellow lava inside a bun layered with charred, lightly caramelized onions and dill chips. Mine was delicious, but I have to say it didn’t really seem to adhere to the classic configuration. The cheese seemed to be simply placed between two patties instead of buried like treasure in one giant patty. You can also order a portobello “burger,” tots, chicken tenders, and a grilled-cheese sandwich. There are kids and brunch menus. Specials pop up now and then on their Facebook and Instagram pages. Recently, they offered a full menu for the debut of the development’s 45-piece Pullman Pops orchestra.
The Abby Singer had no indoor seating apart from the bar the day I visited, although there were plenty of picnic tables — some covered — outside. Since I don’t drink, I don’t talk much to bartenders, but I met my favorite ever at Abby’s. Have you ever met a bartender who is a former public school teacher with a master’s degree in theology from Emory who also pastors a church and has authored a book? How often do you get to use your useless PhD to discuss liberation and queer theology with your barkeep? Her name is Abby. Tip her big. You might be spared eternity in hell for the sin of drinking too much.
I should add that the Kamayan Filipino venue features excellent food that I’ve sampled elsewhere. I’m also excited about the plans to host a regular chefs market where customers can buy prepared dishes. It sounds like a great opportunity for new chefs to introduce their cooking.
I’m really hopeful Pratt Pullman succeeds. Creating a “creative city” is greatly ambitious, and I keep remembering when the Ponce City Market redevelopment was announced. The press releases frequently claimed it was sure to attract successful people with high IQs. That was an obvious failure, but artistic people are so much more open-minded than nerds.
BIRTHDAY DINING: Wayne Johnson, Rose D’Agostino, and I have a long history of celebrating birthdays together. It was Wayne’s turn in July, and we went to one of his favorite restaurants, Nam Phuong, probably the best overall Vietnamese restaurant in the city. Being three highly skilled eaters, we passed on the dinner for three and ordered the dinner for four, which includes seven dishes. Just in case it was not enough — we had no birthday cake — we added one of Wayne’s favorites, the slightly crispy crepe filled with shrimp, pork, and bean sprouts served with herbs and lettuce for wrapping. This was probably my favorite of the eight dishes, only four of which could comfortably sit on the table at a time.
The reason we actually went for the larger dinner was to get Wayne his shaking beef. I have stopped ordering this dish just about everywhere. My first experiences with it in New York and at the wonderful spot in Midtown Promenade many years ago featured exceedingly tender steak, filet mignon typically, lightly marinated and served classically with salt and lime. In the years since then, I’m always presented overcooked or frankly inappropriate cuts like flank steak, typically heavily sauced. The version at Nam Phuong was in that vein. It wasn’t repulsive and maybe the effectively low price requires lower grade beef, but it’s not a favorite.
The table also included a lotus salad, salt and pepper squid, summer rolls, spare ribs, sweet and sour soup with shrimp, and a green Jell-O dessert that reminded me of those complicated congealed salads of my suburban youth. The real reason we ordered the seven-course dinner was to avoid reading the ridiculously enormous menu. You should be more patient, because there are much better dishes available than the “banquet” standards. Service, as always, was perfect and fun.
::::
FOOD MEDIA: Please watch the Netflix four-part series “High on the Hog: How African-American Cuisine Transformed America.” It features Atlantan Stephen Satterfield, the food writer and chef who founded Whetstone, the nation’s only Black-owned food magazine. There is much about the series to love. Principally, what Satterfield does is demonstrate the way storytelling creates history — cultural and personal. It is immensely difficult but possible for anyone, as Satterfield does, to untangle the formation of a cultural narrative to discern the truth, which is almost always quite different from the story we’ve been told, especially if we’re unhappy.
Satterfield’s passion, obviously, is food, and the lens through which he was told to view his life is the one that Black people were handed by a society founded on racism. It doesn’t matter how enlightened or privileged he was. We all internalize systemic cultural stories. In this Netflix series, Satterfield shatters the lens. He goes in search of the story of Black people’s role in American foodways and discovers the massive, indisputable lies of American racism. He finds that American food is fundamentally African-American food. Ultimately, he realizes that African-Americans have basically created popular culture for 200-plus years. This probably sounds impossible to you, but watch the series.
Watching the series brought back rather embarrassing memories that I don’t think I’ve ever publicly shared. Before I was 10, I used to climb into the attic of our house in Charlotte. It was stacked with countless books that my mother had taken from her parents’ home after their deaths. My grandparents operated a former family cotton plantation in South Carolina that had been home to more than 100 slaves. They lost the land and much more in the Depression. Among the books in the attic were many written to educate freed slaves. While their intention may have been superficially positive, the leather-bound, gilt-edged books were horrifying. I remember the illustrations that basically depicted Black people as animals and provided instructions on bathing, dining, and general etiquette. Some directly addressed the former slaves. Most were written for their white owners to facilitate liberation. One of those images has stuck in my head my entire life. When I hear white people disparaging critical race theory’s assertion that you can’t grow up in America without internalizing systemic racism, I use that image that haunts me as a metaphor for that process. The only way I could neutralize the hateful image was to acknowledge its presence in my head.
“High on the Hog” offers inspiration to stop reflexively denying what we believe about ourselves and ask ourselves instead, “What if everything Stephen Satterfield has disclosed is true?” I keep repeating in my head one line he speaks in the first episode when he visits Benin, where people were enslaved and shipped abroad: “It was strange to come home to a place I’d never been.” If only we all could do that. —CL—
The Abby Singer, 225 Rogers St. N.E., #11 in the Pratt Pullman District, secondmeal-llc.com.
Nam Phuong, 4051 Buford Hwy. N.E., 404-633-2400, skiplinow.com/shop/-M2dIWvR0BGxCo2qRbK0/site/ CLIFF BOSTOCK THE JUICY LUCY: A half pound of ground beef encasing a lava flow of American cheese. It's the favorite burger in Minneapolis. 0,0,10 grazing GRAZING: The longtime effect and indisputable lies "
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GRAZING: The longtime effect and indisputable lies Article
Friday August 6, 2021 09:09 AM EDT
Abby Singer, Nam Phuong, and ‘High on the Hog’
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string(10701) "I’ve got great news, hopeful news, and WTF news this month. Let’s start with the great, which is a new Thai restaurant, Tum Pok Pok, whose name describes a sound you know well. It’s what you hear when your Thai mother is in the kitchen pounding chilies in a mortar to make papaya salad. With six versions of the salad — “somtum” — and a menu of other regional spicy dishes, Tum Pok Pok is an absolute must-visit for anyone who loves spicy Thai food.
The restaurant, which opened in April, belongs to the same people who operate Bangkok Thyme in Sandy Springs. The particular region emphasized here is the northeastern Isan, which borders Laos and imports some of the more savory flavors and hotter spices preferred there. The shredded papaya salad, controversially thought by some to originate in Laos, is popular throughout Thailand and Vietnam, and every vendor on every street corner apparently has their own version of their region’s version.
When my friend Rose and I visited the restaurant for lunch on a Friday, we of course went directly for the somtum, which we’ve both devoured at the Vietnamese restaurant, Com, many times. Because we had other dishes in mind, we decided to get the basic version made with “crushed roasted peanuts” combined with the shredded papaya. It only took one taste to distinguish this from the Vietnamese version we’ve eaten — a comparatively volcanic eruption of stinging heat. Fortunately, my tongue and lips went just numb enough to enjoy the spiciness, the faint sourness, and crunchy peanuts and papaya. I should re-emphasize that this intense spiciness is a great part of what sets the cuisine of Isan aside. But you’re gonna love it. And you can order other somtums with less heat combined with ingredients like salted crab.
We also ordered a large plate of Isan’s version of larb, here made with minced chicken, mysterious herbs, and hot chilies tempered by a strong dose of lime. It’s juicy and perfect scooped on the plate’s peppery cabbage leaves. For an “entrée” we went to the generally more familiar Thai street-food menu like green and masaman curries. But we selected the unfamiliar pad-kra-pow moo-grop. This dish could have been made for me. It’s stir-fried crispy pork. Think my favorite carnitas or cracklins in a basil sauce, scattered with scallions and red peppers. It’s hot but not really. You eat it with jasmine rice and you wonder where the hell this dish has been all your Thai-eating life.
Besides the food, I love the look of this place. The dining room and the bar are festooned with kitsch, obviously for the sake of humor — not to promote stereotyping. I also like the location. It’s next to the City Farmers Market, so that you can leave Tum Pok Pok and rummage through the gigantic mainly Asian market for herbal remedies, huge jars of honey at a fraction of the usual cost, super-fresh produce, and rice — rice in quantities you’ve not seen since you left China.
WISHING AND HOPING
Just in time for the End of COVID, Chattahoochee Food Works has opened inside The Works, an 80-acre mixed-use development in northwest Atlanta. It is a project of Bizarre Foods host Andrew Zimmern and Robert Montwaid of Gansevoort Market in New York City. I paid a visit on a recent Sunday — along with seemingly half of Atlanta’s population, drawn by considerable publicity.
There are 31 stalls in the new food hall. Not all are open yet, but there’s plenty of temptation. My plan was to sample a few of the available flavors, but especially at Taqueria La Luz. It is operated by Luis Martinez-Obregon and Lucero Martinez-Obregon, the twins who opened Zocalo in Midtown in 1995, bringing intown Atlanta its first taste of genuine Mexican cooking instead of the otherwise pervasive Tex-Mex. Incidentally, Zocalo gained some absurd notoriety in April because of two videos showing large crowds of mainly unmasked people partying in front of the taqueria, even though it was open only for take-out. I actually wore a mask coming through the door of the new development, but literally did not see more than a few other masked people beside employees inside the stalls. Under such pressure to conform to contemporary fashion and being fully vaccinated, I removed my mask and breathed in the air. Did you know food has a great odor?
One of the shocks of returning to restaurant eating is the increase in prices, and I got a double whammy during my visit. I was excited AF to see that La Luz is featuring al pastor properly spit-roasted on a revolving trompo. For a brief period, Lucero and Luis operated a taqueria in Grant Park, where I live, and served the pork flavored with pineapple juice that is drizzled on the meat during its roasting. I ate there, oh, maybe twice a week. I couldn’t wait to try it at Luz loaded into a quesadilla, whose $10 price shocked me until I saw its huge size. I hate saying this, but it was not good. The pork was mysteriously dried out and tasted somewhat like bacon. A ton of salsa didn’t help moisturize the texture or improve the taste. I should note that the al pastor wasn’t actually on the smeared chalkboard menu. I just happened to notice the kitchen’s loaded trompo from the counter. Tacos are $3.25, which is usual, and gorditas are $7. Fillings include steak, mushrooms, fish, and chicken.
The unexpectedly large portion, only half of which I ate, left me full, but I was craving ice cream from the Morelli’s stall. I was disappointed not to find the salted caramel or my favorite ginger-lavender. I know it’s heresy, but I’m not a fan of chocolate ice cream and that seemed to be the predominant flavor. So, I ordered a sundae. I only remember eating two of these in my life. One was a bribe my mother arranged at a drugstore counter. The other was delivered to my freshman dorm room along with a pipe full of hashish. I really liked the hash better than the maraschino cherry. At Morelli’s I ordered the sundae made with a blondie — the brown-sugar brownie that typically has some chocolate chips but not an overwhelming number. I burrowed through most of the vanilla ice cream, the whipped cream, and the caramel sauce, before hitting the warmed blondie. Sorry, but it was way too chocolatey and gooey for my taste, but that’s just my own peculiar palate. It cost $8.50 — over $10 with a tip.
Other open stalls at Food Works feature Thai cuisine, Vietnamese banh mi, pizza, South African fare, pastries, soul food, sushi, ramen, and bubble teas, with more to open throughout the summer. There’s also booze, lots of booze. Don’t make the stupid mistakes I made. First, there is a huge parking lot at the complex and every space was full. Fortunately, a car came within inches of hitting me as it pulled out, so I scored a spot. I love a good near-accident. When I left, I noticed there is multilevel parking available at the end of the lot. Second, the food hall is very well designed, meaning I could find no place to actually eat my quesadilla. I ate it at the counter of a vacant stall. Later, I found a very large dining area adjacent to the food court and a huge hall lined with retail operations, full of comfy furniture where I ate the sundae.
Honestly, I love the place and expect the food to improve when the huge crowds dissipate. That’s another plus here: The employees are super-nice despite their imminent metamorphosis into zombies at the hands of the food-grubbing rabble.
WTF? GARLIC, SALT, AND TASTELESS CHEESE
It finally happened. I burned out on Trader Joe’s frozen entrees. Oh, I’ll be back for the Indian dinners, but I needed a break. So I decided to do something unappetizing. With a 50-percent-off coupon, I ordered five meals for two from Home Chef. That cost me only $50. At some point after I ordered the meals — it was impulsive, okay? — I realized this was a Kroger operation. I had seen their green-and-white boxed meals in the store. I worried.
They arrived Monday morning chilled in a large box. Each meal’s components, like veggies and spices, were packed with a tray inside a plastic bag. Meats were separately packed. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to prep and cook the meals. There were two serious problems. One meal was missing. I called and they immediately refunded the cost without the 50-percent discount, so that was nice. Then I later found that they had failed to include a major ingredient, black beans, in another meal. Fortunately, I had a can of them, so I survived.
The food? Oy. You get your choice of meats or vegan alternatives like the Impossible Burger. I went for a chicken breast with every meal except one. There were two problems that drove me nuts. Salt and garlic — added or hidden within prepared ingredients — overwhelmed everything. That’s a serious complaint from someone who has eaten salty entrees from Trader Joe’s for a year. The other annoyance was the use of tasteless cheese in every dish. It was yellow cheddar in three and parmesan in the fourth. Onion flavors were prevalent too.
My favorite meal was the simplest — a “bacon and guacamole chicken sandwich.” Okay, the guac was the usual over-seasoned fast-food goop. The bacon was crumbs you microwave and then mix with mayo squeezed out of a little envelope. The slaw dressing was ranch. What I liked really was the crunchy textures, including the cabbage, the browned chicken breast, and the grilled bread.
My least favorite was the meatballs I shaped out of weirdly cotton-candy pink ground beef combined with panko. This was the meal missing the black beans I had to supply and mix with corn kernels, zucchini slices, and, yes, shredded cheese and garlic salt. A lame salsa verde was provided to coat the meatballs. Another dish included two chicken breasts baked with “parmesan thyme butter,” plus green beans sautéed with a sliced, gigantic shallot seasoned with — oh yeah! — garlic salt and topped with the crispy onions your mama used to dump on canned green beans submerged in canned cream of mushroom soup. The final dish was chicken breasts topped with more (caramelized) onions and obnoxious “black garlic gravy,” accompanied by green peas and cheesy mashed potatoes.
I will not be doing this again, especially for double the price I paid. There are alternatives, one of which I’ve scheduled to try. —CL—
Tum Pok Pok, 5000 Buford Highway, 404-990-4688, tumpokpok.com, @tum_pok_pok
Chattahoochee Food Works, 1235 Chattahoochee Ave., Ste. 130, chattahoocheefoodworks.com, @chattahoocheefoodworks
Home Chef, Chicago, 872-225-2433, homechef.com, @homechef"
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string(11377) "I’ve got great news, hopeful news, and WTF news this month. Let’s start with the great, which is a new Thai restaurant, Tum Pok Pok, whose name describes a sound you know well. It’s what you hear when your Thai mother is in the kitchen pounding chilies in a mortar to make papaya salad. With six versions of the salad — “somtum” — and a menu of other regional spicy dishes, Tum Pok Pok is an absolute must-visit for anyone who loves spicy Thai food.
The restaurant, which opened in April, belongs to the same people who operate Bangkok Thyme in Sandy Springs. The particular region emphasized here is the northeastern Isan, which borders Laos and imports some of the more savory flavors and hotter spices preferred there. The shredded papaya salad, controversially thought by some to originate in Laos, is popular throughout Thailand and Vietnam, and every vendor on every street corner apparently has their own version of their region’s version.
When my friend Rose and I visited the restaurant for lunch on a Friday, we of course went directly for the somtum, which we’ve both devoured at the Vietnamese restaurant, Com, many times. Because we had other dishes in mind, we decided to get the basic version made with “crushed roasted peanuts” combined with the shredded papaya. It only took one taste to distinguish this from the Vietnamese version we’ve eaten — a comparatively volcanic eruption of stinging heat. Fortunately, my tongue and lips went just numb enough to enjoy the spiciness, the faint sourness, and crunchy peanuts and papaya. I should re-emphasize that this intense spiciness is a great part of what sets the cuisine of Isan aside. But you’re gonna love it. And you can order other somtums with less heat combined with ingredients like salted crab.
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We also ordered a large plate of Isan’s version of larb, here made with minced chicken, mysterious herbs, and hot chilies tempered by a strong dose of lime. It’s juicy and perfect scooped on the plate’s peppery cabbage leaves. For an “entrée” we went to the generally more familiar Thai street-food menu like green and masaman curries. But we selected the unfamiliar pad-kra-pow moo-grop. This dish could have been made for me. It’s stir-fried crispy pork. Think my favorite carnitas or cracklins in a basil sauce, scattered with scallions and red peppers. It’s hot but not really. You eat it with jasmine rice and you wonder where the hell this dish has been all your Thai-eating life.
Besides the food, I love the look of this place. The dining room and the bar are festooned with kitsch, obviously for the sake of humor — not to promote stereotyping. I also like the location. It’s next to the City Farmers Market, so that you can leave Tum Pok Pok and rummage through the gigantic mainly Asian market for herbal remedies, huge jars of honey at a fraction of the usual cost, super-fresh produce, and rice — rice in quantities you’ve not seen since you left China.
__WISHING AND HOPING__
Just in time for the End of COVID, Chattahoochee Food Works has opened inside The Works, an 80-acre mixed-use development in northwest Atlanta. It is a project of ''Bizarre Foods'' host Andrew Zimmern and Robert Montwaid of Gansevoort Market in New York City. I paid a visit on a recent Sunday — along with seemingly half of Atlanta’s population, drawn by considerable publicity.
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There are 31 stalls in the new food hall. Not all are open yet, but there’s plenty of temptation. My plan was to sample a few of the available flavors, but especially at Taqueria La Luz. It is operated by Luis Martinez-Obregon and Lucero Martinez-Obregon, the twins who opened Zocalo in Midtown in 1995, bringing intown Atlanta its first taste of genuine Mexican cooking instead of the otherwise pervasive Tex-Mex. Incidentally, Zocalo gained some absurd notoriety in April because of two videos showing large crowds of mainly unmasked people partying in front of the taqueria, even though it was open only for take-out. I actually wore a mask coming through the door of the new development, but literally did not see more than a few other masked people beside employees inside the stalls. Under such pressure to conform to contemporary fashion and being fully vaccinated, I removed my mask and breathed in the air. Did you know food has a great odor?
One of the shocks of returning to restaurant eating is the increase in prices, and I got a double whammy during my visit. I was excited AF to see that La Luz is featuring al pastor properly spit-roasted on a revolving ''trompo''. For a brief period, Lucero and Luis operated a taqueria in Grant Park, where I live, and served the pork flavored with pineapple juice that is drizzled on the meat during its roasting. I ate there, oh, maybe twice a week. I couldn’t wait to try it at Luz loaded into a quesadilla, whose $10 price shocked me until I saw its huge size. I hate saying this, but it was not good. The pork was mysteriously dried out and tasted somewhat like bacon. A ton of salsa didn’t help moisturize the texture or improve the taste. I should note that the al pastor wasn’t actually on the smeared chalkboard menu. I just happened to notice the kitchen’s loaded ''trompo'' from the counter. Tacos are $3.25, which is usual, and gorditas are $7. Fillings include steak, mushrooms, fish, and chicken.
The unexpectedly large portion, only half of which I ate, left me full, but I was craving ice cream from the Morelli’s stall. I was disappointed not to find the salted caramel or my favorite ginger-lavender. I know it’s heresy, but I’m not a fan of chocolate ice cream and that seemed to be the predominant flavor. So, I ordered a sundae. I only remember eating two of these in my life. One was a bribe my mother arranged at a drugstore counter. The other was delivered to my freshman dorm room along with a pipe full of hashish. I really liked the hash better than the maraschino cherry. At Morelli’s I ordered the sundae made with a blondie — the brown-sugar brownie that typically has some chocolate chips but not an overwhelming number. I burrowed through most of the vanilla ice cream, the whipped cream, and the caramel sauce, before hitting the warmed blondie. Sorry, but it was way too chocolatey and gooey for my taste, but that’s just my own peculiar palate. It cost $8.50 — over $10 with a tip.
Other open stalls at Food Works feature Thai cuisine, Vietnamese banh mi, pizza, South African fare, pastries, soul food, sushi, ramen, and bubble teas, with more to open throughout the summer. There’s also booze, lots of booze. Don’t make the stupid mistakes I made. First, there is a huge parking lot at the complex and every space was full. Fortunately, a car came within inches of hitting me as it pulled out, so I scored a spot. I love a good near-accident. When I left, I noticed there is ''multilevel parking'' available at the end of the lot. Second, the food hall is very well designed, meaning I could find no place to actually eat my quesadilla. I ate it at the counter of a vacant stall. Later, I found a very large dining area adjacent to the food court and a huge hall lined with retail operations, full of comfy furniture where I ate the sundae.
Honestly, I love the place and expect the food to improve when the huge crowds dissipate. That’s another plus here: The employees are super-nice despite their imminent metamorphosis into zombies at the hands of the food-grubbing rabble.
__WTF? GARLIC, SALT, AND TASTELESS CHEESE__
It finally happened. I burned out on Trader Joe’s frozen entrees. Oh, I’ll be back for the Indian dinners, but I needed a break. So I decided to do something unappetizing. With a 50-percent-off coupon, I ordered five meals for two from Home Chef. That cost me only $50. At some point after I ordered the meals — it was impulsive, okay? — I realized this was a Kroger operation. I had seen their green-and-white boxed meals in the store. I worried.
They arrived Monday morning chilled in a large box. Each meal’s components, like veggies and spices, were packed with a tray inside a plastic bag. Meats were separately packed. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to prep and cook the meals. There were two serious problems. One meal was missing. I called and they immediately refunded the cost without the 50-percent discount, so that was nice. Then I later found that they had failed to include a major ingredient, black beans, in another meal. Fortunately, I had a can of them, so I survived.
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The food? Oy. You get your choice of meats or vegan alternatives like the Impossible Burger. I went for a chicken breast with every meal except one. There were two problems that drove me nuts. Salt and garlic — added or hidden within prepared ingredients — overwhelmed everything. That’s a serious complaint from someone who has eaten salty entrees from Trader Joe’s for a year. The other annoyance was the use of tasteless cheese in every dish. It was yellow cheddar in three and parmesan in the fourth. Onion flavors were prevalent too.
My favorite meal was the simplest — a “bacon and guacamole chicken sandwich.” Okay, the guac was the usual over-seasoned fast-food goop. The bacon was crumbs you microwave and then mix with mayo squeezed out of a little envelope. The slaw dressing was ranch. What I liked really was the crunchy textures, including the cabbage, the browned chicken breast, and the grilled bread.
My least favorite was the meatballs I shaped out of weirdly cotton-candy pink ground beef combined with panko. This was the meal missing the black beans I had to supply and mix with corn kernels, zucchini slices, and, yes, shredded cheese and garlic salt. A lame salsa verde was provided to coat the meatballs. Another dish included two chicken breasts baked with “parmesan thyme butter,” plus green beans sautéed with a sliced, gigantic shallot seasoned with — oh yeah! — garlic salt and topped with the crispy onions your mama used to dump on canned green beans submerged in canned cream of mushroom soup. The final dish was chicken breasts topped with more (caramelized) onions and obnoxious “black garlic gravy,” accompanied by green peas and cheesy mashed potatoes.
I will not be doing this again, especially for double the price I paid. There are alternatives, one of which I’ve scheduled to try. __—CL—__
''Tum Pok Pok, 5000 Buford Highway, 404-990-4688, tumpokpok.com, @tum_pok_pok''
''Chattahoochee Food Works, 1235 Chattahoochee Ave., Ste. 130, chattahoocheefoodworks.com, @chattahoocheefoodworks''
''Home Chef, Chicago, 872-225-2433, homechef.com, @homechef''"
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string(11570) " #2 B98A Reduced 2021-06-30T18:14:29+00:00 #2_B98A_reduced.jpg grazing From Buford Highway to Chattahoochee Avenue — that’s a lot of territory, indeed #2 B98A Reduced 2021-07-01T18:12:00+00:00 Cliff Bostock explores Atlanta's new Thai restaurant Tum Pok Pok. GRAZING: Thai, (real) Mexican, and DIY jim.harris Jim Harris Cliff Bostock cliffbostock (Cliff Bostock) 2021-07-01T18:12:00+00:00 I’ve got great news, hopeful news, and WTF news this month. Let’s start with the great, which is a new Thai restaurant, Tum Pok Pok, whose name describes a sound you know well. It’s what you hear when your Thai mother is in the kitchen pounding chilies in a mortar to make papaya salad. With six versions of the salad — “somtum” — and a menu of other regional spicy dishes, Tum Pok Pok is an absolute must-visit for anyone who loves spicy Thai food.
The restaurant, which opened in April, belongs to the same people who operate Bangkok Thyme in Sandy Springs. The particular region emphasized here is the northeastern Isan, which borders Laos and imports some of the more savory flavors and hotter spices preferred there. The shredded papaya salad, controversially thought by some to originate in Laos, is popular throughout Thailand and Vietnam, and every vendor on every street corner apparently has their own version of their region’s version.
When my friend Rose and I visited the restaurant for lunch on a Friday, we of course went directly for the somtum, which we’ve both devoured at the Vietnamese restaurant, Com, many times. Because we had other dishes in mind, we decided to get the basic version made with “crushed roasted peanuts” combined with the shredded papaya. It only took one taste to distinguish this from the Vietnamese version we’ve eaten — a comparatively volcanic eruption of stinging heat. Fortunately, my tongue and lips went just numb enough to enjoy the spiciness, the faint sourness, and crunchy peanuts and papaya. I should re-emphasize that this intense spiciness is a great part of what sets the cuisine of Isan aside. But you’re gonna love it. And you can order other somtums with less heat combined with ingredients like salted crab.
We also ordered a large plate of Isan’s version of larb, here made with minced chicken, mysterious herbs, and hot chilies tempered by a strong dose of lime. It’s juicy and perfect scooped on the plate’s peppery cabbage leaves. For an “entrée” we went to the generally more familiar Thai street-food menu like green and masaman curries. But we selected the unfamiliar pad-kra-pow moo-grop. This dish could have been made for me. It’s stir-fried crispy pork. Think my favorite carnitas or cracklins in a basil sauce, scattered with scallions and red peppers. It’s hot but not really. You eat it with jasmine rice and you wonder where the hell this dish has been all your Thai-eating life.
Besides the food, I love the look of this place. The dining room and the bar are festooned with kitsch, obviously for the sake of humor — not to promote stereotyping. I also like the location. It’s next to the City Farmers Market, so that you can leave Tum Pok Pok and rummage through the gigantic mainly Asian market for herbal remedies, huge jars of honey at a fraction of the usual cost, super-fresh produce, and rice — rice in quantities you’ve not seen since you left China.
WISHING AND HOPING
Just in time for the End of COVID, Chattahoochee Food Works has opened inside The Works, an 80-acre mixed-use development in northwest Atlanta. It is a project of Bizarre Foods host Andrew Zimmern and Robert Montwaid of Gansevoort Market in New York City. I paid a visit on a recent Sunday — along with seemingly half of Atlanta’s population, drawn by considerable publicity.
There are 31 stalls in the new food hall. Not all are open yet, but there’s plenty of temptation. My plan was to sample a few of the available flavors, but especially at Taqueria La Luz. It is operated by Luis Martinez-Obregon and Lucero Martinez-Obregon, the twins who opened Zocalo in Midtown in 1995, bringing intown Atlanta its first taste of genuine Mexican cooking instead of the otherwise pervasive Tex-Mex. Incidentally, Zocalo gained some absurd notoriety in April because of two videos showing large crowds of mainly unmasked people partying in front of the taqueria, even though it was open only for take-out. I actually wore a mask coming through the door of the new development, but literally did not see more than a few other masked people beside employees inside the stalls. Under such pressure to conform to contemporary fashion and being fully vaccinated, I removed my mask and breathed in the air. Did you know food has a great odor?
One of the shocks of returning to restaurant eating is the increase in prices, and I got a double whammy during my visit. I was excited AF to see that La Luz is featuring al pastor properly spit-roasted on a revolving trompo. For a brief period, Lucero and Luis operated a taqueria in Grant Park, where I live, and served the pork flavored with pineapple juice that is drizzled on the meat during its roasting. I ate there, oh, maybe twice a week. I couldn’t wait to try it at Luz loaded into a quesadilla, whose $10 price shocked me until I saw its huge size. I hate saying this, but it was not good. The pork was mysteriously dried out and tasted somewhat like bacon. A ton of salsa didn’t help moisturize the texture or improve the taste. I should note that the al pastor wasn’t actually on the smeared chalkboard menu. I just happened to notice the kitchen’s loaded trompo from the counter. Tacos are $3.25, which is usual, and gorditas are $7. Fillings include steak, mushrooms, fish, and chicken.
The unexpectedly large portion, only half of which I ate, left me full, but I was craving ice cream from the Morelli’s stall. I was disappointed not to find the salted caramel or my favorite ginger-lavender. I know it’s heresy, but I’m not a fan of chocolate ice cream and that seemed to be the predominant flavor. So, I ordered a sundae. I only remember eating two of these in my life. One was a bribe my mother arranged at a drugstore counter. The other was delivered to my freshman dorm room along with a pipe full of hashish. I really liked the hash better than the maraschino cherry. At Morelli’s I ordered the sundae made with a blondie — the brown-sugar brownie that typically has some chocolate chips but not an overwhelming number. I burrowed through most of the vanilla ice cream, the whipped cream, and the caramel sauce, before hitting the warmed blondie. Sorry, but it was way too chocolatey and gooey for my taste, but that’s just my own peculiar palate. It cost $8.50 — over $10 with a tip.
Other open stalls at Food Works feature Thai cuisine, Vietnamese banh mi, pizza, South African fare, pastries, soul food, sushi, ramen, and bubble teas, with more to open throughout the summer. There’s also booze, lots of booze. Don’t make the stupid mistakes I made. First, there is a huge parking lot at the complex and every space was full. Fortunately, a car came within inches of hitting me as it pulled out, so I scored a spot. I love a good near-accident. When I left, I noticed there is multilevel parking available at the end of the lot. Second, the food hall is very well designed, meaning I could find no place to actually eat my quesadilla. I ate it at the counter of a vacant stall. Later, I found a very large dining area adjacent to the food court and a huge hall lined with retail operations, full of comfy furniture where I ate the sundae.
Honestly, I love the place and expect the food to improve when the huge crowds dissipate. That’s another plus here: The employees are super-nice despite their imminent metamorphosis into zombies at the hands of the food-grubbing rabble.
WTF? GARLIC, SALT, AND TASTELESS CHEESE
It finally happened. I burned out on Trader Joe’s frozen entrees. Oh, I’ll be back for the Indian dinners, but I needed a break. So I decided to do something unappetizing. With a 50-percent-off coupon, I ordered five meals for two from Home Chef. That cost me only $50. At some point after I ordered the meals — it was impulsive, okay? — I realized this was a Kroger operation. I had seen their green-and-white boxed meals in the store. I worried.
They arrived Monday morning chilled in a large box. Each meal’s components, like veggies and spices, were packed with a tray inside a plastic bag. Meats were separately packed. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to prep and cook the meals. There were two serious problems. One meal was missing. I called and they immediately refunded the cost without the 50-percent discount, so that was nice. Then I later found that they had failed to include a major ingredient, black beans, in another meal. Fortunately, I had a can of them, so I survived.
The food? Oy. You get your choice of meats or vegan alternatives like the Impossible Burger. I went for a chicken breast with every meal except one. There were two problems that drove me nuts. Salt and garlic — added or hidden within prepared ingredients — overwhelmed everything. That’s a serious complaint from someone who has eaten salty entrees from Trader Joe’s for a year. The other annoyance was the use of tasteless cheese in every dish. It was yellow cheddar in three and parmesan in the fourth. Onion flavors were prevalent too.
My favorite meal was the simplest — a “bacon and guacamole chicken sandwich.” Okay, the guac was the usual over-seasoned fast-food goop. The bacon was crumbs you microwave and then mix with mayo squeezed out of a little envelope. The slaw dressing was ranch. What I liked really was the crunchy textures, including the cabbage, the browned chicken breast, and the grilled bread.
My least favorite was the meatballs I shaped out of weirdly cotton-candy pink ground beef combined with panko. This was the meal missing the black beans I had to supply and mix with corn kernels, zucchini slices, and, yes, shredded cheese and garlic salt. A lame salsa verde was provided to coat the meatballs. Another dish included two chicken breasts baked with “parmesan thyme butter,” plus green beans sautéed with a sliced, gigantic shallot seasoned with — oh yeah! — garlic salt and topped with the crispy onions your mama used to dump on canned green beans submerged in canned cream of mushroom soup. The final dish was chicken breasts topped with more (caramelized) onions and obnoxious “black garlic gravy,” accompanied by green peas and cheesy mashed potatoes.
I will not be doing this again, especially for double the price I paid. There are alternatives, one of which I’ve scheduled to try. —CL—
Tum Pok Pok, 5000 Buford Highway, 404-990-4688, tumpokpok.com, @tum_pok_pok
Chattahoochee Food Works, 1235 Chattahoochee Ave., Ste. 130, chattahoocheefoodworks.com, @chattahoocheefoodworks
Home Chef, Chicago, 872-225-2433, homechef.com, @homechef Cliff Bostock THE MAIN ATTRACTION: This is one of Tum Pok Pok's classic shredded papaya salads from the Isan region of Thailand. There are five others and this is the basic one made with crushed roasted peanuts. At a later visit, I sampled a more complex version made with salted crab. 0,0,10 Tum Pok Pok (itemId:491760 trackerid:1), Chattahoochee Food Works (itemId:491763 trackerid:1) grazing GRAZING: Thai, (real) Mexican, and DIY "
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GRAZING: Thai, (real) Mexican, and DIY Article
Thursday July 1, 2021 02:12 PM EDT
From Buford Highway to Chattahoochee Avenue — that’s a lot of territory, indeed
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string(11836) "If you’re re-emerging from the misery of home cooking and looking for a unique lunch spot in Midtown, head to El Viñedo Local, a South American café that opened just in time to be hobbled by the Pandemic Royale. I’ve only made it there once, but three friends at my table provided a broad enough sampling to crave more of the savory flavors that Chef Bruno Vergara, a native of Uruguay, is concocting.
El Viñedo, open now only for breakfast and lunch, plans to expand its hours to include dinner. It is located in Circa 730, one of those millennial workday beehives where tenants brainstorm, hit the onsite gym, and probably oil up with CBD sunblock while lounging in the genuinely cool curvy wood swings out front. This ethos of togetherness extends to El Viñedo’s interior where the main seating is communal, but there’s a large patio where you can choose your view. I picked the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer across the street. It’s all pleasant, seriously.
Owner Robert Kaster, who has 20 years experience in the food and beverage industry, envisioned El Viñedo as a bar focusing on South American wines. That’s obvious, given that the name means “the local vineyard,” but the café also features bracing coffees made with organic, fair-trade beans roasted by Café Campesino in Americus, Georgia. A double-shot of espresso with enough crema to make chapstick unnecessary concluded my meal.
Most of the dishes at El Viñedo aren’t new to the city, but I’d venture that most are prepared with more finesse. The menu includes empanadas, arepas, sandwiches, ceviche, plates, and sides. I loved my empanada criolla, which was filled with finely chopped beef, green olives, and boiled eggs. The filling rocked, but what made this and other empanadas unique was the stellar, comparatively thick, slightly crumbly pastry shell. Other fillings include braised chicken, spinach and mushrooms tossed in béchamel, and ham and mozzarella. All also include the queso fresco that Latin Americans love.
We also sampled a plate of fried fish with tartar sauce and lots of lime slices. The super-crispy chunks of fish were topped with a Peruvian-style salad of sliced red onions and cabbage. This same salad or a derivative was on just about everything we ordered. Other plates include the classic pabellon — steak with fried plantains, black beans, cilantro, and rice with salsa rozada. El Viñedo offers chicken as a substitute for beef.
The pabellon is also available served on an arepa. Here, my enthusiasm waned a bit. One of my favorite dining spots is Arepa Mia in Decatur, and my go-to there is the pabellon. An arepa is basically a big crunchy biscuit made with cornmeal, split open and filled with goodies. The version at El Viñedo was a bit thick for my taste, and the filling’s beef was not the juicy shredded variety that I love at Arepa Mia. As such, the arepa itself and the fried sweet plantains didn’t get the lubrication they needed for a good marriage, even with the black beans and queso fresco. I have no idea of the degree to which this might be a regional difference. It’s not bad. It’s just not what I expected. You can also get arepas filled with chicken and, um, Duke’s mayo, or vegetables.
Arguably the best dish on our table was the ceviche made with sliced poached Georgia shrimp (okay, it was cooked) with avocado puree, cilantro, and Meyer lemon oil. It was heaped with the onion salad. The serving is perfect for anorexics but the rest of us can order it as a starter or double, maybe triple, the portion. It’s not that it’s a terribly small portion; it’s just so good. Or maybe you could double-up on the fried plantain chips that come with it.
We didn’t try any of the three sandwiches. The Choripan has become a thing around town, so I’m on a break. It’s grilled Argentinian chorizo layered with butter lettuce, tomatoes, chimichurri, and more Duke’s mayo. The fried fish is also available as a sandwich. The only side we tried was the freshly fried yucca with the zippy salsa rozada. The people around town who serve cold fried yucca need to be imprisoned.
Hours here for the present are 7-10:30 a.m. and 11 a.m.-3 p.m., weekdays only. Breakfast is a few empanadas, pastries, and egg dishes. You might call to see if dinner has begun.
LET’S GO TO THE KRYSTAL: It’s been a year since we all thanked Jesus on learning that bankruptcy would not be closing Dunwoody-based Krystal’s 300 locations. Unfortunately, the new owners have not as yet brought back the $7.99 all-you-can-eat special, probably because the dining rooms are still closed and the takeout windows are not built for plunging gigantic loads of meat slivers and steamed buns down the throats of the indiscriminate.
I was 15 when I ate my first Krystal. My friend Norman bribed me to take the bus to downtown Atlanta with him by offering a free meal at this burger joint he loved. I admit I was repulsed and caused someone behind the counter to screech threats to call the police when I threw the red basket in which the Krystals were served in the garbage. Yes, I exhibited bad etiquette at a Krystal. I thought it was disposable, bitch! In my mid-20s, I lived in Augusta. On many nights I partied at the Peacock Lounge with a friend whose speech therapy was destroyed when he got drunk. “Kriff, wet’s go to da Kritchal!” he’d say as we left the club. We did. I hated the food but I loved the late-night weirdness.
When I moved home to Atlanta, Krystal became a true marker of the luxe real estate I occupied. In the late ‘70s, I lived a block from the Krystal on Peachtree in Midtown where all the trans hookers hung out. I loved hanging with the girls, but I couldn’t eat the stuff. In 1982, after being escorted to an AA meeting by a cop, I ended up renting an apartment directly behind the Krystal on Ponce de Leon. Homeless people foraged in the dumpster there and frequently brought the bounty across the parking lot to eat in my junked car. I never ate there. Honestly, the only time I enthusiastically ate Krystals was after nights in places where every desire of the human body was completely degraded.
But last month, after I proved I could actually love hot dogs after a lifetime of avoiding them, I decided I should give Krystal a try after a very long time. I was partly incentivized, too, by the absurdly low cost of the tiny square oddities. If you’ve resumed dining out, you’ve probably noticed that prices have increased dramatically at many restaurants. Krystal was actually founded during the Depression in Chattanooga as a knockoff of the Midwestern chain, White Castle. The idea was and remains explicitly to provide super-cheap eats. Of course, it doesn’t take long to figure out that you have to eat a ton of Krystals to equal a regular burger’s meat content, but you are supposed to fill up on the buns. It’s kind of like going to an Ethiopian restaurant and having the spongy injera bread expand in your stomach before you complain about the skimpy portion of stew on the table.
I drove to the Krystal on Moreland Avenue, expecting to dine in and soak up the atmosphere, but business was limited to the takeout window, and during the eternity it took to decipher the menu, order, and drive away, I didn’t see a single other car arrive. I did not know the chain had expanded to chicken and hot dogs, but I was only interested in the burger patties that are blotted with mustard and layered with a pickle slice between the “famous steamed bun.” Diced onions, which used to be inevitable, apparently no longer are. There were none on our burgers. I ordered the queasily named “sackful with cheese” — 12 burgers with American cheese for $12.49. I added tots and fries at $2.29 each. Yes, I ate six Krystals with little difficulty and really found them less disgusting than pathetic. The only flavor was in the pickle and mustard. I added some real mustard, which was a mistake because it deprived the Krystal of the kind of affection we have for, say, mangy stray dogs that lick our faces and beg to bring their worms and fleas home with us.
JUST SAYING: If you have resumed eating out at places beside Krystal, you have noticed that prices really have increased significantly at many restaurants. You would expect increases after a year in any case, but the pandemic has aggravated the situation. You can’t peruse an industry publication without reading how restaurants are finding it almost impossible to find staff. It’s partly because some would-be employees probably still prefer to avoid contracting COVID, but the stunningly low pay is the big issue outside fine-dining venues. That in turn makes it hard for restaurants to operate at anything close to full capacity, and that drives prices up.
As long as I’ve been writing about restaurants, I’ve been astounded at the stingy attitudes of people about tipping. Last month, I went to a restaurant with two very comfortable friends. On the way, we were talking about tipping, and I said that I never tip less than 20 percent after taxes. One of my friends wrapped up the attitude of Marie-Antoinette’s heirs: “I am not paying someone 20 percent to hand me a sandwich.” I explained that the tips are shared, that servers are often paid barely better than minimum wage. He repeated his declamation. We ordered our sandwiches at the counter and took a seat on the patio. I asked Marie if he had left a tip. He said no. I told them both to look at their receipts. The restaurant had added a 20-percent tip to each bill. That is the right thing to do, at least until wages increase to the point you don’t have to live under a bridge to work for a restaurant, and that, Marie, is not an uncommon situation.
MEDIA: I’m always behind and only just learned that Jennifer Zyman, our former dining critic, is producing a podcast, “The Food that Binds.” I asked Jennifer for a quick description: “As a food writer and restaurant critic, my work was always focused on the how of food, but the why has always interested me. There are so many different relationships — good and bad — within the food space, hence the title ‘The Food that Binds.’ So many people in the culinary space have fascinating stories, and I wanted to explore it all, whether it is a chef with body image issues to how diners are interacting with restaurants post-COVID to the power of mutual aid.”
Her first episode is a fascinating conversation in which Chef Kevin Gillespie and Jennifer discuss body image and their own issues with it. I have to say one “positive” result of the pandemic seems to be that, in the absence of epidemic restaurant reviewing, food writers have been compelled to take a deeper dive, and Jennifer is doing that. You can find the podcast on the usual platforms or check out Jennifer’s website, where she also archives her writing for Atlanta Magazine and other publications: jenniferzyman.com.
One of our city’s long-lost geniuses, Paul Luna, has also launched an online media program, accessible on Facebook as Lunacy.TV and on YouTube under his name, Chef Paul Luna. It’s brief interviews, mainly with people from the Atlanta restaurant scene. Paul resides in Switzerland now, so he is at a safe distance if he asks any impertinent questions. The interviews (minus one) are all entertaining and under 10 minutes.
Thank you, Jennifer and Paul, for inviting me on your programs, but ever since my on-air battle at WGST with Sean Hannity, the worst person on earth before Tucker Carlson was invented, I have studiously avoided interviews. —CL—
El Viñedo Local, 730 Peachtree St. N.E., 404-596-8239, elvinedolocal.com
Krystal, 415 Moreland Ave. S.E., 404-524-3616, krystal.com"
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El Viñedo, open now only for breakfast and lunch, plans to expand its hours to include dinner. It is located in Circa 730, one of those millennial workday beehives where tenants brainstorm, hit the onsite gym, and probably oil up with CBD sunblock while lounging in the genuinely cool curvy wood swings out front. This ethos of togetherness extends to El Viñedo’s interior where the main seating is communal, but there’s a large patio where you can choose your view. I picked the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer across the street. It’s all pleasant, seriously.
Owner Robert Kaster, who has 20 years experience in the food and beverage industry, envisioned El Viñedo as a bar focusing on South American wines. That’s obvious, given that the name means “the local vineyard,” but the café also features bracing coffees made with organic, fair-trade beans roasted by Café Campesino in Americus, Georgia. A double-shot of espresso with enough crema to make chapstick unnecessary concluded my meal.
Most of the dishes at El Viñedo aren’t new to the city, but I’d venture that most are prepared with more finesse. The menu includes empanadas, arepas, sandwiches, ceviche, plates, and sides. I loved my empanada criolla, which was filled with finely chopped beef, green olives, and boiled eggs. The filling rocked, but what made this and other empanadas unique was the stellar, comparatively thick, slightly crumbly pastry shell. Other fillings include braised chicken, spinach and mushrooms tossed in béchamel, and ham and mozzarella. All also include the queso fresco that Latin Americans love.
We also sampled a plate of fried fish with tartar sauce and lots of lime slices. The super-crispy chunks of fish were topped with a Peruvian-style salad of sliced red onions and cabbage. This same salad or a derivative was on just about everything we ordered. Other plates include the classic pabellon — steak with fried plantains, black beans, cilantro, and rice with salsa rozada. El Viñedo offers chicken as a substitute for beef.
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The pabellon is also available served on an arepa. Here, my enthusiasm waned a bit. One of my favorite dining spots is Arepa Mia in Decatur, and my go-to there is the pabellon. An arepa is basically a big crunchy biscuit made with cornmeal, split open and filled with goodies. The version at El Viñedo was a bit thick for my taste, and the filling’s beef was not the juicy shredded variety that I love at Arepa Mia. As such, the arepa itself and the fried sweet plantains didn’t get the lubrication they needed for a good marriage, even with the black beans and queso fresco. I have no idea of the degree to which this might be a regional difference. It’s not bad. It’s just not what I expected. You can also get arepas filled with chicken and, um, Duke’s mayo, or vegetables.
Arguably the best dish on our table was the ceviche made with sliced poached Georgia shrimp (okay, it was cooked) with avocado puree, cilantro, and Meyer lemon oil. It was heaped with the onion salad. The serving is perfect for anorexics but the rest of us can order it as a starter or double, maybe triple, the portion. It’s not that it’s a terribly small portion; it’s just so good. Or maybe you could double-up on the fried plantain chips that come with it.
We didn’t try any of the three sandwiches. The Choripan has become a thing around town, so I’m on a break. It’s grilled Argentinian chorizo layered with butter lettuce, tomatoes, chimichurri, and more Duke’s mayo. The fried fish is also available as a sandwich. The only side we tried was the freshly fried yucca with the zippy salsa rozada. The people around town who serve cold fried yucca need to be imprisoned.
Hours here for the present are 7-10:30 a.m. and 11 a.m.-3 p.m., weekdays only. Breakfast is a few empanadas, pastries, and egg dishes. You might call to see if dinner has begun.
LET’S GO TO THE KRYSTAL: It’s been a year since we all thanked Jesus on learning that bankruptcy would not be closing Dunwoody-based Krystal’s 300 locations. Unfortunately, the new owners have not as yet brought back the $7.99 all-you-can-eat special, probably because the dining rooms are still closed and the takeout windows are not built for plunging gigantic loads of meat slivers and steamed buns down the throats of the indiscriminate.
I was 15 when I ate my first Krystal. My friend Norman bribed me to take the bus to downtown Atlanta with him by offering a free meal at this burger joint he loved. I admit I was repulsed and caused someone behind the counter to screech threats to call the police when I threw the red basket in which the Krystals were served in the garbage. Yes, I exhibited bad etiquette at a Krystal. I thought it was disposable, bitch! In my mid-20s, I lived in Augusta. On many nights I partied at the Peacock Lounge with a friend whose speech therapy was destroyed when he got drunk. “Kriff, wet’s go to da Kritchal!” he’d say as we left the club. We did. I hated the food but I loved the late-night weirdness.
When I moved home to Atlanta, Krystal became a true marker of the luxe real estate I occupied. In the late ‘70s, I lived a block from the Krystal on Peachtree in Midtown where all the trans hookers hung out. I loved hanging with the girls, but I couldn’t eat the stuff. In 1982, after being escorted to an AA meeting by a cop, I ended up renting an apartment directly behind the Krystal on Ponce de Leon. Homeless people foraged in the dumpster there and frequently brought the bounty across the parking lot to eat in my junked car. I never ate there. Honestly, the only time I enthusiastically ate Krystals was after nights in places where every desire of the human body was completely degraded.
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But last month, after I proved I could actually love hot dogs after a lifetime of avoiding them, I decided I should give Krystal a try after a very long time. I was partly incentivized, too, by the absurdly low cost of the tiny square oddities. If you’ve resumed dining out, you’ve probably noticed that prices have increased dramatically at many restaurants. Krystal was actually founded during the Depression in Chattanooga as a knockoff of the Midwestern chain, White Castle. The idea was and remains explicitly to provide super-cheap eats. Of course, it doesn’t take long to figure out that you have to eat a ton of Krystals to equal a regular burger’s meat content, but you are supposed to fill up on the buns. It’s kind of like going to an Ethiopian restaurant and having the spongy injera bread expand in your stomach before you complain about the skimpy portion of stew on the table.
I drove to the Krystal on Moreland Avenue, expecting to dine in and soak up the atmosphere, but business was limited to the takeout window, and during the eternity it took to decipher the menu, order, and drive away, I didn’t see a single other car arrive. I did not know the chain had expanded to chicken and hot dogs, but I was only interested in the burger patties that are blotted with mustard and layered with a pickle slice between the “famous steamed bun.” Diced onions, which used to be inevitable, apparently no longer are. There were none on our burgers. I ordered the queasily named “sackful with cheese” — 12 burgers with American cheese for $12.49. I added tots and fries at $2.29 each. Yes, I ate six Krystals with little difficulty and really found them less disgusting than pathetic. The only flavor was in the pickle and mustard. I added some real mustard, which was a mistake because it deprived the Krystal of the kind of affection we have for, say, mangy stray dogs that lick our faces and beg to bring their worms and fleas home with us.
JUST SAYING: If you have resumed eating out at places beside Krystal, you have noticed that prices really have increased significantly at many restaurants. You would expect increases after a year in any case, but the pandemic has aggravated the situation. You can’t peruse an industry publication without reading how restaurants are finding it almost impossible to find staff. It’s partly because some would-be employees probably still prefer to avoid contracting COVID, but the stunningly low pay is the big issue outside fine-dining venues. That in turn makes it hard for restaurants to operate at anything close to full capacity, and that drives prices up.
As long as I’ve been writing about restaurants, I’ve been astounded at the stingy attitudes of people about tipping. Last month, I went to a restaurant with two very comfortable friends. On the way, we were talking about tipping, and I said that I never tip less than 20 percent after taxes. One of my friends wrapped up the attitude of Marie-Antoinette’s heirs: “I am not paying someone 20 percent to hand me a sandwich.” I explained that the tips are shared, that servers are often paid barely better than minimum wage. He repeated his declamation. We ordered our sandwiches at the counter and took a seat on the patio. I asked Marie if he had left a tip. He said no. I told them both to look at their receipts. The restaurant had added a 20-percent tip to each bill. That is the right thing to do, at least until wages increase to the point you don’t have to live under a bridge to work for a restaurant, and that, Marie, is not an uncommon situation.
MEDIA: I’m always behind and only just learned that Jennifer Zyman, our former dining critic, is producing a podcast, “The Food that Binds.” I asked Jennifer for a quick description: “As a food writer and restaurant critic, my work was always focused on the how of food, but the why has always interested me. There are so many different relationships — good and bad — within the food space, hence the title ‘The Food that Binds.’ So many people in the culinary space have fascinating stories, and I wanted to explore it all, whether it is a chef with body image issues to how diners are interacting with restaurants post-COVID to the power of mutual aid.”
Her first episode is a fascinating conversation in which Chef Kevin Gillespie and Jennifer discuss body image and their own issues with it. I have to say one “positive” result of the pandemic seems to be that, in the absence of epidemic restaurant reviewing, food writers have been compelled to take a deeper dive, and Jennifer is doing that. You can find the podcast on the usual platforms or check out Jennifer’s website, where she also archives her writing for ''Atlanta Magazine'' and other publications: jenniferzyman.com.
One of our city’s long-lost geniuses, Paul Luna, has also launched an online media program, accessible on Facebook as Lunacy.TV and on YouTube under his name, Chef Paul Luna. It’s brief interviews, mainly with people from the Atlanta restaurant scene. Paul resides in Switzerland now, so he is at a safe distance if he asks any impertinent questions. The interviews (minus one) are all entertaining and under 10 minutes.
Thank you, Jennifer and Paul, for inviting me on your programs, but ever since my on-air battle at WGST with Sean Hannity, the worst person on earth before Tucker Carlson was invented, I have studiously avoided interviews. __—CL—__
''El Viñedo Local, 730 Peachtree St. N.E., 404-596-8239, elvinedolocal.com''
''Krystal, 415 Moreland Ave. S.E., 404-524-3616, krystal.com''"
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string(12627) " Graz #2 Resize 2021-06-03T13:58:24+00:00 Graz_#2_resize.jpeg Oh Cliff - how I've missed your humor! I've missed the restaurant reviews too, but oh how I've missed your take on the world. We are kindred spirits. You make me blow co-cola outta my nose. grazing Lunch at El Viñedo Local, dinner from Krystal, lecturing cheap tippers, exploring new foodie media Graz #2 Resize 2021-06-03T13:53:56+00:00 GRAZING: Hell ain’t a bad place to be jim.harris Jim Harris CLIFF BOSTOCK cliffbostock (Cliff Bostock) 2021-06-03T13:53:56+00:00 If you’re re-emerging from the misery of home cooking and looking for a unique lunch spot in Midtown, head to El Viñedo Local, a South American café that opened just in time to be hobbled by the Pandemic Royale. I’ve only made it there once, but three friends at my table provided a broad enough sampling to crave more of the savory flavors that Chef Bruno Vergara, a native of Uruguay, is concocting.
El Viñedo, open now only for breakfast and lunch, plans to expand its hours to include dinner. It is located in Circa 730, one of those millennial workday beehives where tenants brainstorm, hit the onsite gym, and probably oil up with CBD sunblock while lounging in the genuinely cool curvy wood swings out front. This ethos of togetherness extends to El Viñedo’s interior where the main seating is communal, but there’s a large patio where you can choose your view. I picked the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer across the street. It’s all pleasant, seriously.
Owner Robert Kaster, who has 20 years experience in the food and beverage industry, envisioned El Viñedo as a bar focusing on South American wines. That’s obvious, given that the name means “the local vineyard,” but the café also features bracing coffees made with organic, fair-trade beans roasted by Café Campesino in Americus, Georgia. A double-shot of espresso with enough crema to make chapstick unnecessary concluded my meal.
Most of the dishes at El Viñedo aren’t new to the city, but I’d venture that most are prepared with more finesse. The menu includes empanadas, arepas, sandwiches, ceviche, plates, and sides. I loved my empanada criolla, which was filled with finely chopped beef, green olives, and boiled eggs. The filling rocked, but what made this and other empanadas unique was the stellar, comparatively thick, slightly crumbly pastry shell. Other fillings include braised chicken, spinach and mushrooms tossed in béchamel, and ham and mozzarella. All also include the queso fresco that Latin Americans love.
We also sampled a plate of fried fish with tartar sauce and lots of lime slices. The super-crispy chunks of fish were topped with a Peruvian-style salad of sliced red onions and cabbage. This same salad or a derivative was on just about everything we ordered. Other plates include the classic pabellon — steak with fried plantains, black beans, cilantro, and rice with salsa rozada. El Viñedo offers chicken as a substitute for beef.
The pabellon is also available served on an arepa. Here, my enthusiasm waned a bit. One of my favorite dining spots is Arepa Mia in Decatur, and my go-to there is the pabellon. An arepa is basically a big crunchy biscuit made with cornmeal, split open and filled with goodies. The version at El Viñedo was a bit thick for my taste, and the filling’s beef was not the juicy shredded variety that I love at Arepa Mia. As such, the arepa itself and the fried sweet plantains didn’t get the lubrication they needed for a good marriage, even with the black beans and queso fresco. I have no idea of the degree to which this might be a regional difference. It’s not bad. It’s just not what I expected. You can also get arepas filled with chicken and, um, Duke’s mayo, or vegetables.
Arguably the best dish on our table was the ceviche made with sliced poached Georgia shrimp (okay, it was cooked) with avocado puree, cilantro, and Meyer lemon oil. It was heaped with the onion salad. The serving is perfect for anorexics but the rest of us can order it as a starter or double, maybe triple, the portion. It’s not that it’s a terribly small portion; it’s just so good. Or maybe you could double-up on the fried plantain chips that come with it.
We didn’t try any of the three sandwiches. The Choripan has become a thing around town, so I’m on a break. It’s grilled Argentinian chorizo layered with butter lettuce, tomatoes, chimichurri, and more Duke’s mayo. The fried fish is also available as a sandwich. The only side we tried was the freshly fried yucca with the zippy salsa rozada. The people around town who serve cold fried yucca need to be imprisoned.
Hours here for the present are 7-10:30 a.m. and 11 a.m.-3 p.m., weekdays only. Breakfast is a few empanadas, pastries, and egg dishes. You might call to see if dinner has begun.
LET’S GO TO THE KRYSTAL: It’s been a year since we all thanked Jesus on learning that bankruptcy would not be closing Dunwoody-based Krystal’s 300 locations. Unfortunately, the new owners have not as yet brought back the $7.99 all-you-can-eat special, probably because the dining rooms are still closed and the takeout windows are not built for plunging gigantic loads of meat slivers and steamed buns down the throats of the indiscriminate.
I was 15 when I ate my first Krystal. My friend Norman bribed me to take the bus to downtown Atlanta with him by offering a free meal at this burger joint he loved. I admit I was repulsed and caused someone behind the counter to screech threats to call the police when I threw the red basket in which the Krystals were served in the garbage. Yes, I exhibited bad etiquette at a Krystal. I thought it was disposable, bitch! In my mid-20s, I lived in Augusta. On many nights I partied at the Peacock Lounge with a friend whose speech therapy was destroyed when he got drunk. “Kriff, wet’s go to da Kritchal!” he’d say as we left the club. We did. I hated the food but I loved the late-night weirdness.
When I moved home to Atlanta, Krystal became a true marker of the luxe real estate I occupied. In the late ‘70s, I lived a block from the Krystal on Peachtree in Midtown where all the trans hookers hung out. I loved hanging with the girls, but I couldn’t eat the stuff. In 1982, after being escorted to an AA meeting by a cop, I ended up renting an apartment directly behind the Krystal on Ponce de Leon. Homeless people foraged in the dumpster there and frequently brought the bounty across the parking lot to eat in my junked car. I never ate there. Honestly, the only time I enthusiastically ate Krystals was after nights in places where every desire of the human body was completely degraded.
But last month, after I proved I could actually love hot dogs after a lifetime of avoiding them, I decided I should give Krystal a try after a very long time. I was partly incentivized, too, by the absurdly low cost of the tiny square oddities. If you’ve resumed dining out, you’ve probably noticed that prices have increased dramatically at many restaurants. Krystal was actually founded during the Depression in Chattanooga as a knockoff of the Midwestern chain, White Castle. The idea was and remains explicitly to provide super-cheap eats. Of course, it doesn’t take long to figure out that you have to eat a ton of Krystals to equal a regular burger’s meat content, but you are supposed to fill up on the buns. It’s kind of like going to an Ethiopian restaurant and having the spongy injera bread expand in your stomach before you complain about the skimpy portion of stew on the table.
I drove to the Krystal on Moreland Avenue, expecting to dine in and soak up the atmosphere, but business was limited to the takeout window, and during the eternity it took to decipher the menu, order, and drive away, I didn’t see a single other car arrive. I did not know the chain had expanded to chicken and hot dogs, but I was only interested in the burger patties that are blotted with mustard and layered with a pickle slice between the “famous steamed bun.” Diced onions, which used to be inevitable, apparently no longer are. There were none on our burgers. I ordered the queasily named “sackful with cheese” — 12 burgers with American cheese for $12.49. I added tots and fries at $2.29 each. Yes, I ate six Krystals with little difficulty and really found them less disgusting than pathetic. The only flavor was in the pickle and mustard. I added some real mustard, which was a mistake because it deprived the Krystal of the kind of affection we have for, say, mangy stray dogs that lick our faces and beg to bring their worms and fleas home with us.
JUST SAYING: If you have resumed eating out at places beside Krystal, you have noticed that prices really have increased significantly at many restaurants. You would expect increases after a year in any case, but the pandemic has aggravated the situation. You can’t peruse an industry publication without reading how restaurants are finding it almost impossible to find staff. It’s partly because some would-be employees probably still prefer to avoid contracting COVID, but the stunningly low pay is the big issue outside fine-dining venues. That in turn makes it hard for restaurants to operate at anything close to full capacity, and that drives prices up.
As long as I’ve been writing about restaurants, I’ve been astounded at the stingy attitudes of people about tipping. Last month, I went to a restaurant with two very comfortable friends. On the way, we were talking about tipping, and I said that I never tip less than 20 percent after taxes. One of my friends wrapped up the attitude of Marie-Antoinette’s heirs: “I am not paying someone 20 percent to hand me a sandwich.” I explained that the tips are shared, that servers are often paid barely better than minimum wage. He repeated his declamation. We ordered our sandwiches at the counter and took a seat on the patio. I asked Marie if he had left a tip. He said no. I told them both to look at their receipts. The restaurant had added a 20-percent tip to each bill. That is the right thing to do, at least until wages increase to the point you don’t have to live under a bridge to work for a restaurant, and that, Marie, is not an uncommon situation.
MEDIA: I’m always behind and only just learned that Jennifer Zyman, our former dining critic, is producing a podcast, “The Food that Binds.” I asked Jennifer for a quick description: “As a food writer and restaurant critic, my work was always focused on the how of food, but the why has always interested me. There are so many different relationships — good and bad — within the food space, hence the title ‘The Food that Binds.’ So many people in the culinary space have fascinating stories, and I wanted to explore it all, whether it is a chef with body image issues to how diners are interacting with restaurants post-COVID to the power of mutual aid.”
Her first episode is a fascinating conversation in which Chef Kevin Gillespie and Jennifer discuss body image and their own issues with it. I have to say one “positive” result of the pandemic seems to be that, in the absence of epidemic restaurant reviewing, food writers have been compelled to take a deeper dive, and Jennifer is doing that. You can find the podcast on the usual platforms or check out Jennifer’s website, where she also archives her writing for Atlanta Magazine and other publications: jenniferzyman.com.
One of our city’s long-lost geniuses, Paul Luna, has also launched an online media program, accessible on Facebook as Lunacy.TV and on YouTube under his name, Chef Paul Luna. It’s brief interviews, mainly with people from the Atlanta restaurant scene. Paul resides in Switzerland now, so he is at a safe distance if he asks any impertinent questions. The interviews (minus one) are all entertaining and under 10 minutes.
Thank you, Jennifer and Paul, for inviting me on your programs, but ever since my on-air battle at WGST with Sean Hannity, the worst person on earth before Tucker Carlson was invented, I have studiously avoided interviews. —CL—
El Viñedo Local, 730 Peachtree St. N.E., 404-596-8239, elvinedolocal.com
Krystal, 415 Moreland Ave. S.E., 404-524-3616, krystal.com CLIFF BOSTOCK THE TABLE’S BEST: Ceviche made with poached Georgia shrimp, avocado puree, meyer lemon oil, and cilantro, served with fried green plantain chips. 0,0,10 grazing GRAZING: Hell ain’t a bad place to be "
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GRAZING: Hell ain’t a bad place to be Article
Thursday June 3, 2021 09:53 AM EDT
Lunch at El Viñedo Local, dinner from Krystal, lecturing cheap tippers, exploring new foodie media
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string(23954) "It was a day that I should have named the Weenie Apocalypse. It was July 11, 1979, and I was in Gibsonton, Florida, outside Tampa. On that day, the whole world was crazy. The 77-ton Skylab space station was set to crash to earth. The fear that it would miss its target, the Indian Ocean, and create random hellfire turned it into the favored party theme everywhere that year.
I went to one such impromptu party that day in Gibsonton, which was famous as the summer residence of the nation’s “carnies” — people who work for the carnivals that move all around America most of the year. My particular motivation for spending a few weeks there was to hang out with sideshow performers, especially the stars of so-called freak shows — “human oddities” — for a story I was writing. Unfortunately, it was difficult to penetrate that community unless I combined obsequiousness with drunkenness. I’ll spare you the details, but I ended up drunk behind the trailer of a famous freak, grilling burgers and hot dogs. It was a big deal for an outsider to be included by carnies.
The host brought me a hot dog and I balked. “Thanks, but I don’t eat those.”
I might as well have dropped the Skylab on the festival. Everyone went silent. “You said you love carnivals and you don’t eat hot dogs? Why don’t you eat them?”
“They make me sick. Ever since I was a kid, they’ve made me sick. It’s nothing personal. They make me sick, man.” I laughed drunkenly. “It’s like you’d be hit right here by a gut bomb instead of a space station. Haha.” Nobody laughed.
Thus did I brand myself a human oddity among professional human oddities. Truly, as long as I can remember, I would not eat the scrap meat ground and compressed into the gruesome treat wrapped in spongy white bread often drenched with ketchup called the hot dog. I did learn to eat some real sausages whose flavor made it worth risking a gastrointestinal catastrophe, but I have mainly avoided hot dogs my entire life ... until a few weeks ago, when I ate so many I lost count. Pathetically, I now crave them. I love them.
It wasn’t so much culinary adventure as pandemic cabin fever that led me to my new lover. True, I was intrigued when I came across promo material for a new venture in East Atlanta Village called Screamin’ Weenies. The name isn’t novel but it’s a good choice since the hot dog stand is operated on the rear patio of the very cool Banshee restaurant. Screaming is what banshees do best. It also occurred to me that hot dog joints might make a good pandemic story. I was double-vaccinated but still cautious, and I figured hot dogs are a quick, usually outdoors eat. So I took the pills I take to make scary food digestible and headed over to Screamin’ Weenies, which is open 11:30 a.m.-3:30 p.m. Thursday through Saturday.
The patio space is small, and most people were picking up at the window of the mini-food truck where the dogs are cooked. I wanted to soak up the screamin’ vibe, so I threw my book on one of the few tiny tables available before ordering from the menu of five dogs. There was the Atlanta chili/slaw, the classic Chicago, a New Yorker with stewed onions, the classic naked that you dump everything from relish to sauerkraut on, and the day’s special Banshee Dog. I went for the latter. It included a beef hot dog over caramelized onion, flanked by sliced American cheese, topped with Thousand Island dressing pocked with chunks of dill pickle. I got all sentimental when I saw that Cheerwine, the cherry soda I drank on the Catawba River as a kid, was available.
While I swilled my Cheerwine, I watched a woman be repelled from the order window for not wearing a mask. She had left hers in the car. “Hey,” I said, “I’m double-vaccinated. You can wear mine.” She declined. Hey, it’s not like I have herpes, bitch.
I got up to fetch my dog. How do I love thee? Let me count the inches. The slim dog languidly draped itself across the roll, seriously jutting out at each end, grilled with a slight char. The ingredients were arranged with intention. I bit into one of the naked ends and got that vaunted snap from the natural lamb casing. The damn thing was delicious. The firm dog, made locally by Fripper’s, tasted like real beef and was nestled in all those creamy textures with one bit of crunch from the pickles. Damn. I wanted another but I confess I wasn’t up for paying about $20 for two dogs and a drink. But I was happy. I felt so ashamed that the young me had disparaged that hot dog long ago in Gib’town.
That very evening, I excitedly told my friend Sausage Boy about the experience. He suggested that I may not want to generalize my new happiness to every hot dog in town. For an example of irredeemable misery, he said, I would not be able to write about hot dogs in Atlanta without going to the Varsity. I gasped. “I can’t go everywhere,” I said.
He said: “The Varsity isn’t some unknown everywhere. It’s the mother of dogs, the nipple on which every Atlanta child is suckled all the way through adulthood until the grease coagulates in every artery and lands you in a coffin at a funeral celebration catered by the Varsity, the very people who killed you.”
I told him I’d think about it. I had, by the way, decided I would limit this adventure to hot dogs, not the more complicated sausages that I really did learn to love. Nor would I be eating the raw onions that overpower every other taste with which they are associated. I would, however, permit myself to sample some chili, despite my dislike of the “classic” stuff that tastes like it was poured from a can stored in a fallout shelter for 40 years.
That night I decided to try the hot dog at Grindhouse Killer Burgers. I’ve been addicted to their Apache burger ever since they first opened just over 10 years ago at the Sweet Auburn Curb Market. It has since left that location, expanding to several others, including the gigantic one on Memorial Drive that I decided to visit.
It was a Sunday night and I didn’t expect a wait. It was, after all, the Lord’s Day during a plague he had visited upon the entire world in retaliation for America’s embrace of Donald Trump. The place actually was relatively packed, and the line to order moved so slowly that, exasperated, I decided to leave and go across the parking lot to load up on Sunday specials at Supremo Taco. As I approached the window, they literally slammed the shutters closed. “Sold out!” I returned to Grindhouse, and the people in front of me earlier admitted me back to my former place. I waited literally 20 minutes total with a crowd of fellow deep-sighers and eye-rollers.
“Y’all are really slow,” I rudely said to the guy taking orders. He explained they were short-handed. Whatever. I placed my order to go and went to wait another 15 minutes at a table. When the bag arrived, I was ravenous and I decided to eat the hot dog on the premises. Grindhouse buys its dogs from legendary Vienna Beef in Chicago. I’d ordered mine with slaw, apparently the Atlanta favorite everywhere. I reached in the bag, pulled it out, and it completely fell apart in my hands. The aluminum foil I presumed was wrapping it turned out to be a loose sheet set over the top of the dog, which was in the usual cardboard cradle. I fetched the dog and bun from the floor. I swept the slaw on the table onto it. I ate it. It was actually delicious, and at $4 (including 50 cents for the slaw), it was the cheapest dog I’d eat. (I should note that the light use of aluminum foil would make the dog’s transport less steamy than full wrapping, but my piggy hands did not anticipate that.)
I began to lose track of time. The hands on my clock turned into naked weenies. Eventually, a Saturday rolled around, and I felt fortified enough to attempt the unthinkable: The Varsity. I have lived in Atlanta most of my life and I have been to this enormous cliché only three times, as I recall. Once was in high school, on the way to the Georgia/Georgia Tech game. Second was with a visiting former college roommate who later cursed himself for trusting a tourist guide. Third was with my partner’s family. All were occasions of violent protest by my innards.
I was shocked when I arrived, under the influence of GI medication, to see how crowded the place was, although I quickly found a parking space. The long line inside moved more rapidly than the bowels of the diners speeding to the bathrooms. I was happy to see that literally everyone in view was wearing a mask, except for the family of seven Appalachian refugees directly behind me. The woman in front of me surreptitiously took their picture and posted it online. “Where your masks at?” I asked Daddy Billy. He glared and pulled one of his litter close to him like a shield. “If you can use a child as your shield, you can wear a mask, dumbass.” Okay, I didn’t really say that.
I ordered the iconic crap. A chili-cheese-slaw dog, onion rings, a fried peach pie, and a Frosted Orange. I was happy to notice that I did not hear any of the counter people shrieking the classic mantra, “Whattayahave?” My order instantaneously appeared, and I toted it to the “ESPN room” where I watched the Master’s Tournament and had flashbacks to childhood of watching golf all weekend with my father. I ate.
You know what? I hate myself. I ate those gigantic, greasy onion rings in nothing flat. A young guy at a nearby table noted my speed and whined that he didn’t receive any ketchup for his rings. I tossed him my envelopes.
“Why do you people put ketchup on everything fried?” I asked him.
“Us people do that to cover up the strongest taste of the grease, dude. Duh!”
Oh my god. It makes sense because everything there does have that singular note of aged, cured frying oil, supposedly never changed for decades.
The Frosted Orange tasted like a melted Creamsicle, a bit watery but good enough to ring the bells of an ice cream truck in my head. The peach pie was fucking delicious. The hot dog of course was the most revolting thing I’ve put in my mouth since I was potty-trained. The greasy, stinky, yellow-stained chili made with ground-up mystery meat was slimed with hidden slaw from hell and yellow cheese that wouldn’t melt. Somehow, the baloney-tasting hot dog itself and its bun literally broke as if it were crying to be put out of its misery. Two bites and I was done. Sorry, dog.
I called Sausage Boy on the way home. “It wasn’t that bad,” I said. “Only the hot dog was inedible.”
“But the hot dog is the point,” he said. “You failed.”
I was okay with failing. The Lord’s Day arrived again. I decided to head to Cabbagetown to visit Little’s Food Store, where I hadn’t been in years. I used to love to visit it and neighboring Carroll Street Café but that narrow street is a nightmare to negotiate. I actually embarrassed myself by immediately finding a large parking space directly in front of Little’s, which looks like a monument to so-called outsider art. As usual, the street was full of milling residents, hanging out in a few vacant lots turned into make-shift parks.
I went inside. My eyes teared-up seeing all the grunge, and I rushed toward the grill where I was abruptly told to step my ass back. Soon enough, I ordered a chili dog with a side of slaw and some fries. I loitered, looking around mindlessly. An employee ordered me outside, where she soon brought my food in a black Styrofoam box.
I sat on a bench outside the store and opened the box. My plan was to dump the sweet, spicy slaw on the chili dog, but that was difficult. I bit into the dog. I sighed. “I might as well face it,” I told the black cat that had suddenly appeared. “I just don’t like this super-ground version of chili that seems to be everyone’s favorite.” I dunked a limp fry in the chili and put it on the sidewalk for the presumably hungry stray. The cat sniffed and looked away. Fine. I put some slaw down. He struck it with his paw and backed away. Then he turned the corner and ran up the stairs to his apparent home. I wasn’t quite as unimpressed as the cat, who probably got sick of the food years ago, and the chili was definitely better than the Varsity’s, as was the hot dog itself, made by Fripper’s like those at Screamin’ Weenies. I ate it all. But I shuddered when I looked up and saw that Little’s flew a pirate’s flag. Between it and the black cat, I must have been bound for bad luck.
I called Sausage Boy again. “I’m becoming indiscriminate,” I said. “Everything is running together in my head. A black cat derided me for eating a chili dog today.” He proposed a solution: “Go try a vegan or vegetarian hot dog.”
Was this the bad luck the cat brought? Most of the hot dog places I investigated did offer such a thing, but how could something I have always hated be any more tolerable when imitated by healthy vegetables put to criminal use? But I decided to give it a go. I journeyed in the rain to the MET in West Atlanta. This gigantic warehouse development is home to La Bodega, a take-out pupuseria which also hosts the Window, a pop-up location for start-ups. One of those is Carrot Dog, operated by Kemi Bennings as part of her company, Food for Thought Vegan Café. She has an impressive resume of feeding celebrities and brands herself a “renaissance woman and creative badass.”
When I first saw Carrot Dog during an earlier visit to review Bodega, I was thoroughly repulsed. I don’t really like carrots, and at the time I still really loathed even the thought of a hot dog. I’m going to be hated for saying this, but I ended up telling myself that this ridiculous creation was my favorite hot dog. I don’t know if that’s fair. Calling a carrot a weenie may be too oxymoronic even for this dying world.
Bennings brines fat carrots in countless spices before cooking them. The carrots have just the right texture. They aren’t mushy like the ones your mother serves with pot roast, and they aren’t raw and unseasoned like people who claim they improve vision want them to be. These are nestled into slightly grilled buns and then dressed in a variety of ways. I chose a “Southern Santa Fe” specialty dog. The carrot is covered with chopped romaine lettuce, sliced avocado, smoked chipotle vegan mayo, chopped onions (which I declined), and, um, vegan bacon. Alright, I admit that the best thing about the tiny flap of vegan bacon was that it was completely inconspicuous with no noticeable taste or texture. I actually would have preferred more heat from the chipotle mayo, but this creation was a huge relief from everything I’d eaten. I think the effect was like eating dog food for weeks and then being served a fresh salad. Whatever, it was really good and only available Saturdays.
But I was still hungry.
Shamefully, on the way home, I decided to pay a second quick visit to Hot Dog Pete’s in Summerhill. I had tried takeout with a friend last summer and wasn’t impressed enough to eat more than a couple of bites of the two dogs we ordered. The menu includes sausages as well as an all-beef wiener and one made with beef and pork. They are all made by Fritz’s Meat & Superior Sausage in Kansas City. Pete’s shares ownership and patios with the oddly named Hero Doughnuts & Buns. More than doughnuts, Hero is known for its sandwiches made with house-baked brioche buns. The fried pork chop, the “Super Crunch” chicken, and the burger are all as addictive as the name of the house’s secret sauce — “crack sauce” — suggests.
To stay consistent, I ordered an all-beef hot dog with chili and slaw. The big difference here is slaw made with collards and a brioche bun from Alon’s that earns our highly coveted Best of the Buns Award. Everything about this dog was savory — even the chili, despite one flaw: weirdly dry beans. But I’ll gladly deal with that in exchange for not having to deal with the over-seasoned greasy stuff that most seem to prefer.
Time ticked on. I was growing tired of this adventure. I called Sausage Boy and told him I felt I needed to get to two more places — the Original Hot Dog Factory and Skip’s Chicago Dogs. “I need encouragement,” I told him. “Last night I dreamed I was back in Gibsonton and Lobster Boy murdered me.” The Sausage told me he had faith in me. I hung up the phone and got in my car and headed to the Original Hot Dog Factory on Piedmont Avenue. It’s technically on the Georgia State University campus.
About four hours later I was looking up from a bed and had no idea where I was. A doctor explained that I was in the Emory Midtown Hospital emergency room. I had been in a car wreck. I was completely uninjured, but I was in a state of total amnesia. I remembered nothing of the last hours. “What is wrong with me?” I asked.
“We’re not sure,” he said.
“It’s the hot dogs,” I said.
“What?”
“Never mind.”
He wanted me to stay overnight for examination the next morning by a neurologist. However, Kaiser, my insurance company, insisted that I be discharged (and it took over a week to get an appointment with them). The next morning, I Ubered to pick up my car at the city lot where it had been towed. I expected it to be damaged, but it was not. “Are you okay?” one of the employees out front asked me.
“I need a hot dog.”
I got in my car and drove directly to the Original Hot Dog Factory. I wasn’t sure if I had actually been there or not. I only knew that my accident, which involved another car, was in the immediate area. The restaurant, part of a chain, was empty except for me and two employees.
“Hey,” I said, “did y’all happen to see an accident near here yesterday?” They said they had not. “Well, what about me? Did I eat here?” They looked a bit perturbed. “Never mind,” I said. With the advice of one of the employees, I ordered the all-beef Hawaiian dog. I also forced myself to do the unthinkable and order the second corn dog of my life.
As I had come to realize by this point, there is no such thing as a hot dog with too much topping. The Hawaiian dog’s included a gigantic load of bacon, cheese, lightly grilled onions, and lots of grilled pineapple. In other words, it was the weenie version of the Hawaiian pizza which I usually detest, but it was the perfect mindless food for the amnesiac I had become. I figured I’d forget it by the time I got home. Obviously, I didn’t. I do congratulate myself for being able to eat the mess without resorting to a knife and fork. Hot dogs have made me a master of finger food.
I don’t know exactly why the concept of a corn dog disgusts me. The only one I remember ever eating was on a dare at Dakota Blue in Grant Park about five years ago, and I actually kind of liked it. My corn dog at The Hot Dog Factory looked like a bulbous fried sex toy. I nervously bit into it and was surprised by a rush of crispy, juicy sweetness. The all-beef dog retained its earthy flavor. Yeah, boy!
I decided I needed to try a dessert. This causes me a great deal of shame, and I blame it on my brain-rattling accident. I ate a fried Twinkie. I can say with absolute certainty that I have never eaten a Twinkie in any form, although I was tempted in the late ’70s when Dan White supposedly blamed eating too many Twinkies for his assassination of San Francisco Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk. This was labeled the “Twinkie Defense.” I have no viable defense of my decision to eat the deep-fried mess at the Hot Dog Factory, but it was spectacularly delicious, like a fist full of creamy melting cake oozing all kinds of white stuff inside sugar-coated crispy batter. It made the glazed donut at Krispy Kreme seem so pathetic.
I shared this discovery with Sausage Boy, explaining that I was starting to doubt my taste. He acknowledged my worry but urged me to be kinder to myself. I told him the Twinkie had awakened a memory of working at Six Flags Over Georgia when I was 16. How had I forgotten that I worked in a hot dog stand? How had I forgotten how much I hated the customers who acted like they were buying delicacies instead of shitloads of crap I barely cooked on a griddle? How had I forgotten that throwing a hot dog at a customer and shoving him with a broom handle had nearly gotten me fired? Obviously, the hot dog — foe of my digestion and weapon against redneck assholes — was intimately connected to the PTSD I never knew I suffered. “Be strong,” Sausage Boy told me. “You’re at the end.”
Onward! Wednesday arrived. That’s the day I resumed my years-long weekly lunch with two fully vaccinated friends. We drove to 40-year-old Skip’s Chicago Dogs in Avondale, probably the venue most hot dog lovers mentioned to me when I asked for recommendations. It looks like your usual fast-food place with mustard-and-ketchup-colored walls hung with sports stuff. Despite the name, sandwiches and burgers outnumber the hot dogs, which are made with Vienna beef.
In my little sampling of hot dogs over the years, the Chicago style has usually been the most appetizing. Skip’s dog, according to the menu, is typically topped with pickles, peppers, celery salt, mustard, relish, and tomatoes. Sorry, Skip, but my dog was a low-class version. I found none of the juicy-hot sport pickles that I love. The huge strip of dill pickle overwhelmed everything. The tomatoes were pink and flavorless. What am I missing, people?
By way of comparison to the Varsity, with which everyone positively compared it, I also ordered onion rings and a chili-slaw dog. The rings weren’t bad, but they were anemically skinny compared to the Varsity’s (and, granted, a ton less greasy). While no chili anywhere on the planet is as vile as the Varsity’s, Skip’s was totally meh, and the slaw tasted straight out of the Kroger deli bin. My friends did no better with their orders. I expected this to be the grand finale of my tour. But it was more like a return to vapidity. I felt my lust for hot dogs deflating, and, looking back, it was the dogs at Screamin’ Weenies and Carrot Dog that I hold dearest to my broken heart.
I called Sausage Boy and told him I was done. He warmly congratulated me. “Is Little’s black cat of bad fortune on you forever? Was it worth the traffic accident you don’t remember and might land you in jail?” he asked. “Was it worth the derepression of traumatic memories of the human oddities you outraged and the customer you assaulted with a hot dog at Six Flags? What impassions you now? What calls you?”
I had no answer. I had gone so high. Maybe … I called Sausage Boy repeatedly for guidance in the weeks that followed and never heard back from him. Finally, the doorbell rang one day, and there was a black cat on the front porch with a weenie between its teeth. It was time to start over. —CL—
Screamin’ Weenies, 1271 Glenwood Ave. (rear of Banshee), 404-428-2034, open 11:30 a.m.-3:30 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. only, @screaminweeniesatlanta
Grindhouse Killer Burgers, 701 Memorial Drive S.E., 404-228-3722, grindhouseburgers.com.
The Varsity, 61 North Ave. N.W., 404-881-1706, https://www.thevarsity.com/
Little’s Food Store, 198 Carroll St. S.E., 404-963-7012, https://www.littlesfoodstore.com/
Carrot Dog, 680 Murphy Ave., 404-447-8451, open 12-4 p.m. Saturdays, kemibennings.com, Kemi Bennings @carrotdogatl
Hot Dog Pete’s, 25 Georgia Ave., 470-369-6777, hotdogpetes.com, @hotdogpetes
The Original Hot Dog Factory, 75 Piedmont Ave., 404-907-4133, theoriginalhotdogfactory.com
Skip’s Chicago Dogs, 48 N. Avondale Road, Avondale Estates, 404-292-6703, skipschicagodogs.com"
["tracker_field_contentWikiPage_raw"]=>
string(24754) "It was a day that I should have named the Weenie Apocalypse. It was July 11, 1979, and I was in Gibsonton, Florida, outside Tampa. On that day, the whole world was crazy. The 77-ton Skylab space station was set to crash to earth. The fear that it would miss its target, the Indian Ocean, and create random hellfire turned it into the favored party theme everywhere that year.
I went to one such impromptu party that day in Gibsonton, which was famous as the summer residence of the nation’s “carnies” — people who work for the carnivals that move all around America most of the year. My particular motivation for spending a few weeks there was to hang out with sideshow performers, especially the stars of so-called freak shows — “human oddities” — for a story I was writing. Unfortunately, it was difficult to penetrate that community unless I combined obsequiousness with drunkenness. I’ll spare you the details, but I ended up drunk behind the trailer of a famous freak, grilling burgers and hot dogs. It was a big deal for an outsider to be included by carnies.
The host brought me a hot dog and I balked. “Thanks, but I don’t eat those.”
I might as well have dropped the Skylab on the festival. Everyone went silent. “You said you love carnivals and you don’t eat hot dogs? Why don’t you eat them?”
“They make me sick. Ever since I was a kid, they’ve made me sick. It’s nothing personal. They make me sick, man.” I laughed drunkenly. “It’s like you’d be hit right here by a gut bomb instead of a space station. Haha.” Nobody laughed.
Thus did I brand myself a human oddity among professional human oddities. Truly, as long as I can remember, I would not eat the scrap meat ground and compressed into the gruesome treat wrapped in spongy white bread often drenched with ketchup called the hot dog. I did learn to eat some real sausages whose flavor made it worth risking a gastrointestinal catastrophe, but I have mainly avoided hot dogs my entire life ... until a few weeks ago, when I ate so many I lost count. Pathetically, I now crave them. I love them.
It wasn’t so much culinary adventure as pandemic cabin fever that led me to my new lover. True, I was intrigued when I came across promo material for a new venture in East Atlanta Village called Screamin’ Weenies. The name isn’t novel but it’s a good choice since the hot dog stand is operated on the rear patio of the very cool Banshee restaurant. Screaming is what banshees do best. It also occurred to me that hot dog joints might make a good pandemic story. I was double-vaccinated but still cautious, and I figured hot dogs are a quick, usually outdoors eat. So I took the pills I take to make scary food digestible and headed over to Screamin’ Weenies, which is open 11:30 a.m.-3:30 p.m. Thursday through Saturday.
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The patio space is small, and most people were picking up at the window of the mini-food truck where the dogs are cooked. I wanted to soak up the screamin’ vibe, so I threw my book on one of the few tiny tables available before ordering from the menu of five dogs. There was the Atlanta chili/slaw, the classic Chicago, a New Yorker with stewed onions, the classic naked that you dump everything from relish to sauerkraut on, and the day’s special Banshee Dog. I went for the latter. It included a beef hot dog over caramelized onion, flanked by sliced American cheese, topped with Thousand Island dressing pocked with chunks of dill pickle. I got all sentimental when I saw that Cheerwine, the cherry soda I drank on the Catawba River as a kid, was available.
While I swilled my Cheerwine, I watched a woman be repelled from the order window for not wearing a mask. She had left hers in the car. “Hey,” I said, “I’m double-vaccinated. You can wear mine.” She declined. Hey, it’s not like I have herpes, bitch.
I got up to fetch my dog. How do I love thee? Let me count the inches. The slim dog languidly draped itself across the roll, seriously jutting out at each end, grilled with a slight char. The ingredients were arranged with intention. I bit into one of the naked ends and got that vaunted snap from the natural lamb casing. The damn thing was delicious. The firm dog, made locally by Fripper’s, tasted like real beef and was nestled in all those creamy textures with one bit of crunch from the pickles. Damn. I wanted another but I confess I wasn’t up for paying about $20 for two dogs and a drink. But I was happy. I felt so ashamed that the young me had disparaged that hot dog long ago in Gib’town.
That very evening, I excitedly told my friend Sausage Boy about the experience. He suggested that I may not want to generalize my new happiness to every hot dog in town. For an example of irredeemable misery, he said, I would not be able to write about hot dogs in Atlanta without going to the Varsity. I gasped. “I can’t go everywhere,” I said.
He said: “The Varsity isn’t some unknown everywhere. It’s the mother of dogs, the nipple on which every Atlanta child is suckled all the way through adulthood until the grease coagulates in every artery and lands you in a coffin at a funeral celebration catered by the Varsity, the very people who killed you.”
I told him I’d think about it. I had, by the way, decided I would limit this adventure to hot dogs, not the more complicated sausages that I really did learn to love. Nor would I be eating the raw onions that overpower every other taste with which they are associated. I would, however, permit myself to sample some chili, despite my dislike of the “classic” stuff that tastes like it was poured from a can stored in a fallout shelter for 40 years.
That night I decided to try the hot dog at Grindhouse Killer Burgers. I’ve been addicted to their Apache burger ever since they first opened just over 10 years ago at the Sweet Auburn Curb Market. It has since left that location, expanding to several others, including the gigantic one on Memorial Drive that I decided to visit.
It was a Sunday night and I didn’t expect a wait. It was, after all, the Lord’s Day during a plague he had visited upon the entire world in retaliation for America’s embrace of Donald Trump. The place actually was relatively packed, and the line to order moved so slowly that, exasperated, I decided to leave and go across the parking lot to load up on Sunday specials at Supremo Taco. As I approached the window, they literally slammed the shutters closed. “Sold out!” I returned to Grindhouse, and the people in front of me earlier admitted me back to my former place. I waited literally 20 minutes total with a crowd of fellow deep-sighers and eye-rollers.
“Y’all are really slow,” I rudely said to the guy taking orders. He explained they were short-handed. Whatever. I placed my order to go and went to wait another 15 minutes at a table. When the bag arrived, I was ravenous and I decided to eat the hot dog on the premises. Grindhouse buys its dogs from legendary Vienna Beef in Chicago. I’d ordered mine with slaw, apparently the Atlanta favorite everywhere. I reached in the bag, pulled it out, and it completely fell apart in my hands. The aluminum foil I presumed was wrapping it turned out to be a loose sheet set over the top of the dog, which was in the usual cardboard cradle. I fetched the dog and bun from the floor. I swept the slaw on the table onto it. I ate it. It was actually delicious, and at $4 (including 50 cents for the slaw), it was the cheapest dog I’d eat. (I should note that the light use of aluminum foil would make the dog’s transport less steamy than full wrapping, but my piggy hands did not anticipate that.)
I began to lose track of time. The hands on my clock turned into naked weenies. Eventually, a Saturday rolled around, and I felt fortified enough to attempt the unthinkable: The Varsity. I have lived in Atlanta most of my life and I have been to this enormous cliché only three times, as I recall. Once was in high school, on the way to the Georgia/Georgia Tech game. Second was with a visiting former college roommate who later cursed himself for trusting a tourist guide. Third was with my partner’s family. All were occasions of violent protest by my innards.
I was shocked when I arrived, under the influence of GI medication, to see how crowded the place was, although I quickly found a parking space. The long line inside moved more rapidly than the bowels of the diners speeding to the bathrooms. I was happy to see that literally everyone in view was wearing a mask, except for the family of seven Appalachian refugees directly behind me. The woman in front of me surreptitiously took their picture and posted it online. “Where your masks at?” I asked Daddy Billy. He glared and pulled one of his litter close to him like a shield. “If you can use a child as your shield, you can wear a mask, dumbass.” Okay, I didn’t really say that.
I ordered the iconic crap. A chili-cheese-slaw dog, onion rings, a fried peach pie, and a Frosted Orange. I was happy to notice that I did not hear any of the counter people shrieking the classic mantra, “Whattayahave?” My order instantaneously appeared, and I toted it to the “ESPN room” where I watched the Master’s Tournament and had flashbacks to childhood of watching golf all weekend with my father. I ate.
You know what? I hate myself. I ate those gigantic, greasy onion rings in nothing flat. A young guy at a nearby table noted my speed and whined that he didn’t receive any ketchup for his rings. I tossed him my envelopes.
“Why do you people put ketchup on everything fried?” I asked him.
“Us people do that to cover up the strongest taste of the grease, dude. Duh!”
Oh my god. It makes sense because everything there does have that singular note of aged, cured frying oil, supposedly never changed for decades.
The Frosted Orange tasted like a melted Creamsicle, a bit watery but good enough to ring the bells of an ice cream truck in my head. The peach pie was fucking delicious. The hot dog of course was the most revolting thing I’ve put in my mouth since I was potty-trained. The greasy, stinky, yellow-stained chili made with ground-up mystery meat was slimed with hidden slaw from hell and yellow cheese that wouldn’t melt. Somehow, the baloney-tasting hot dog itself and its bun literally broke as if it were crying to be put out of its misery. Two bites and I was done. Sorry, dog.
I called Sausage Boy on the way home. “It wasn’t that bad,” I said. “Only the hot dog was inedible.”
“But the hot dog is the point,” he said. “You failed.”
I was okay with failing. The Lord’s Day arrived again. I decided to head to Cabbagetown to visit Little’s Food Store, where I hadn’t been in years. I used to love to visit it and neighboring Carroll Street Café but that narrow street is a nightmare to negotiate. I actually embarrassed myself by immediately finding a large parking space directly in front of Little’s, which looks like a monument to so-called outsider art. As usual, the street was full of milling residents, hanging out in a few vacant lots turned into make-shift parks.
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I went inside. My eyes teared-up seeing all the grunge, and I rushed toward the grill where I was abruptly told to step my ass back. Soon enough, I ordered a chili dog with a side of slaw and some fries. I loitered, looking around mindlessly. An employee ordered me outside, where she soon brought my food in a black Styrofoam box.
I sat on a bench outside the store and opened the box. My plan was to dump the sweet, spicy slaw on the chili dog, but that was difficult. I bit into the dog. I sighed. “I might as well face it,” I told the black cat that had suddenly appeared. “I just don’t like this super-ground version of chili that seems to be everyone’s favorite.” I dunked a limp fry in the chili and put it on the sidewalk for the presumably hungry stray. The cat sniffed and looked away. Fine. I put some slaw down. He struck it with his paw and backed away. Then he turned the corner and ran up the stairs to his apparent home. I wasn’t quite as unimpressed as the cat, who probably got sick of the food years ago, and the chili was definitely better than the Varsity’s, as was the hot dog itself, made by Fripper’s like those at Screamin’ Weenies. I ate it all. But I shuddered when I looked up and saw that Little’s flew a pirate’s flag. Between it and the black cat, I must have been bound for bad luck.
I called Sausage Boy again. “I’m becoming indiscriminate,” I said. “Everything is running together in my head. A black cat derided me for eating a chili dog today.” He proposed a solution: “Go try a vegan or vegetarian hot dog.”
Was this the bad luck the cat brought? Most of the hot dog places I investigated did offer such a thing, but how could something I have always hated be any more tolerable when imitated by healthy vegetables put to criminal use? But I decided to give it a go. I journeyed in the rain to the MET in West Atlanta. This gigantic warehouse development is home to La Bodega, a take-out pupuseria which also hosts the Window, a pop-up location for start-ups. One of those is Carrot Dog, operated by Kemi Bennings as part of her company, Food for Thought Vegan Café. She has an impressive resume of feeding celebrities and brands herself a “renaissance woman and creative badass.”
When I first saw Carrot Dog during an earlier visit to review Bodega, I was thoroughly repulsed. I don’t really like carrots, and at the time I still really loathed even the thought of a hot dog. I’m going to be hated for saying this, but I ended up telling myself that this ridiculous creation was my favorite hot dog. I don’t know if that’s fair. Calling a carrot a weenie may be too oxymoronic even for this dying world.
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Bennings brines fat carrots in countless spices before cooking them. The carrots have just the right texture. They aren’t mushy like the ones your mother serves with pot roast, and they aren’t raw and unseasoned like people who claim they improve vision want them to be. These are nestled into slightly grilled buns and then dressed in a variety of ways. I chose a “Southern Santa Fe” specialty dog. The carrot is covered with chopped romaine lettuce, sliced avocado, smoked chipotle vegan mayo, chopped onions (which I declined), and, um, vegan bacon. Alright, I admit that the best thing about the tiny flap of vegan bacon was that it was completely inconspicuous with no noticeable taste or texture. I actually would have preferred more heat from the chipotle mayo, but this creation was a huge relief from everything I’d eaten. I think the effect was like eating dog food for weeks and then being served a fresh salad. Whatever, it was really good and only available Saturdays.
But I was still hungry.
Shamefully, on the way home, I decided to pay a second quick visit to Hot Dog Pete’s in Summerhill. I had tried takeout with a friend last summer and wasn’t impressed enough to eat more than a couple of bites of the two dogs we ordered. The menu includes sausages as well as an all-beef wiener and one made with beef and pork. They are all made by Fritz’s Meat & Superior Sausage in Kansas City. Pete’s shares ownership and patios with the oddly named Hero Doughnuts & Buns. More than doughnuts, Hero is known for its sandwiches made with house-baked brioche buns. The fried pork chop, the “Super Crunch” chicken, and the burger are all as addictive as the name of the house’s secret sauce — “crack sauce” — suggests.
To stay consistent, I ordered an all-beef hot dog with chili and slaw. The big difference here is slaw made with collards and a brioche bun from Alon’s that earns our highly coveted Best of the Buns Award. Everything about this dog was savory — even the chili, despite one flaw: weirdly dry beans. But I’ll gladly deal with that in exchange for not having to deal with the over-seasoned greasy stuff that most seem to prefer.
Time ticked on. I was growing tired of this adventure. I called Sausage Boy and told him I felt I needed to get to two more places — the Original Hot Dog Factory and Skip’s Chicago Dogs. “I need encouragement,” I told him. “Last night I dreamed I was back in Gibsonton and Lobster Boy murdered me.” The Sausage told me he had faith in me. I hung up the phone and got in my car and headed to the Original Hot Dog Factory on Piedmont Avenue. It’s technically on the Georgia State University campus.
About four hours later I was looking up from a bed and had no idea where I was. A doctor explained that I was in the Emory Midtown Hospital emergency room. I had been in a car wreck. I was completely uninjured, but I was in a state of total amnesia. I remembered nothing of the last hours. “What is wrong with me?” I asked.
“We’re not sure,” he said.
“It’s the hot dogs,” I said.
“What?”
“Never mind.”
He wanted me to stay overnight for examination the next morning by a neurologist. However, Kaiser, my insurance company, insisted that I be discharged (and it took over a week to get an appointment with them). The next morning, I Ubered to pick up my car at the city lot where it had been towed. I expected it to be damaged, but it was not. “Are you okay?” one of the employees out front asked me.
“I need a hot dog.”
I got in my car and drove directly to the Original Hot Dog Factory. I wasn’t sure if I had actually been there or not. I only knew that my accident, which involved another car, was in the immediate area. The restaurant, part of a chain, was empty except for me and two employees.
“Hey,” I said, “did y’all happen to see an accident near here yesterday?” They said they had not. “Well, what about me? Did I eat here?” They looked a bit perturbed. “Never mind,” I said. With the advice of one of the employees, I ordered the all-beef Hawaiian dog. I also forced myself to do the unthinkable and order the second corn dog of my life.
As I had come to realize by this point, there is no such thing as a hot dog with too much topping. The Hawaiian dog’s included a gigantic load of bacon, cheese, lightly grilled onions, and lots of grilled pineapple. In other words, it was the weenie version of the Hawaiian pizza which I usually detest, but it was the perfect mindless food for the amnesiac I had become. I figured I’d forget it by the time I got home. Obviously, I didn’t. I do congratulate myself for being able to eat the mess without resorting to a knife and fork. Hot dogs have made me a master of finger food.
I don’t know exactly why the concept of a corn dog disgusts me. The only one I remember ever eating was on a dare at Dakota Blue in Grant Park about five years ago, and I actually kind of liked it. My corn dog at The Hot Dog Factory looked like a bulbous fried sex toy. I nervously bit into it and was surprised by a rush of crispy, juicy sweetness. The all-beef dog retained its earthy flavor. Yeah, boy!
I decided I needed to try a dessert. This causes me a great deal of shame, and I blame it on my brain-rattling accident. I ate a fried Twinkie. I can say with absolute certainty that I have never eaten a Twinkie in any form, although I was tempted in the late ’70s when Dan White supposedly blamed eating too many Twinkies for his assassination of San Francisco Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk. This was labeled the “Twinkie Defense.” I have no viable defense of my decision to eat the deep-fried mess at the Hot Dog Factory, but it was spectacularly delicious, like a fist full of creamy melting cake oozing all kinds of white stuff inside sugar-coated crispy batter. It made the glazed donut at Krispy Kreme seem so pathetic.
I shared this discovery with Sausage Boy, explaining that I was starting to doubt my taste. He acknowledged my worry but urged me to be kinder to myself. I told him the Twinkie had awakened a memory of working at Six Flags Over Georgia when I was 16. How had I forgotten that I worked in a hot dog stand? How had I forgotten how much I hated the customers who acted like they were buying delicacies instead of shitloads of crap I barely cooked on a griddle? How had I forgotten that throwing a hot dog at a customer and shoving him with a broom handle had nearly gotten me fired? Obviously, the hot dog — foe of my digestion and weapon against redneck assholes — was intimately connected to the PTSD I never knew I suffered. “Be strong,” Sausage Boy told me. “You’re at the end.”
Onward! Wednesday arrived. That’s the day I resumed my years-long weekly lunch with two fully vaccinated friends. We drove to 40-year-old Skip’s Chicago Dogs in Avondale, probably the venue most hot dog lovers mentioned to me when I asked for recommendations. It looks like your usual fast-food place with mustard-and-ketchup-colored walls hung with sports stuff. Despite the name, sandwiches and burgers outnumber the hot dogs, which are made with Vienna beef.
In my little sampling of hot dogs over the years, the Chicago style has usually been the most appetizing. Skip’s dog, according to the menu, is typically topped with pickles, peppers, celery salt, mustard, relish, and tomatoes. Sorry, Skip, but my dog was a low-class version. I found none of the juicy-hot sport pickles that I love. The huge strip of dill pickle overwhelmed everything. The tomatoes were pink and flavorless. What am I missing, people?
By way of comparison to the Varsity, with which everyone positively compared it, I also ordered onion rings and a chili-slaw dog. The rings weren’t bad, but they were anemically skinny compared to the Varsity’s (and, granted, a ton less greasy). While no chili anywhere on the planet is as vile as the Varsity’s, Skip’s was totally meh, and the slaw tasted straight out of the Kroger deli bin. My friends did no better with their orders. I expected this to be the grand finale of my tour. But it was more like a return to vapidity. I felt my lust for hot dogs deflating, and, looking back, it was the dogs at Screamin’ Weenies and Carrot Dog that I hold dearest to my broken heart.
I called Sausage Boy and told him I was done. He warmly congratulated me. “Is Little’s black cat of bad fortune on you forever? Was it worth the traffic accident you don’t remember and might land you in jail?” he asked. “Was it worth the derepression of traumatic memories of the human oddities you outraged and the customer you assaulted with a hot dog at Six Flags? What impassions you now? What calls you?”
I had no answer. I had gone so high. Maybe … I called Sausage Boy repeatedly for guidance in the weeks that followed and never heard back from him. Finally, the doorbell rang one day, and there was a black cat on the front porch with a weenie between its teeth. It was time to start over. __—CL—__
''Screamin’ Weenies, 1271 Glenwood Ave. (rear of Banshee), 404-428-2034, open 11:30 a.m.-3:30 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. only, @screaminweeniesatlanta''
''Grindhouse Killer Burgers, 701 Memorial Drive S.E., 404-228-3722, grindhouseburgers.com.''
''The Varsity, 61 North Ave. N.W., 404-881-1706, [https://www.thevarsity.com/]''
''Little’s Food Store, 198 Carroll St. S.E., 404-963-7012, [https://www.littlesfoodstore.com/]''
''Carrot Dog, 680 Murphy Ave., 404-447-8451, open 12-4 p.m. Saturdays, kemibennings.com, @foodforthoughtvegancafe @carrotdogatl''
''Hot Dog Pete’s, 25 Georgia Ave., 470-369-6777, [https://www.hotdogpetes.com/|hotdogpetes.com], @hotdogpetes''
''The Original Hot Dog Factory, 75 Piedmont Ave., 404-907-4133, [https://theoriginalhotdogfactory.com/|theoriginalhotdogfactory.com]''
''Skip’s Chicago Dogs, 48 N. Avondale Road, Avondale Estates, 404-292-6703, [https://www.skipschicagodogs.com/|skipschicagodogs.com]''"
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string(25001) " #1 Screamin Reduced 2021-05-03T16:37:15+00:00 #1_Screamin_reduced.jpg If you haven't tried Sahlen's hot dogs (they only sell them at Publix) then your research is incomplete. They are a 3rd generation owned family affair that have been making their own dogs in Western New York for that long. They are far superior to any other dogs. The only kind I buy now for my home grill. They used to be at Barker's Red Hots on Windy Hill that has since closed. grazing hot dogs Grazing surveys some Atlanta hot dogs #1 Screamin Reduced 2021-05-03T16:42:23+00:00 GRAZING: Hot dogs, sideshow freaks, black cats, amnesia, and Sausage Boy jim.harris Jim Harris Cliff Bostock 2021-05-03T16:42:23+00:00 It was a day that I should have named the Weenie Apocalypse. It was July 11, 1979, and I was in Gibsonton, Florida, outside Tampa. On that day, the whole world was crazy. The 77-ton Skylab space station was set to crash to earth. The fear that it would miss its target, the Indian Ocean, and create random hellfire turned it into the favored party theme everywhere that year.
I went to one such impromptu party that day in Gibsonton, which was famous as the summer residence of the nation’s “carnies” — people who work for the carnivals that move all around America most of the year. My particular motivation for spending a few weeks there was to hang out with sideshow performers, especially the stars of so-called freak shows — “human oddities” — for a story I was writing. Unfortunately, it was difficult to penetrate that community unless I combined obsequiousness with drunkenness. I’ll spare you the details, but I ended up drunk behind the trailer of a famous freak, grilling burgers and hot dogs. It was a big deal for an outsider to be included by carnies.
The host brought me a hot dog and I balked. “Thanks, but I don’t eat those.”
I might as well have dropped the Skylab on the festival. Everyone went silent. “You said you love carnivals and you don’t eat hot dogs? Why don’t you eat them?”
“They make me sick. Ever since I was a kid, they’ve made me sick. It’s nothing personal. They make me sick, man.” I laughed drunkenly. “It’s like you’d be hit right here by a gut bomb instead of a space station. Haha.” Nobody laughed.
Thus did I brand myself a human oddity among professional human oddities. Truly, as long as I can remember, I would not eat the scrap meat ground and compressed into the gruesome treat wrapped in spongy white bread often drenched with ketchup called the hot dog. I did learn to eat some real sausages whose flavor made it worth risking a gastrointestinal catastrophe, but I have mainly avoided hot dogs my entire life ... until a few weeks ago, when I ate so many I lost count. Pathetically, I now crave them. I love them.
It wasn’t so much culinary adventure as pandemic cabin fever that led me to my new lover. True, I was intrigued when I came across promo material for a new venture in East Atlanta Village called Screamin’ Weenies. The name isn’t novel but it’s a good choice since the hot dog stand is operated on the rear patio of the very cool Banshee restaurant. Screaming is what banshees do best. It also occurred to me that hot dog joints might make a good pandemic story. I was double-vaccinated but still cautious, and I figured hot dogs are a quick, usually outdoors eat. So I took the pills I take to make scary food digestible and headed over to Screamin’ Weenies, which is open 11:30 a.m.-3:30 p.m. Thursday through Saturday.
The patio space is small, and most people were picking up at the window of the mini-food truck where the dogs are cooked. I wanted to soak up the screamin’ vibe, so I threw my book on one of the few tiny tables available before ordering from the menu of five dogs. There was the Atlanta chili/slaw, the classic Chicago, a New Yorker with stewed onions, the classic naked that you dump everything from relish to sauerkraut on, and the day’s special Banshee Dog. I went for the latter. It included a beef hot dog over caramelized onion, flanked by sliced American cheese, topped with Thousand Island dressing pocked with chunks of dill pickle. I got all sentimental when I saw that Cheerwine, the cherry soda I drank on the Catawba River as a kid, was available.
While I swilled my Cheerwine, I watched a woman be repelled from the order window for not wearing a mask. She had left hers in the car. “Hey,” I said, “I’m double-vaccinated. You can wear mine.” She declined. Hey, it’s not like I have herpes, bitch.
I got up to fetch my dog. How do I love thee? Let me count the inches. The slim dog languidly draped itself across the roll, seriously jutting out at each end, grilled with a slight char. The ingredients were arranged with intention. I bit into one of the naked ends and got that vaunted snap from the natural lamb casing. The damn thing was delicious. The firm dog, made locally by Fripper’s, tasted like real beef and was nestled in all those creamy textures with one bit of crunch from the pickles. Damn. I wanted another but I confess I wasn’t up for paying about $20 for two dogs and a drink. But I was happy. I felt so ashamed that the young me had disparaged that hot dog long ago in Gib’town.
That very evening, I excitedly told my friend Sausage Boy about the experience. He suggested that I may not want to generalize my new happiness to every hot dog in town. For an example of irredeemable misery, he said, I would not be able to write about hot dogs in Atlanta without going to the Varsity. I gasped. “I can’t go everywhere,” I said.
He said: “The Varsity isn’t some unknown everywhere. It’s the mother of dogs, the nipple on which every Atlanta child is suckled all the way through adulthood until the grease coagulates in every artery and lands you in a coffin at a funeral celebration catered by the Varsity, the very people who killed you.”
I told him I’d think about it. I had, by the way, decided I would limit this adventure to hot dogs, not the more complicated sausages that I really did learn to love. Nor would I be eating the raw onions that overpower every other taste with which they are associated. I would, however, permit myself to sample some chili, despite my dislike of the “classic” stuff that tastes like it was poured from a can stored in a fallout shelter for 40 years.
That night I decided to try the hot dog at Grindhouse Killer Burgers. I’ve been addicted to their Apache burger ever since they first opened just over 10 years ago at the Sweet Auburn Curb Market. It has since left that location, expanding to several others, including the gigantic one on Memorial Drive that I decided to visit.
It was a Sunday night and I didn’t expect a wait. It was, after all, the Lord’s Day during a plague he had visited upon the entire world in retaliation for America’s embrace of Donald Trump. The place actually was relatively packed, and the line to order moved so slowly that, exasperated, I decided to leave and go across the parking lot to load up on Sunday specials at Supremo Taco. As I approached the window, they literally slammed the shutters closed. “Sold out!” I returned to Grindhouse, and the people in front of me earlier admitted me back to my former place. I waited literally 20 minutes total with a crowd of fellow deep-sighers and eye-rollers.
“Y’all are really slow,” I rudely said to the guy taking orders. He explained they were short-handed. Whatever. I placed my order to go and went to wait another 15 minutes at a table. When the bag arrived, I was ravenous and I decided to eat the hot dog on the premises. Grindhouse buys its dogs from legendary Vienna Beef in Chicago. I’d ordered mine with slaw, apparently the Atlanta favorite everywhere. I reached in the bag, pulled it out, and it completely fell apart in my hands. The aluminum foil I presumed was wrapping it turned out to be a loose sheet set over the top of the dog, which was in the usual cardboard cradle. I fetched the dog and bun from the floor. I swept the slaw on the table onto it. I ate it. It was actually delicious, and at $4 (including 50 cents for the slaw), it was the cheapest dog I’d eat. (I should note that the light use of aluminum foil would make the dog’s transport less steamy than full wrapping, but my piggy hands did not anticipate that.)
I began to lose track of time. The hands on my clock turned into naked weenies. Eventually, a Saturday rolled around, and I felt fortified enough to attempt the unthinkable: The Varsity. I have lived in Atlanta most of my life and I have been to this enormous cliché only three times, as I recall. Once was in high school, on the way to the Georgia/Georgia Tech game. Second was with a visiting former college roommate who later cursed himself for trusting a tourist guide. Third was with my partner’s family. All were occasions of violent protest by my innards.
I was shocked when I arrived, under the influence of GI medication, to see how crowded the place was, although I quickly found a parking space. The long line inside moved more rapidly than the bowels of the diners speeding to the bathrooms. I was happy to see that literally everyone in view was wearing a mask, except for the family of seven Appalachian refugees directly behind me. The woman in front of me surreptitiously took their picture and posted it online. “Where your masks at?” I asked Daddy Billy. He glared and pulled one of his litter close to him like a shield. “If you can use a child as your shield, you can wear a mask, dumbass.” Okay, I didn’t really say that.
I ordered the iconic crap. A chili-cheese-slaw dog, onion rings, a fried peach pie, and a Frosted Orange. I was happy to notice that I did not hear any of the counter people shrieking the classic mantra, “Whattayahave?” My order instantaneously appeared, and I toted it to the “ESPN room” where I watched the Master’s Tournament and had flashbacks to childhood of watching golf all weekend with my father. I ate.
You know what? I hate myself. I ate those gigantic, greasy onion rings in nothing flat. A young guy at a nearby table noted my speed and whined that he didn’t receive any ketchup for his rings. I tossed him my envelopes.
“Why do you people put ketchup on everything fried?” I asked him.
“Us people do that to cover up the strongest taste of the grease, dude. Duh!”
Oh my god. It makes sense because everything there does have that singular note of aged, cured frying oil, supposedly never changed for decades.
The Frosted Orange tasted like a melted Creamsicle, a bit watery but good enough to ring the bells of an ice cream truck in my head. The peach pie was fucking delicious. The hot dog of course was the most revolting thing I’ve put in my mouth since I was potty-trained. The greasy, stinky, yellow-stained chili made with ground-up mystery meat was slimed with hidden slaw from hell and yellow cheese that wouldn’t melt. Somehow, the baloney-tasting hot dog itself and its bun literally broke as if it were crying to be put out of its misery. Two bites and I was done. Sorry, dog.
I called Sausage Boy on the way home. “It wasn’t that bad,” I said. “Only the hot dog was inedible.”
“But the hot dog is the point,” he said. “You failed.”
I was okay with failing. The Lord’s Day arrived again. I decided to head to Cabbagetown to visit Little’s Food Store, where I hadn’t been in years. I used to love to visit it and neighboring Carroll Street Café but that narrow street is a nightmare to negotiate. I actually embarrassed myself by immediately finding a large parking space directly in front of Little’s, which looks like a monument to so-called outsider art. As usual, the street was full of milling residents, hanging out in a few vacant lots turned into make-shift parks.
I went inside. My eyes teared-up seeing all the grunge, and I rushed toward the grill where I was abruptly told to step my ass back. Soon enough, I ordered a chili dog with a side of slaw and some fries. I loitered, looking around mindlessly. An employee ordered me outside, where she soon brought my food in a black Styrofoam box.
I sat on a bench outside the store and opened the box. My plan was to dump the sweet, spicy slaw on the chili dog, but that was difficult. I bit into the dog. I sighed. “I might as well face it,” I told the black cat that had suddenly appeared. “I just don’t like this super-ground version of chili that seems to be everyone’s favorite.” I dunked a limp fry in the chili and put it on the sidewalk for the presumably hungry stray. The cat sniffed and looked away. Fine. I put some slaw down. He struck it with his paw and backed away. Then he turned the corner and ran up the stairs to his apparent home. I wasn’t quite as unimpressed as the cat, who probably got sick of the food years ago, and the chili was definitely better than the Varsity’s, as was the hot dog itself, made by Fripper’s like those at Screamin’ Weenies. I ate it all. But I shuddered when I looked up and saw that Little’s flew a pirate’s flag. Between it and the black cat, I must have been bound for bad luck.
I called Sausage Boy again. “I’m becoming indiscriminate,” I said. “Everything is running together in my head. A black cat derided me for eating a chili dog today.” He proposed a solution: “Go try a vegan or vegetarian hot dog.”
Was this the bad luck the cat brought? Most of the hot dog places I investigated did offer such a thing, but how could something I have always hated be any more tolerable when imitated by healthy vegetables put to criminal use? But I decided to give it a go. I journeyed in the rain to the MET in West Atlanta. This gigantic warehouse development is home to La Bodega, a take-out pupuseria which also hosts the Window, a pop-up location for start-ups. One of those is Carrot Dog, operated by Kemi Bennings as part of her company, Food for Thought Vegan Café. She has an impressive resume of feeding celebrities and brands herself a “renaissance woman and creative badass.”
When I first saw Carrot Dog during an earlier visit to review Bodega, I was thoroughly repulsed. I don’t really like carrots, and at the time I still really loathed even the thought of a hot dog. I’m going to be hated for saying this, but I ended up telling myself that this ridiculous creation was my favorite hot dog. I don’t know if that’s fair. Calling a carrot a weenie may be too oxymoronic even for this dying world.
Bennings brines fat carrots in countless spices before cooking them. The carrots have just the right texture. They aren’t mushy like the ones your mother serves with pot roast, and they aren’t raw and unseasoned like people who claim they improve vision want them to be. These are nestled into slightly grilled buns and then dressed in a variety of ways. I chose a “Southern Santa Fe” specialty dog. The carrot is covered with chopped romaine lettuce, sliced avocado, smoked chipotle vegan mayo, chopped onions (which I declined), and, um, vegan bacon. Alright, I admit that the best thing about the tiny flap of vegan bacon was that it was completely inconspicuous with no noticeable taste or texture. I actually would have preferred more heat from the chipotle mayo, but this creation was a huge relief from everything I’d eaten. I think the effect was like eating dog food for weeks and then being served a fresh salad. Whatever, it was really good and only available Saturdays.
But I was still hungry.
Shamefully, on the way home, I decided to pay a second quick visit to Hot Dog Pete’s in Summerhill. I had tried takeout with a friend last summer and wasn’t impressed enough to eat more than a couple of bites of the two dogs we ordered. The menu includes sausages as well as an all-beef wiener and one made with beef and pork. They are all made by Fritz’s Meat & Superior Sausage in Kansas City. Pete’s shares ownership and patios with the oddly named Hero Doughnuts & Buns. More than doughnuts, Hero is known for its sandwiches made with house-baked brioche buns. The fried pork chop, the “Super Crunch” chicken, and the burger are all as addictive as the name of the house’s secret sauce — “crack sauce” — suggests.
To stay consistent, I ordered an all-beef hot dog with chili and slaw. The big difference here is slaw made with collards and a brioche bun from Alon’s that earns our highly coveted Best of the Buns Award. Everything about this dog was savory — even the chili, despite one flaw: weirdly dry beans. But I’ll gladly deal with that in exchange for not having to deal with the over-seasoned greasy stuff that most seem to prefer.
Time ticked on. I was growing tired of this adventure. I called Sausage Boy and told him I felt I needed to get to two more places — the Original Hot Dog Factory and Skip’s Chicago Dogs. “I need encouragement,” I told him. “Last night I dreamed I was back in Gibsonton and Lobster Boy murdered me.” The Sausage told me he had faith in me. I hung up the phone and got in my car and headed to the Original Hot Dog Factory on Piedmont Avenue. It’s technically on the Georgia State University campus.
About four hours later I was looking up from a bed and had no idea where I was. A doctor explained that I was in the Emory Midtown Hospital emergency room. I had been in a car wreck. I was completely uninjured, but I was in a state of total amnesia. I remembered nothing of the last hours. “What is wrong with me?” I asked.
“We’re not sure,” he said.
“It’s the hot dogs,” I said.
“What?”
“Never mind.”
He wanted me to stay overnight for examination the next morning by a neurologist. However, Kaiser, my insurance company, insisted that I be discharged (and it took over a week to get an appointment with them). The next morning, I Ubered to pick up my car at the city lot where it had been towed. I expected it to be damaged, but it was not. “Are you okay?” one of the employees out front asked me.
“I need a hot dog.”
I got in my car and drove directly to the Original Hot Dog Factory. I wasn’t sure if I had actually been there or not. I only knew that my accident, which involved another car, was in the immediate area. The restaurant, part of a chain, was empty except for me and two employees.
“Hey,” I said, “did y’all happen to see an accident near here yesterday?” They said they had not. “Well, what about me? Did I eat here?” They looked a bit perturbed. “Never mind,” I said. With the advice of one of the employees, I ordered the all-beef Hawaiian dog. I also forced myself to do the unthinkable and order the second corn dog of my life.
As I had come to realize by this point, there is no such thing as a hot dog with too much topping. The Hawaiian dog’s included a gigantic load of bacon, cheese, lightly grilled onions, and lots of grilled pineapple. In other words, it was the weenie version of the Hawaiian pizza which I usually detest, but it was the perfect mindless food for the amnesiac I had become. I figured I’d forget it by the time I got home. Obviously, I didn’t. I do congratulate myself for being able to eat the mess without resorting to a knife and fork. Hot dogs have made me a master of finger food.
I don’t know exactly why the concept of a corn dog disgusts me. The only one I remember ever eating was on a dare at Dakota Blue in Grant Park about five years ago, and I actually kind of liked it. My corn dog at The Hot Dog Factory looked like a bulbous fried sex toy. I nervously bit into it and was surprised by a rush of crispy, juicy sweetness. The all-beef dog retained its earthy flavor. Yeah, boy!
I decided I needed to try a dessert. This causes me a great deal of shame, and I blame it on my brain-rattling accident. I ate a fried Twinkie. I can say with absolute certainty that I have never eaten a Twinkie in any form, although I was tempted in the late ’70s when Dan White supposedly blamed eating too many Twinkies for his assassination of San Francisco Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk. This was labeled the “Twinkie Defense.” I have no viable defense of my decision to eat the deep-fried mess at the Hot Dog Factory, but it was spectacularly delicious, like a fist full of creamy melting cake oozing all kinds of white stuff inside sugar-coated crispy batter. It made the glazed donut at Krispy Kreme seem so pathetic.
I shared this discovery with Sausage Boy, explaining that I was starting to doubt my taste. He acknowledged my worry but urged me to be kinder to myself. I told him the Twinkie had awakened a memory of working at Six Flags Over Georgia when I was 16. How had I forgotten that I worked in a hot dog stand? How had I forgotten how much I hated the customers who acted like they were buying delicacies instead of shitloads of crap I barely cooked on a griddle? How had I forgotten that throwing a hot dog at a customer and shoving him with a broom handle had nearly gotten me fired? Obviously, the hot dog — foe of my digestion and weapon against redneck assholes — was intimately connected to the PTSD I never knew I suffered. “Be strong,” Sausage Boy told me. “You’re at the end.”
Onward! Wednesday arrived. That’s the day I resumed my years-long weekly lunch with two fully vaccinated friends. We drove to 40-year-old Skip’s Chicago Dogs in Avondale, probably the venue most hot dog lovers mentioned to me when I asked for recommendations. It looks like your usual fast-food place with mustard-and-ketchup-colored walls hung with sports stuff. Despite the name, sandwiches and burgers outnumber the hot dogs, which are made with Vienna beef.
In my little sampling of hot dogs over the years, the Chicago style has usually been the most appetizing. Skip’s dog, according to the menu, is typically topped with pickles, peppers, celery salt, mustard, relish, and tomatoes. Sorry, Skip, but my dog was a low-class version. I found none of the juicy-hot sport pickles that I love. The huge strip of dill pickle overwhelmed everything. The tomatoes were pink and flavorless. What am I missing, people?
By way of comparison to the Varsity, with which everyone positively compared it, I also ordered onion rings and a chili-slaw dog. The rings weren’t bad, but they were anemically skinny compared to the Varsity’s (and, granted, a ton less greasy). While no chili anywhere on the planet is as vile as the Varsity’s, Skip’s was totally meh, and the slaw tasted straight out of the Kroger deli bin. My friends did no better with their orders. I expected this to be the grand finale of my tour. But it was more like a return to vapidity. I felt my lust for hot dogs deflating, and, looking back, it was the dogs at Screamin’ Weenies and Carrot Dog that I hold dearest to my broken heart.
I called Sausage Boy and told him I was done. He warmly congratulated me. “Is Little’s black cat of bad fortune on you forever? Was it worth the traffic accident you don’t remember and might land you in jail?” he asked. “Was it worth the derepression of traumatic memories of the human oddities you outraged and the customer you assaulted with a hot dog at Six Flags? What impassions you now? What calls you?”
I had no answer. I had gone so high. Maybe … I called Sausage Boy repeatedly for guidance in the weeks that followed and never heard back from him. Finally, the doorbell rang one day, and there was a black cat on the front porch with a weenie between its teeth. It was time to start over. —CL—
Screamin’ Weenies, 1271 Glenwood Ave. (rear of Banshee), 404-428-2034, open 11:30 a.m.-3:30 p.m. Thurs.-Sat. only, @screaminweeniesatlanta
Grindhouse Killer Burgers, 701 Memorial Drive S.E., 404-228-3722, grindhouseburgers.com.
The Varsity, 61 North Ave. N.W., 404-881-1706, https://www.thevarsity.com/
Little’s Food Store, 198 Carroll St. S.E., 404-963-7012, https://www.littlesfoodstore.com/
Carrot Dog, 680 Murphy Ave., 404-447-8451, open 12-4 p.m. Saturdays, kemibennings.com, Kemi Bennings @carrotdogatl
Hot Dog Pete’s, 25 Georgia Ave., 470-369-6777, hotdogpetes.com, @hotdogpetes
The Original Hot Dog Factory, 75 Piedmont Ave., 404-907-4133, theoriginalhotdogfactory.com
Skip’s Chicago Dogs, 48 N. Avondale Road, Avondale Estates, 404-292-6703, skipschicagodogs.com Cliff Bostock TOP DOG: SCREAMIN' WEENIES' RECENT WEEKLY SPECIAL, AN INCOMPARABLE DOG FROM FRIPPER'S GRILLED AND SERVED OVER CARAMELIZED ONIONS AND DECORATED WITH THOUSAND ISLAND DRESSING, PICKLES, AND AMERICAN CHEESE. 0,0,10 grazing "hot dogs" GRAZING: Hot dogs, sideshow freaks, black cats, amnesia, and Sausage Boy "
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GRAZING: Hot dogs, sideshow freaks, black cats, amnesia, and Sausage Boy Article
Monday May 3, 2021 12:42 PM EDT
Grazing surveys some Atlanta hot dogs
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string(10403) "I did it! I was vaccinated into super-human immunity and now I can stare into the naked faces of super-spreaders and say, “You’re not going to kill me! In fact, you’re not going to kill anyone but yourself, your friends, and your family!” It’s a really good feeling to say that. And I’m indebted to Kroger and Moderna for making it possible.
That said, supposedly being over 90 percent immune to COVID-19 has not inclined me to eat inside restaurants. However, last month I went to two restaurants, expecting to do takeout or maybe patio dining, but found their interior dining rooms empty. So, I made the leap into the swarming sea of variants.
First up is Botica, which opened in January in the space formerly occupied by Watershed. I balked when I walked by the restaurant’s patio. Its 100 seats were packed with noisy, unmasked, boozy diners. The bar area inside seemed nearly as crowded. A server pointed to the large, empty dining room adjacent to the bar and I followed her there. I did ask why masks apparently weren’t required by the restaurant, and she answered with a long silence, then offered to teach me how to take a picture with my phone and store it on an app. I told her I already knew how to do that. She said that was great. I agreed.
Botica is the creation of well-known Atlanta chef/restaurateur Mimmo Alboumeh, who formerly owned the three locations of Red Pepper Taqueria. While it’s too bad he’s not running the show there any longer, Botica’s cuisine is a big step forward. Alboumeh’s main theme remains Mexican, but he’s gently hybridizing it with his personal heritage, which includes a childhood in Lebanon and Spain, plus adult residency in Italy before moving here.
While Botica’s menu includes a few surprises, the main attraction is the “D.F. Streets Inspired Tacos” which are super trendy in Atlanta these days. “D.F.” stands for “Distrito Federal” which refers to Mexico City. In other words, they aren’t Tex-Mex or Southwestern or Taco Bell colon-cleansing snacks. I was at Botica for a quick meal, so I didn’t get a broad sampling of the menu and stuck to a couple of taco classics — the pork pibil and the lamb birria. If you read foodie peregrinations (like this one), you already know birria is an “it food.” It’s a stew typically made with goat (in my experience) but lamb is also common (and it’s my favorite meat). I’m tempted to say Botica’s is the best version on a taco I’ve encountered in the city. The lamb is shredded and juicy, complemented by a fruity, mild guajillo salsa. Garbanzos add a slightly nutty touch. The taco is accompanied by a shot of rather light consommé. Typically, people dip the taco in it. I suggest you pour half of it over the meat and add a squeeze of lime. Birria is a stew, and while I love tacos made with it, they do not capture the entire range of flavors.
My other taco was pork pibil, which you may remember was Johnny Depp’s obsession in Once Upon a Time in Mexico. The usual name is “cochinita pibil” which signifies that it’s made with a suckling pig, so I’m assuming Botica’s is made with a grown-up. I also doubt that it’s cooked in the ground, wrapped in banana leaves, like it is in Yucatan. But it’s fine as hell. I wanted to try it because it’s served here under a green salsa that’s tart and citric, zapped with pickled onions.
Altogether, there are 10 tacos on the menu. The only one I saw that had a decidedly fusion quality was one made with falafel. Default tortillas at Botica are flour, but corn are sometimes available. At $4 each they are a bargain, and any normal human will find two more than adequate with a shared appetizer.
Speaking of appetizers, I was expecting to see tapas on the menu here, given Alboumeh’s background. Instead, there are appetizers that feed two or more. In Spain, these would be called media raciones, and they are much more appropriate since a true tapa is only a bite or two composed for one person. Noticing this, I also began to wonder exactly where the Spanish influence was at Botica. I asked my server, and she pointed at the “Spanish octopus” appetizer on my menu. “That’s it?” I asked. She nodded. The next day, looking at the restaurant’s Facebook page, I saw that Alboumeh is preparing paella on a patio grill every Wednesday. Take a look. You’ll be there ASAP.
Of the 12 appetizers, I chose a pair of chicken tamales. After a brief wait in which I managed to avoid looking at all but one of the restaurant’s countless TV screens, someone brought a basket of chips and salsa to my table. I told her I had not ordered that. She looked confused. “What did you order?” she asked. “The tamales,” I said. “Just for yourself?” she replied. Huh? She left, and a few minutes later my server arrived, also with the chips in hand. Eventually, the tamales — redolent of corn, coated in crema, served over a pool of spicy salsa morita — arrived, each one roughly the size of an infant. As the server hinted, there was no way I was going to eat the whole serving, so I asked for a carry-out box.
But wait! I hadn’t noticed the desserts. I owed it to CL readers to try the bread pudding made with croissants and pineapple, topped with salted-caramel gelato, all on a bed of powdered sugar drizzled with more caramel. Were it not for a pandemic that has taught so many of us how to cultivate obesity at home, this would be enough for two or more persons. I readily devoured it, and scraped the leftover half — yes, half! — a tamale into the take-out box.
Besides appetizers, tacos, and desserts, the menu includes salads and larger plates like wild salmon, burgers, burritos, enchiladas, and fajitas. They seem clearly targeted for less adventurous palates. There’s also a decidedly more vanilla brunch menu available on weekends. And speaking of vanilla, I noticed that the tables here are not crowded with hot sauces for you to ruin Alboumeh’s deft handling of a cuisine whose flavors are far more complex than Texas Pete would have you believe. (Then again, Alboumeh does market his own “Chico” sauce.)
Botica’s décor is discernably Mexican but not showy or kitschy unless you count those innumerable TV screens. There’s no reason for me to be snarky about that, since I stared at my phone screen and texted hungry unvaccinated friends anyway. I wish it were possible to dine on Botica’s patio (or inside for that matter) with the guarantee of social distancing, but it apparently is not. I’m sure some diners’ worries in that respect are diminished by the restaurant’s prolific menu of margaritas, tequilas, wines, and signature cocktails. Being out of Xanax and not being a drinker, I would have resisted going inside had I not joined the class of the fully vaccinated.
My second dining-in meal was at Mukja in Midtown. This restaurant, opened by two longtime, 20-something pals, Peter Chung and Sean Chang, specializes in Korean fried chicken. Just like the birria at Botica, Korean fried chicken is an “it food” or maybe, better said, it’s a subcategory of the it food known as spicy fried chicken. It’s no longer hidden on Buford Highway. It’s everywhere.
Chung and Chang call their version Southern-Korean, which also describes their ethnic backgrounds. Any suspicion that might be a contrivance was dispelled by Chang during my meal. He was working the floor the day I went in for a late lunch, and we got to talking about fried chicken. I told him I was proud to say I was an advocate of Popeyes chicken long before its sandwich made the list of it foods too. Chang lit up and said he was likewise obsessed and gave me a great tip. “I always tell my friends,” he said (I’m paraphrasing), “that the best way to get a really good sandwich is to call ahead and make sure they do not have any available at the moment. That way, you might have to wait 20 minutes at the restaurant to get one, but it will be perfect.” Laugh at this, but it is so true that the piled-up, cooked-ahead sandwiches suck.
I did not order the sandwich at Mukja, just wanting to get a taste of the fried chicken. I got a quarter of a bird (white meat) with a waffle and some mac and cheese. The chicken was fabulous — unbelievably juicy due to its marinating and brining. It’s dredged and fried and fried again, as is typical. It’s as if the chicken is inside a thick, deliciously edible egg shell that shatters and seeps spicy flavor that you amp up by dipping in one of the house-made sauces. It’s served with traditional pickled radishes that cool off and clear the palate before your next bite of the chicken.
The waffles are clever. Flavor-wise, they are like classic Korean pancakes, but reformed as waffles since that’s what Southerners eat with their chicken. They are seasoned with garlic, serranos, scallions, and honey butter. I wasn’t too crazy about them. They bordered on soggy and the taste was quite muddled. Chang told me that he’s still experimenting with different cooking methods. For now, I’d go with other sides like the mac and cheese which is topped with roasted kimchi and bacon. There’s also red-cabbage slaw with a vinaigrette spiked with gochugaru, the ubiquitous Korean pepper spice. I definitely want to try the “Korean loaded fries,” which are apparently too rococo to describe on the menu. “Ask us for details,” the menu says. The main dishes are all different quantities of fried chicken, including wings. There’s one salad that includes a grilled chicken thigh.
When I visited the restaurant, there was a steady stream of people in a take-out lane wearing masks and maintaining distance, but nobody dining in. So I took a seat. The space is loft-like — large, airy, and decorated with some art that plays up the owners’ personal connection to the Southern motif. There is an inspiring story behind the restaurant that has been widely covered in the media. Chang and Chung went through great personal challenges, plus the pandemic complications, to open Mukja, which means “Let’s eat!” I think the passion that drove them to face such adversity is clear in their restaurant. —CL—
Botica, 1820 Peachtree Road N.W. , (404) 228-6358, eatbotica.com
Mukja , 933 Peachtree St. N.E., 404-855-5516, mukjaatl.com"
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string(10661) "I did it! I was vaccinated into super-human immunity and now I can stare into the naked faces of super-spreaders and say, “You’re not going to kill me! In fact, you’re not going to kill anyone but yourself, your friends, and your family!” It’s a really good feeling to say that. And I’m indebted to Kroger and Moderna for making it possible.
That said, supposedly being over 90 percent immune to COVID-19 has not inclined me to eat inside restaurants. However, last month I went to two restaurants, expecting to do takeout or maybe patio dining, but found their interior dining rooms empty. So, I made the leap into the swarming sea of variants.
First up is __Botica__, which opened in January in the space formerly occupied by Watershed. I balked when I walked by the restaurant’s patio. Its 100 seats were packed with noisy, unmasked, boozy diners. The bar area inside seemed nearly as crowded. A server pointed to the large, empty dining room adjacent to the bar and I followed her there. I did ask why masks apparently weren’t required by the restaurant, and she answered with a long silence, then offered to teach me how to take a picture with my phone and store it on an app. I told her I already knew how to do that. She said that was great. I agreed.
Botica is the creation of well-known Atlanta chef/restaurateur Mimmo Alboumeh, who formerly owned the three locations of Red Pepper Taqueria. While it’s too bad he’s not running the show there any longer, Botica’s cuisine is a big step forward. Alboumeh’s main theme remains Mexican, but he’s gently hybridizing it with his personal heritage, which includes a childhood in Lebanon and Spain, plus adult residency in Italy before moving here.
While Botica’s menu includes a few surprises, the main attraction is the “D.F. Streets Inspired Tacos” which are super trendy in Atlanta these days. “D.F.” stands for “Distrito Federal” which refers to Mexico City. In other words, they aren’t Tex-Mex or Southwestern or Taco Bell colon-cleansing snacks. I was at Botica for a quick meal, so I didn’t get a broad sampling of the menu and stuck to a couple of taco classics — the pork pibil and the lamb birria. If you read foodie peregrinations (like this one), you already know birria is an “it food.” It’s a stew typically made with goat (in my experience) but lamb is also common (and it’s my favorite meat). I’m tempted to say Botica’s is the best version on a taco I’ve encountered in the city. The lamb is shredded and juicy, complemented by a fruity, mild guajillo salsa. Garbanzos add a slightly nutty touch. The taco is accompanied by a shot of rather light consommé. Typically, people dip the taco in it. I suggest you pour half of it over the meat and add a squeeze of lime. Birria is a stew, and while I love tacos made with it, they do not capture the entire range of flavors.
My other taco was pork pibil, which you may remember was Johnny Depp’s obsession in ''Once Upon a Time in Mexico''. The usual name is “cochinita pibil” which signifies that it’s made with a suckling pig, so I’m assuming Botica’s is made with a grown-up. I also doubt that it’s cooked in the ground, wrapped in banana leaves, like it is in Yucatan. But it’s fine as hell. I wanted to try it because it’s served here under a green salsa that’s tart and citric, zapped with pickled onions.
Altogether, there are 10 tacos on the menu. The only one I saw that had a decidedly fusion quality was one made with falafel. Default tortillas at Botica are flour, but corn are sometimes available. At $4 each they are a bargain, and any normal human will find two more than adequate with a shared appetizer.
Speaking of appetizers, I was expecting to see tapas on the menu here, given Alboumeh’s background. Instead, there are appetizers that feed two or more. In Spain, these would be called media raciones, and they are much more appropriate since a true tapa is only a bite or two composed for one person. Noticing this, I also began to wonder exactly where the Spanish influence was at Botica. I asked my server, and she pointed at the “Spanish octopus” appetizer on my menu. “That’s it?” I asked. She nodded. The next day, looking at the restaurant’s Facebook page, I saw that Alboumeh is preparing paella on a patio grill every Wednesday. Take a look. You’ll be there ASAP.
Of the 12 appetizers, I chose a pair of chicken tamales. After a brief wait in which I managed to avoid looking at all but one of the restaurant’s countless TV screens, someone brought a basket of chips and salsa to my table. I told her I had not ordered that. She looked confused. “What did you order?” she asked. “The tamales,” I said. “Just for yourself?” she replied. Huh? She left, and a few minutes later my server arrived, also with the chips in hand. Eventually, the tamales — redolent of corn, coated in crema, served over a pool of spicy salsa morita — arrived, each one roughly the size of an infant. As the server hinted, there was no way I was going to eat the whole serving, so I asked for a carry-out box.
But wait! I hadn’t noticed the desserts. I owed it to ''CL'' readers to try the bread pudding made with croissants and pineapple, topped with salted-caramel gelato, all on a bed of powdered sugar drizzled with more caramel. Were it not for a pandemic that has taught so many of us how to cultivate obesity at home, this would be enough for two or more persons. I readily devoured it, and scraped the leftover half — yes, half! — a tamale into the take-out box.
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Besides appetizers, tacos, and desserts, the menu includes salads and larger plates like wild salmon, burgers, burritos, enchiladas, and fajitas. They seem clearly targeted for less adventurous palates. There’s also a decidedly more vanilla brunch menu available on weekends. And speaking of vanilla, I noticed that the tables here are not crowded with hot sauces for you to ruin Alboumeh’s deft handling of a cuisine whose flavors are far more complex than Texas Pete would have you believe. (Then again, Alboumeh does market his own “Chico” sauce.)
Botica’s décor is discernably Mexican but not showy or kitschy unless you count those innumerable TV screens. There’s no reason for me to be snarky about that, since I stared at my phone screen and texted hungry unvaccinated friends anyway. I wish it were possible to dine on Botica’s patio (or inside for that matter) with the guarantee of social distancing, but it apparently is not. I’m sure some diners’ worries in that respect are diminished by the restaurant’s prolific menu of margaritas, tequilas, wines, and signature cocktails. Being out of Xanax and not being a drinker, I would have resisted going inside had I not joined the class of the fully vaccinated.
My second dining-in meal was at __Mukja__ in Midtown. This restaurant, opened by two longtime, 20-something pals, Peter Chung and Sean Chang, specializes in Korean fried chicken. Just like the birria at Botica, Korean fried chicken is an “it food” or maybe, better said, it’s a subcategory of the it food known as spicy fried chicken. It’s no longer hidden on Buford Highway. It’s everywhere.
Chung and Chang call their version Southern-Korean, which also describes their ethnic backgrounds. Any suspicion that might be a contrivance was dispelled by Chang during my meal. He was working the floor the day I went in for a late lunch, and we got to talking about fried chicken. I told him I was proud to say I was an advocate of Popeyes chicken long before its sandwich made the list of it foods too. Chang lit up and said he was likewise obsessed and gave me a great tip. “I always tell my friends,” he said (I’m paraphrasing), “that the best way to get a really good sandwich is to call ahead and make sure they do not have any available at the moment. That way, you might have to wait 20 minutes at the restaurant to get one, but it will be perfect.” Laugh at this, but it is so true that the piled-up, cooked-ahead sandwiches suck.
I did not order the sandwich at Mukja, just wanting to get a taste of the fried chicken. I got a quarter of a bird (white meat) with a waffle and some mac and cheese. The chicken was fabulous — unbelievably juicy due to its marinating and brining. It’s dredged and fried and fried again, as is typical. It’s as if the chicken is inside a thick, deliciously edible egg shell that shatters and seeps spicy flavor that you amp up by dipping in one of the house-made sauces. It’s served with traditional pickled radishes that cool off and clear the palate before your next bite of the chicken.
The waffles are clever. Flavor-wise, they are like classic Korean pancakes, but reformed as waffles since that’s what Southerners eat with their chicken. They are seasoned with garlic, serranos, scallions, and honey butter. I wasn’t too crazy about them. They bordered on soggy and the taste was quite muddled. Chang told me that he’s still experimenting with different cooking methods. For now, I’d go with other sides like the mac and cheese which is topped with roasted kimchi and bacon. There’s also red-cabbage slaw with a vinaigrette spiked with gochugaru, the ubiquitous Korean pepper spice. I definitely want to try the “Korean loaded fries,” which are apparently too rococo to describe on the menu. “Ask us for details,” the menu says. The main dishes are all different quantities of fried chicken, including wings. There’s one salad that includes a grilled chicken thigh.
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When I visited the restaurant, there was a steady stream of people in a take-out lane wearing masks and maintaining distance, but nobody dining in. So I took a seat. The space is loft-like — large, airy, and decorated with some art that plays up the owners’ personal connection to the Southern motif. There is an inspiring story behind the restaurant that has been widely covered in the media. Chang and Chung went through great personal challenges, plus the pandemic complications, to open Mukja, which means “Let’s eat!” I think the passion that drove them to face such adversity is clear in their restaurant. __—CL—__
''Botica, 1820 Peachtree Road N.W. , (404) 228-6358, eatbotica.com''
''Mukja , 933 Peachtree St. N.E., 404-855-5516, mukjaatl.com''"
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string(11011) " #1 Tacos Botica 2021-04-06T17:26:00+00:00 #1_tacos_botica.jpeg Loved the detailed reviews minus the sanctimonious COVID bits grazing The borderless menus of Botica and Mukja #1 Tacos Botica 2021-04-06T17:32:16+00:00 GRAZING: When Mexican is Lebanese and Korean is Southern jim.harris Jim Harris CLIFF BOSTOCK cliffbostock (Cliff Bostock) 2021-04-06T17:32:16+00:00 I did it! I was vaccinated into super-human immunity and now I can stare into the naked faces of super-spreaders and say, “You’re not going to kill me! In fact, you’re not going to kill anyone but yourself, your friends, and your family!” It’s a really good feeling to say that. And I’m indebted to Kroger and Moderna for making it possible.
That said, supposedly being over 90 percent immune to COVID-19 has not inclined me to eat inside restaurants. However, last month I went to two restaurants, expecting to do takeout or maybe patio dining, but found their interior dining rooms empty. So, I made the leap into the swarming sea of variants.
First up is Botica, which opened in January in the space formerly occupied by Watershed. I balked when I walked by the restaurant’s patio. Its 100 seats were packed with noisy, unmasked, boozy diners. The bar area inside seemed nearly as crowded. A server pointed to the large, empty dining room adjacent to the bar and I followed her there. I did ask why masks apparently weren’t required by the restaurant, and she answered with a long silence, then offered to teach me how to take a picture with my phone and store it on an app. I told her I already knew how to do that. She said that was great. I agreed.
Botica is the creation of well-known Atlanta chef/restaurateur Mimmo Alboumeh, who formerly owned the three locations of Red Pepper Taqueria. While it’s too bad he’s not running the show there any longer, Botica’s cuisine is a big step forward. Alboumeh’s main theme remains Mexican, but he’s gently hybridizing it with his personal heritage, which includes a childhood in Lebanon and Spain, plus adult residency in Italy before moving here.
While Botica’s menu includes a few surprises, the main attraction is the “D.F. Streets Inspired Tacos” which are super trendy in Atlanta these days. “D.F.” stands for “Distrito Federal” which refers to Mexico City. In other words, they aren’t Tex-Mex or Southwestern or Taco Bell colon-cleansing snacks. I was at Botica for a quick meal, so I didn’t get a broad sampling of the menu and stuck to a couple of taco classics — the pork pibil and the lamb birria. If you read foodie peregrinations (like this one), you already know birria is an “it food.” It’s a stew typically made with goat (in my experience) but lamb is also common (and it’s my favorite meat). I’m tempted to say Botica’s is the best version on a taco I’ve encountered in the city. The lamb is shredded and juicy, complemented by a fruity, mild guajillo salsa. Garbanzos add a slightly nutty touch. The taco is accompanied by a shot of rather light consommé. Typically, people dip the taco in it. I suggest you pour half of it over the meat and add a squeeze of lime. Birria is a stew, and while I love tacos made with it, they do not capture the entire range of flavors.
My other taco was pork pibil, which you may remember was Johnny Depp’s obsession in Once Upon a Time in Mexico. The usual name is “cochinita pibil” which signifies that it’s made with a suckling pig, so I’m assuming Botica’s is made with a grown-up. I also doubt that it’s cooked in the ground, wrapped in banana leaves, like it is in Yucatan. But it’s fine as hell. I wanted to try it because it’s served here under a green salsa that’s tart and citric, zapped with pickled onions.
Altogether, there are 10 tacos on the menu. The only one I saw that had a decidedly fusion quality was one made with falafel. Default tortillas at Botica are flour, but corn are sometimes available. At $4 each they are a bargain, and any normal human will find two more than adequate with a shared appetizer.
Speaking of appetizers, I was expecting to see tapas on the menu here, given Alboumeh’s background. Instead, there are appetizers that feed two or more. In Spain, these would be called media raciones, and they are much more appropriate since a true tapa is only a bite or two composed for one person. Noticing this, I also began to wonder exactly where the Spanish influence was at Botica. I asked my server, and she pointed at the “Spanish octopus” appetizer on my menu. “That’s it?” I asked. She nodded. The next day, looking at the restaurant’s Facebook page, I saw that Alboumeh is preparing paella on a patio grill every Wednesday. Take a look. You’ll be there ASAP.
Of the 12 appetizers, I chose a pair of chicken tamales. After a brief wait in which I managed to avoid looking at all but one of the restaurant’s countless TV screens, someone brought a basket of chips and salsa to my table. I told her I had not ordered that. She looked confused. “What did you order?” she asked. “The tamales,” I said. “Just for yourself?” she replied. Huh? She left, and a few minutes later my server arrived, also with the chips in hand. Eventually, the tamales — redolent of corn, coated in crema, served over a pool of spicy salsa morita — arrived, each one roughly the size of an infant. As the server hinted, there was no way I was going to eat the whole serving, so I asked for a carry-out box.
But wait! I hadn’t noticed the desserts. I owed it to CL readers to try the bread pudding made with croissants and pineapple, topped with salted-caramel gelato, all on a bed of powdered sugar drizzled with more caramel. Were it not for a pandemic that has taught so many of us how to cultivate obesity at home, this would be enough for two or more persons. I readily devoured it, and scraped the leftover half — yes, half! — a tamale into the take-out box.
Besides appetizers, tacos, and desserts, the menu includes salads and larger plates like wild salmon, burgers, burritos, enchiladas, and fajitas. They seem clearly targeted for less adventurous palates. There’s also a decidedly more vanilla brunch menu available on weekends. And speaking of vanilla, I noticed that the tables here are not crowded with hot sauces for you to ruin Alboumeh’s deft handling of a cuisine whose flavors are far more complex than Texas Pete would have you believe. (Then again, Alboumeh does market his own “Chico” sauce.)
Botica’s décor is discernably Mexican but not showy or kitschy unless you count those innumerable TV screens. There’s no reason for me to be snarky about that, since I stared at my phone screen and texted hungry unvaccinated friends anyway. I wish it were possible to dine on Botica’s patio (or inside for that matter) with the guarantee of social distancing, but it apparently is not. I’m sure some diners’ worries in that respect are diminished by the restaurant’s prolific menu of margaritas, tequilas, wines, and signature cocktails. Being out of Xanax and not being a drinker, I would have resisted going inside had I not joined the class of the fully vaccinated.
My second dining-in meal was at Mukja in Midtown. This restaurant, opened by two longtime, 20-something pals, Peter Chung and Sean Chang, specializes in Korean fried chicken. Just like the birria at Botica, Korean fried chicken is an “it food” or maybe, better said, it’s a subcategory of the it food known as spicy fried chicken. It’s no longer hidden on Buford Highway. It’s everywhere.
Chung and Chang call their version Southern-Korean, which also describes their ethnic backgrounds. Any suspicion that might be a contrivance was dispelled by Chang during my meal. He was working the floor the day I went in for a late lunch, and we got to talking about fried chicken. I told him I was proud to say I was an advocate of Popeyes chicken long before its sandwich made the list of it foods too. Chang lit up and said he was likewise obsessed and gave me a great tip. “I always tell my friends,” he said (I’m paraphrasing), “that the best way to get a really good sandwich is to call ahead and make sure they do not have any available at the moment. That way, you might have to wait 20 minutes at the restaurant to get one, but it will be perfect.” Laugh at this, but it is so true that the piled-up, cooked-ahead sandwiches suck.
I did not order the sandwich at Mukja, just wanting to get a taste of the fried chicken. I got a quarter of a bird (white meat) with a waffle and some mac and cheese. The chicken was fabulous — unbelievably juicy due to its marinating and brining. It’s dredged and fried and fried again, as is typical. It’s as if the chicken is inside a thick, deliciously edible egg shell that shatters and seeps spicy flavor that you amp up by dipping in one of the house-made sauces. It’s served with traditional pickled radishes that cool off and clear the palate before your next bite of the chicken.
The waffles are clever. Flavor-wise, they are like classic Korean pancakes, but reformed as waffles since that’s what Southerners eat with their chicken. They are seasoned with garlic, serranos, scallions, and honey butter. I wasn’t too crazy about them. They bordered on soggy and the taste was quite muddled. Chang told me that he’s still experimenting with different cooking methods. For now, I’d go with other sides like the mac and cheese which is topped with roasted kimchi and bacon. There’s also red-cabbage slaw with a vinaigrette spiked with gochugaru, the ubiquitous Korean pepper spice. I definitely want to try the “Korean loaded fries,” which are apparently too rococo to describe on the menu. “Ask us for details,” the menu says. The main dishes are all different quantities of fried chicken, including wings. There’s one salad that includes a grilled chicken thigh.
When I visited the restaurant, there was a steady stream of people in a take-out lane wearing masks and maintaining distance, but nobody dining in. So I took a seat. The space is loft-like — large, airy, and decorated with some art that plays up the owners’ personal connection to the Southern motif. There is an inspiring story behind the restaurant that has been widely covered in the media. Chang and Chung went through great personal challenges, plus the pandemic complications, to open Mukja, which means “Let’s eat!” I think the passion that drove them to face such adversity is clear in their restaurant. —CL—
Botica, 1820 Peachtree Road N.W. , (404) 228-6358, eatbotica.com
Mukja , 933 Peachtree St. N.E., 404-855-5516, mukjaatl.com Cliff Bostock CLASSIC TACOS: BOTICA SERVES 12 DIFFERENT TACOS INCLUDING PORK PIBIL (LEFT) AND LAMB BIRRIA, A NATIONAL OBSESSION. 0,0,10 grazing GRAZING: When Mexican is Lebanese and Korean is Southern "
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GRAZING: When Mexican is Lebanese and Korean is Southern Article
Tuesday April 6, 2021 01:32 PM EDT
The borderless menus of Botica and Mukja
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string(12867) "While the COVID-19 pandemic has permanently closed many longtime Atlanta restaurants, a surprising number are opening. Many are relatively small operations focused on takeout, but certainly not all. Since I’m still unwilling to eat inside a restaurant, I’m taking a look this month at four spots close enough to my place in Grant Park that I could rush my orders home with minimal risk of their congealing into gummy facsimiles. I ordered at the restaurants instead of calling ahead and I focused on sandwiches — the ultimate takeout food, right? — but strayed a good bit.
Before I describe my experience, I’ve got to say this: If you are a restaurateur who is not requiring masks and social distancing inside, you’re contributing to the misery that engulfs the planet. At one restaurant recently, the host directed me to the corner of the bar to place my to-go order. Suffocating with my KF94 strapped over a surgeon’s mask, I looked and told her no, I was not going to join the six unmasked people, including staff, standing around the bar cash register, aerosolizing the area with their laughter. I also noticed that the restaurant was empty except for maybe four tables, but they were all in unnecessarily close proximity to one another. Then I saw an unmasked chef walk to a table for a few minutes of chitchat. I know this has all been described repeatedly, mainly with bars, and I’m not going to join the shaming that has infamously forced some to close long enough to, oh, read death toll numbers and learn that safety measures are not just about protecting your super-hero-self, but also, if not mainly, the community in which you function.
I feel calmer now.
Elsewhere Brewing: This brewery — the second to open at the Beacon in Grant Park — endured a long pandemic-caused waiting game with builders and suppliers before opening in September. The inspiration is Euro-style cafes and beer gardens. So you have a large hangarlike interior bar and dining area that seats about 80 and a dog-friendly patio that seats about 50. I visited with two serious liabilities. First, a week of miserable weather kept me from sitting on the patio. Second, a tendency to take up residence in dumpsters if I drink alcohol kept me from enjoying Elsewhere’s raison d’etre. (In other words, I don’t drink.)
The menu here is really interesting. It features a strong Argentine influence. That means, since Argentina has a famously large population with Italian heritage, you get a mashup of flavors like Argentinian-style milanesa napolitana and empanadas filled with mozzarella and wild mushrooms. The hybridization broadens with chimichurri hummus and beer-glazed Amish chicken with oregano. Since I was on a sandwich binge, I went immediately to the “choripan” sandwich. It’s a soft, house-made, white roll layered with grilled, locally made chorizo sausage, served with a bracing chimichurri sauce and a salsa criolla made with mild red peppers (put both on the sandwich). It comes with a large order of thin, red-speckled fries that stayed crunchy on the quick trip home. The sandwich is incredibly rich, and I only ate half of it. I suggest you order one to share along with something with a bit of acid, like the arugula house salad or the right carry-out beer.
Elsewhere offers a community-supported brewery program. A monthly fee provides cans or growlers, along with multiple discounts on events and merchandise. It even gives members access to annual culinary tours. The first will include travel through the Andes in Argentina. To be clear, this is about enlightenment achieved through drinking beer, not ayahuasca with a shaman — every millennial’s stale requirement for coolness. The restaurant requires masks when not eating or when standing inside. There is a takeout window on the patio. (1039 Grant St. S.E., 770-727-0009, elsewherebrewing.com)
D.B.A. Sandwich Company: If anything I ate at these four restaurants has screamed at me to come back and have another, it’s the Southern Italian Hoagie at this new takeout-only sandwich shop in the Irwin Street Market. The sandwich is a classic hoagie but it includes a layer of Carolina-style barbecue, When I first saw the sandwich on the shop’s online menu, it was frankly one of those WTF moments that melds titillation with morbid curiosity. I love hoagies and I especially love Carolina barbecue — both favorites from a childhood that included Philly and the Carolinas, but, I mean …
Here’s the menu’s description: “Spicy capricola, prosciutto, salami, and spicy Carolina chopped pork with pepperoncini and provolone on a toasted hoagie. Served with a side of Carolina vinegar sauce.” To put it another way: you get the crunch of the warm bread, the creaminess of the melted cheese, the smooth earthiness and mild, layered spice of the three Italian meats colliding with the chopped pork whose vinegary taste is amped up by the pepperoncini and the side sauce. The sandwich traveled well. I was worried because it was wrapped tightly, which often adds to the effect of steam. I also tried a taco made with a small flour tortilla filled with braised brisket topped with chipotle-seasoned sour cream. The meat was tasty, but the tortilla was indeed a shriveled mess when I unwrapped it. Eat it outside or in your car.
The menu includes Cuban, Reuben, and barbecue sandwiches. Others are made with pot roast, pimento cheese with bacon, and more. This is the first expansion of D.B.A. Barbecue, the longtime Virginia-Highland favorite that opened in 2009. Masks are required. (660 Irwin St. N.E., 678-705-5684, dbabarbecue.com)
Woodward & Park: This restaurant in the Larkin on Memorial has been in planning for two years. It finally opened in September and, although its website says curb pick-up is offered, I ordered inside to get the food as freshly cooked as possible and to get a look at the roomy, clubby dining room and bar with an open kitchen. Nice. Then I got home and realized I’d only been given one entrée I ordered, plus two small plates I had not ordered. I drove back, was immediately handed the missing dish and told to keep the sides. It happens.
I opened the boxes. This place is five minutes from my home, but the food was everything you hope your takeout won’t be. There was utterly no attention to aesthetics. The food appeared to be haphazardly thrown into the boxes and it was all steamed to hell, if not actually overcooked. The effect was to just about totally rob each dish of the complexity of flavors the menu promised. For example, an entrée of (three clumps of) roasted cauliflower supposedly included “sweet potato, charred eggplant, toasted hemp seed, black locust vinegar, fresh herbs.” I tasted only tepid cauliflower and two skinny fingers of sweet potato and passed on the dish. The biggest disappointment was the main attraction to me, a Korean Pork Philly sandwich: “Gochujang-marinated Stone Mtn. Cattle Co. pork shoulder, house-made kimchi, scallion, white American cheese, caramelized onion, garlic aioli, served with hand-cut fries.” Had I been blindfolded and asked what I was eating, I would have guessed “something mildly, densely cheesy.” The texture was so gummy-greasy that I ended up scraping the filling out of the bun, pulling everything apart and adding some kimchi I had in my refrigerator. It helped. Fries? Dead. The third entrée, half a smoked Springer Mountain chicken, was the winner. It was surprisingly juicy, uncomplicated, and served with a pile of wild mushrooms and mashed fingerling potatoes. Homey.
The two bonus small plates? I just can’t. Two pierogi looked like flying saucers with a marble-sized cabin in the middle. Chewy and dry AF. The starter of Brussels sprouts had this description of its additives: “Dried cranberry, caramelized onion, pickled fennel, goat cheese, smoked olive oil, benne seeds.” Sounds fantastic! I literally could taste nothing but super-bitter sprouts. I didn’t even know about the other ingredients until I read the website description. Masks encouraged. (519 Memorial Drive S.E., 404-748-1091, woodwardparkatl.com)
OK Yaki: Winner of the best bargain is OK Yaki, the brick-and-mortar home of the popular pop-up that’s been around since 2016. Located next to the way-groovy Hodgepodge Coffeehouse, OK Yaki specializes in the street food of Osaka, Japan. The big deal here is the okonomiyaki, the grilled pancake that has become a national “it-food” in recent years. (In fact, Woodward & Park also makes them.) Here’s the menu description: “Japanese savory pancake made by mixing a rich batter with cabbage, green onions, pickled ginger, tenkasu, and nagaimo. Fired on both sides and topped with okonomi sauce, Kewpie mayo, seaweed flakes, bonito flakes, and one topping.” There are eight toppings, from shrimp to steak, but I beg you to order the pork belly. It’s thin-sliced and adheres to both sides of the pancake, adding crispy meatiness to the otherwise soft and luscious pancake. I also got an order of superb yakisoba — lightly sauced wheat noodles to which I added ginger chicken. I have utterly no complaints.
The menu also includes a handful of small plates, like Japanese-style fried chicken, a panko-crusted fried pork cutlet, and dumplings. There’s a burger made with ground beef, kelp, and bonito, plus a steak curry. The restaurant has a roomy inside dining room, but you can only eat on the large, heated patio where the takeout window is located. Both items I ordered traveled without problem. Masks are required. (714 Moreland Ave., S.E., 404-999-9254, okyakiatl.com)
FANTASTIC BARGAIN: I can’t wait to try the new Mercer Street Meals, a takeout service operated by Lance Gummere, co-founder of The Federal and Bantam and Biddy. Before that, he was chef at The Shed at Glenwood where I became addicted to his weekly menu of weird-and-wacky sliders. The deal here is multi-course meals at ridiculously low prices of $25 for two or $45 for four. An example is baked salmon with lemony-herb pasta, broccoli-jalapeño slaw, and pimento cheese. Sliders with potato salad and salted caramel apple pie were available last month, as were cabbage rolls with herbed potatoes, salad, and dessert. Customers pick up meals at Gummere’s home in Ormewood Park. They are available four nights a week, and you need to make reservations well in advance. Check out the website, mercerstreetmeals.com, to see the menu and order.
THE SUGAR REPORT: The pandemic sucks but it sucks even more now that the Krispy Kreme on Ponce de Leon has burned to the ground. It was long the place to go when you left a club in Midtown without a hook-up and needed some compensatory, sticky, sugary love. Word is that it will be resurrected …. I have written here before about my longtime addiction to Klondike Bars, the Pavlovian treat with which I started rewarding myself after writing every 10 words of my doctoral dissertation 15 years ago. I finally broke the addiction two months ago and then, as if sensing my freedom, the company began selling drumstick-style ice cream cones that demanded my attention. They come in eight-packs, half chocolate and half vanilla. I’m happy to say they suck …. I am still struggling with my addiction to Kroger-brand ginger snaps. They are ridiculously cheap — $1.69 a box — and are a ton better than other brands, except for Trader Joe’s. Generally, I’m frequently surprised how well Kroger products taste. I’m also addicted to tonic water, and their ultra-cheap version has a stronger flavor than even the over-priced boutique brands. Their take on Nutella is flawless …. I gobbled a caramel-apple-cheesecake bar from Baker Dude after picking up my sandwich at Elsewhere Brewing. I could have eaten 10. The bakery, infamous for its true-to-life cupcakes, has diversified greatly …. Little Tart Bakery still makes the best almond croissant I’ve eaten anywhere. I bought one and two other pastries for a friend’s birthday party. Unfortunately, because the party was via Zoom, I had to eat all of them myself.
ONLINE SCORES: On the advice of my foodissimo friend Brad Lapin, I’ve been shopping on Eataly.com and scored cans of my favorite coffee, Lavazza, on sale for under $6, along with flawless pistachio butter and truffle risotto. He also advised me to try Mae Ploy Thai curry pastes, available from Amazon.com. I bought a triplet of red, green, and yellow versions, and I can’t recommend them enough.
NEW RESTAURANTS I LOOK FORWARD TO TRYING: Baffi (Italian), Sea Salt Seafood Lounge, LowCountry Steak, Spicy Hill (Jamaican), The Chastain (American), Botica (Spanish-Lebanese-Mexican), Girl Diver Atlanta (Viet-Chinese), Apt 4B (French-Caribbean). There are many others.
—CL—"
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string(13555) "While the COVID-19 pandemic has permanently closed many longtime Atlanta restaurants, a surprising number are opening. Many are relatively small operations focused on takeout, but certainly not all. Since I’m still unwilling to eat inside a restaurant, I’m taking a look this month at four spots close enough to my place in Grant Park that I could rush my orders home with minimal risk of their congealing into gummy facsimiles. I ordered at the restaurants instead of calling ahead and I focused on sandwiches — the ultimate takeout food, right? — but strayed a good bit.
Before I describe my experience, I’ve got to say this: If you are a restaurateur who is not requiring masks and social distancing inside, you’re contributing to the misery that engulfs the planet. At one restaurant recently, the host directed me to the corner of the bar to place my to-go order. Suffocating with my KF94 strapped over a surgeon’s mask, I looked and told her no, I was not going to join the six unmasked people, including staff, standing around the bar cash register, aerosolizing the area with their laughter. I also noticed that the restaurant was empty except for maybe four tables, but they were all in unnecessarily close proximity to one another. Then I saw an unmasked chef walk to a table for a few minutes of chitchat. I know this has all been described repeatedly, mainly with bars, and I’m not going to join the shaming that has infamously forced some to close long enough to, oh, read death toll numbers and learn that safety measures are not just about protecting your super-hero-self, but also, if not mainly, the community in which you function.
I feel calmer now.
__Elsewhere Brewing:__ This brewery — the second to open at the Beacon in Grant Park — endured a long pandemic-caused waiting game with builders and suppliers before opening in September. The inspiration is Euro-style cafes and beer gardens. So you have a large hangarlike interior bar and dining area that seats about 80 and a dog-friendly patio that seats about 50. I visited with two serious liabilities. First, a week of miserable weather kept me from sitting on the patio. Second, a tendency to take up residence in dumpsters if I drink alcohol kept me from enjoying Elsewhere’s raison d’etre. (In other words, I don’t drink.)
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The menu here is really interesting. It features a strong Argentine influence. That means, since Argentina has a famously large population with Italian heritage, you get a mashup of flavors like Argentinian-style milanesa napolitana and empanadas filled with mozzarella and wild mushrooms. The hybridization broadens with chimichurri hummus and beer-glazed Amish chicken with oregano. Since I was on a sandwich binge, I went immediately to the “choripan” sandwich. It’s a soft, house-made, white roll layered with grilled, locally made chorizo sausage, served with a bracing chimichurri sauce and a salsa criolla made with mild red peppers (put both on the sandwich). It comes with a large order of thin, red-speckled fries that stayed crunchy on the quick trip home. The sandwich is incredibly rich, and I only ate half of it. I suggest you order one to share along with something with a bit of acid, like the arugula house salad or the right carry-out beer.
Elsewhere offers a community-supported brewery program. A monthly fee provides cans or growlers, along with multiple discounts on events and merchandise. It even gives members access to annual culinary tours. The first will include travel through the Andes in Argentina. To be clear, this is about enlightenment achieved through drinking beer, not ayahuasca with a shaman — every millennial’s stale requirement for coolness. The restaurant requires masks when not eating or when standing inside. There is a takeout window on the patio. (1039 Grant St. S.E., 770-727-0009, elsewherebrewing.com)
__D.B.A. Sandwich Company:__ If anything I ate at these four restaurants has screamed at me to come back and have another, it’s the Southern Italian Hoagie at this new takeout-only sandwich shop in the Irwin Street Market. The sandwich is a classic hoagie but it includes a layer of Carolina-style barbecue, When I first saw the sandwich on the shop’s online menu, it was frankly one of those WTF moments that melds titillation with morbid curiosity. I love hoagies and I especially love Carolina barbecue — both favorites from a childhood that included Philly and the Carolinas, but, I mean …
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Here’s the menu’s description: “Spicy capricola, prosciutto, salami, and spicy Carolina chopped pork with pepperoncini and provolone on a toasted hoagie. Served with a side of Carolina vinegar sauce.” To put it another way: you get the crunch of the warm bread, the creaminess of the melted cheese, the smooth earthiness and mild, layered spice of the three Italian meats colliding with the chopped pork whose vinegary taste is amped up by the pepperoncini and the side sauce. The sandwich traveled well. I was worried because it was wrapped tightly, which often adds to the effect of steam. I also tried a taco made with a small flour tortilla filled with braised brisket topped with chipotle-seasoned sour cream. The meat was tasty, but the tortilla was indeed a shriveled mess when I unwrapped it. Eat it outside or in your car.
The menu includes Cuban, Reuben, and barbecue sandwiches. Others are made with pot roast, pimento cheese with bacon, and more. This is the first expansion of D.B.A. Barbecue, the longtime Virginia-Highland favorite that opened in 2009. Masks are required. (660 Irwin St. N.E., 678-705-5684, dbabarbecue.com)
__Woodward & Park:__ This restaurant in the Larkin on Memorial has been in planning for two years. It finally opened in September and, although its website says curb pick-up is offered, I ordered inside to get the food as freshly cooked as possible and to get a look at the roomy, clubby dining room and bar with an open kitchen. Nice. Then I got home and realized I’d only been given one entrée I ordered, plus two small plates I had not ordered. I drove back, was immediately handed the missing dish and told to keep the sides. It happens.
I opened the boxes. This place is five minutes from my home, but the food was everything you hope your takeout won’t be. There was utterly no attention to aesthetics. The food appeared to be haphazardly thrown into the boxes and it was all steamed to hell, if not actually overcooked. The effect was to just about totally rob each dish of the complexity of flavors the menu promised. For example, an entrée of (three clumps of) roasted cauliflower supposedly included “sweet potato, charred eggplant, toasted hemp seed, black locust vinegar, fresh herbs.” I tasted only tepid cauliflower and two skinny fingers of sweet potato and passed on the dish. The biggest disappointment was the main attraction to me, a Korean Pork Philly sandwich: “Gochujang-marinated Stone Mtn. Cattle Co. pork shoulder, house-made kimchi, scallion, white American cheese, caramelized onion, garlic aioli, served with hand-cut fries.” Had I been blindfolded and asked what I was eating, I would have guessed “something mildly, densely cheesy.” The texture was so gummy-greasy that I ended up scraping the filling out of the bun, pulling everything apart and adding some kimchi I had in my refrigerator. It helped. Fries? Dead. The third entrée, half a smoked Springer Mountain chicken, was the winner. It was surprisingly juicy, uncomplicated, and served with a pile of wild mushrooms and mashed fingerling potatoes. Homey.
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The two bonus small plates? I just can’t. Two pierogi looked like flying saucers with a marble-sized cabin in the middle. Chewy and dry AF. The starter of Brussels sprouts had this description of its additives: “Dried cranberry, caramelized onion, pickled fennel, goat cheese, smoked olive oil, benne seeds.” Sounds fantastic! I literally could taste nothing but super-bitter sprouts. I didn’t even know about the other ingredients until I read the website description. Masks encouraged. (519 Memorial Drive S.E., 404-748-1091, woodwardparkatl.com)
__OK Yaki:__ Winner of the best bargain is OK Yaki, the brick-and-mortar home of the popular pop-up that’s been around since 2016. Located next to the way-groovy Hodgepodge Coffeehouse, OK Yaki specializes in the street food of Osaka, Japan. The big deal here is the okonomiyaki, the grilled pancake that has become a national “it-food” in recent years. (In fact, Woodward & Park also makes them.) Here’s the menu description: “Japanese savory pancake made by mixing a rich batter with cabbage, green onions, pickled ginger, tenkasu, and nagaimo. Fired on both sides and topped with okonomi sauce, Kewpie mayo, seaweed flakes, bonito flakes, and one topping.” There are eight toppings, from shrimp to steak, but I beg you to order the pork belly. It’s thin-sliced and adheres to both sides of the pancake, adding crispy meatiness to the otherwise soft and luscious pancake. I also got an order of superb yakisoba — lightly sauced wheat noodles to which I added ginger chicken. I have utterly no complaints.
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The menu also includes a handful of small plates, like Japanese-style fried chicken, a panko-crusted fried pork cutlet, and dumplings. There’s a burger made with ground beef, kelp, and bonito, plus a steak curry. The restaurant has a roomy inside dining room, but you can only eat on the large, heated patio where the takeout window is located. Both items I ordered traveled without problem. Masks are required. (714 Moreland Ave., S.E., 404-999-9254, okyakiatl.com)
__FANTASTIC BARGAIN:__ I can’t wait to try the new __Mercer Street Meals__, a takeout service operated by Lance Gummere, co-founder of The Federal and Bantam and Biddy. Before that, he was chef at The Shed at Glenwood where I became addicted to his weekly menu of weird-and-wacky sliders. The deal here is multi-course meals at ridiculously low prices of $25 for two or $45 for four. An example is baked salmon with lemony-herb pasta, broccoli-jalapeño slaw, and pimento cheese. Sliders with potato salad and salted caramel apple pie were available last month, as were cabbage rolls with herbed potatoes, salad, and dessert. Customers pick up meals at Gummere’s home in Ormewood Park. They are available four nights a week, and you need to make reservations well in advance. Check out the website, mercerstreetmeals.com, to see the menu and order.
__THE SUGAR REPORT:__ The pandemic sucks but it sucks even more now that the __Krispy Kreme__ on Ponce de Leon has burned to the ground. It was long the place to go when you left a club in Midtown without a hook-up and needed some compensatory, sticky, sugary love. Word is that it will be resurrected …. I have written here before about my longtime addiction to __Klondike Bars__, the Pavlovian treat with which I started rewarding myself after writing every 10 words of my doctoral dissertation 15 years ago. I finally broke the addiction two months ago and then, as if sensing my freedom, the company began selling drumstick-style ice cream cones that demanded my attention. They come in eight-packs, half chocolate and half vanilla. I’m happy to say they suck …. I am still struggling with my addiction to __Kroger-brand ginger snaps__. They are ridiculously cheap — $1.69 a box — and are a ton better than other brands, except for Trader Joe’s. Generally, I’m frequently surprised how well Kroger products taste. I’m also addicted to tonic water, and their ultra-cheap version has a stronger flavor than even the over-priced boutique brands. Their take on Nutella is flawless …. I gobbled a caramel-apple-cheesecake bar from __Baker Dude__ after picking up my sandwich at Elsewhere Brewing. I could have eaten 10. The bakery, infamous for its true-to-life cupcakes, has diversified greatly …. __Little Tart Bakery__ still makes the best almond croissant I’ve eaten anywhere. I bought one and two other pastries for a friend’s birthday party. Unfortunately, because the party was via Zoom, I had to eat all of them myself.
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__ONLINE SCORES:__ On the advice of my foodissimo friend Brad Lapin, I’ve been shopping on __Eataly.com__ and scored cans of my favorite coffee, __Lavazza__, on sale for under $6, along with flawless pistachio butter and truffle risotto. He also advised me to try __Mae Ploy__ Thai curry pastes, available from Amazon.com. I bought a triplet of red, green, and yellow versions, and I can’t recommend them enough.
__NEW RESTAURANTS I LOOK FORWARD TO TRYING:__ Baffi (Italian), Sea Salt Seafood Lounge, LowCountry Steak, Spicy Hill (Jamaican), The Chastain (American), Botica (Spanish-Lebanese-Mexican), Girl Diver Atlanta (Viet-Chinese), Apt 4B (French-Caribbean). There are many others.
__—CL—__"
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string(13644) " J C474 PASTRY PLUNDER: The Little Tart Bakery makes the best croissants, almond or butter, in the city. The scones ain’t bad, either. We are open to test competitors.
PHOTO CREDIT: CLIFF BOSTOCK 2021-03-04T14:43:24+00:00 J--C474.jpeg grazing And a cheap fix you can buy right off the shelf J C474 2021-03-04T15:01:12+00:00 GRAZING: Four new restaurants that won’t give you the plague jim.harris Jim Harris CLIFF BOSTOCK cliffbostock (Cliff Bostock) 2021-03-04T15:01:12+00:00 While the COVID-19 pandemic has permanently closed many longtime Atlanta restaurants, a surprising number are opening. Many are relatively small operations focused on takeout, but certainly not all. Since I’m still unwilling to eat inside a restaurant, I’m taking a look this month at four spots close enough to my place in Grant Park that I could rush my orders home with minimal risk of their congealing into gummy facsimiles. I ordered at the restaurants instead of calling ahead and I focused on sandwiches — the ultimate takeout food, right? — but strayed a good bit.
Before I describe my experience, I’ve got to say this: If you are a restaurateur who is not requiring masks and social distancing inside, you’re contributing to the misery that engulfs the planet. At one restaurant recently, the host directed me to the corner of the bar to place my to-go order. Suffocating with my KF94 strapped over a surgeon’s mask, I looked and told her no, I was not going to join the six unmasked people, including staff, standing around the bar cash register, aerosolizing the area with their laughter. I also noticed that the restaurant was empty except for maybe four tables, but they were all in unnecessarily close proximity to one another. Then I saw an unmasked chef walk to a table for a few minutes of chitchat. I know this has all been described repeatedly, mainly with bars, and I’m not going to join the shaming that has infamously forced some to close long enough to, oh, read death toll numbers and learn that safety measures are not just about protecting your super-hero-self, but also, if not mainly, the community in which you function.
I feel calmer now.
Elsewhere Brewing: This brewery — the second to open at the Beacon in Grant Park — endured a long pandemic-caused waiting game with builders and suppliers before opening in September. The inspiration is Euro-style cafes and beer gardens. So you have a large hangarlike interior bar and dining area that seats about 80 and a dog-friendly patio that seats about 50. I visited with two serious liabilities. First, a week of miserable weather kept me from sitting on the patio. Second, a tendency to take up residence in dumpsters if I drink alcohol kept me from enjoying Elsewhere’s raison d’etre. (In other words, I don’t drink.)
The menu here is really interesting. It features a strong Argentine influence. That means, since Argentina has a famously large population with Italian heritage, you get a mashup of flavors like Argentinian-style milanesa napolitana and empanadas filled with mozzarella and wild mushrooms. The hybridization broadens with chimichurri hummus and beer-glazed Amish chicken with oregano. Since I was on a sandwich binge, I went immediately to the “choripan” sandwich. It’s a soft, house-made, white roll layered with grilled, locally made chorizo sausage, served with a bracing chimichurri sauce and a salsa criolla made with mild red peppers (put both on the sandwich). It comes with a large order of thin, red-speckled fries that stayed crunchy on the quick trip home. The sandwich is incredibly rich, and I only ate half of it. I suggest you order one to share along with something with a bit of acid, like the arugula house salad or the right carry-out beer.
Elsewhere offers a community-supported brewery program. A monthly fee provides cans or growlers, along with multiple discounts on events and merchandise. It even gives members access to annual culinary tours. The first will include travel through the Andes in Argentina. To be clear, this is about enlightenment achieved through drinking beer, not ayahuasca with a shaman — every millennial’s stale requirement for coolness. The restaurant requires masks when not eating or when standing inside. There is a takeout window on the patio. (1039 Grant St. S.E., 770-727-0009, elsewherebrewing.com)
D.B.A. Sandwich Company: If anything I ate at these four restaurants has screamed at me to come back and have another, it’s the Southern Italian Hoagie at this new takeout-only sandwich shop in the Irwin Street Market. The sandwich is a classic hoagie but it includes a layer of Carolina-style barbecue, When I first saw the sandwich on the shop’s online menu, it was frankly one of those WTF moments that melds titillation with morbid curiosity. I love hoagies and I especially love Carolina barbecue — both favorites from a childhood that included Philly and the Carolinas, but, I mean …
Here’s the menu’s description: “Spicy capricola, prosciutto, salami, and spicy Carolina chopped pork with pepperoncini and provolone on a toasted hoagie. Served with a side of Carolina vinegar sauce.” To put it another way: you get the crunch of the warm bread, the creaminess of the melted cheese, the smooth earthiness and mild, layered spice of the three Italian meats colliding with the chopped pork whose vinegary taste is amped up by the pepperoncini and the side sauce. The sandwich traveled well. I was worried because it was wrapped tightly, which often adds to the effect of steam. I also tried a taco made with a small flour tortilla filled with braised brisket topped with chipotle-seasoned sour cream. The meat was tasty, but the tortilla was indeed a shriveled mess when I unwrapped it. Eat it outside or in your car.
The menu includes Cuban, Reuben, and barbecue sandwiches. Others are made with pot roast, pimento cheese with bacon, and more. This is the first expansion of D.B.A. Barbecue, the longtime Virginia-Highland favorite that opened in 2009. Masks are required. (660 Irwin St. N.E., 678-705-5684, dbabarbecue.com)
Woodward & Park: This restaurant in the Larkin on Memorial has been in planning for two years. It finally opened in September and, although its website says curb pick-up is offered, I ordered inside to get the food as freshly cooked as possible and to get a look at the roomy, clubby dining room and bar with an open kitchen. Nice. Then I got home and realized I’d only been given one entrée I ordered, plus two small plates I had not ordered. I drove back, was immediately handed the missing dish and told to keep the sides. It happens.
I opened the boxes. This place is five minutes from my home, but the food was everything you hope your takeout won’t be. There was utterly no attention to aesthetics. The food appeared to be haphazardly thrown into the boxes and it was all steamed to hell, if not actually overcooked. The effect was to just about totally rob each dish of the complexity of flavors the menu promised. For example, an entrée of (three clumps of) roasted cauliflower supposedly included “sweet potato, charred eggplant, toasted hemp seed, black locust vinegar, fresh herbs.” I tasted only tepid cauliflower and two skinny fingers of sweet potato and passed on the dish. The biggest disappointment was the main attraction to me, a Korean Pork Philly sandwich: “Gochujang-marinated Stone Mtn. Cattle Co. pork shoulder, house-made kimchi, scallion, white American cheese, caramelized onion, garlic aioli, served with hand-cut fries.” Had I been blindfolded and asked what I was eating, I would have guessed “something mildly, densely cheesy.” The texture was so gummy-greasy that I ended up scraping the filling out of the bun, pulling everything apart and adding some kimchi I had in my refrigerator. It helped. Fries? Dead. The third entrée, half a smoked Springer Mountain chicken, was the winner. It was surprisingly juicy, uncomplicated, and served with a pile of wild mushrooms and mashed fingerling potatoes. Homey.
The two bonus small plates? I just can’t. Two pierogi looked like flying saucers with a marble-sized cabin in the middle. Chewy and dry AF. The starter of Brussels sprouts had this description of its additives: “Dried cranberry, caramelized onion, pickled fennel, goat cheese, smoked olive oil, benne seeds.” Sounds fantastic! I literally could taste nothing but super-bitter sprouts. I didn’t even know about the other ingredients until I read the website description. Masks encouraged. (519 Memorial Drive S.E., 404-748-1091, woodwardparkatl.com)
OK Yaki: Winner of the best bargain is OK Yaki, the brick-and-mortar home of the popular pop-up that’s been around since 2016. Located next to the way-groovy Hodgepodge Coffeehouse, OK Yaki specializes in the street food of Osaka, Japan. The big deal here is the okonomiyaki, the grilled pancake that has become a national “it-food” in recent years. (In fact, Woodward & Park also makes them.) Here’s the menu description: “Japanese savory pancake made by mixing a rich batter with cabbage, green onions, pickled ginger, tenkasu, and nagaimo. Fired on both sides and topped with okonomi sauce, Kewpie mayo, seaweed flakes, bonito flakes, and one topping.” There are eight toppings, from shrimp to steak, but I beg you to order the pork belly. It’s thin-sliced and adheres to both sides of the pancake, adding crispy meatiness to the otherwise soft and luscious pancake. I also got an order of superb yakisoba — lightly sauced wheat noodles to which I added ginger chicken. I have utterly no complaints.
The menu also includes a handful of small plates, like Japanese-style fried chicken, a panko-crusted fried pork cutlet, and dumplings. There’s a burger made with ground beef, kelp, and bonito, plus a steak curry. The restaurant has a roomy inside dining room, but you can only eat on the large, heated patio where the takeout window is located. Both items I ordered traveled without problem. Masks are required. (714 Moreland Ave., S.E., 404-999-9254, okyakiatl.com)
FANTASTIC BARGAIN: I can’t wait to try the new Mercer Street Meals, a takeout service operated by Lance Gummere, co-founder of The Federal and Bantam and Biddy. Before that, he was chef at The Shed at Glenwood where I became addicted to his weekly menu of weird-and-wacky sliders. The deal here is multi-course meals at ridiculously low prices of $25 for two or $45 for four. An example is baked salmon with lemony-herb pasta, broccoli-jalapeño slaw, and pimento cheese. Sliders with potato salad and salted caramel apple pie were available last month, as were cabbage rolls with herbed potatoes, salad, and dessert. Customers pick up meals at Gummere’s home in Ormewood Park. They are available four nights a week, and you need to make reservations well in advance. Check out the website, mercerstreetmeals.com, to see the menu and order.
THE SUGAR REPORT: The pandemic sucks but it sucks even more now that the Krispy Kreme on Ponce de Leon has burned to the ground. It was long the place to go when you left a club in Midtown without a hook-up and needed some compensatory, sticky, sugary love. Word is that it will be resurrected …. I have written here before about my longtime addiction to Klondike Bars, the Pavlovian treat with which I started rewarding myself after writing every 10 words of my doctoral dissertation 15 years ago. I finally broke the addiction two months ago and then, as if sensing my freedom, the company began selling drumstick-style ice cream cones that demanded my attention. They come in eight-packs, half chocolate and half vanilla. I’m happy to say they suck …. I am still struggling with my addiction to Kroger-brand ginger snaps. They are ridiculously cheap — $1.69 a box — and are a ton better than other brands, except for Trader Joe’s. Generally, I’m frequently surprised how well Kroger products taste. I’m also addicted to tonic water, and their ultra-cheap version has a stronger flavor than even the over-priced boutique brands. Their take on Nutella is flawless …. I gobbled a caramel-apple-cheesecake bar from Baker Dude after picking up my sandwich at Elsewhere Brewing. I could have eaten 10. The bakery, infamous for its true-to-life cupcakes, has diversified greatly …. Little Tart Bakery still makes the best almond croissant I’ve eaten anywhere. I bought one and two other pastries for a friend’s birthday party. Unfortunately, because the party was via Zoom, I had to eat all of them myself.
ONLINE SCORES: On the advice of my foodissimo friend Brad Lapin, I’ve been shopping on Eataly.com and scored cans of my favorite coffee, Lavazza, on sale for under $6, along with flawless pistachio butter and truffle risotto. He also advised me to try Mae Ploy Thai curry pastes, available from Amazon.com. I bought a triplet of red, green, and yellow versions, and I can’t recommend them enough.
NEW RESTAURANTS I LOOK FORWARD TO TRYING: Baffi (Italian), Sea Salt Seafood Lounge, LowCountry Steak, Spicy Hill (Jamaican), The Chastain (American), Botica (Spanish-Lebanese-Mexican), Girl Diver Atlanta (Viet-Chinese), Apt 4B (French-Caribbean). There are many others.
—CL— CLIFF BOSTOCK PASTRY PLUNDER: The Little Tart Bakery makes the best croissants, almond or butter, in the city. The scones ain’t bad, either. We are open to test competitors. 0,0,10 grazing GRAZING: Four new restaurants that won’t give you the plague "
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string(13101) "It’s no surprise that the most repeated memes among dining critics since March feature the coronavirus pandemic. With a huge number of restaurants closing and a tiny number opening, critics don’t have much to review. Having basically always been an adjunct to the food service industry, they are now awakening to the kind of misery many never noticed — from the low pay and instability of restaurant employment to the way the coronavirus literally erases taste, thus provoking soul-searching like, “OMG, who made me the king of taste?”
While the present context is horrific, examination of the critic’s role has been underway at least since the Great Recession of 2007 accelerated the starvation of print journalism. To maintain economic viability, many critics were called down from the mountaintop to write news and feature stories as well as restaurant reviews. In the process, they lost the pretentious anonymity they never had to begin with while thousands of food bloggers and anonymous Yelpers created consensus that arguably gained more reliability in the public mind. Now, watching millions lose their jobs, critics are publicly ruminating their own futures. Many of their essays are a mix of hubris and startled compassion. In order to agonize for thousands of words over your need to support the industry in the future, you must have retained a very high opinion of your power, right?
More important than the etiquette of what is articulated, though, is what dining critics have long avoided saying. I’ve posted some links below that I found particularly thoughtful in this respect. I especially urge you to read the Los Angeles Times piece by critic Bill Addison, who started his career at Creative Loafing. Bill calls out the hierarchy of virtual enslavement that has defined the restaurant industry since its beginnings. Critics who can bring the insights of anthropology, history, and economics into view don’t stray from their art or purpose, as some argue. When someone whom you know to be underpaid and uninsured presents you a perfect plate of food while an infamous chef is screaming racial epithets at kitchen staff in the background, maybe it’s finally time to report the whole story. It’s the hospitality industry, after all!
Restaurants have long been the place where we gather to mark special occasions, reinforce social bonds, and cross so-called ethnic boundaries even as our actual borders remain supposedly walled. The absence of safe restaurants has added to the culture’s general malaise and — be warned — it’s really hard to find a single essay predicting a return to “normal.” Recovery from the viral threat and the devastated economy won’t occur overnight because of a vaccine’s availability on a particular day in the spring. Healing will be gradual and haunted by painful memories. So, no, you’ll likely not be able to head back to your favorite neighborhood spot in a year and find it unchanged.
Already, new restaurants are opening that enhance social distancing, especially by offering lots of patio space, but that’s not going to help much as we head into winter and must decide whether to take a table inside. Some new restaurants have incorporated interior distancing but that, to say nothing of required masks, challenges us to find pleasure amid reminders of a plague. Old and new restaurants alike are highlighting delivery, takeout, and “curb service,” a term that described dining in your car at the Varsity when I was a kid, but now means a Hazmat-clad restaurant employee will come outside and hand you your chili dogs when you drive up to the restaurant and then vamoose immediately. While you’re not supposed to eat in restaurant parking lots, I admit that more than once I’ve driven a few blocks away and tailgated in order to avoid the sloppy, steaming deterioration that takeout containers can cause. Delivery makes that effect even worse and adds a lot of dollars. Turning the whole world into one big food hall has one especially depressing effect: It reduces employment numbers significantly in a business with a very slim profit margin.
Recently, I visited three new venues that exemplify the joys and complications of takeout and dining in. They all feature Hispanic street food, which has become extremely popular in the last decade, but these three top my recent charts. I’m not going to bother to rave in particular at length about each. Just take my word for it: They are all worth the cost, which is generally low, but let’s not delude ourselves. If you want good prepared food during the pandemic (and likely after), you’re going to pay a bit more for street food and a bit less for fine dining, whose death knell is another column.
Chi Chi Vegan Taco Shop: If you’re a foodie, you’re usually willing to suspend dread in order to make room for curiosity. That was my feeling when I set out for this new Reynoldstown restaurant. Being behind the times by still expecting vegan food to taste outré instead of chichi, I thought the restaurant’s name was self-parody. It’s actually a play on owner-chef Chris Hodge’s name and, hell yes, Chi Chi is chichi AF. Located in a renovated building with other tenants, the restaurant’s exterior is salmon pink while the interior is whitewashed brick and marble.
I expected the restaurant to have patio space, but it does not, and, frankly, I was disturbed by the interior seating. There are only 20 seats and people were certainly seated near one another. Despite the requirement to wear masks, I didn’t see anyone among the seated wearing a mask while waiting for their food. Two of three people who strolled in to pick up orders were also naked from the neck up. I’ve become really grouchy about this and complained to the woman delivering food to tables. She disputed my observation, and I chose not to argue. I waited outside, perched on one of four stools.
When my food arrived 15 minutes after ordering at the counter, it was plated for dining in. I thought I’d ordered it to go. I was paranoid as hell but decided to go with it. The woman working the floor cleared a space at the end of a bar, next to the door. My first bite of an al pastor taco was astonishing. In meat-eating life it is a flour tortilla full of spit-roasted, marinated pork basted in fresh pineapple juice as it cooks. Chi Chi’s version is served in a slightly crispy tortilla. The meat substitute, “chk’n,” is plant-based, of course, and doesn’t make an effort to exactly impersonate sliced meat. It was almost like a deliciously seasoned stew topped with explosively fresh pineapple, cilantro, and onions (but missing the promised guac). I also ordered a veggie chimichanga, which was equally stunning. It was $16 but large enough for two people, and I’d venture to say it’s the best version of a chimichanga I’ve eaten in our city in a very long time. It’s full of rice, black beans, and fajita-style veggies wrapped in a gigantic fried burrito, topped with faux queso and pico de gallo. (You can add “meat” and guac.) Everything about its seasonings and textures seemed fine-tuned compared to the usual burrito dump.
The menu here is brief and I want to try everything on it, but I’m not planning to eat on the premises. Halfway through my chimichanga I got anxious as hell and asked for a box to take it home. It held up pretty well, but like all takeout food, it lost some of its gloss, even in a brief drive. Still, I suggest that you order online for pickup.
La Bodega: This is a little complicated. La Bodega is three food things seemingly crawling toward infinity. It is, foremost (to my mind), a Salvadoran pupuseria. It is a developing Hispanic grocery store (or “bodega”). It also hosts The Window for takeout pop-ups of potentially infinite numbers. Located in the gigantic, old, renovating, artsy, alternative, lovable MET complex in southwest Atlanta, it is the project of Ken and Jeanette Katz, owners of Buenos Dias Café in downtown Atlanta, which they’ve shuttered due to COVID-19.
I love pupusas but I have eaten so many bad ones in Atlanta, I gave up ordering them anywhere a few years ago. They’re not complicated. They are griddle cakes made of corn flour stuffed with a variety of ingredients. They are often compared to Venezuelan arepas and Mexican gorditas, but pupusas are stuffed before they are cooked instead of after. This makes them denser, and if made too long in advance they are virtually inedible even when dunked deeply into sauce for a long time.
I ordered a sample plate of two pupusas, with plantains, pickled cabbage slaw, and quinoa topped with black beans. The first was the pupusa revuelta, probably El Salvador’s favorite and certainly mine. It’s full of black beans, cheese, and crunchy bits of chicharrones, the fried pork fat that made my life worth living south of the border. I’ll get two next time. The other pupusa I ordered was stuffed with chicken mole characteristic of the Mexican state of Guerrero. It was tasty and tender but the red mole was a bit thin and lightly flavored for my taste. I’m not saying that’s bad. It’s a popular style, but I want more depth. You can eat these with your hands or with utensils. Just be sure you include a bit of the tangy slaw with each bite. The menu includes many other dishes such as bizarrely compelling pizzas, breakfast nachos, and Cuban sandwiches.
During my visit, two pop-up vendors were working the Windows gig. One was Carrot Dog. Sorry, I really don’t like hot dogs or carrots. However, I love banana pudding, and I made a beeline to BeyNana’s window. The owner, Micki Bey, was working outside the window, something like a carnival barker, urging people to try samples of her banana pudding. The interesting thing about BeyNana’s banana pudding is that it contains no bananas. That’s right. You don’t have to shove those overripe, browning bananas out of the way while you go for the pudding, as Ms. Bey explained to VoyageATL. There are about 20 different varieties of the pudding available, such as delicious S’mores, which I sampled. While I waited for my pupusas, I swung basic and devoured half a tub of the plain pudding with vanilla wafers. How good was it? I ate the rest of it at traffic lights on my way home, getting honked at twice. Check out La Bodega’s website for other pop-ups.
Lupe’s Mexican Eatery: Sofia Garcia Diaz of Little Tart Bake Shop has fed me something I have only been able to find one time in Atlanta since the late ‘80s. I’m talking about tacos filled with chicharrones suaves — big sloppy pieces of soft pork fat and skin. Granted, she stews them in a red sauce instead of the salsa verde in which I ate them voraciously in Houston and Mexico, but I don’t care.
Diaz, a native of Guadalajara, hosts a pop-up, Lupe’s Mexican Eatery, at Little Tart every Saturday and Sunday, 5-8 p.m. The fare changes weekly, of course. I scored my pork chubs during a week she was preparing tacos made with stews, “guisados.” I did get a dose of green sauce in which she cooked luscious beef tongue. We also sampled perfect chicken tinga and cochinita pibil. The only near-meh was the “chocoflan” — chocolate sponge cake topped with flan. Because the cake was twice as thick as the rather airy flan, the taste was overwhelmingly chocolate with only a thin ribbon of caramel here and there.
We hoped to eat on the premises, once again to avoid the terrible effect of takeout boxes on steamy tacos. We were invited to use the patio in the rear. It was empty and really dark. Nobody could find the light switch, so we ran home with our bounty. Yep, the tortillas were wrinkled, but nothing can really ruin a big glob of pork fat and a chunk of cow tongue.—CL—
Chi Chi Vegan Taco Shop, 1 Moreland Ave., 404-464-7153, chichivegan.com, @chichiveganATL, facebook.com/ChiChiVegan/
La Bodega, 680 Murphy Ave. #4158, 404-809-4158, labodegaatl.com, @labodega.atl, facebook.com/LaBodega.Atl/; BeyNana’s, @beynanassweets; Carrot Dog, Kemi Bennings
Lupe’s Mexican Eatery at Little Tart Bake Shop, 68 Georgia Ave., 404-348-4797, order online, @lupes.eatery
Suggested articles on dining criticism and post-pandemic reality
“The New Order” by Tom Sietsema, The Washington Post: https://www.washingtonpost.com/magazine/2020/04/23/restaurants-matter-reasons-more-than-dinner-posts-food-critic-what-were-danger-losing/?arc404=true
“Razed and Exposed, the Restaurant Industry is Due for Change” by Bill Addison, The Los Angeles Times: https://sports.yahoo.com/razed-exposed-restaurant-industry-due-130018600.html
“Why This Dining Critic Isn’t Eating Out Right Now” by Ryan Sutton, Eater New York: https://ny.eater.com/2020/7/1/21310249/against-dining-out-bars-coronavirus-nyc-restaurants
“What’s Next for Restaurant Criticism?” by Christiane Lauterbach, Atlanta Magazine: https://www.atlantamagazine.com/dining-news/whats-next-for-restaurant-criticism/ —CL—"
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While the present context is horrific, examination of the critic’s role has been underway at least since the Great Recession of 2007 accelerated the starvation of print journalism. To maintain economic viability, many critics were called down from the mountaintop to write news and feature stories as well as restaurant reviews. In the process, they lost the pretentious anonymity they never had to begin with while thousands of food bloggers and anonymous Yelpers created consensus that arguably gained more reliability in the public mind. Now, watching millions lose their jobs, critics are publicly ruminating their own futures. Many of their essays are a mix of hubris and startled compassion. In order to agonize for thousands of words over your need to support the industry in the future, you must have retained a very high opinion of your power, right?
More important than the etiquette of what is articulated, though, is what dining critics have long avoided saying. I’ve posted some links below that I found particularly thoughtful in this respect. I especially urge you to read the ''Los Angeles Times'' piece by critic Bill Addison, who started his career at ''Creative Loafing''. Bill calls out the hierarchy of virtual enslavement that has defined the restaurant industry since its beginnings. Critics who can bring the insights of anthropology, history, and economics into view don’t stray from their art or purpose, as some argue. When someone whom you know to be underpaid and uninsured presents you a perfect plate of food while an infamous chef is screaming racial epithets at kitchen staff in the background, maybe it’s finally time to report the whole story. It’s the hospitality industry, after all!
Restaurants have long been the place where we gather to mark special occasions, reinforce social bonds, and cross so-called ethnic boundaries even as our actual borders remain supposedly walled. The absence of safe restaurants has added to the culture’s general malaise and — be warned — it’s really hard to find a single essay predicting a return to “normal.” Recovery from the viral threat and the devastated economy won’t occur overnight because of a vaccine’s availability on a particular day in the spring. Healing will be gradual and haunted by painful memories. So, no, you’ll likely not be able to head back to your favorite neighborhood spot in a year and find it unchanged.
Already, new restaurants are opening that enhance social distancing, especially by offering lots of patio space, but that’s not going to help much as we head into winter and must decide whether to take a table inside. Some new restaurants have incorporated interior distancing but that, to say nothing of required masks, challenges us to find pleasure amid reminders of a plague. Old and new restaurants alike are highlighting delivery, takeout, and “curb service,” a term that described dining in your car at the Varsity when I was a kid, but now means a Hazmat-clad restaurant employee will come outside and hand you your chili dogs when you drive up to the restaurant and then vamoose immediately. While you’re not supposed to eat in restaurant parking lots, I admit that more than once I’ve driven a few blocks away and tailgated in order to avoid the sloppy, steaming deterioration that takeout containers can cause. Delivery makes that effect even worse and adds a lot of dollars. Turning the whole world into one big food hall has one especially depressing effect: It reduces employment numbers significantly in a business with a very slim profit margin.
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Recently, I visited three new venues that exemplify the joys and complications of takeout and dining in. They all feature Hispanic street food, which has become extremely popular in the last decade, but these three top my recent charts. I’m not going to bother to rave in particular at length about each. Just take my word for it: They are all worth the cost, which is generally low, but let’s not delude ourselves. If you want good prepared food during the pandemic (and likely after), you’re going to pay a bit more for street food and a bit less for fine dining, whose death knell is another column.
__Chi Chi Vegan Taco Shop:__ If you’re a foodie, you’re usually willing to suspend dread in order to make room for curiosity. That was my feeling when I set out for this new Reynoldstown restaurant. Being behind the times by still expecting vegan food to taste outré instead of chichi, I thought the restaurant’s name was self-parody. It’s actually a play on owner-chef Chris Hodge’s name and, hell yes, Chi Chi is chichi AF. Located in a renovated building with other tenants, the restaurant’s exterior is salmon pink while the interior is whitewashed brick and marble.
I expected the restaurant to have patio space, but it does not, and, frankly, I was disturbed by the interior seating. There are only 20 seats and people were certainly seated near one another. Despite the requirement to wear masks, I didn’t see anyone among the seated wearing a mask while waiting for their food. Two of three people who strolled in to pick up orders were also naked from the neck up. I’ve become really grouchy about this and complained to the woman delivering food to tables. She disputed my observation, and I chose not to argue. I waited outside, perched on one of four stools.
When my food arrived 15 minutes after ordering at the counter, it was plated for dining in. I thought I’d ordered it to go. I was paranoid as hell but decided to go with it. The woman working the floor cleared a space at the end of a bar, next to the door. My first bite of an al pastor taco was astonishing. In meat-eating life it is a flour tortilla full of spit-roasted, marinated pork basted in fresh pineapple juice as it cooks. Chi Chi’s version is served in a slightly crispy tortilla. The meat substitute, “chk’n,” is plant-based, of course, and doesn’t make an effort to exactly impersonate sliced meat. It was almost like a deliciously seasoned stew topped with explosively fresh pineapple, cilantro, and onions (but missing the promised guac). I also ordered a veggie chimichanga, which was equally stunning. It was $16 but large enough for two people, and I’d venture to say it’s the best version of a chimichanga I’ve eaten in our city in a very long time. It’s full of rice, black beans, and fajita-style veggies wrapped in a gigantic fried burrito, topped with faux queso and pico de gallo. (You can add “meat” and guac.) Everything about its seasonings and textures seemed fine-tuned compared to the usual burrito dump.
The menu here is brief and I want to try everything on it, but I’m not planning to eat on the premises. Halfway through my chimichanga I got anxious as hell and asked for a box to take it home. It held up pretty well, but like all takeout food, it lost some of its gloss, even in a brief drive. Still, I suggest that you order online for pickup.
__La Bodega:__ This is a little complicated. La Bodega is three food things seemingly crawling toward infinity. It is, foremost (to my mind), a Salvadoran pupuseria. It is a developing Hispanic grocery store (or “bodega”). It also hosts The Window for takeout pop-ups of potentially infinite numbers. Located in the gigantic, old, renovating, artsy, alternative, lovable MET complex in southwest Atlanta, it is the project of Ken and Jeanette Katz, owners of Buenos Dias Café in downtown Atlanta, which they’ve shuttered due to COVID-19.
I love pupusas but I have eaten so many bad ones in Atlanta, I gave up ordering them anywhere a few years ago. They’re not complicated. They are griddle cakes made of corn flour stuffed with a variety of ingredients. They are often compared to Venezuelan arepas and Mexican gorditas, but pupusas are stuffed before they are cooked instead of after. This makes them denser, and if made too long in advance they are virtually inedible even when dunked deeply into sauce for a long time.
I ordered a sample plate of two pupusas, with plantains, pickled cabbage slaw, and quinoa topped with black beans. The first was the pupusa revuelta, probably El Salvador’s favorite and certainly mine. It’s full of black beans, cheese, and crunchy bits of chicharrones, the fried pork fat that made my life worth living south of the border. I’ll get two next time. The other pupusa I ordered was stuffed with chicken mole characteristic of the Mexican state of Guerrero. It was tasty and tender but the red mole was a bit thin and lightly flavored for my taste. I’m not saying that’s bad. It’s a popular style, but I want more depth. You can eat these with your hands or with utensils. Just be sure you include a bit of the tangy slaw with each bite. The menu includes many other dishes such as bizarrely compelling pizzas, breakfast nachos, and Cuban sandwiches.
During my visit, two pop-up vendors were working the Windows gig. One was Carrot Dog. Sorry, I really don’t like hot dogs or carrots. However, I love banana pudding, and I made a beeline to __BeyNana__’s window. The owner, Micki Bey, was working outside the window, something like a carnival barker, urging people to try samples of her banana pudding. The interesting thing about BeyNana’s banana pudding is that it contains no bananas. That’s right. You don’t have to shove those overripe, browning bananas out of the way while you go for the pudding, as Ms. Bey explained to VoyageATL. There are about 20 different varieties of the pudding available, such as delicious S’mores, which I sampled. While I waited for my pupusas, I swung basic and devoured half a tub of the plain pudding with vanilla wafers. How good was it? I ate the rest of it at traffic lights on my way home, getting honked at twice. Check out La Bodega’s website for other pop-ups.
__Lupe’s Mexican Eatery:__ Sofia Garcia Diaz of Little Tart Bake Shop has fed me something I have only been able to find one time in Atlanta since the late ‘80s. I’m talking about tacos filled with chicharrones suaves — big sloppy pieces of soft pork fat and skin. Granted, she stews them in a red sauce instead of the salsa verde in which I ate them voraciously in Houston and Mexico, but I don’t care.
Diaz, a native of Guadalajara, hosts a pop-up, Lupe’s Mexican Eatery, at Little Tart every Saturday and Sunday, 5-8 p.m. The fare changes weekly, of course. I scored my pork chubs during a week she was preparing tacos made with stews, “guisados.” I did get a dose of green sauce in which she cooked luscious beef tongue. We also sampled perfect chicken tinga and cochinita pibil. The only near-meh was the “chocoflan” — chocolate sponge cake topped with flan. Because the cake was twice as thick as the rather airy flan, the taste was overwhelmingly chocolate with only a thin ribbon of caramel here and there.
We hoped to eat on the premises, once again to avoid the terrible effect of takeout boxes on steamy tacos. We were invited to use the patio in the rear. It was empty and really dark. Nobody could find the light switch, so we ran home with our bounty. Yep, the tortillas were wrinkled, but nothing can really ruin a big glob of pork fat and a chunk of cow tongue.__—CL—__
''Chi Chi Vegan Taco Shop, 1 Moreland Ave., 404-464-7153, chichivegan.com, @chichiveganATL, facebook.com/ChiChiVegan/''
''La Bodega, 680 Murphy Ave. #4158, 404-809-4158, labodegaatl.com, @labodega.atl, facebook.com/LaBodega.Atl/; BeyNana’s, @beynanassweets; Carrot Dog, @foodforthoughtvegancafe''
''Lupe’s Mexican Eatery at Little Tart Bake Shop, 68 Georgia Ave., 404-348-4797, order online, @lupes.eatery''
__Suggested articles on dining criticism and post-pandemic reality__
“The New Order” by Tom Sietsema, ''The Washington Post'': https://www.washingtonpost.com/magazine/2020/04/23/restaurants-matter-reasons-more-than-dinner-posts-food-critic-what-were-danger-losing/?arc404=true
“Razed and Exposed, the Restaurant Industry is Due for Change” by Bill Addison, ''The Los Angeles Times'': https://sports.yahoo.com/razed-exposed-restaurant-industry-due-130018600.html
“Why This Dining Critic Isn’t Eating Out Right Now” by Ryan Sutton, ''Eater New York'': https://ny.eater.com/2020/7/1/21310249/against-dining-out-bars-coronavirus-nyc-restaurants
“What’s Next for Restaurant Criticism?” by Christiane Lauterbach, ''Atlanta Magazine'': https://www.atlantamagazine.com/dining-news/whats-next-for-restaurant-criticism/ __—CL—__"
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string(13728) " GRAZ A70604B6 2020-12-08T14:30:04+00:00 GRAZ_A70604B6.jpeg grazing The pandemic makes critics self-critical but Hispanic street food still tastes really good GRAZ A70604B6 2020-12-08T14:33:37+00:00 GRAZING: Tacos, chimichangas, pupusas – and ‘banana’ pudding jim.harris Jim Harris Cliff Bostock cliffbostock (Cliff Bostock) 2020-12-08T14:33:37+00:00 It’s no surprise that the most repeated memes among dining critics since March feature the coronavirus pandemic. With a huge number of restaurants closing and a tiny number opening, critics don’t have much to review. Having basically always been an adjunct to the food service industry, they are now awakening to the kind of misery many never noticed — from the low pay and instability of restaurant employment to the way the coronavirus literally erases taste, thus provoking soul-searching like, “OMG, who made me the king of taste?”
While the present context is horrific, examination of the critic’s role has been underway at least since the Great Recession of 2007 accelerated the starvation of print journalism. To maintain economic viability, many critics were called down from the mountaintop to write news and feature stories as well as restaurant reviews. In the process, they lost the pretentious anonymity they never had to begin with while thousands of food bloggers and anonymous Yelpers created consensus that arguably gained more reliability in the public mind. Now, watching millions lose their jobs, critics are publicly ruminating their own futures. Many of their essays are a mix of hubris and startled compassion. In order to agonize for thousands of words over your need to support the industry in the future, you must have retained a very high opinion of your power, right?
More important than the etiquette of what is articulated, though, is what dining critics have long avoided saying. I’ve posted some links below that I found particularly thoughtful in this respect. I especially urge you to read the Los Angeles Times piece by critic Bill Addison, who started his career at Creative Loafing. Bill calls out the hierarchy of virtual enslavement that has defined the restaurant industry since its beginnings. Critics who can bring the insights of anthropology, history, and economics into view don’t stray from their art or purpose, as some argue. When someone whom you know to be underpaid and uninsured presents you a perfect plate of food while an infamous chef is screaming racial epithets at kitchen staff in the background, maybe it’s finally time to report the whole story. It’s the hospitality industry, after all!
Restaurants have long been the place where we gather to mark special occasions, reinforce social bonds, and cross so-called ethnic boundaries even as our actual borders remain supposedly walled. The absence of safe restaurants has added to the culture’s general malaise and — be warned — it’s really hard to find a single essay predicting a return to “normal.” Recovery from the viral threat and the devastated economy won’t occur overnight because of a vaccine’s availability on a particular day in the spring. Healing will be gradual and haunted by painful memories. So, no, you’ll likely not be able to head back to your favorite neighborhood spot in a year and find it unchanged.
Already, new restaurants are opening that enhance social distancing, especially by offering lots of patio space, but that’s not going to help much as we head into winter and must decide whether to take a table inside. Some new restaurants have incorporated interior distancing but that, to say nothing of required masks, challenges us to find pleasure amid reminders of a plague. Old and new restaurants alike are highlighting delivery, takeout, and “curb service,” a term that described dining in your car at the Varsity when I was a kid, but now means a Hazmat-clad restaurant employee will come outside and hand you your chili dogs when you drive up to the restaurant and then vamoose immediately. While you’re not supposed to eat in restaurant parking lots, I admit that more than once I’ve driven a few blocks away and tailgated in order to avoid the sloppy, steaming deterioration that takeout containers can cause. Delivery makes that effect even worse and adds a lot of dollars. Turning the whole world into one big food hall has one especially depressing effect: It reduces employment numbers significantly in a business with a very slim profit margin.
Recently, I visited three new venues that exemplify the joys and complications of takeout and dining in. They all feature Hispanic street food, which has become extremely popular in the last decade, but these three top my recent charts. I’m not going to bother to rave in particular at length about each. Just take my word for it: They are all worth the cost, which is generally low, but let’s not delude ourselves. If you want good prepared food during the pandemic (and likely after), you’re going to pay a bit more for street food and a bit less for fine dining, whose death knell is another column.
Chi Chi Vegan Taco Shop: If you’re a foodie, you’re usually willing to suspend dread in order to make room for curiosity. That was my feeling when I set out for this new Reynoldstown restaurant. Being behind the times by still expecting vegan food to taste outré instead of chichi, I thought the restaurant’s name was self-parody. It’s actually a play on owner-chef Chris Hodge’s name and, hell yes, Chi Chi is chichi AF. Located in a renovated building with other tenants, the restaurant’s exterior is salmon pink while the interior is whitewashed brick and marble.
I expected the restaurant to have patio space, but it does not, and, frankly, I was disturbed by the interior seating. There are only 20 seats and people were certainly seated near one another. Despite the requirement to wear masks, I didn’t see anyone among the seated wearing a mask while waiting for their food. Two of three people who strolled in to pick up orders were also naked from the neck up. I’ve become really grouchy about this and complained to the woman delivering food to tables. She disputed my observation, and I chose not to argue. I waited outside, perched on one of four stools.
When my food arrived 15 minutes after ordering at the counter, it was plated for dining in. I thought I’d ordered it to go. I was paranoid as hell but decided to go with it. The woman working the floor cleared a space at the end of a bar, next to the door. My first bite of an al pastor taco was astonishing. In meat-eating life it is a flour tortilla full of spit-roasted, marinated pork basted in fresh pineapple juice as it cooks. Chi Chi’s version is served in a slightly crispy tortilla. The meat substitute, “chk’n,” is plant-based, of course, and doesn’t make an effort to exactly impersonate sliced meat. It was almost like a deliciously seasoned stew topped with explosively fresh pineapple, cilantro, and onions (but missing the promised guac). I also ordered a veggie chimichanga, which was equally stunning. It was $16 but large enough for two people, and I’d venture to say it’s the best version of a chimichanga I’ve eaten in our city in a very long time. It’s full of rice, black beans, and fajita-style veggies wrapped in a gigantic fried burrito, topped with faux queso and pico de gallo. (You can add “meat” and guac.) Everything about its seasonings and textures seemed fine-tuned compared to the usual burrito dump.
The menu here is brief and I want to try everything on it, but I’m not planning to eat on the premises. Halfway through my chimichanga I got anxious as hell and asked for a box to take it home. It held up pretty well, but like all takeout food, it lost some of its gloss, even in a brief drive. Still, I suggest that you order online for pickup.
La Bodega: This is a little complicated. La Bodega is three food things seemingly crawling toward infinity. It is, foremost (to my mind), a Salvadoran pupuseria. It is a developing Hispanic grocery store (or “bodega”). It also hosts The Window for takeout pop-ups of potentially infinite numbers. Located in the gigantic, old, renovating, artsy, alternative, lovable MET complex in southwest Atlanta, it is the project of Ken and Jeanette Katz, owners of Buenos Dias Café in downtown Atlanta, which they’ve shuttered due to COVID-19.
I love pupusas but I have eaten so many bad ones in Atlanta, I gave up ordering them anywhere a few years ago. They’re not complicated. They are griddle cakes made of corn flour stuffed with a variety of ingredients. They are often compared to Venezuelan arepas and Mexican gorditas, but pupusas are stuffed before they are cooked instead of after. This makes them denser, and if made too long in advance they are virtually inedible even when dunked deeply into sauce for a long time.
I ordered a sample plate of two pupusas, with plantains, pickled cabbage slaw, and quinoa topped with black beans. The first was the pupusa revuelta, probably El Salvador’s favorite and certainly mine. It’s full of black beans, cheese, and crunchy bits of chicharrones, the fried pork fat that made my life worth living south of the border. I’ll get two next time. The other pupusa I ordered was stuffed with chicken mole characteristic of the Mexican state of Guerrero. It was tasty and tender but the red mole was a bit thin and lightly flavored for my taste. I’m not saying that’s bad. It’s a popular style, but I want more depth. You can eat these with your hands or with utensils. Just be sure you include a bit of the tangy slaw with each bite. The menu includes many other dishes such as bizarrely compelling pizzas, breakfast nachos, and Cuban sandwiches.
During my visit, two pop-up vendors were working the Windows gig. One was Carrot Dog. Sorry, I really don’t like hot dogs or carrots. However, I love banana pudding, and I made a beeline to BeyNana’s window. The owner, Micki Bey, was working outside the window, something like a carnival barker, urging people to try samples of her banana pudding. The interesting thing about BeyNana’s banana pudding is that it contains no bananas. That’s right. You don’t have to shove those overripe, browning bananas out of the way while you go for the pudding, as Ms. Bey explained to VoyageATL. There are about 20 different varieties of the pudding available, such as delicious S’mores, which I sampled. While I waited for my pupusas, I swung basic and devoured half a tub of the plain pudding with vanilla wafers. How good was it? I ate the rest of it at traffic lights on my way home, getting honked at twice. Check out La Bodega’s website for other pop-ups.
Lupe’s Mexican Eatery: Sofia Garcia Diaz of Little Tart Bake Shop has fed me something I have only been able to find one time in Atlanta since the late ‘80s. I’m talking about tacos filled with chicharrones suaves — big sloppy pieces of soft pork fat and skin. Granted, she stews them in a red sauce instead of the salsa verde in which I ate them voraciously in Houston and Mexico, but I don’t care.
Diaz, a native of Guadalajara, hosts a pop-up, Lupe’s Mexican Eatery, at Little Tart every Saturday and Sunday, 5-8 p.m. The fare changes weekly, of course. I scored my pork chubs during a week she was preparing tacos made with stews, “guisados.” I did get a dose of green sauce in which she cooked luscious beef tongue. We also sampled perfect chicken tinga and cochinita pibil. The only near-meh was the “chocoflan” — chocolate sponge cake topped with flan. Because the cake was twice as thick as the rather airy flan, the taste was overwhelmingly chocolate with only a thin ribbon of caramel here and there.
We hoped to eat on the premises, once again to avoid the terrible effect of takeout boxes on steamy tacos. We were invited to use the patio in the rear. It was empty and really dark. Nobody could find the light switch, so we ran home with our bounty. Yep, the tortillas were wrinkled, but nothing can really ruin a big glob of pork fat and a chunk of cow tongue.—CL—
Chi Chi Vegan Taco Shop, 1 Moreland Ave., 404-464-7153, chichivegan.com, @chichiveganATL, facebook.com/ChiChiVegan/
La Bodega, 680 Murphy Ave. #4158, 404-809-4158, labodegaatl.com, @labodega.atl, facebook.com/LaBodega.Atl/; BeyNana’s, @beynanassweets; Carrot Dog, Kemi Bennings
Lupe’s Mexican Eatery at Little Tart Bake Shop, 68 Georgia Ave., 404-348-4797, order online, @lupes.eatery
Suggested articles on dining criticism and post-pandemic reality
“The New Order” by Tom Sietsema, The Washington Post: https://www.washingtonpost.com/magazine/2020/04/23/restaurants-matter-reasons-more-than-dinner-posts-food-critic-what-were-danger-losing/?arc404=true
“Razed and Exposed, the Restaurant Industry is Due for Change” by Bill Addison, The Los Angeles Times: https://sports.yahoo.com/razed-exposed-restaurant-industry-due-130018600.html
“Why This Dining Critic Isn’t Eating Out Right Now” by Ryan Sutton, Eater New York: https://ny.eater.com/2020/7/1/21310249/against-dining-out-bars-coronavirus-nyc-restaurants
“What’s Next for Restaurant Criticism?” by Christiane Lauterbach, Atlanta Magazine: https://www.atlantamagazine.com/dining-news/whats-next-for-restaurant-criticism/ —CL— Cliff Bostock IT'S REAL: The new Chi Chi Vegan Taco Shop features reworked Hispanic classics like this gigantic chicmichanga and al pastor taco. 0,0,10 grazing GRAZING: Tacos, chimichangas, pupusas – and ‘banana’ pudding "
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GRAZING: Tacos, chimichangas, pupusas – and ‘banana’ pudding Article
Tuesday December 8, 2020 09:33 AM EST
The pandemic makes critics self-critical but Hispanic street food still tastes really good
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string(8066) "I can’t take it anymore. The dining room has become a solitary confinement cell where cobwebs float onto plates piled with food that has all the pizzazz of an electric can opener. I eat at my desk, staring at the TV, watching sanctimonious Chris Cuomo not listen to the responses of guests he interviews. Ultimately, I take the one pill that has made COVID-19 bearable — Ambien — and totter off to bed at 9:30. Really, I’m going crazy. Finally, though, it came to pass on a late Friday afternoon in mid-October, that I just had to eat out.
No, it wasn’t something exotic or fancy I craved. I wanted to check out the new Hero Doughnuts and Buns, in Summerhill, not far from home. It shares ownership, Alabama origins, and a patio with the also new Hot Dog Pete’s. What could beat a burger, a hot dog, fries, and a doughnut for an early dinner, seated socially distant on a patio on a beautiful day? Unfortunately, as I walked across the street from the large parking lot at the end of Georgia Avenue, I saw that the front patio between the two restaurants was packed. I’m talking elbow-to-elbow people and virtually nobody wearing a mask. Actually, they weren’t even eating, so I have no idea what the deal was. Perhaps Gov. Kemp was about to mimic his lover Donald Trump by staging a Rose Garden-style super-spreader weenie roast. I don’t know. I ordered my stuff for takeout and resisted the urge to go all-out, pro-mask Karen.
As I’ve written here before, I really don’t trust most takeout food because the containers often affect taste and texture by basically steaming the contents. You don’t get to taste the food at its best. For that reason, I’m reluctant to say anything definitive about Hot Dog Pete’s, even though hot dogs are arguably to-go by most people’s definition. While the menu features American classics like Coney Island and Chicago hot dogs, I ordered two of the more exotic sausage combos. The Hot Rod, described as “cheddarwurst sausage,” was piled with bacon, caramelized onions, shredded cheddar, and barbecue sauce. The Sonora Dog features the cheddarwurst enlivened by jalapenos, topped with bacon, avocado, pinto beans, pico de gallo, mustard, and mayo. I’m not a big hot dog fan, but I shared the two dogs with someone who is. Neither of us was impressed. One of the sausages was so dry, it had wrinkled. None of the jumbled toppings offered standout flavors and, most surprising of all, the brioche buns from Alon’s tasted stale and dry as hell. Like I said, it’s too early to fail the place and I’m betting it gets better.
Meanwhile, there’s Hero Doughnuts and Buns, which also has two locations in Alabama. I’ve become totally addicted and find the roomy rear patio just fine for dining on the premises. One simple way it shuts down Pete’s is the far superior super-light brioche buns and doughnuts made on the premises. On my first visit, I ordered the Super Crunch sandwich — a chicken breast fried Korean-style, layered with pickles, pepper jam, and “cracked sauce,” which the cashier told me also contains a heavy dose of pepper. It’s crack, but not to the extent the double-patty Hero Burger is with its ton of melting American cheese, more cracked sauce, grilled onions, and bread-and-butter pickles. I was feeling cynical when I ordered the burger because it had become a nominee in Creative Loafing’s best burger list during Atlanta Burger Week, despite the brief time the restaurant has been open. Well, it deserved to be there. I also ordered some crinkle fries and — sorry guys — they sucked: cold, dry, and not easy to swallow. Nonetheless, I returned for a third visit, this time ordering the panko-fried pork chop sandwich with so-called boom-boom sauce, shredded cabbage, and pickles. All three of these sandwiches were dream-worthy and compact enough to make a doughnut seem like a rational side dish. So, I tried three — a classically round pistachio, an apple fritter, and the bread pudding. The latter two are so decadent, you might want to pop them in the oven, smother them with whipped cream, and use them as an aphrodisiac to pep up your neglectful lover. The restaurant also serves breakfast buns and plates like “Loaded Hashbrowns,” whose load includes the potatoes with a fried egg, onions, jalapeños, American cheese, pepper jam, cracked sauce, and your choice of bacon or three varieties of sausage. Oh yeah!
That same week, I visited a new Filipino restaurant, Estrellita, in Grant Park. My intention was takeout, but I arrived 30 minutes before closing and the dining room was empty, so I decided to eat in. This was the first time I’ve done that since the pandemic appeared in March. I’m happy to say I love everything about this place, which is owned by Hope Webb, Walter Cortado, and Blesseda Gamble. While it only seats a socially-distanced 20, you’ll first notice the décor designed by Webb. Her inspiration is the Hollywood Regency style (which, incidentally, is on display in Ryan Murphy’s “Hollywood” series on Netflix). The style’s main elements are glass, mirrors, metal, and lattice patterns. That means you’ll be sitting on a simple gold chair or viewing yourself in the restroom’s three many-sided gold mirrors. None of this is meant to imply the golden pomposity of a Trumpian hotel. On the contrary, the ambiance is sleekly informal, and the sound system’s mid-century jazz adds extra coolness.
Estrellita (“little star”) is open for dinner every evening except Tuesday. I visited on a Saturday afternoon when brunch is also served. I only got to try three dishes, but I’ll definitely be returning. My starter reflected the long Spanish occupation of the Philippines — a torta of creamy eggs, onions, and potatoes on a really delicious pandesal bun. My entrée was the soon-to-become notorious P.I.G. plate. That stands for pork, itlog (egg), and garlicky jasmine rice. The pork was fried and crunchy, sort of like carnitas, and the egg was likewise fried and served atop a huge serving of the rice. While I quickly polished off the pork and egg, I left a good bit of the rice behind, prompting Cortado to say, “I see you’re not that much into carbs.” Honestly, I don’t question the plate’s authenticity, but, hell yes, I wanted a lot more of that pork. I also ordered dessert — two large scoops of ice cream made of ube, a purple yam. It was accompanied by four lumpia, spring rolls filled with plantains. This was obviously meant for two but you will want to relieve your pandemic anxiety by eating the whole damn thing by yourself. The menu offers other classic Filipino dishes like shaved beef (bistek), fried pork belly, lo mein-like noodles, stews, and lumpia with savory fillings. Cortado also regularly prepares specials. My only complaint was the sauces, especially a super-sweet banana ketchup that had no banana flavor. I didn’t care for another cloyingly sweet condiment that reminded me of apple sauce. Cortado rescued me from these by offering a tart soy vinegar. Much better.
These three restaurants likely represent the future by stressing takeout and small dining rooms. Unfortunately, Estrellita does not offer patio space, but that is definitely the preference of most diners for now. We’ll see what happens when winter arrives. I shouldn’t fail to mention that all three of these places are inexpensive. Well, some people object to paying $2.50 or more for a doughnut, but they can go to Krispy Kreme and be the foody philistines they are. You and I are so much better than that. —CL—
Hot Dog Pete’s, 25 Georgia Ave., 470-369-6777, 11 a.m.-8 p.m. Sun.-Thurs., 11 a.m.-9 p.m., Fri. & Sat., hotdogpetes.com, @hotdogpetes.
Hero Doughnuts and Buns, 33 Georgia Ave., 470-369-6800, 7 a.m.-5 p.m. daily, herodoughnutsandbuns.com, @herodoughnuts.
Estrellita, 580 Woodward Ave., 404-390-3038, 5 p.m.-10 p.m. Mon. and Wed.–Sun, closed Tuesday; brunch 11 a.m.-2 p.m. Sat. and Sun., estrellitafilipino.com, @estrellitafilipino."
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No, it wasn’t something exotic or fancy I craved. I wanted to check out the new __Hero Doughnuts and Buns__, in Summerhill, not far from home. It shares ownership, Alabama origins, and a patio with the also new __Hot Dog Pete’s__. What could beat a burger, a hot dog, fries, and a doughnut for an early dinner, seated socially distant on a patio on a beautiful day? Unfortunately, as I walked across the street from the large parking lot at the end of Georgia Avenue, I saw that the front patio between the two restaurants was packed. I’m talking elbow-to-elbow people and virtually nobody wearing a mask. Actually, they weren’t even eating, so I have no idea what the deal was. Perhaps Gov. Kemp was about to mimic his lover Donald Trump by staging a Rose Garden-style super-spreader weenie roast. I don’t know. I ordered my stuff for takeout and resisted the urge to go all-out, pro-mask Karen.
As I’ve written here before, I really don’t trust most takeout food because the containers often affect taste and texture by basically steaming the contents. You don’t get to taste the food at its best. For that reason, I’m reluctant to say anything definitive about Hot Dog Pete’s, even though hot dogs are arguably to-go by most people’s definition. While the menu features American classics like Coney Island and Chicago hot dogs, I ordered two of the more exotic sausage combos. The Hot Rod, described as “cheddarwurst sausage,” was piled with bacon, caramelized onions, shredded cheddar, and barbecue sauce. The Sonora Dog features the cheddarwurst enlivened by jalapenos, topped with bacon, avocado, pinto beans, pico de gallo, mustard, and mayo. I’m not a big hot dog fan, but I shared the two dogs with someone who is. Neither of us was impressed. One of the sausages was so dry, it had wrinkled. None of the jumbled toppings offered standout flavors and, most surprising of all, the brioche buns from Alon’s tasted stale and dry as hell. Like I said, it’s too early to fail the place and I’m betting it gets better.
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Meanwhile, there’s Hero Doughnuts and Buns, which also has two locations in Alabama. I’ve become totally addicted and find the roomy rear patio just fine for dining on the premises. One simple way it shuts down Pete’s is the far superior super-light brioche buns and doughnuts made on the premises. On my first visit, I ordered the Super Crunch sandwich — a chicken breast fried Korean-style, layered with pickles, pepper jam, and “cracked sauce,” which the cashier told me also contains a heavy dose of pepper. It’s crack, but not to the extent the double-patty Hero Burger is with its ton of melting American cheese, more cracked sauce, grilled onions, and bread-and-butter pickles. I was feeling cynical when I ordered the burger because it had become a nominee in ''Creative Loafing''’s best burger list during Atlanta Burger Week, despite the brief time the restaurant has been open. Well, it deserved to be there. I also ordered some crinkle fries and — sorry guys — they sucked: cold, dry, and not easy to swallow. Nonetheless, I returned for a third visit, this time ordering the panko-fried pork chop sandwich with so-called boom-boom sauce, shredded cabbage, and pickles. All three of these sandwiches were dream-worthy and compact enough to make a doughnut seem like a rational side dish. So, I tried three — a classically round pistachio, an apple fritter, and the bread pudding. The latter two are so decadent, you might want to pop them in the oven, smother them with whipped cream, and use them as an aphrodisiac to pep up your neglectful lover. The restaurant also serves breakfast buns and plates like “Loaded Hashbrowns,” whose load includes the potatoes with a fried egg, onions, jalapeños, American cheese, pepper jam, cracked sauce, and your choice of bacon or three varieties of sausage. Oh yeah!
That same week, I visited a new Filipino restaurant, __Estrellita__, in Grant Park. My intention was takeout, but I arrived 30 minutes before closing and the dining room was empty, so I decided to eat in. This was the first time I’ve done that since the pandemic appeared in March. I’m happy to say I love everything about this place, which is owned by Hope Webb, Walter Cortado, and Blesseda Gamble. While it only seats a socially-distanced 20, you’ll first notice the décor designed by Webb. Her inspiration is the Hollywood Regency style (which, incidentally, is on display in Ryan Murphy’s “Hollywood” series on Netflix). The style’s main elements are glass, mirrors, metal, and lattice patterns. That means you’ll be sitting on a simple gold chair or viewing yourself in the restroom’s three many-sided gold mirrors. None of this is meant to imply the golden pomposity of a Trumpian hotel. On the contrary, the ambiance is sleekly informal, and the sound system’s mid-century jazz adds extra coolness.
Estrellita (“little star”) is open for dinner every evening except Tuesday. I visited on a Saturday afternoon when brunch is also served. I only got to try three dishes, but I’ll definitely be returning. My starter reflected the long Spanish occupation of the Philippines — a torta of creamy eggs, onions, and potatoes on a really delicious pandesal bun. My entrée was the soon-to-become notorious P.I.G. plate. That stands for pork, itlog (egg), and garlicky jasmine rice. The pork was fried and crunchy, sort of like carnitas, and the egg was likewise fried and served atop a huge serving of the rice. While I quickly polished off the pork and egg, I left a good bit of the rice behind, prompting Cortado to say, “I see you’re not that much into carbs.” Honestly, I don’t question the plate’s authenticity, but, hell yes, I wanted a lot more of that pork. I also ordered dessert — two large scoops of ice cream made of ube, a purple yam. It was accompanied by four lumpia, spring rolls filled with plantains. This was obviously meant for two but you will want to relieve your pandemic anxiety by eating the whole damn thing by yourself. The menu offers other classic Filipino dishes like shaved beef (bistek), fried pork belly, lo mein-like noodles, stews, and lumpia with savory fillings. Cortado also regularly prepares specials. My only complaint was the sauces, especially a super-sweet banana ketchup that had no banana flavor. I didn’t care for another cloyingly sweet condiment that reminded me of apple sauce. Cortado rescued me from these by offering a tart soy vinegar. Much better.
These three restaurants likely represent the future by stressing takeout and small dining rooms. Unfortunately, Estrellita does not offer patio space, but that is definitely the preference of most diners for now. We’ll see what happens when winter arrives. I shouldn’t fail to mention that all three of these places are inexpensive. Well, some people object to paying $2.50 or more for a doughnut, but they can go to Krispy Kreme and be the foody philistines they are. You and I are so much better than that. __—CL—__
''Hot Dog Pete’s, 25 Georgia Ave., 470-369-6777, 11 a.m.-8 p.m. Sun.-Thurs., 11 a.m.-9 p.m., Fri. & Sat., hotdogpetes.com, @hotdogpetes.''
''Hero Doughnuts and Buns, 33 Georgia Ave., 470-369-6800, 7 a.m.-5 p.m. daily, herodoughnutsandbuns.com, @herodoughnuts.''
''Estrellita, 580 Woodward Ave., 404-390-3038, 5 p.m.-10 p.m. Mon. and Wed.–Sun, closed Tuesday; brunch 11 a.m.-2 p.m. Sat. and Sun., estrellitafilipino.com, @estrellitafilipino.''"
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string(9075) " C5D5AC58 7351 413E B1AE 42CB374BD2FA 1 201 A Resized MASH-UP: A pistachio doughnut and fries from Hero and samples of two sausage dogs from Pete's. Photo credit: Cliff Bostock 2020-11-09T15:05:15+00:00 C5D5AC58-7351-413E-B1AE-42CB374BD2FA_1_201_a__resized.jpg Next time, try the regular hot dog at Hot Dog Pete's., and get the fries there. Try the slaw at Hero. It is the perfect foil for the Hero burger. grazing Doughnuts, weenies, purple ice cream, and fried pork chop sandwiches C5D5AC58 7351 413E B1AE 42CB374BD2FA 1 201 A Resized 2020-11-09T15:27:53+00:00 Dining out: Hero Donuts and Buns plus Hot Dog Pete’s in Summerhill; Estrellita in Grant Park jim.harris Jim Harris CLIFF BOSTOCK cliffbostock (Cliff Bostock) 2020-11-09T15:27:53+00:00 I can’t take it anymore. The dining room has become a solitary confinement cell where cobwebs float onto plates piled with food that has all the pizzazz of an electric can opener. I eat at my desk, staring at the TV, watching sanctimonious Chris Cuomo not listen to the responses of guests he interviews. Ultimately, I take the one pill that has made COVID-19 bearable — Ambien — and totter off to bed at 9:30. Really, I’m going crazy. Finally, though, it came to pass on a late Friday afternoon in mid-October, that I just had to eat out.
No, it wasn’t something exotic or fancy I craved. I wanted to check out the new Hero Doughnuts and Buns, in Summerhill, not far from home. It shares ownership, Alabama origins, and a patio with the also new Hot Dog Pete’s. What could beat a burger, a hot dog, fries, and a doughnut for an early dinner, seated socially distant on a patio on a beautiful day? Unfortunately, as I walked across the street from the large parking lot at the end of Georgia Avenue, I saw that the front patio between the two restaurants was packed. I’m talking elbow-to-elbow people and virtually nobody wearing a mask. Actually, they weren’t even eating, so I have no idea what the deal was. Perhaps Gov. Kemp was about to mimic his lover Donald Trump by staging a Rose Garden-style super-spreader weenie roast. I don’t know. I ordered my stuff for takeout and resisted the urge to go all-out, pro-mask Karen.
As I’ve written here before, I really don’t trust most takeout food because the containers often affect taste and texture by basically steaming the contents. You don’t get to taste the food at its best. For that reason, I’m reluctant to say anything definitive about Hot Dog Pete’s, even though hot dogs are arguably to-go by most people’s definition. While the menu features American classics like Coney Island and Chicago hot dogs, I ordered two of the more exotic sausage combos. The Hot Rod, described as “cheddarwurst sausage,” was piled with bacon, caramelized onions, shredded cheddar, and barbecue sauce. The Sonora Dog features the cheddarwurst enlivened by jalapenos, topped with bacon, avocado, pinto beans, pico de gallo, mustard, and mayo. I’m not a big hot dog fan, but I shared the two dogs with someone who is. Neither of us was impressed. One of the sausages was so dry, it had wrinkled. None of the jumbled toppings offered standout flavors and, most surprising of all, the brioche buns from Alon’s tasted stale and dry as hell. Like I said, it’s too early to fail the place and I’m betting it gets better.
Meanwhile, there’s Hero Doughnuts and Buns, which also has two locations in Alabama. I’ve become totally addicted and find the roomy rear patio just fine for dining on the premises. One simple way it shuts down Pete’s is the far superior super-light brioche buns and doughnuts made on the premises. On my first visit, I ordered the Super Crunch sandwich — a chicken breast fried Korean-style, layered with pickles, pepper jam, and “cracked sauce,” which the cashier told me also contains a heavy dose of pepper. It’s crack, but not to the extent the double-patty Hero Burger is with its ton of melting American cheese, more cracked sauce, grilled onions, and bread-and-butter pickles. I was feeling cynical when I ordered the burger because it had become a nominee in Creative Loafing’s best burger list during Atlanta Burger Week, despite the brief time the restaurant has been open. Well, it deserved to be there. I also ordered some crinkle fries and — sorry guys — they sucked: cold, dry, and not easy to swallow. Nonetheless, I returned for a third visit, this time ordering the panko-fried pork chop sandwich with so-called boom-boom sauce, shredded cabbage, and pickles. All three of these sandwiches were dream-worthy and compact enough to make a doughnut seem like a rational side dish. So, I tried three — a classically round pistachio, an apple fritter, and the bread pudding. The latter two are so decadent, you might want to pop them in the oven, smother them with whipped cream, and use them as an aphrodisiac to pep up your neglectful lover. The restaurant also serves breakfast buns and plates like “Loaded Hashbrowns,” whose load includes the potatoes with a fried egg, onions, jalapeños, American cheese, pepper jam, cracked sauce, and your choice of bacon or three varieties of sausage. Oh yeah!
That same week, I visited a new Filipino restaurant, Estrellita, in Grant Park. My intention was takeout, but I arrived 30 minutes before closing and the dining room was empty, so I decided to eat in. This was the first time I’ve done that since the pandemic appeared in March. I’m happy to say I love everything about this place, which is owned by Hope Webb, Walter Cortado, and Blesseda Gamble. While it only seats a socially-distanced 20, you’ll first notice the décor designed by Webb. Her inspiration is the Hollywood Regency style (which, incidentally, is on display in Ryan Murphy’s “Hollywood” series on Netflix). The style’s main elements are glass, mirrors, metal, and lattice patterns. That means you’ll be sitting on a simple gold chair or viewing yourself in the restroom’s three many-sided gold mirrors. None of this is meant to imply the golden pomposity of a Trumpian hotel. On the contrary, the ambiance is sleekly informal, and the sound system’s mid-century jazz adds extra coolness.
Estrellita (“little star”) is open for dinner every evening except Tuesday. I visited on a Saturday afternoon when brunch is also served. I only got to try three dishes, but I’ll definitely be returning. My starter reflected the long Spanish occupation of the Philippines — a torta of creamy eggs, onions, and potatoes on a really delicious pandesal bun. My entrée was the soon-to-become notorious P.I.G. plate. That stands for pork, itlog (egg), and garlicky jasmine rice. The pork was fried and crunchy, sort of like carnitas, and the egg was likewise fried and served atop a huge serving of the rice. While I quickly polished off the pork and egg, I left a good bit of the rice behind, prompting Cortado to say, “I see you’re not that much into carbs.” Honestly, I don’t question the plate’s authenticity, but, hell yes, I wanted a lot more of that pork. I also ordered dessert — two large scoops of ice cream made of ube, a purple yam. It was accompanied by four lumpia, spring rolls filled with plantains. This was obviously meant for two but you will want to relieve your pandemic anxiety by eating the whole damn thing by yourself. The menu offers other classic Filipino dishes like shaved beef (bistek), fried pork belly, lo mein-like noodles, stews, and lumpia with savory fillings. Cortado also regularly prepares specials. My only complaint was the sauces, especially a super-sweet banana ketchup that had no banana flavor. I didn’t care for another cloyingly sweet condiment that reminded me of apple sauce. Cortado rescued me from these by offering a tart soy vinegar. Much better.
These three restaurants likely represent the future by stressing takeout and small dining rooms. Unfortunately, Estrellita does not offer patio space, but that is definitely the preference of most diners for now. We’ll see what happens when winter arrives. I shouldn’t fail to mention that all three of these places are inexpensive. Well, some people object to paying $2.50 or more for a doughnut, but they can go to Krispy Kreme and be the foody philistines they are. You and I are so much better than that. —CL—
Hot Dog Pete’s, 25 Georgia Ave., 470-369-6777, 11 a.m.-8 p.m. Sun.-Thurs., 11 a.m.-9 p.m., Fri. & Sat., hotdogpetes.com, @hotdogpetes.
Hero Doughnuts and Buns, 33 Georgia Ave., 470-369-6800, 7 a.m.-5 p.m. daily, herodoughnutsandbuns.com, @herodoughnuts.
Estrellita, 580 Woodward Ave., 404-390-3038, 5 p.m.-10 p.m. Mon. and Wed.–Sun, closed Tuesday; brunch 11 a.m.-2 p.m. Sat. and Sun., estrellitafilipino.com, @estrellitafilipino. Cliff Bostock MASH-UP: A pistachio doughnut and fries from Hero and samples of two sausage dogs from Pete's. 0,0,10 grazing Dining out: Hero Donuts and Buns plus Hot Dog Pete’s in Summerhill; Estrellita in Grant Park "
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Dining out: Hero Donuts and Buns plus Hot Dog Pete’s in Summerhill; Estrellita in Grant Park Article
Monday November 9, 2020 10:27 AM EST
Doughnuts, weenies, purple ice cream, and fried pork chop sandwiches
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string(12771) "Not all great chefs feed humans. We’ll get to that, but first I should explain that I’m not a homebody. I’ve always seen my psychology clients in my home office in Grant Park, but I’ve done most of my writing in coffee shops. I even dedicated my 400-page doctoral dissertation to the staff of the Ansley Starbucks. Now, thanks to COVID-19, I have no choice but to sit in place at home. That brings me to the front porch of this house. It’s purple, as Prince would have it, and it’s up a flight of stairs so steep that I’ve frequently seen delivery drivers slow down, look up, and keep driving. The sad thing is that despite the pleasant view, the porch has had no furniture in the 25 years I’ve lived here because, well, sitting should occur at restaurants and coffee shops.
Since I can’t hang out in coffee shops now, in August I finally retired my Bialetti moka, and bought a cheap but deservedly well-rated espresso maker from Hamilton Beach. I’ve taken to making lattes and sitting on the steps mornings because I have to socialize with a tortoiseshell cat that has taken up residence on the porch. She started hanging out behind the house in mid-August, frequently peering through the glass panes of the door, making an unearthly sound — something like a squeak that turned into a high-pitched whine. We figured she was yet another starving stray we’d end up letting in the house. She looked skinny, so I took out some Hill’s dry food, which we feed our cat Patricia. I have never seen food disappear so quickly. I noticed she was wearing a tag and mentioned this to Wayne. He read it. Her name is Quiz. He managed to wrangle her into a crate after two days and walked her over to her owners’ house on a street barely a block away. That was that. Obviously, she was feigning hunger because her owners said they feed her regularly. They explained that they had adopted her from a nearby resident who moved and couldn’t take her with him. She has lived outdoors all of her estimated 15 years.
A month later, I was sitting on the steps with Quiz shortly after I got out of bed around 12 noon. She came back to the purple porch after Wayne carried her home. Then the owners came over, and we crated her for a second trip home. She had a great meal there, hung out with a neighbor … and returned to the purple porch. So, there we were on September 12, watching a bunch of masked people who were hanging out at the coach house across the street, laughing, listening to faint music, drinking coffee, and eating pastries. It turned out to be a new pop-up, Café Nube, whose theme is the culture of Miami, where co-owner Raul Peña, a first-generation Cuban immigrant, was born. He and his wife Liz Peña both lost their jobs, thanks to La Corona, and decided to create Nube, which means “cloud” and alludes to “the magical sunsets and clouds that Miami is known for,” according to Liz. Her background is in event production and marketing. Raul, a DJ and producer, was in the film industry, and the music angle is what makes Café Nube especially unique. Besides traditional Cuban pastries and coffee drinks, they collect and sell vintage vinyl records. Raul curates gift packs of five records.
The pop-up in front of the house was their first, and because of my late rising and sitting on the steps in boxer shorts, I decided to not risk indecent exposure while senile by walking across the street. Later, I chatted with Raul, who told me he is making flan and pastelitos, the traditional Cuban puff pastry typically filled with guava. I’ll be honest. Guava’s not my fave. I ate several tons of the sticky stuff after I married a Cuban woman when I was 20. I don’t get it. What I do like is Cuban coffee. Raul makes it in the traditional stove-top moka, like the one I just retired. People often equate Cuban coffee, “cafecito,” with Italian espresso, but it’s different. At least it is in Miami. Typically made with very strong, finely-ground coffee like Bustelo, it’s somewhat bitter but super-sweet because it is combined with a frothy blend of sugar and a few teaspoons of coffee. It looks like Italian crema, but it’s not. Café Nube serves four coffee drinks and several mysterious sodas based on Cuban cocktails. Liz infuses them with CBD, which means they cure everything. Check out their Instagram for dates of upcoming pop-ups and go early. They sold almost everything, including the record packs, during this first pop-up.
When Quiz returned after the two attempts to reunite her with her owners, I became suspicious. The couple, Matt and Tina Lunalover, seemed extremely nice, despite their weird surname. But maybe they just had too much on their plate. They had disclosed that they own four additional cats and two dogs (including one kitten and one puppy). We swapped a lot of email while Quiz continued to rule the purple porch day and night. The Lunalovers mentioned during the second attempted abduction that all of their pets’ food is homemade. I inwardly rolled my eyes, remembering my mother scraping all the day’s leftovers into a dog bowl. How do people not understand that dry food like Hill’s is finely tuned to a pet’s nutritional needs? Maybe Quiz, like all wise inhabitants of the planet, knew a healthy diet was life-giving. I mean, we all read the nutritional analysis on food labels to make sure we are getting everything we need, right? But I’m not calling DFACS for CATS, and I agreed with the Lunalovers that the only way Quiz was going to return home was if I stopped feeding her altogether. I tried, but my heart is gold. Like a Pavlovian rat, I wasn’t able to go longer than 15 hours before I rewarded Quiz’s shouting for kibble.
Then the Lunalovers, both former Apple employees, bomb-shelled me. It turns out that making gourmet raw food for cats and dogs is actually their livelihood. They operate Rebel Raw, continually grinding up organs, muscle, skin, and bones of everything from rabbits to turkeys and lambs in a facility near their home. They use restaurant-grade meat and only add vitamins and minerals — no filler. Customers have the option of delivery or picking up their orders from a freezer on the Lunalovers’ front porch. As if to add more absurdity to this drama, it turns out that Matt is the nephew of Paul Luna — the infamous, temperamental, and brilliant chef who opened many restaurants here, the last one being Lunacy Black Market. Matt’s father, Albert Lunalover, who changed his name from Luna to be cooler, worked with Paul, developing Eclipse di Luna and Luna Si. Then he created Avocados and Hopscotch in downtown Gainesville. Matt and Tina use the same suppliers as most restaurants do, including Springer Mountain chicken. (Paul now resides in Winterthur, Switzerland, where he operates JesusRICE!)
Tina provided all the details about the inadequacy of corporate pet foods, which you can read about on the Rebel Raw website. The more she said, the more I felt like an inadequate parent. She wrote me: “We know you mean well by feeding her but realize that … dry, hard pellets are nutritionally insufficient and consist of processed non-foods. Kibble is coated with chemicals and appetite enhancers to get cats to eat what is nowhere near their natural diet. Think the cat equivalent of corn syrup and MSG. Thus cats become ‘addicted’ and eat way more than they need to … Why do you think so many cats have kidney disease? Their kidneys have been overworked trying to process kibble all those years. Cats’ digestive systems were not designed to process hard, dry pellets. Those were made for shelf life and human convenience.”
OMGMEOW! A few days later, I was hauling about 10 days’ worth of chicken meals out of the Rebel Raw freezer. Quiz started eating it straight away, but I confess I left some kibble in her bowl at night. Big mistake. If she doesn’t get it, she truly turns into a banshee withdrawing from crack, screaming at the back door. Hopefully that will be fully resolved by the time you read this. It’s true that some cats do become fussy, but the Lunalovers suggest experimenting with different ground meats when that occurs. Rebel Raw also sells tempting side dishes and treats like pig ears, chicken necks, beef jerky, sardines, and other items that will make life a daily nightmare for vegetarian animal activists. (Yes, I know about evolution.)
Why would Quiz abandon her owners who have comfy porch furniture and provide a fancy resting space for her, whereas we have no porch furniture — only a cardboard box. Ultimately, we concluded that Quiz took up residence on the purple porch, not because she loves us, but because, after 15 years of outdoor living, she hates dogs. The Lunalovers have two, and the neighbor Quiz visited regularly had been hosting a friend’s puppy for a week. Quiz abandoned her too. So Quiz remains a citizen of the world, not a mere pet, although she started coming inside occasionally. She is grateful. I know this because she left a dead mouse on the purple porch, standing a few yards away, happily squeaking. Inside, she prefers my office, particularly the chair where clients usually sit. Like some clients, she talks continually — something I learned is common among tortoiseshell cats. But now, the tide has turned. She jumps on the table where I am eating one of my many guilty pleasures, the frozen Thai eggplant from Trader Joe’s. It is my favorite of all their frozen dishes, but it has an absurd quantity of salt in it, as do the Indian meals I most frequently consume, especially the butter chicken which is also slick with cholesterol. In other words, La Corona has me eating really bad. But I won’t quibble with Quiz about human kibble.
Last month, admitting my TJ COVID-19 Diet, I promised to name my favorite salt licks there. Here we go. After the microwavable Indian foods and the Thai eggplant, I most enjoy the kung pao chicken, the extremely popular Mandarin orange chicken (with sickeningly sweet sauce whose dose I cut in half), the spanakopita (the triangles, not the pie), the chicken pot pie (though the pastry is temperamental), the shepherd’s pie, the cauliflower gnocchi (as well as the “real” gnocchi), and the steak and stout pies. Anything cheesy is usually good. I don’t like their Mexican food because it has the usual Texxy-Mexxy overdose of “chile powder.” Okay, the microwavable frozen chicken burrito with green salsa will pass. Minus the lasagna, I have found the Italian dishes pretty mediocre, although I was surprised by the realness of flat bread topped with burrata, super-micro-shaved prosciutto, and arugula.
Speaking of arugula, that and red bell peppers are the only produce I buy at Trader Joe’s. They are high-quality and cheap while most other vegetables are overpriced. The only bread I much like is the ciabatta rolls, but be warned: These, like most TJ bread, sprout mold in just a few days because they are preservative-free. The solution is to freeze the bread; it doesn’t affect quality. I also like the crumpets, something hard to find anywhere else in the city, and I like to slather them with either the store’s lemon curd or fig butter. Nearly every aisle of Trader Joe’s is topped with cookies and crackers. If you don’t buy the triple-ginger snaps, you are dumb. So, what to avoid for sure? I haven’t eaten everything there, but the frozen “bowls” like the Mexican burrito bowl and the Cuban one are really bad. Looking over this list, I realize that with the exception of the Indian and Thai dishes, I use a real stove and oven for dishes that need browning, even though they are microwavable. Sometimes, I actually add ingredients. Props to me for that homey touch.
“Is this an ethical dilemma?” I ask Quiz. “Why should I buy you the raw flesh of slaughtered, ground-up animals, just because you are a cat, while I eat cheap Trader Joe’s stuff because I don’t want to cook or spend the money on healthy precooked meals?” She does that cat-stretch thing, turns and heads to the comfortless purple porch where nobody owns her and the space is pure feng shui with only her cardboard box. Annoyed, she seriously didn’t come back inside for another 24 hours, even during a thunderstorm. She is well fed. She is fearless. She is a loving con. —CL—
Café Nube, 305-303-9614, cafenuberecords at gmail.com, @cafenuberecords.
Rebel Raw, 404-382-7729, rebelraw.com, questions at rebelraw.com, @rebelrawfood.
Paul Luna, facebook.com/JesusRiceByChefLuna/.
Trader Joe’s, traderjoes.com. (Note: TJ’s stores are open 8-9 a.m. for disabled and senior shoppers only, due to the COVID pandemic.)"
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Since I can’t hang out in coffee shops now, in August I finally retired my Bialetti moka, and bought a cheap but deservedly well-rated espresso maker from Hamilton Beach. I’ve taken to making lattes and sitting on the steps mornings because I have to socialize with a tortoiseshell cat that has taken up residence on the porch. She started hanging out behind the house in mid-August, frequently peering through the glass panes of the door, making an unearthly sound — something like a squeak that turned into a high-pitched whine. We figured she was yet another starving stray we’d end up letting in the house. She looked skinny, so I took out some Hill’s dry food, which we feed our cat Patricia. I have never seen food disappear so quickly. I noticed she was wearing a tag and mentioned this to Wayne. He read it. Her name is Quiz. He managed to wrangle her into a crate after two days and walked her over to her owners’ house on a street barely a block away. That was that. Obviously, she was feigning hunger because her owners said they feed her regularly. They explained that they had adopted her from a nearby resident who moved and couldn’t take her with him. She has lived outdoors all of her estimated 15 years.
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A month later, I was sitting on the steps with Quiz shortly after I got out of bed around 12 noon. She came back to the purple porch after Wayne carried her home. Then the owners came over, and we crated her for a second trip home. She had a great meal there, hung out with a neighbor … and returned to the purple porch. So, there we were on September 12, watching a bunch of masked people who were hanging out at the coach house across the street, laughing, listening to faint music, drinking coffee, and eating pastries. It turned out to be a new pop-up, Café Nube, whose theme is the culture of Miami, where co-owner Raul Peña, a first-generation Cuban immigrant, was born. He and his wife Liz Peña both lost their jobs, thanks to La Corona, and decided to create Nube, which means “cloud” and alludes to “the magical sunsets and clouds that Miami is known for,” according to Liz. Her background is in event production and marketing. Raul, a DJ and producer, was in the film industry, and the music angle is what makes Café Nube especially unique. Besides traditional Cuban pastries and coffee drinks, they collect and sell vintage vinyl records. Raul curates gift packs of five records.
The pop-up in front of the house was their first, and because of my late rising and sitting on the steps in boxer shorts, I decided to not risk indecent exposure while senile by walking across the street. Later, I chatted with Raul, who told me he is making flan and pastelitos, the traditional Cuban puff pastry typically filled with guava. I’ll be honest. Guava’s not my fave. I ate several tons of the sticky stuff after I married a Cuban woman when I was 20. I don’t get it. What I do like is Cuban coffee. Raul makes it in the traditional stove-top moka, like the one I just retired. People often equate Cuban coffee, “cafecito,” with Italian espresso, but it’s different. At least it is in Miami. Typically made with very strong, finely-ground coffee like Bustelo, it’s somewhat bitter but super-sweet because it is combined with a frothy blend of sugar and a few teaspoons of coffee. It looks like Italian crema, but it’s not. Café Nube serves four coffee drinks and several mysterious sodas based on Cuban cocktails. Liz infuses them with CBD, which means they cure everything. Check out their Instagram for dates of upcoming pop-ups and go early. They sold almost everything, including the record packs, during this first pop-up.
When Quiz returned after the two attempts to reunite her with her owners, I became suspicious. The couple, Matt and Tina Lunalover, seemed extremely nice, despite their weird surname. But maybe they just had too much on their plate. They had disclosed that they own four additional cats and two dogs (including one kitten and one puppy). We swapped a lot of email while Quiz continued to rule the purple porch day and night. The Lunalovers mentioned during the second attempted abduction that all of their pets’ food is homemade. I inwardly rolled my eyes, remembering my mother scraping all the day’s leftovers into a dog bowl. How do people not understand that dry food like Hill’s is finely tuned to a pet’s nutritional needs? Maybe Quiz, like all wise inhabitants of the planet, knew a healthy diet was life-giving. I mean, we all read the nutritional analysis on food labels to make sure we are getting everything we need, right? But I’m not calling DFACS for CATS, and I agreed with the Lunalovers that the only way Quiz was going to return home was if I stopped feeding her altogether. I tried, but my heart is gold. Like a Pavlovian rat, I wasn’t able to go longer than 15 hours before I rewarded Quiz’s shouting for kibble.
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Then the Lunalovers, both former Apple employees, bomb-shelled me. It turns out that making gourmet raw food for cats and dogs is actually their livelihood. They operate Rebel Raw, continually grinding up organs, muscle, skin, and bones of everything from rabbits to turkeys and lambs in a facility near their home. They use restaurant-grade meat and only add vitamins and minerals — no filler. Customers have the option of delivery or picking up their orders from a freezer on the Lunalovers’ front porch. As if to add more absurdity to this drama, it turns out that Matt is the nephew of Paul Luna — the infamous, temperamental, and brilliant chef who opened many restaurants here, the last one being Lunacy Black Market. Matt’s father, Albert Lunalover, who changed his name from Luna to be cooler, worked with Paul, developing Eclipse di Luna and Luna Si. Then he created Avocados and Hopscotch in downtown Gainesville. Matt and Tina use the same suppliers as most restaurants do, including Springer Mountain chicken. (Paul now resides in Winterthur, Switzerland, where he operates JesusRICE!)
Tina provided all the details about the inadequacy of corporate pet foods, which you can read about on the Rebel Raw website. The more she said, the more I felt like an inadequate parent. She wrote me: “We know you mean well by feeding her but realize that … dry, hard pellets are nutritionally insufficient and consist of processed non-foods. Kibble is coated with chemicals and appetite enhancers to get cats to eat what is nowhere near their natural diet. Think the cat equivalent of corn syrup and MSG. Thus cats become ‘addicted’ and eat way more than they need to … Why do you think so many cats have kidney disease? Their kidneys have been overworked trying to process kibble all those years. Cats’ digestive systems were not designed to process hard, dry pellets. Those were made for shelf life and human convenience.”
OMGMEOW! A few days later, I was hauling about 10 days’ worth of chicken meals out of the Rebel Raw freezer. Quiz started eating it straight away, but I confess I left some kibble in her bowl at night. Big mistake. If she doesn’t get it, she truly turns into a banshee withdrawing from crack, screaming at the back door. Hopefully that will be fully resolved by the time you read this. It’s true that some cats do become fussy, but the Lunalovers suggest experimenting with different ground meats when that occurs. Rebel Raw also sells tempting side dishes and treats like pig ears, chicken necks, beef jerky, sardines, and other items that will make life a daily nightmare for vegetarian animal activists. (Yes, I know about evolution.)
Why would Quiz abandon her owners who have comfy porch furniture and provide a fancy resting space for her, whereas we have no porch furniture — only a cardboard box. Ultimately, we concluded that Quiz took up residence on the purple porch, not because she loves us, but because, after 15 years of outdoor living, she hates dogs. The Lunalovers have two, and the neighbor Quiz visited regularly had been hosting a friend’s puppy for a week. Quiz abandoned her too. So Quiz remains a citizen of the world, not a mere pet, although she started coming inside occasionally. She is grateful. I know this because she left a dead mouse on the purple porch, standing a few yards away, happily squeaking. Inside, she prefers my office, particularly the chair where clients usually sit. Like some clients, she talks continually — something I learned is common among tortoiseshell cats. But now, the tide has turned. She jumps on the table where I am eating one of my many guilty pleasures, the frozen Thai eggplant from Trader Joe’s. It is my favorite of all their frozen dishes, but it has an absurd quantity of salt in it, as do the Indian meals I most frequently consume, especially the butter chicken which is also slick with cholesterol. In other words, La Corona has me eating really bad. But I won’t quibble with Quiz about human kibble.
Last month, admitting my TJ COVID-19 Diet, I promised to name my favorite salt licks there. Here we go. After the microwavable Indian foods and the Thai eggplant, I most enjoy the kung pao chicken, the extremely popular Mandarin orange chicken (with sickeningly sweet sauce whose dose I cut in half), the spanakopita (the triangles, not the pie), the chicken pot pie (though the pastry is temperamental), the shepherd’s pie, the cauliflower gnocchi (as well as the “real” gnocchi), and the steak and stout pies. Anything cheesy is usually good. I don’t like their Mexican food because it has the usual Texxy-Mexxy overdose of “chile powder.” Okay, the microwavable frozen chicken burrito with green salsa will pass. Minus the lasagna, I have found the Italian dishes pretty mediocre, although I was surprised by the realness of flat bread topped with burrata, super-micro-shaved prosciutto, and arugula.
Speaking of arugula, that and red bell peppers are the only produce I buy at Trader Joe’s. They are high-quality and cheap while most other vegetables are overpriced. The only bread I much like is the ciabatta rolls, but be warned: These, like most TJ bread, sprout mold in just a few days because they are preservative-free. The solution is to freeze the bread; it doesn’t affect quality. I also like the crumpets, something hard to find anywhere else in the city, and I like to slather them with either the store’s lemon curd or fig butter. Nearly every aisle of Trader Joe’s is topped with cookies and crackers. If you don’t buy the triple-ginger snaps, you are dumb. So, what to avoid for sure? I haven’t eaten everything there, but the frozen “bowls” like the Mexican burrito bowl and the Cuban one are really bad. Looking over this list, I realize that with the exception of the Indian and Thai dishes, I use a real stove and oven for dishes that need browning, even though they are microwavable. Sometimes, I actually add ingredients. Props to me for that homey touch.
“Is this an ethical dilemma?” I ask Quiz. “Why should I buy you the raw flesh of slaughtered, ground-up animals, just because you are a cat, while I eat cheap Trader Joe’s stuff because I don’t want to cook or spend the money on healthy precooked meals?” She does that cat-stretch thing, turns and heads to the comfortless purple porch where nobody owns her and the space is pure feng shui with only her cardboard box. Annoyed, she seriously didn’t come back inside for another 24 hours, even during a thunderstorm. She is well fed. She is fearless. She is a loving con. __—CL—__
''Café Nube, 305-303-9614, cafenuberecords@gmail.com, @cafenuberecords.''
''Rebel Raw, 404-382-7729, rebelraw.com, questions@rebelraw.com, @rebelrawfood.''
''Paul Luna, facebook.com/JesusRiceByChefLuna/.''
''Trader Joe’s, traderjoes.com. (Note: TJ’s stores are open 8-9 a.m. for disabled and senior shoppers only, due to the COVID pandemic.)''"
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string(13423) " Quiz The Cat QUIZ: A health-food trickster poses as a 15-year-old tortoiseshell cat on a purple porch. Photo credit: Cliff Bostock 2020-10-02T15:08:03+00:00 quiz_the_cat.jpeg grazing Quiz The Cat 2020-10-03T14:26:00+00:00 GRAZING: A quizzical inquiry: Why is a transient cat eating better than her human host? jim.harris Jim Harris Cliff Bostock cliffbostock (Cliff Bostock) 2020-10-03T14:26:00+00:00 Not all great chefs feed humans. We’ll get to that, but first I should explain that I’m not a homebody. I’ve always seen my psychology clients in my home office in Grant Park, but I’ve done most of my writing in coffee shops. I even dedicated my 400-page doctoral dissertation to the staff of the Ansley Starbucks. Now, thanks to COVID-19, I have no choice but to sit in place at home. That brings me to the front porch of this house. It’s purple, as Prince would have it, and it’s up a flight of stairs so steep that I’ve frequently seen delivery drivers slow down, look up, and keep driving. The sad thing is that despite the pleasant view, the porch has had no furniture in the 25 years I’ve lived here because, well, sitting should occur at restaurants and coffee shops.
Since I can’t hang out in coffee shops now, in August I finally retired my Bialetti moka, and bought a cheap but deservedly well-rated espresso maker from Hamilton Beach. I’ve taken to making lattes and sitting on the steps mornings because I have to socialize with a tortoiseshell cat that has taken up residence on the porch. She started hanging out behind the house in mid-August, frequently peering through the glass panes of the door, making an unearthly sound — something like a squeak that turned into a high-pitched whine. We figured she was yet another starving stray we’d end up letting in the house. She looked skinny, so I took out some Hill’s dry food, which we feed our cat Patricia. I have never seen food disappear so quickly. I noticed she was wearing a tag and mentioned this to Wayne. He read it. Her name is Quiz. He managed to wrangle her into a crate after two days and walked her over to her owners’ house on a street barely a block away. That was that. Obviously, she was feigning hunger because her owners said they feed her regularly. They explained that they had adopted her from a nearby resident who moved and couldn’t take her with him. She has lived outdoors all of her estimated 15 years.
A month later, I was sitting on the steps with Quiz shortly after I got out of bed around 12 noon. She came back to the purple porch after Wayne carried her home. Then the owners came over, and we crated her for a second trip home. She had a great meal there, hung out with a neighbor … and returned to the purple porch. So, there we were on September 12, watching a bunch of masked people who were hanging out at the coach house across the street, laughing, listening to faint music, drinking coffee, and eating pastries. It turned out to be a new pop-up, Café Nube, whose theme is the culture of Miami, where co-owner Raul Peña, a first-generation Cuban immigrant, was born. He and his wife Liz Peña both lost their jobs, thanks to La Corona, and decided to create Nube, which means “cloud” and alludes to “the magical sunsets and clouds that Miami is known for,” according to Liz. Her background is in event production and marketing. Raul, a DJ and producer, was in the film industry, and the music angle is what makes Café Nube especially unique. Besides traditional Cuban pastries and coffee drinks, they collect and sell vintage vinyl records. Raul curates gift packs of five records.
The pop-up in front of the house was their first, and because of my late rising and sitting on the steps in boxer shorts, I decided to not risk indecent exposure while senile by walking across the street. Later, I chatted with Raul, who told me he is making flan and pastelitos, the traditional Cuban puff pastry typically filled with guava. I’ll be honest. Guava’s not my fave. I ate several tons of the sticky stuff after I married a Cuban woman when I was 20. I don’t get it. What I do like is Cuban coffee. Raul makes it in the traditional stove-top moka, like the one I just retired. People often equate Cuban coffee, “cafecito,” with Italian espresso, but it’s different. At least it is in Miami. Typically made with very strong, finely-ground coffee like Bustelo, it’s somewhat bitter but super-sweet because it is combined with a frothy blend of sugar and a few teaspoons of coffee. It looks like Italian crema, but it’s not. Café Nube serves four coffee drinks and several mysterious sodas based on Cuban cocktails. Liz infuses them with CBD, which means they cure everything. Check out their Instagram for dates of upcoming pop-ups and go early. They sold almost everything, including the record packs, during this first pop-up.
When Quiz returned after the two attempts to reunite her with her owners, I became suspicious. The couple, Matt and Tina Lunalover, seemed extremely nice, despite their weird surname. But maybe they just had too much on their plate. They had disclosed that they own four additional cats and two dogs (including one kitten and one puppy). We swapped a lot of email while Quiz continued to rule the purple porch day and night. The Lunalovers mentioned during the second attempted abduction that all of their pets’ food is homemade. I inwardly rolled my eyes, remembering my mother scraping all the day’s leftovers into a dog bowl. How do people not understand that dry food like Hill’s is finely tuned to a pet’s nutritional needs? Maybe Quiz, like all wise inhabitants of the planet, knew a healthy diet was life-giving. I mean, we all read the nutritional analysis on food labels to make sure we are getting everything we need, right? But I’m not calling DFACS for CATS, and I agreed with the Lunalovers that the only way Quiz was going to return home was if I stopped feeding her altogether. I tried, but my heart is gold. Like a Pavlovian rat, I wasn’t able to go longer than 15 hours before I rewarded Quiz’s shouting for kibble.
Then the Lunalovers, both former Apple employees, bomb-shelled me. It turns out that making gourmet raw food for cats and dogs is actually their livelihood. They operate Rebel Raw, continually grinding up organs, muscle, skin, and bones of everything from rabbits to turkeys and lambs in a facility near their home. They use restaurant-grade meat and only add vitamins and minerals — no filler. Customers have the option of delivery or picking up their orders from a freezer on the Lunalovers’ front porch. As if to add more absurdity to this drama, it turns out that Matt is the nephew of Paul Luna — the infamous, temperamental, and brilliant chef who opened many restaurants here, the last one being Lunacy Black Market. Matt’s father, Albert Lunalover, who changed his name from Luna to be cooler, worked with Paul, developing Eclipse di Luna and Luna Si. Then he created Avocados and Hopscotch in downtown Gainesville. Matt and Tina use the same suppliers as most restaurants do, including Springer Mountain chicken. (Paul now resides in Winterthur, Switzerland, where he operates JesusRICE!)
Tina provided all the details about the inadequacy of corporate pet foods, which you can read about on the Rebel Raw website. The more she said, the more I felt like an inadequate parent. She wrote me: “We know you mean well by feeding her but realize that … dry, hard pellets are nutritionally insufficient and consist of processed non-foods. Kibble is coated with chemicals and appetite enhancers to get cats to eat what is nowhere near their natural diet. Think the cat equivalent of corn syrup and MSG. Thus cats become ‘addicted’ and eat way more than they need to … Why do you think so many cats have kidney disease? Their kidneys have been overworked trying to process kibble all those years. Cats’ digestive systems were not designed to process hard, dry pellets. Those were made for shelf life and human convenience.”
OMGMEOW! A few days later, I was hauling about 10 days’ worth of chicken meals out of the Rebel Raw freezer. Quiz started eating it straight away, but I confess I left some kibble in her bowl at night. Big mistake. If she doesn’t get it, she truly turns into a banshee withdrawing from crack, screaming at the back door. Hopefully that will be fully resolved by the time you read this. It’s true that some cats do become fussy, but the Lunalovers suggest experimenting with different ground meats when that occurs. Rebel Raw also sells tempting side dishes and treats like pig ears, chicken necks, beef jerky, sardines, and other items that will make life a daily nightmare for vegetarian animal activists. (Yes, I know about evolution.)
Why would Quiz abandon her owners who have comfy porch furniture and provide a fancy resting space for her, whereas we have no porch furniture — only a cardboard box. Ultimately, we concluded that Quiz took up residence on the purple porch, not because she loves us, but because, after 15 years of outdoor living, she hates dogs. The Lunalovers have two, and the neighbor Quiz visited regularly had been hosting a friend’s puppy for a week. Quiz abandoned her too. So Quiz remains a citizen of the world, not a mere pet, although she started coming inside occasionally. She is grateful. I know this because she left a dead mouse on the purple porch, standing a few yards away, happily squeaking. Inside, she prefers my office, particularly the chair where clients usually sit. Like some clients, she talks continually — something I learned is common among tortoiseshell cats. But now, the tide has turned. She jumps on the table where I am eating one of my many guilty pleasures, the frozen Thai eggplant from Trader Joe’s. It is my favorite of all their frozen dishes, but it has an absurd quantity of salt in it, as do the Indian meals I most frequently consume, especially the butter chicken which is also slick with cholesterol. In other words, La Corona has me eating really bad. But I won’t quibble with Quiz about human kibble.
Last month, admitting my TJ COVID-19 Diet, I promised to name my favorite salt licks there. Here we go. After the microwavable Indian foods and the Thai eggplant, I most enjoy the kung pao chicken, the extremely popular Mandarin orange chicken (with sickeningly sweet sauce whose dose I cut in half), the spanakopita (the triangles, not the pie), the chicken pot pie (though the pastry is temperamental), the shepherd’s pie, the cauliflower gnocchi (as well as the “real” gnocchi), and the steak and stout pies. Anything cheesy is usually good. I don’t like their Mexican food because it has the usual Texxy-Mexxy overdose of “chile powder.” Okay, the microwavable frozen chicken burrito with green salsa will pass. Minus the lasagna, I have found the Italian dishes pretty mediocre, although I was surprised by the realness of flat bread topped with burrata, super-micro-shaved prosciutto, and arugula.
Speaking of arugula, that and red bell peppers are the only produce I buy at Trader Joe’s. They are high-quality and cheap while most other vegetables are overpriced. The only bread I much like is the ciabatta rolls, but be warned: These, like most TJ bread, sprout mold in just a few days because they are preservative-free. The solution is to freeze the bread; it doesn’t affect quality. I also like the crumpets, something hard to find anywhere else in the city, and I like to slather them with either the store’s lemon curd or fig butter. Nearly every aisle of Trader Joe’s is topped with cookies and crackers. If you don’t buy the triple-ginger snaps, you are dumb. So, what to avoid for sure? I haven’t eaten everything there, but the frozen “bowls” like the Mexican burrito bowl and the Cuban one are really bad. Looking over this list, I realize that with the exception of the Indian and Thai dishes, I use a real stove and oven for dishes that need browning, even though they are microwavable. Sometimes, I actually add ingredients. Props to me for that homey touch.
“Is this an ethical dilemma?” I ask Quiz. “Why should I buy you the raw flesh of slaughtered, ground-up animals, just because you are a cat, while I eat cheap Trader Joe’s stuff because I don’t want to cook or spend the money on healthy precooked meals?” She does that cat-stretch thing, turns and heads to the comfortless purple porch where nobody owns her and the space is pure feng shui with only her cardboard box. Annoyed, she seriously didn’t come back inside for another 24 hours, even during a thunderstorm. She is well fed. She is fearless. She is a loving con. —CL—
Café Nube, 305-303-9614, cafenuberecords at gmail.com, @cafenuberecords.
Rebel Raw, 404-382-7729, rebelraw.com, questions at rebelraw.com, @rebelrawfood.
Paul Luna, facebook.com/JesusRiceByChefLuna/.
Trader Joe’s, traderjoes.com. (Note: TJ’s stores are open 8-9 a.m. for disabled and senior shoppers only, due to the COVID pandemic.) Cliff Bostock QUIZ: A health-food trickster poses as a 15-year-old tortoiseshell cat on a purple porch. 0,0,10 grazing GRAZING: A quizzical inquiry: Why is a transient cat eating better than her human host? "
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GRAZING: A quizzical inquiry: Why is a transient cat eating better than her human host? Article
Saturday October 3, 2020 10:26 AM EDT
Not all great chefs feed humans. We’ll get to that, but first I should explain that I’m not a homebody. I’ve always seen my psychology clients in my home office in Grant Park, but I’ve done most of my writing in coffee shops. I even dedicated my 400-page doctoral dissertation to the staff of the Ansley Starbucks. Now, thanks to COVID-19, I have no choice but to sit in place at home. That brings... |
more...
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string(18480) "The coronavirus pandemic has wrought complete chaos in Atlanta’s restaurant and bar community. Anything definitive I might try to say about the scene would be completely changed by the time you read this. So, my purpose here is to look at some of the general effects of the pandemic from my own and a few others’ personal perspectives. Let’s start with the particularly amazing resilience of neighborhood restaurants, without which, could turn into heartbreaking loss.
I’ve lived in Grant Park for 25 years, and during the last six of those, I’ve walked the three blocks to Grant Central Pizza alone every Wednesday. The draw is the weekly special, chicken piccata with mashed potatoes, but I’ve also formed all the attachments that make neighborhood restaurants so compelling in that “Cheers” sort of way.
Well, sort of.
!!Where nobody knows your name no more
Personally, I hate people, but I enjoy watching them in the way children love watching the animals in the zoo down the road. I do, however, actually love Grant Central’s staff — particularly Jessy Forney, the young front-of-the-house manager for almost eight years. I started my weekly visits soon after my life turned to shit, and, in need of distraction, I bought a television for the first time in 35 years. One day, I heard Jessy going on about some TV program. At that moment she became my TV mentor, but, over the years, she also became someone whose mind I realized was wonderfully weird and far more brilliant than she realized herself. She also operates a pet-sitting business — that business is also down — and I’ve made it my goal to get her to become a therapist specializing in emotional support animals.
Grant Central, like most neighborhood restaurants, discontinued inside dining when the pandemic arrived. It is lucky in that, as a pizzeria, it already had a great takeout business, whereas many other small neighbor-hood restaurants have been severely crippled or killed by the pandemic. Jessy, who had to let most of the staff go, now works the makeshift take-out counter that allows people to come into the restaurant for pickup as long as they wear masks and keep their distance. Now and then, someone goes Karen, particularly with the younger staff members.
She, Jessy, misses her customers as much as we miss her. “It makes me teary-eyed thinking of it,” she wrote me. “I miss things like our ‘Friday Night Crew,’ where I would get to talk to all these amazing regulars about the past week. I have regulars who would come in almost daily after hours of the trauma-infused Atlanta traffic, and we would chat about all kinds of interesting things or nothing at all. There are a lot of smiles I miss.” She also mentioned our ritual of recounting TV plots and strange dreams we had on Tuesday nights.
Generally, she copes with the loss of income and uncertainty with the help of meditation. If there’s a silver lining around, she says the sudden increase in free time has led her down a new path of self-examination. Fine, girl, but don’t go all sane on us.
!!It may be a pandemic, but we be in-a-gadda-da-vida with a little bear…
Takeout and patios have saved the restaurant industry. While Little Bear in Summerhill does not offer the latter, it does provide $55, multi-course takeout meals for two that are absolutely the city’s most compelling. It’s difficult to describe owner/chef Jarrett Stieber’s cuisine without sounding silly. But when I look at his food, I often recall a quote from playwright Luigi Pirandello that captioned a black light poster of a fish in a tree in my freshman dormitory room: “Life is full of infinite absurdities, which, strangely enough, do not even need to appear plausible, since they are true.” His food is culinary theater of the absurd so good it had the James Beard committee giving him a (metaphorical) standing ovation last year.
Speaking as someone with a useless PhD in psychology, I think Stieber’s absurdism is really, really good for mental health. The pandemic, the racial strife, and the jack-o-lantern’s bid for reelection have turned our collective skull into a cauldron of bubbling ugliness. Stieber’s cooking is the contrary. It’s a melding of seemingly disparate elements into a beautiful landscape that’s going to fill you with wonder — as in “Wonderland” — instead of disgust. One recent example that Stieber “absolutely loved” was a “butternut squash salad dressed with smoked fig, yung lemongrass, aji limon chili, dried cucumber seasoning, and holy basil.” He also mentioned — I’m editing — “a fun posset dessert, a medieval cream pudding thickened by citric acid … topped with what we referred to as a ‘terrarium-like mélange of nutty choco crunch mix — pretentious flowers, mountain mint, and benne seed.” Yeah, boy.
Stieber, whom I profiled in our May issue, opened Little Bear only two weeks before restaurants were closed by mandate. Since his work was already nationally renowned as a pop-up called Eat Me Speak Me, take-out business sold out quickly every week, but he told me things had faltered for two weeks when we communicated in mid-August. I blame it on the Dog Days. So. I urge you to lay off the DMT, put down your copy of Food of the Gods and investigate Little Bear on Instagram, @littlebearatl. (More about Stieber below.)
!!Food porn blossoms in the pandemic, proving Freud to be intelligent …
Talk to any online sex-toy merchant and he’ll tell you business is booming, since everyone is regressing by necessity to the teenage joys of masturbation. Combine that with the fact that many people are, in Freud’s terms, sublimating the erotic through artistry — the artistry of cooking in the present context. In short, we are living in a perfect storm of food porn. Brian Cohn of PetLuv Cat Carrier fame demonstrates the full spectrum by serving a fab dinner to a maskless but safe lady friend. She is enjoying “Pork Volcánes al Pastor,” tacos whose recipe he found in the March issue of Bon Appetit. The pork is shaved super-thin and flavored with lime juice and three different chilies, topped with melted Oaxaca cheese, which adds to the “lava” that gives the dish its volcanic name. Brian, the most adamantly sheltered-at-home person I know, manages to order all his cooking ingredients online without difficulty. I asked him the most difficult part of cooking in the pandemic. “Cooking for one leaves a ton of leftovers.” What has he learned? “When working with hot peppers, do not touch your eyes or private parts.”
!!Racism matters not when you got white pride! Grow up! Let the POC taste the icing of the privilegeds’ cake!
Is it a surprise that the $660-billion restaurant and food service industry is as contaminated with racism as the rest of the U.S. economy? Almost surreally, Susan DeRose, the owner of OK Café, smacked Atlantans in the face with that reality during, of all things, a march down West Paces Ferry organized by Buckhead4BlackLives to oppose the police murder of George Floyd. DeRose hung a banner on the restaurant that chastised Black Lives Matter with an allusion to the myth of lazy black people: “Lives that matter are made with positive purpose.” It was a shockingly thoughtless action, since she has long been controversial for decorating a wall with a supposedly arty representation of the old Georgia flag, which appropriates the image of the Confederate battle flag. She removed the banner and flag and explained it all away while seriously laying claim to “white pride.” Her actions provoked a storm of promises to boycott the café and her two other restaurants, Bones and Blue Ridge Grill, but we’ll see. Americans have a habit of backsliding into institutionalized norms of prejudice. Going deeper, we need to acknowledge that racism enforces the economic classism required by increasingly unregulated capitalism. Atlanta, like many U.S. cities, has become a prime example of the privileged sweeping the already marginalized to the city’s edges. (Be gone! Do not sully our BeltLine!) Graciously, members of enlightened corporate royalty now reverse the edict of Marie Antoinette and urge their peers to eat cake made with soul. Atlanta Magazine, for example, provides its largely white readership with a daring list of black-owned restaurants to patronize. Bless their hearts, they mean well, and the dollars handed out by tourists in the heart of darkness will help entrepreneurs a bit, but in the bigger picture, it’s a truly trivial gesture. Ending the enablement of genocide, racism, and fascism require sacrifice by the privileged themselves — not just sharing a bit of the icing of their privilege.
!!They have shattered the dinnerware and nothing is the same!
For the antisocial like me, the pandemic at first seemed like paradise. There was no traffic and no need to concoct excuses not to go to parties. Not so for my friends writer Brad Lapin and professor Eric Varner. For them, it brought a screeching halt to the dinner parties they host unrelentingly at their dual homes in Atlanta and Rome. Now, they compensate by cooking two meals a day for themselves, usually testing out new recipes. Recently, they prepared a Sonora-style carne asada feast detailed in the New York Times. The married couple normally dines out frequently but has only done so once, with friends, during the pandemic. Brad said that the restaurant followed all the protocols but that it was nonetheless an anxiety-provoking experience. “This fear and loathing will probably prove the single most tenacious effect of the pandemic.” So they carry on at home (also eschewing takeout). How obsessive are they? I asked Brad to name some of their pandemic faves. “Earlier this summer, Eric produced an authentic version of fettucine Alfredo that both captured the essence of the decadent dish and reestablished its Italian bonafides.” Yeah, cool, man. Did I mention they cook all the food for their four Scottish terriers? And, oh, they host international Zoom cocktail parties, and I Zoom-lunch with Brad and Brian, mentioned above, on Fridays — something I’ve done in real life for years. I love you boys.
!!The pandemic makes the TV dinner cool again …
Unlike my friends mentioned above, the pandemic has not motivated me to hone fine dining skills in the harvest-gold kitchen full of cracked tile and broken appliances of this 125-year-old home. Long ago, I liked to cook and was pretty good at it, but writing about restaurants for 30 years eventually led me to call any day I didn’t have to eat out a “Freedom from Food Day.” So, I’m going to share a dirty secret. About six years ago, I fell in love with Trader Joe’s. The grocery chain vends a huge line of frozen meals that I would never imagine myself eating. I thought they would be like the TV dinners of yore that my mother would not allow us to eat. (Yet, weirdly, the only person in my family I ever saw eat one of those was my super-wealthy uncle Steve, who otherwise introduced me to fried grasshoppers, chocolate-covered ants, and my beloved pickled lamb tongues.) And then I discovered Trader Joe’s Indian meals. Let me put it this way. One day two of us bought Indian food at a well-known food truck. Our bill, seriously, was about $65. Later in the week we ate a similar-sized meal of Trader Joe’s Indian food that cost us less than $15 for four dishes and tasted much better. Over the years, I’ve explored more of their food, and I unapologetically eat so much now that I enjoy feeling like an antifoodie. Oh, there are drawbacks — like the consumption of more salt than is needed to preserve an obese ox. But I can’t resist. In our October issue, I will go into more detail. The larger point is that the pandemic really has taught many of us that our mothers lied when they said all frozen prepared food was crap. And, hell, the store’s ginger snaps are better than my mother’s too!
!!Sometimes a takeout box is like a crypt …
Takeout and food-delivery operations are saving many restaurants, but answer this question, please: “What is the big drawback to takeout food?” It’s the packaging itself, of course. I’m not going to name names, but I’ve picked up simple food at favorite restaurants, taken it home, unwrapped it, and found myself confronted by a revoltingly steamy mess. It’s not like this is an entirely new phenomenon. Carrying a properly cooked Neapolitan pizza home in a closed, unventilated cardboard box typically is stupid. Eat it in the car or on the curb. Open the top first if you take it home, or, failing that, throw it in a damn blender. The weird thing is that fast-food operations clearly know a lot more about takeout packaging than many high-quality restaurants, and it’s not as if there isn’t a ton of available guidance about this. A notable local exception to the problem is the above-mentioned Little Bear. Owner Jarrett Stieber told me that his approach to cooking itself helps: “We conceptualize dishes to not just be things we think sound good but things we think sound good AND will transport well.” By that he means the food maintains flavor integrity and its gorgeous appearance. While many restaurants are packing up all their regular menu items, Stieber says that’s often unthinkable. When the restaurant was open for inside dining, for example, “we always had tartare on the menu, but we can’t be sure people will take it straight home and not let the meat warm up or sit so long the acid starts pickling it.” Perhaps Stieber can begin teaching the art of food transport. In the meantime, a really large number of foodies will continue to avoid takeout.
!!In a pandemic, the death of a server is good for a vote ...
Gov. Brian Kemp, one of the few elected officials as dumb and heartless as President Don Don, has, at this writing, reversed his ban of city health-protection mandates in an incomprehensibly garbled way that allows restaurants and other private businesses to ignore the mandates, because … well … because he doesn’t mind killing off restaurant employees if it earns him votes from the adult toddlers who believe COVID-19 is a hoax so nefarious that it hypnotizes their relatives into dying from propaganda poisoning. Fortunately, some restaurants are taking a strong stand against the mask-o-phobic. West Egg Café, for example, posted the following on Instagram:
“We asked nicely, then we begged. Masks are now required for all guests at West Egg, whenever you are not seated at your table. Period. Living in society (which includes doing things like going out to eat at restaurants) sometimes means relinquishing some of your individual liberties for the common good. Public health crises are one of those times. You do not have the ‘right’ not to wear a mask in public when exercising that ‘right’ exposes the community to communicable disease. We do have the right to exclude you from the West Egg community on the basis of refusal to wear a mask. Why’d you have to go and make us do that, though?”
Meanwhile, restaurants continue to close temporarily and permanently. A surprising number of newbies are on the way, though. As Jarrett Stieber told me, most will likely highlight well-engineered takeout and seating options, as well as smaller staffs, that make them more economically viable.
!!When a pandemic of disease is overshadowed by a pandemic of lovelessness …
::::
The absolute devastation of the lives of restaurant and bar employees is reflective of everything my socialist mind detests about the lie of the American dream. I won’t repeat my rant from above about the economics of racism, except to note that the groovy foodie magazine, Bon Appetit, has been exposed for inequitable payment to employees based on race. A bunch of employees have quit. They were lucky to have options. In the real world of restaurant work, where people live paycheck-to-paycheck, you can’t walk out without someplace to go. Restaurant employees who were laid off at first qualified for over $900 a week in unemployment compensation. But that was all a mess. Say you were laid off and then called back to work part-time or were only laid off part-time to begin with. Such convolutions affected what you qualified for, and now Republicans want to slash subsidies to guarantee nobody gets too comfortable driving their Cadillac without a job. Of course, if you were lucky enough to have rare employer-paid health insurance, you’ve lost that too. In any other developed country, millions of people would not be dumped into misery and, predictably, blamed for their own situation. It’s maddening that it’s necessary, but people have organized nonprofits to provide help. Chief among them in Atlanta is The Giving Kitchen. The organization, which has extended its services statewide, is grounded in a tale of love, death, and heartbreak, which you may read on their website. It provides a rare remedy to the suffering caused by the greater pandemic of lovelessness in America. Check out their story online (thegivingkitchen.org and @givingkitchen on Twitter and IG). Donate. Bigly. And ask for help.
!!Is there hope?
I have mixed feelings about hope. As American psychologist James Hillman pointed out, hope was inside Pandora’s box of evils. She snapped the lid shut before it escaped with the other evils. So, in the ancient Greeks’ thinking, hope was an evil because it frequently caused the pain of disappointed expectations and had nothing to do with actually producing happy endings. I once asked Hillman what we were left with if we couldn’t be hopeful and he talked about reflection on the beauty of what is present. Such reflection can arise with the art of cooking and dining, whether alone or with one another. You can argue that the beauty of my Trader Joe’s microwaved palak paneer fades miserably beside my friend’s exquisite fettucine Alfredo, but comparison is ultimately immaterial. Eat what pleases you, drink, help others, and be merry — but wear your damn mask, because in this plague you really may die tomorrow. —CL—
Grant Central Pizza, 451 Cherokee Ave. S.E., 404-523-8900.
Little Bear, 71-A Georgia Ave. S.E., Ste. A. 404-500-5396. @littlebearatl"
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I’ve lived in Grant Park for 25 years, and during the last six of those, I’ve walked the three blocks to Grant Central Pizza alone every Wednesday. The draw is the weekly special, chicken piccata with mashed potatoes, but I’ve also formed all the attachments that make neighborhood restaurants so compelling in that “Cheers” sort of way.
Well, sort of.
!!~~black:Where nobody knows your name no more~~
Personally, I hate people, but I enjoy watching them in the way children love watching the animals in the zoo down the road. I do, however, actually love Grant Central’s staff — particularly Jessy Forney, the young front-of-the-house manager for almost eight years. I started my weekly visits soon after my life turned to shit, and, in need of distraction, I bought a television for the first time in 35 years. One day, I heard Jessy going on about some TV program. At that moment she became my TV mentor, but, over the years, she also became someone whose mind I realized was wonderfully weird and far more brilliant than she realized herself. She also operates a pet-sitting business — that business is also down — and I’ve made it my goal to get her to become a therapist specializing in emotional support animals.
Grant Central, like most neighborhood restaurants, discontinued inside dining when the pandemic arrived. It is lucky in that, as a pizzeria, it already had a great takeout business, whereas many other small neighbor-hood restaurants have been severely crippled or killed by the pandemic. Jessy, who had to let most of the staff go, now works the makeshift take-out counter that allows people to come into the restaurant for pickup as long as they wear masks and keep their distance. Now and then, someone goes Karen, particularly with the younger staff members.
She, Jessy, misses her customers as much as we miss her. “It makes me teary-eyed thinking of it,” she wrote me. “I miss things like our ‘Friday Night Crew,’ where I would get to talk to all these amazing regulars about the past week. I have regulars who would come in almost daily after hours of the trauma-infused Atlanta traffic, and we would chat about all kinds of interesting things or nothing at all. There are a lot of smiles I miss.” She also mentioned our ritual of recounting TV plots and strange dreams we had on Tuesday nights.
Generally, she copes with the loss of income and uncertainty with the help of meditation. If there’s a silver lining around, she says the sudden increase in free time has led her down a new path of self-examination. Fine, girl, but don’t go all sane on us.
!!~~black:It may be a pandemic, but we be in-a-gadda-da-vida with a little bear…~~
Takeout and patios have saved the restaurant industry. While Little Bear in Summerhill does not offer the latter, it does provide $55, multi-course takeout meals for two that are absolutely the city’s most compelling. It’s difficult to describe owner/chef Jarrett Stieber’s cuisine without sounding silly. But when I look at his food, I often recall a quote from playwright Luigi Pirandello that captioned a black light poster of a fish in a tree in my freshman dormitory room: “Life is full of infinite absurdities, which, strangely enough, do not even need to appear plausible, since they are true.” His food is culinary theater of the absurd so good it had the James Beard committee giving him a (metaphorical) standing ovation last year.
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Speaking as someone with a useless PhD in psychology, I think Stieber’s absurdism is really, really good for mental health. The pandemic, the racial strife, and the jack-o-lantern’s bid for reelection have turned our collective skull into a cauldron of bubbling ugliness. Stieber’s cooking is the contrary. It’s a melding of seemingly disparate elements into a beautiful landscape that’s going to fill you with wonder — as in “Wonderland” — instead of disgust. One recent example that Stieber “absolutely loved” was a “butternut squash salad dressed with smoked fig, yung lemongrass, aji limon chili, dried cucumber seasoning, and holy basil.” He also mentioned — I’m editing — “a fun posset dessert, a medieval cream pudding thickened by citric acid … topped with what we referred to as a ‘terrarium-like mélange of nutty choco crunch mix — pretentious flowers, mountain mint, and benne seed.” Yeah, boy.
Stieber, whom I profiled in our May issue, opened Little Bear only two weeks before restaurants were closed by mandate. Since his work was already nationally renowned as a pop-up called Eat Me Speak Me, take-out business sold out quickly every week, but he told me things had faltered for two weeks when we communicated in mid-August. I blame it on the Dog Days. So. I urge you to lay off the DMT, put down your copy of ''Food of the Gods'' and investigate Little Bear on Instagram, @littlebearatl. (More about Stieber below.)
!!~~black:Food porn blossoms in the pandemic, proving Freud to be intelligent …~~
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Talk to any online sex-toy merchant and he’ll tell you business is booming, since everyone is regressing by necessity to the teenage joys of masturbation. Combine that with the fact that many people are, in Freud’s terms, sublimating the erotic through artistry — the artistry of cooking in the present context. In short, we are living in a perfect storm of food porn. Brian Cohn of PetLuv Cat Carrier fame demonstrates the full spectrum by serving a fab dinner to a maskless but safe lady friend. She is enjoying “Pork Volcánes al Pastor,” tacos whose recipe he found in the March issue of ''Bon Appetit''. The pork is shaved super-thin and flavored with lime juice and three different chilies, topped with melted Oaxaca cheese, which adds to the “lava” that gives the dish its volcanic name. Brian, the most adamantly sheltered-at-home person I know, manages to order all his cooking ingredients online without difficulty. I asked him the most difficult part of cooking in the pandemic. “Cooking for one leaves a ton of leftovers.” What has he learned? “When working with hot peppers, do not touch your eyes or private parts.”
!!~~black:Racism matters not when you got white pride! Grow up! Let the POC taste the icing of the privilegeds’ cake!~~
Is it a surprise that the $660-billion restaurant and food service industry is as contaminated with racism as the rest of the U.S. economy? Almost surreally, Susan DeRose, the owner of OK Café, smacked Atlantans in the face with that reality during, of all things, a march down West Paces Ferry organized by Buckhead4BlackLives to oppose the police murder of George Floyd. DeRose hung a banner on the restaurant that chastised Black Lives Matter with an allusion to the myth of lazy black people: “Lives that matter are made with positive purpose.” It was a shockingly thoughtless action, since she has long been controversial for decorating a wall with a supposedly arty representation of the old Georgia flag, which appropriates the image of the Confederate battle flag. She removed the banner and flag and explained it all away while seriously laying claim to “white pride.” Her actions provoked a storm of promises to boycott the café and her two other restaurants, Bones and Blue Ridge Grill, but we’ll see. Americans have a habit of backsliding into institutionalized norms of prejudice. Going deeper, we need to acknowledge that racism enforces the economic classism required by increasingly unregulated capitalism. Atlanta, like many U.S. cities, has become a prime example of the privileged sweeping the already marginalized to the city’s edges. (Be gone! Do not sully our BeltLine!) Graciously, members of enlightened corporate royalty now reverse the edict of Marie Antoinette and urge their peers to eat cake made with soul. ''Atlanta'' Magazine, for example, provides its largely white readership with a daring list of black-owned restaurants to patronize. Bless their hearts, they mean well, and the dollars handed out by tourists in the heart of darkness will help entrepreneurs a bit, but in the bigger picture, it’s a truly trivial gesture. Ending the enablement of genocide, racism, and fascism require sacrifice by the privileged themselves — not just sharing a bit of the icing of their privilege.
!!~~black:They have shattered the dinnerware and nothing is the same!~~
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For the antisocial like me, the pandemic at first seemed like paradise. There was no traffic and no need to concoct excuses not to go to parties. Not so for my friends writer Brad Lapin and professor Eric Varner. For them, it brought a screeching halt to the dinner parties they host unrelentingly at their dual homes in Atlanta and Rome. Now, they compensate by cooking two meals a day for themselves, usually testing out new recipes. Recently, they prepared a Sonora-style carne asada feast detailed in the ''New York Times''. The married couple normally dines out frequently but has only done so once, with friends, during the pandemic. Brad said that the restaurant followed all the protocols but that it was nonetheless an anxiety-provoking experience. “This fear and loathing will probably prove the single most tenacious effect of the pandemic.” So they carry on at home (also eschewing takeout). How obsessive are they? I asked Brad to name some of their pandemic faves. “Earlier this summer, Eric produced an authentic version of fettucine Alfredo that both captured the essence of the decadent dish and reestablished its Italian bonafides.” Yeah, cool, man. Did I mention they cook all the food for their four Scottish terriers? And, oh, they host international Zoom cocktail parties, and I Zoom-lunch with Brad and Brian, mentioned above, on Fridays — something I’ve done in real life for years. I love you boys.
!!~~black:The pandemic makes the TV dinner cool again …~~
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Unlike my friends mentioned above, the pandemic has not motivated me to hone fine dining skills in the harvest-gold kitchen full of cracked tile and broken appliances of this 125-year-old home. Long ago, I liked to cook and was pretty good at it, but writing about restaurants for 30 years eventually led me to call any day I didn’t have to eat out a “Freedom from Food Day.” So, I’m going to share a dirty secret. About six years ago, I fell in love with Trader Joe’s. The grocery chain vends a huge line of frozen meals that I would never imagine myself eating. I thought they would be like the TV dinners of yore that my mother would not allow us to eat. (Yet, weirdly, the only person in my family I ever saw eat one of those was my super-wealthy uncle Steve, who otherwise introduced me to fried grasshoppers, chocolate-covered ants, and my beloved pickled lamb tongues.) And then I discovered Trader Joe’s Indian meals. Let me put it this way. One day two of us bought Indian food at a well-known food truck. Our bill, seriously, was about $65. Later in the week we ate a similar-sized meal of Trader Joe’s Indian food that cost us less than $15 for four dishes and tasted much better. Over the years, I’ve explored more of their food, and I unapologetically eat so much now that I enjoy feeling like an antifoodie. Oh, there are drawbacks — like the consumption of more salt than is needed to preserve an obese ox. But I can’t resist. In our October issue, I will go into more detail. The larger point is that the pandemic really has taught many of us that our mothers lied when they said all frozen prepared food was crap. And, hell, the store’s ginger snaps are better than my mother’s too!
!!~~black:Sometimes a takeout box is like a crypt …~~
Takeout and food-delivery operations are saving many restaurants, but answer this question, please: “What is the big drawback to takeout food?” It’s the packaging itself, of course. I’m not going to name names, but I’ve picked up simple food at favorite restaurants, taken it home, unwrapped it, and found myself confronted by a revoltingly steamy mess. It’s not like this is an entirely new phenomenon. Carrying a properly cooked Neapolitan pizza home in a closed, unventilated cardboard box typically is stupid. Eat it in the car or on the curb. Open the top first if you take it home, or, failing that, throw it in a damn blender. The weird thing is that fast-food operations clearly know a lot more about takeout packaging than many high-quality restaurants, and it’s not as if there isn’t a ton of available guidance about this. A notable local exception to the problem is the above-mentioned Little Bear. Owner Jarrett Stieber told me that his approach to cooking itself helps: “We conceptualize dishes to not just be things we think sound good but things we think sound good AND will transport well.” By that he means the food maintains flavor integrity and its gorgeous appearance. While many restaurants are packing up all their regular menu items, Stieber says that’s often unthinkable. When the restaurant was open for inside dining, for example, “we always had tartare on the menu, but we can’t be sure people will take it straight home and not let the meat warm up or sit so long the acid starts pickling it.” Perhaps Stieber can begin teaching the art of food transport. In the meantime, a really large number of foodies will continue to avoid takeout.
!!~~black:In a pandemic, the death of a server is good for a vote ...~~
Gov. Brian Kemp, one of the few elected officials as dumb and heartless as President Don Don, has, at this writing, reversed his ban of city health-protection mandates in an incomprehensibly garbled way that allows restaurants and other private businesses to ignore the mandates, because … well … because he doesn’t mind killing off restaurant employees if it earns him votes from the adult toddlers who believe COVID-19 is a hoax so nefarious that it hypnotizes their relatives into dying from propaganda poisoning. Fortunately, some restaurants are taking a strong stand against the mask-o-phobic. West Egg Café, for example, posted the following on Instagram:
“We asked nicely, then we begged. Masks are now required for all guests at West Egg, whenever you are not seated at your table. Period. Living in society (which includes doing things like going out to eat at restaurants) sometimes means relinquishing some of your individual liberties for the common good. Public health crises are one of those times. You do not have the ‘right’ not to wear a mask in public when exercising that ‘right’ exposes the community to communicable disease. We do have the right to exclude you from the West Egg community on the basis of refusal to wear a mask. Why’d you have to go and make us do that, though?”
Meanwhile, restaurants continue to close temporarily and permanently. A surprising number of newbies are on the way, though. As Jarrett Stieber told me, most will likely highlight well-engineered takeout and seating options, as well as smaller staffs, that make them more economically viable.
!!~~black:When a pandemic of disease is overshadowed by a pandemic of lovelessness …~~
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The absolute devastation of the lives of restaurant and bar employees is reflective of everything my socialist mind detests about the lie of the American dream. I won’t repeat my rant from above about the economics of racism, except to note that the groovy foodie magazine, ''Bon Appetit'', has been exposed for inequitable payment to employees based on race. A bunch of employees have quit. They were lucky to have options. In the real world of restaurant work, where people live paycheck-to-paycheck, you can’t walk out without someplace to go. Restaurant employees who were laid off at first qualified for over $900 a week in unemployment compensation. But that was all a mess. Say you were laid off and then called back to work part-time or were only laid off part-time to begin with. Such convolutions affected what you qualified for, and now Republicans want to slash subsidies to guarantee nobody gets too comfortable driving their Cadillac without a job. Of course, if you were lucky enough to have rare employer-paid health insurance, you’ve lost that too. In any other developed country, millions of people would not be dumped into misery and, predictably, blamed for their own situation. It’s maddening that it’s necessary, but people have organized nonprofits to provide help. Chief among them in Atlanta is The Giving Kitchen. The organization, which has extended its services statewide, is grounded in a tale of love, death, and heartbreak, which you may read on their website. It provides a rare remedy to the suffering caused by the greater pandemic of lovelessness in America. Check out their story online (thegivingkitchen.org and @givingkitchen on Twitter and IG). Donate. Bigly. And ask for help.
!!~~black:Is there hope?~~
I have mixed feelings about hope. As American psychologist James Hillman pointed out, hope was inside Pandora’s box of evils. She snapped the lid shut before it escaped with the other evils. So, in the ancient Greeks’ thinking, hope was an evil because it frequently caused the pain of disappointed expectations and had nothing to do with actually producing happy endings. I once asked Hillman what we were left with if we couldn’t be hopeful and he talked about reflection on the beauty of what is present. Such reflection can arise with the art of cooking and dining, whether alone or with one another. You can argue that the beauty of my Trader Joe’s microwaved palak paneer fades miserably beside my friend’s exquisite fettucine Alfredo, but comparison is ultimately immaterial. Eat what pleases you, drink, help others, and be merry — but wear your damn mask, because in this plague you really may die tomorrow. __—CL—__
''Grant Central Pizza, 451 Cherokee Ave. S.E., 404-523-8900.''
''Little Bear, 71-A Georgia Ave. S.E., Ste. A. 404-500-5396. @littlebearatl''"
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string(19243) " Web Lede Grazing Sept (LEFT)GRANT CENTRAL PIZZA: Jessy Forney. Photo credit: Courtesy Jesse Forney. (RIGHT)LITTLE BEAR: Jarrett Stieber. Photo credit: Cliff Bostock. 2020-09-09T14:47:03+00:00 Web_Lede_Grazing_Sept.jpg grazing During the pandemic, treat yourself to dinner and yourself Web Lede Grazing Sept 2020-09-09T13:49:42+00:00 GRAZING: Ten ways COVID-19 has changed the foodie experience in Atlanta jim.harris Jim Harris Cliff Bostock cliffbostock (Cliff Bostock) 2020-09-09T13:49:42+00:00 The coronavirus pandemic has wrought complete chaos in Atlanta’s restaurant and bar community. Anything definitive I might try to say about the scene would be completely changed by the time you read this. So, my purpose here is to look at some of the general effects of the pandemic from my own and a few others’ personal perspectives. Let’s start with the particularly amazing resilience of neighborhood restaurants, without which, could turn into heartbreaking loss.
I’ve lived in Grant Park for 25 years, and during the last six of those, I’ve walked the three blocks to Grant Central Pizza alone every Wednesday. The draw is the weekly special, chicken piccata with mashed potatoes, but I’ve also formed all the attachments that make neighborhood restaurants so compelling in that “Cheers” sort of way.
Well, sort of.
!!Where nobody knows your name no more
Personally, I hate people, but I enjoy watching them in the way children love watching the animals in the zoo down the road. I do, however, actually love Grant Central’s staff — particularly Jessy Forney, the young front-of-the-house manager for almost eight years. I started my weekly visits soon after my life turned to shit, and, in need of distraction, I bought a television for the first time in 35 years. One day, I heard Jessy going on about some TV program. At that moment she became my TV mentor, but, over the years, she also became someone whose mind I realized was wonderfully weird and far more brilliant than she realized herself. She also operates a pet-sitting business — that business is also down — and I’ve made it my goal to get her to become a therapist specializing in emotional support animals.
Grant Central, like most neighborhood restaurants, discontinued inside dining when the pandemic arrived. It is lucky in that, as a pizzeria, it already had a great takeout business, whereas many other small neighbor-hood restaurants have been severely crippled or killed by the pandemic. Jessy, who had to let most of the staff go, now works the makeshift take-out counter that allows people to come into the restaurant for pickup as long as they wear masks and keep their distance. Now and then, someone goes Karen, particularly with the younger staff members.
She, Jessy, misses her customers as much as we miss her. “It makes me teary-eyed thinking of it,” she wrote me. “I miss things like our ‘Friday Night Crew,’ where I would get to talk to all these amazing regulars about the past week. I have regulars who would come in almost daily after hours of the trauma-infused Atlanta traffic, and we would chat about all kinds of interesting things or nothing at all. There are a lot of smiles I miss.” She also mentioned our ritual of recounting TV plots and strange dreams we had on Tuesday nights.
Generally, she copes with the loss of income and uncertainty with the help of meditation. If there’s a silver lining around, she says the sudden increase in free time has led her down a new path of self-examination. Fine, girl, but don’t go all sane on us.
!!It may be a pandemic, but we be in-a-gadda-da-vida with a little bear…
Takeout and patios have saved the restaurant industry. While Little Bear in Summerhill does not offer the latter, it does provide $55, multi-course takeout meals for two that are absolutely the city’s most compelling. It’s difficult to describe owner/chef Jarrett Stieber’s cuisine without sounding silly. But when I look at his food, I often recall a quote from playwright Luigi Pirandello that captioned a black light poster of a fish in a tree in my freshman dormitory room: “Life is full of infinite absurdities, which, strangely enough, do not even need to appear plausible, since they are true.” His food is culinary theater of the absurd so good it had the James Beard committee giving him a (metaphorical) standing ovation last year.
Speaking as someone with a useless PhD in psychology, I think Stieber’s absurdism is really, really good for mental health. The pandemic, the racial strife, and the jack-o-lantern’s bid for reelection have turned our collective skull into a cauldron of bubbling ugliness. Stieber’s cooking is the contrary. It’s a melding of seemingly disparate elements into a beautiful landscape that’s going to fill you with wonder — as in “Wonderland” — instead of disgust. One recent example that Stieber “absolutely loved” was a “butternut squash salad dressed with smoked fig, yung lemongrass, aji limon chili, dried cucumber seasoning, and holy basil.” He also mentioned — I’m editing — “a fun posset dessert, a medieval cream pudding thickened by citric acid … topped with what we referred to as a ‘terrarium-like mélange of nutty choco crunch mix — pretentious flowers, mountain mint, and benne seed.” Yeah, boy.
Stieber, whom I profiled in our May issue, opened Little Bear only two weeks before restaurants were closed by mandate. Since his work was already nationally renowned as a pop-up called Eat Me Speak Me, take-out business sold out quickly every week, but he told me things had faltered for two weeks when we communicated in mid-August. I blame it on the Dog Days. So. I urge you to lay off the DMT, put down your copy of Food of the Gods and investigate Little Bear on Instagram, @littlebearatl. (More about Stieber below.)
!!Food porn blossoms in the pandemic, proving Freud to be intelligent …
Talk to any online sex-toy merchant and he’ll tell you business is booming, since everyone is regressing by necessity to the teenage joys of masturbation. Combine that with the fact that many people are, in Freud’s terms, sublimating the erotic through artistry — the artistry of cooking in the present context. In short, we are living in a perfect storm of food porn. Brian Cohn of PetLuv Cat Carrier fame demonstrates the full spectrum by serving a fab dinner to a maskless but safe lady friend. She is enjoying “Pork Volcánes al Pastor,” tacos whose recipe he found in the March issue of Bon Appetit. The pork is shaved super-thin and flavored with lime juice and three different chilies, topped with melted Oaxaca cheese, which adds to the “lava” that gives the dish its volcanic name. Brian, the most adamantly sheltered-at-home person I know, manages to order all his cooking ingredients online without difficulty. I asked him the most difficult part of cooking in the pandemic. “Cooking for one leaves a ton of leftovers.” What has he learned? “When working with hot peppers, do not touch your eyes or private parts.”
!!Racism matters not when you got white pride! Grow up! Let the POC taste the icing of the privilegeds’ cake!
Is it a surprise that the $660-billion restaurant and food service industry is as contaminated with racism as the rest of the U.S. economy? Almost surreally, Susan DeRose, the owner of OK Café, smacked Atlantans in the face with that reality during, of all things, a march down West Paces Ferry organized by Buckhead4BlackLives to oppose the police murder of George Floyd. DeRose hung a banner on the restaurant that chastised Black Lives Matter with an allusion to the myth of lazy black people: “Lives that matter are made with positive purpose.” It was a shockingly thoughtless action, since she has long been controversial for decorating a wall with a supposedly arty representation of the old Georgia flag, which appropriates the image of the Confederate battle flag. She removed the banner and flag and explained it all away while seriously laying claim to “white pride.” Her actions provoked a storm of promises to boycott the café and her two other restaurants, Bones and Blue Ridge Grill, but we’ll see. Americans have a habit of backsliding into institutionalized norms of prejudice. Going deeper, we need to acknowledge that racism enforces the economic classism required by increasingly unregulated capitalism. Atlanta, like many U.S. cities, has become a prime example of the privileged sweeping the already marginalized to the city’s edges. (Be gone! Do not sully our BeltLine!) Graciously, members of enlightened corporate royalty now reverse the edict of Marie Antoinette and urge their peers to eat cake made with soul. Atlanta Magazine, for example, provides its largely white readership with a daring list of black-owned restaurants to patronize. Bless their hearts, they mean well, and the dollars handed out by tourists in the heart of darkness will help entrepreneurs a bit, but in the bigger picture, it’s a truly trivial gesture. Ending the enablement of genocide, racism, and fascism require sacrifice by the privileged themselves — not just sharing a bit of the icing of their privilege.
!!They have shattered the dinnerware and nothing is the same!
For the antisocial like me, the pandemic at first seemed like paradise. There was no traffic and no need to concoct excuses not to go to parties. Not so for my friends writer Brad Lapin and professor Eric Varner. For them, it brought a screeching halt to the dinner parties they host unrelentingly at their dual homes in Atlanta and Rome. Now, they compensate by cooking two meals a day for themselves, usually testing out new recipes. Recently, they prepared a Sonora-style carne asada feast detailed in the New York Times. The married couple normally dines out frequently but has only done so once, with friends, during the pandemic. Brad said that the restaurant followed all the protocols but that it was nonetheless an anxiety-provoking experience. “This fear and loathing will probably prove the single most tenacious effect of the pandemic.” So they carry on at home (also eschewing takeout). How obsessive are they? I asked Brad to name some of their pandemic faves. “Earlier this summer, Eric produced an authentic version of fettucine Alfredo that both captured the essence of the decadent dish and reestablished its Italian bonafides.” Yeah, cool, man. Did I mention they cook all the food for their four Scottish terriers? And, oh, they host international Zoom cocktail parties, and I Zoom-lunch with Brad and Brian, mentioned above, on Fridays — something I’ve done in real life for years. I love you boys.
!!The pandemic makes the TV dinner cool again …
Unlike my friends mentioned above, the pandemic has not motivated me to hone fine dining skills in the harvest-gold kitchen full of cracked tile and broken appliances of this 125-year-old home. Long ago, I liked to cook and was pretty good at it, but writing about restaurants for 30 years eventually led me to call any day I didn’t have to eat out a “Freedom from Food Day.” So, I’m going to share a dirty secret. About six years ago, I fell in love with Trader Joe’s. The grocery chain vends a huge line of frozen meals that I would never imagine myself eating. I thought they would be like the TV dinners of yore that my mother would not allow us to eat. (Yet, weirdly, the only person in my family I ever saw eat one of those was my super-wealthy uncle Steve, who otherwise introduced me to fried grasshoppers, chocolate-covered ants, and my beloved pickled lamb tongues.) And then I discovered Trader Joe’s Indian meals. Let me put it this way. One day two of us bought Indian food at a well-known food truck. Our bill, seriously, was about $65. Later in the week we ate a similar-sized meal of Trader Joe’s Indian food that cost us less than $15 for four dishes and tasted much better. Over the years, I’ve explored more of their food, and I unapologetically eat so much now that I enjoy feeling like an antifoodie. Oh, there are drawbacks — like the consumption of more salt than is needed to preserve an obese ox. But I can’t resist. In our October issue, I will go into more detail. The larger point is that the pandemic really has taught many of us that our mothers lied when they said all frozen prepared food was crap. And, hell, the store’s ginger snaps are better than my mother’s too!
!!Sometimes a takeout box is like a crypt …
Takeout and food-delivery operations are saving many restaurants, but answer this question, please: “What is the big drawback to takeout food?” It’s the packaging itself, of course. I’m not going to name names, but I’ve picked up simple food at favorite restaurants, taken it home, unwrapped it, and found myself confronted by a revoltingly steamy mess. It’s not like this is an entirely new phenomenon. Carrying a properly cooked Neapolitan pizza home in a closed, unventilated cardboard box typically is stupid. Eat it in the car or on the curb. Open the top first if you take it home, or, failing that, throw it in a damn blender. The weird thing is that fast-food operations clearly know a lot more about takeout packaging than many high-quality restaurants, and it’s not as if there isn’t a ton of available guidance about this. A notable local exception to the problem is the above-mentioned Little Bear. Owner Jarrett Stieber told me that his approach to cooking itself helps: “We conceptualize dishes to not just be things we think sound good but things we think sound good AND will transport well.” By that he means the food maintains flavor integrity and its gorgeous appearance. While many restaurants are packing up all their regular menu items, Stieber says that’s often unthinkable. When the restaurant was open for inside dining, for example, “we always had tartare on the menu, but we can’t be sure people will take it straight home and not let the meat warm up or sit so long the acid starts pickling it.” Perhaps Stieber can begin teaching the art of food transport. In the meantime, a really large number of foodies will continue to avoid takeout.
!!In a pandemic, the death of a server is good for a vote ...
Gov. Brian Kemp, one of the few elected officials as dumb and heartless as President Don Don, has, at this writing, reversed his ban of city health-protection mandates in an incomprehensibly garbled way that allows restaurants and other private businesses to ignore the mandates, because … well … because he doesn’t mind killing off restaurant employees if it earns him votes from the adult toddlers who believe COVID-19 is a hoax so nefarious that it hypnotizes their relatives into dying from propaganda poisoning. Fortunately, some restaurants are taking a strong stand against the mask-o-phobic. West Egg Café, for example, posted the following on Instagram:
“We asked nicely, then we begged. Masks are now required for all guests at West Egg, whenever you are not seated at your table. Period. Living in society (which includes doing things like going out to eat at restaurants) sometimes means relinquishing some of your individual liberties for the common good. Public health crises are one of those times. You do not have the ‘right’ not to wear a mask in public when exercising that ‘right’ exposes the community to communicable disease. We do have the right to exclude you from the West Egg community on the basis of refusal to wear a mask. Why’d you have to go and make us do that, though?”
Meanwhile, restaurants continue to close temporarily and permanently. A surprising number of newbies are on the way, though. As Jarrett Stieber told me, most will likely highlight well-engineered takeout and seating options, as well as smaller staffs, that make them more economically viable.
!!When a pandemic of disease is overshadowed by a pandemic of lovelessness …
::::
The absolute devastation of the lives of restaurant and bar employees is reflective of everything my socialist mind detests about the lie of the American dream. I won’t repeat my rant from above about the economics of racism, except to note that the groovy foodie magazine, Bon Appetit, has been exposed for inequitable payment to employees based on race. A bunch of employees have quit. They were lucky to have options. In the real world of restaurant work, where people live paycheck-to-paycheck, you can’t walk out without someplace to go. Restaurant employees who were laid off at first qualified for over $900 a week in unemployment compensation. But that was all a mess. Say you were laid off and then called back to work part-time or were only laid off part-time to begin with. Such convolutions affected what you qualified for, and now Republicans want to slash subsidies to guarantee nobody gets too comfortable driving their Cadillac without a job. Of course, if you were lucky enough to have rare employer-paid health insurance, you’ve lost that too. In any other developed country, millions of people would not be dumped into misery and, predictably, blamed for their own situation. It’s maddening that it’s necessary, but people have organized nonprofits to provide help. Chief among them in Atlanta is The Giving Kitchen. The organization, which has extended its services statewide, is grounded in a tale of love, death, and heartbreak, which you may read on their website. It provides a rare remedy to the suffering caused by the greater pandemic of lovelessness in America. Check out their story online (thegivingkitchen.org and @givingkitchen on Twitter and IG). Donate. Bigly. And ask for help.
!!Is there hope?
I have mixed feelings about hope. As American psychologist James Hillman pointed out, hope was inside Pandora’s box of evils. She snapped the lid shut before it escaped with the other evils. So, in the ancient Greeks’ thinking, hope was an evil because it frequently caused the pain of disappointed expectations and had nothing to do with actually producing happy endings. I once asked Hillman what we were left with if we couldn’t be hopeful and he talked about reflection on the beauty of what is present. Such reflection can arise with the art of cooking and dining, whether alone or with one another. You can argue that the beauty of my Trader Joe’s microwaved palak paneer fades miserably beside my friend’s exquisite fettucine Alfredo, but comparison is ultimately immaterial. Eat what pleases you, drink, help others, and be merry — but wear your damn mask, because in this plague you really may die tomorrow. —CL—
Grant Central Pizza, 451 Cherokee Ave. S.E., 404-523-8900.
Little Bear, 71-A Georgia Ave. S.E., Ste. A. 404-500-5396. @littlebearatl (L)Courtesy Jesse Forney, (R)Cliff Bostock (L)GRANT CENTRAL PIZZA: Jessy Forney. (R)LITTLE BEAR: Jarrett Stieber. 0,0,10 cl issue september 2020 grazing GRAZING: Ten ways COVID-19 has changed the foodie experience in Atlanta "
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GRAZING: Ten ways COVID-19 has changed the foodie experience in Atlanta Article
Wednesday September 9, 2020 09:49 AM EDT
During the pandemic, treat yourself to dinner and yourself
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string(9254) "It was mid-July and I had not eaten in a restaurant in four months — not even outdoors. The idea was terrifying. I imagined people huddled on crowded patios, inhaling and exhaling the coronavirus like smoke in a hookah lounge. They would all be 23 and drunk, flaunting their dolphinlike lungs and uncreased skin, or they would be escapees from nursing homes blowing kisses through fingers coated with mucous.
Finally, though, more reasonable friends and desperation for something to write about convinced me to visit two restaurant patios. And, to my surprise, my anxiety did not become the panic attack I expected. I don’t have too many illusions about this. I know that COVID-19’s infection rate is “soaring” and “surging” — the media love those words — so that, once again, fewer people are entering public space. Don’t regard what follows as a real-time account of anything more than the food at these places based on single visits. At this writing, both restaurants have menus for dining in and taking out. You should call ahead, because the pandemic comes with scheduling pandemonium.
First up was Grana, a newish Italian restaurant that opened just in time for La Corona in mid-March on Piedmont Avenue, near Cheshire Bridge. It is owned by the exceedingly talented Pat Pascarella, who owned a renowned restaurant in Connecticut and moved here, where he became executive chef at the Optimist, arguably the city’s best seafood destination. Last year, he opened the White Bull in Decatur. It draws on Pascarella’s Italian heritage, but is mainly a playful farm-to-table venue heavy on veggies. Its name pays homage to Ernest Hemingway, who romanticized himself as a writerly matador. He referred to the blank page as his white bull, his challenge to dance with an overwhelming onslaught of words until he found the perfect textual moves and slayed the beast of mediocrity with his pen. It’s not a bad metaphor for the chef’s challenge to shape seasonal harvests from local farms and create something masterful. Pascarella succeeds at that at the White Bull.
Much of the same ethos prevails at Grana, but the menu is explicitly and classically Italian. Like every Italian chef in America, Pascarella attributes his tastes and skills to his mother and grandmother, who mastered the classics of southern Italy. The menu is divided into seven sections: bread, mozzarella plates, meatballs, pasta, entrees, vegetables, and Neapolitan-style pizzas. There seriously wasn’t anything on the menu that I wouldn’t love to try, but two of us couldn’t even finish the four dishes we ordered. Prepare for leftovers.
I knew that I was not going to pass up the fig pizza, one of my favorites, and this was by far the best I’ve had in years. Besides fat slices of ripe figs, the charred pie was topped with ricotta cheese and speck. Vincotto added a slightly sweet note that toyed with peppery arugula profusely scattered on the pie after it was taken from one of the two wood-fire ovens. I have to admit I did encounter an odd note of anchovies now and then. My companion didn’t, so I don’t know if this was my super-sensitive nose inhaling something from the lone table at the other end of the patio or what. As it happens, we did order a pasta dish that included anchovies but it did not arrive until well after the pizza.
The pasta was a classic, paccheri alla Norma — a Neapolitan favorite of rather chunky tubes of hollow pasta in a pomodoro sauce with anchovies, ricotta, and eggplant. It hit the spot but went way over the top with the pizza. The five other pastas are also classics, including pappardelle with a pork ragu and pecorino cheese, ricotta ravioli, and corn agnolotti. There are five equally classic entrees — two chicken dishes, wood-roasted branzino, and porchetta, which I’m anxious to try.
I didn’t get to choose the meatballs we ordered, so my companion selected a savory serving of three meatballs in a tomato/mostarda sauce with currants. They were terrific, but why the hell didn’t he order the beef ones with gouda, red onion, and black truffle jam? Our fourth dish was by far the most dramatic. In fact, when it arrived at the table I immediately thought of the Wicked Witch of the West, hurling fire balls from her broom while Dorothy proceeded to Oz. It was roasted ears of corn whose singed leaves were pulled back in a mad whirl. The corn itself was not particularly notable until you slathered it in the lemon aioli and Calabrian peppers on which the dramatic broom piece sat. Seven other vegetable dishes were available and, congruent with the White Bull menu, they were the menu’s most compelling dishes to me. Well, they may have tied with the five mozzarella plates. I really wanted the burrata with prosciutto, peaches, and bread sticks. Maybe next time. And maybe I’ll get a cannoli too.
I did go inside the large restaurant for a quick tour in my low-fashion mask, and the place was smart but lonely. Only two tables were occupied. The capacious dining room includes a mezzanine, which seems to be an architectural thing with restaurants these days. There’s also a long bar and a very open kitchen. Besides the tiny patio out front, there’s also rooftop dining. Both come with plenty of oxygen. The staff is well educated about the menu, and our server had mastered the art of clear articulation while facially mummified. Give it a try.
My second experiment with patio dining during the plague was a visit to Delbar, a new Persian restaurant off North Highland. The name means “soulmate” or “true love” in Farsi, one of the most beautiful languages on the planet. If I had to name a psychedelic moment that involved no ingestion of psychedelics, it would be the afternoon in grad school I listened to an Iranian woman read the 13th-century Persian poet Rumi in Farsi. I told this story to my masked server, Radman, an Iranian student studying at Georgia State. We talked about how much more complex Persian culture is than its media representation. He visits often to see family in Tehran.
That being his experience, the restaurant’s owner/chef, Fares Kargar, told “What Now Atlanta” that he left Iran for Turkey as a refugee when he was 17. He soon migrated to Atlanta to study hospitality and, for a while, worked at Rumi’s Kitchen. Delbar is an ambitious project, not helped by opening during the pandemic. The bright, multilevel interior is huge and intriguing, probably reflective of Kargar’s call to architecture before he discovered the restaurant industry. Just like Pascarella at Grana, he says the menu is inspired by the food his family’s women cooked.
The patio at Delbar is small, and when a thunderstorm forced me inside, I sat at the otherwise empty bar (wondering if the friendly, masked bartender was a viral sponge). I was eating alone, so I didn’t get to taste much of the menu. I ordered two dishes with which I had some familiarity. The main one was a Cornish hen coated in saffron and deep-fried whole in butter. You tear the bird apart with your hands and drag the meat through one serving of more melted butter and another of Iran’s signature pomegranate sauce. The flavors verged on decadent, but in truth the bird’s white meat was so dry that even an extra-long bath in the sauces was inadequate to add much moisture. I also ordered a plate of the traditional adas polo, a huge plate of saffron basmati rice with lentils and raisins. Traditionally the outer coat of the rice, topped with fried onions, is a bit crispy, but Delbar’s not so much. Here’s the thing, though. I took the leftovers home, tore the flesh from the bird, let it soak in some melted butter, sat it on the rice, then anointed it with pomegranate sauce. The result was much more appetizing. The crowded plating at the restaurant actually made doing this impossible. The rice was truly enough for more than two people, so order it with one of the mezzes, like “sour orange” prawns. Or make a meal of the mezzes, which also include falafel and spreads like hummus and labneh. Be aware, too, that every meal comes with a truly wonderful starter of charred, chewy flatbread with radishes, walnuts, an unusually good feta-type cheese, and herbs. Fold the mint and tarragon into pieces of the bread along with the cheese.
I did take a second meal home for the over-worked CDC scientist with whom I live, and I’m tempted to say it was better than my own, although I barely got a taste. He got a whole, silvery trout with walnuts, herbs, and pomegranate. He also got an order of the fried-eggplant spread with onion, mint, and cream of whey. He raved. Then he returned to the plague.
This may be the first Persian restaurant I’ve visited where I didn’t order lamb, but there are three dishes on the menu — a stew, chops, and shwarma. There are also kabobs, vegetables, and three rice dishes besides the one I ordered. A few adjustments will make the restaurant a favorite destination for lovers of Middle Eastern cuisine. —CL—
Grana, 1835 Piedmont Ave. N.E. 404-231-9000, granaatl.com, @granaatl.
Delbar, 870 Inman Village Parkway N.E., Suite 1, 404-500-1444, delbaratl.com, @delbaratl."
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Finally, though, more reasonable friends and desperation for something to write about convinced me to visit two restaurant patios. And, to my surprise, my anxiety did not become the panic attack I expected. I don’t have too many illusions about this. I know that COVID-19’s infection rate is “soaring” and “surging” — the media love those words — so that, once again, fewer people are entering public space. Don’t regard what follows as a real-time account of anything more than the food at these places based on single visits. At this writing, both restaurants have menus for dining in and taking out. You should call ahead, because the pandemic comes with scheduling pandemonium.
First up was Grana, a newish Italian restaurant that opened just in time for La Corona in mid-March on Piedmont Avenue, near Cheshire Bridge. It is owned by the exceedingly talented Pat Pascarella, who owned a renowned restaurant in Connecticut and moved here, where he became executive chef at the Optimist, arguably the city’s best seafood destination. Last year, he opened the White Bull in Decatur. It draws on Pascarella’s Italian heritage, but is mainly a playful farm-to-table venue heavy on veggies. Its name pays homage to Ernest Hemingway, who romanticized himself as a writerly matador. He referred to the blank page as his white bull, his challenge to dance with an overwhelming onslaught of words until he found the perfect textual moves and slayed the beast of mediocrity with his pen. It’s not a bad metaphor for the chef’s challenge to shape seasonal harvests from local farms and create something masterful. Pascarella succeeds at that at the White Bull.
Much of the same ethos prevails at Grana, but the menu is explicitly and classically Italian. Like every Italian chef in America, Pascarella attributes his tastes and skills to his mother and grandmother, who mastered the classics of southern Italy. The menu is divided into seven sections: bread, mozzarella plates, meatballs, pasta, entrees, vegetables, and Neapolitan-style pizzas. There seriously wasn’t anything on the menu that I wouldn’t love to try, but two of us couldn’t even finish the four dishes we ordered. Prepare for leftovers.
I knew that I was not going to pass up the fig pizza, one of my favorites, and this was by far the best I’ve had in years. Besides fat slices of ripe figs, the charred pie was topped with ricotta cheese and speck. Vincotto added a slightly sweet note that toyed with peppery arugula profusely scattered on the pie after it was taken from one of the two wood-fire ovens. I have to admit I did encounter an odd note of anchovies now and then. My companion didn’t, so I don’t know if this was my super-sensitive nose inhaling something from the lone table at the other end of the patio or what. As it happens, we did order a pasta dish that included anchovies but it did not arrive until well after the pizza.
The pasta was a classic, paccheri alla Norma — a Neapolitan favorite of rather chunky tubes of hollow pasta in a pomodoro sauce with anchovies, ricotta, and eggplant. It hit the spot but went way over the top with the pizza. The five other pastas are also classics, including pappardelle with a pork ragu and pecorino cheese, ricotta ravioli, and corn agnolotti. There are five equally classic entrees — two chicken dishes, wood-roasted branzino, and porchetta, which I’m anxious to try.
I didn’t get to choose the meatballs we ordered, so my companion selected a savory serving of three meatballs in a tomato/mostarda sauce with currants. They were terrific, but why the hell didn’t he order the beef ones with gouda, red onion, and black truffle jam? Our fourth dish was by far the most dramatic. In fact, when it arrived at the table I immediately thought of the Wicked Witch of the West, hurling fire balls from her broom while Dorothy proceeded to Oz. It was roasted ears of corn whose singed leaves were pulled back in a mad whirl. The corn itself was not particularly notable until you slathered it in the lemon aioli and Calabrian peppers on which the dramatic broom piece sat. Seven other vegetable dishes were available and, congruent with the White Bull menu, they were the menu’s most compelling dishes to me. Well, they may have tied with the five mozzarella plates. I really wanted the burrata with prosciutto, peaches, and bread sticks. Maybe next time. And maybe I’ll get a cannoli too.
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I did go inside the large restaurant for a quick tour in my low-fashion mask, and the place was smart but lonely. Only two tables were occupied. The capacious dining room includes a mezzanine, which seems to be an architectural thing with restaurants these days. There’s also a long bar and a very open kitchen. Besides the tiny patio out front, there’s also rooftop dining. Both come with plenty of oxygen. The staff is well educated about the menu, and our server had mastered the art of clear articulation while facially mummified. Give it a try.
My second experiment with patio dining during the plague was a visit to Delbar, a new Persian restaurant off North Highland. The name means “soulmate” or “true love” in Farsi, one of the most beautiful languages on the planet. If I had to name a psychedelic moment that involved no ingestion of psychedelics, it would be the afternoon in grad school I listened to an Iranian woman read the 13th-century Persian poet Rumi in Farsi. I told this story to my masked server, Radman, an Iranian student studying at Georgia State. We talked about how much more complex Persian culture is than its media representation. He visits often to see family in Tehran.
That being his experience, the restaurant’s owner/chef, Fares Kargar, told “What Now Atlanta” that he left Iran for Turkey as a refugee when he was 17. He soon migrated to Atlanta to study hospitality and, for a while, worked at Rumi’s Kitchen. Delbar is an ambitious project, not helped by opening during the pandemic. The bright, multilevel interior is huge and intriguing, probably reflective of Kargar’s call to architecture before he discovered the restaurant industry. Just like Pascarella at Grana, he says the menu is inspired by the food his family’s women cooked.
The patio at Delbar is small, and when a thunderstorm forced me inside, I sat at the otherwise empty bar (wondering if the friendly, masked bartender was a viral sponge). I was eating alone, so I didn’t get to taste much of the menu. I ordered two dishes with which I had some familiarity. The main one was a Cornish hen coated in saffron and deep-fried whole in butter. You tear the bird apart with your hands and drag the meat through one serving of more melted butter and another of Iran’s signature pomegranate sauce. The flavors verged on decadent, but in truth the bird’s white meat was so dry that even an extra-long bath in the sauces was inadequate to add much moisture. I also ordered a plate of the traditional adas polo, a huge plate of saffron basmati rice with lentils and raisins. Traditionally the outer coat of the rice, topped with fried onions, is a bit crispy, but Delbar’s not so much. Here’s the thing, though. I took the leftovers home, tore the flesh from the bird, let it soak in some melted butter, sat it on the rice, then anointed it with pomegranate sauce. The result was much more appetizing. The crowded plating at the restaurant actually made doing this impossible. The rice was truly enough for more than two people, so order it with one of the mezzes, like “sour orange” prawns. Or make a meal of the mezzes, which also include falafel and spreads like hummus and labneh. Be aware, too, that every meal comes with a truly wonderful starter of charred, chewy flatbread with radishes, walnuts, an unusually good feta-type cheese, and herbs. Fold the mint and tarragon into pieces of the bread along with the cheese.
I did take a second meal home for the over-worked CDC scientist with whom I live, and I’m tempted to say it was better than my own, although I barely got a taste. He got a whole, silvery trout with walnuts, herbs, and pomegranate. He also got an order of the fried-eggplant spread with onion, mint, and cream of whey. He raved. Then he returned to the plague.
This may be the first Persian restaurant I’ve visited where I didn’t order lamb, but there are three dishes on the menu — a stew, chops, and shwarma. There are also kabobs, vegetables, and three rice dishes besides the one I ordered. A few adjustments will make the restaurant a favorite destination for lovers of Middle Eastern cuisine. __—CL—__
''Grana, 1835 Piedmont Ave. N.E. 404-231-9000, granaatl.com, @granaatl.''
''Delbar, 870 Inman Village Parkway N.E., Suite 1, 404-500-1444, delbaratl.com, @delbaratl.''"
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string(9967) " GRAZ Witch Broom Web A WITCH'S BROOM?: Roasted corn stands over lemon aioli beneath a headdress designed by the Wicked Witch of the West. Photo credit: Cliff Bostock 2020-08-05T20:34:06+00:00 GRAZ_witch_broom_web.jpg grazing GRAZ Witch Broom Web 2020-08-05T20:44:22+00:00 GRAZING: Grana and Delbar provide two new opportunities for patio plague dining jim.harris Jim Harris Cliff Bostock cliffbostock (Cliff Bostock) 2020-08-05T20:44:22+00:00 It was mid-July and I had not eaten in a restaurant in four months — not even outdoors. The idea was terrifying. I imagined people huddled on crowded patios, inhaling and exhaling the coronavirus like smoke in a hookah lounge. They would all be 23 and drunk, flaunting their dolphinlike lungs and uncreased skin, or they would be escapees from nursing homes blowing kisses through fingers coated with mucous.
Finally, though, more reasonable friends and desperation for something to write about convinced me to visit two restaurant patios. And, to my surprise, my anxiety did not become the panic attack I expected. I don’t have too many illusions about this. I know that COVID-19’s infection rate is “soaring” and “surging” — the media love those words — so that, once again, fewer people are entering public space. Don’t regard what follows as a real-time account of anything more than the food at these places based on single visits. At this writing, both restaurants have menus for dining in and taking out. You should call ahead, because the pandemic comes with scheduling pandemonium.
First up was Grana, a newish Italian restaurant that opened just in time for La Corona in mid-March on Piedmont Avenue, near Cheshire Bridge. It is owned by the exceedingly talented Pat Pascarella, who owned a renowned restaurant in Connecticut and moved here, where he became executive chef at the Optimist, arguably the city’s best seafood destination. Last year, he opened the White Bull in Decatur. It draws on Pascarella’s Italian heritage, but is mainly a playful farm-to-table venue heavy on veggies. Its name pays homage to Ernest Hemingway, who romanticized himself as a writerly matador. He referred to the blank page as his white bull, his challenge to dance with an overwhelming onslaught of words until he found the perfect textual moves and slayed the beast of mediocrity with his pen. It’s not a bad metaphor for the chef’s challenge to shape seasonal harvests from local farms and create something masterful. Pascarella succeeds at that at the White Bull.
Much of the same ethos prevails at Grana, but the menu is explicitly and classically Italian. Like every Italian chef in America, Pascarella attributes his tastes and skills to his mother and grandmother, who mastered the classics of southern Italy. The menu is divided into seven sections: bread, mozzarella plates, meatballs, pasta, entrees, vegetables, and Neapolitan-style pizzas. There seriously wasn’t anything on the menu that I wouldn’t love to try, but two of us couldn’t even finish the four dishes we ordered. Prepare for leftovers.
I knew that I was not going to pass up the fig pizza, one of my favorites, and this was by far the best I’ve had in years. Besides fat slices of ripe figs, the charred pie was topped with ricotta cheese and speck. Vincotto added a slightly sweet note that toyed with peppery arugula profusely scattered on the pie after it was taken from one of the two wood-fire ovens. I have to admit I did encounter an odd note of anchovies now and then. My companion didn’t, so I don’t know if this was my super-sensitive nose inhaling something from the lone table at the other end of the patio or what. As it happens, we did order a pasta dish that included anchovies but it did not arrive until well after the pizza.
The pasta was a classic, paccheri alla Norma — a Neapolitan favorite of rather chunky tubes of hollow pasta in a pomodoro sauce with anchovies, ricotta, and eggplant. It hit the spot but went way over the top with the pizza. The five other pastas are also classics, including pappardelle with a pork ragu and pecorino cheese, ricotta ravioli, and corn agnolotti. There are five equally classic entrees — two chicken dishes, wood-roasted branzino, and porchetta, which I’m anxious to try.
I didn’t get to choose the meatballs we ordered, so my companion selected a savory serving of three meatballs in a tomato/mostarda sauce with currants. They were terrific, but why the hell didn’t he order the beef ones with gouda, red onion, and black truffle jam? Our fourth dish was by far the most dramatic. In fact, when it arrived at the table I immediately thought of the Wicked Witch of the West, hurling fire balls from her broom while Dorothy proceeded to Oz. It was roasted ears of corn whose singed leaves were pulled back in a mad whirl. The corn itself was not particularly notable until you slathered it in the lemon aioli and Calabrian peppers on which the dramatic broom piece sat. Seven other vegetable dishes were available and, congruent with the White Bull menu, they were the menu’s most compelling dishes to me. Well, they may have tied with the five mozzarella plates. I really wanted the burrata with prosciutto, peaches, and bread sticks. Maybe next time. And maybe I’ll get a cannoli too.
I did go inside the large restaurant for a quick tour in my low-fashion mask, and the place was smart but lonely. Only two tables were occupied. The capacious dining room includes a mezzanine, which seems to be an architectural thing with restaurants these days. There’s also a long bar and a very open kitchen. Besides the tiny patio out front, there’s also rooftop dining. Both come with plenty of oxygen. The staff is well educated about the menu, and our server had mastered the art of clear articulation while facially mummified. Give it a try.
My second experiment with patio dining during the plague was a visit to Delbar, a new Persian restaurant off North Highland. The name means “soulmate” or “true love” in Farsi, one of the most beautiful languages on the planet. If I had to name a psychedelic moment that involved no ingestion of psychedelics, it would be the afternoon in grad school I listened to an Iranian woman read the 13th-century Persian poet Rumi in Farsi. I told this story to my masked server, Radman, an Iranian student studying at Georgia State. We talked about how much more complex Persian culture is than its media representation. He visits often to see family in Tehran.
That being his experience, the restaurant’s owner/chef, Fares Kargar, told “What Now Atlanta” that he left Iran for Turkey as a refugee when he was 17. He soon migrated to Atlanta to study hospitality and, for a while, worked at Rumi’s Kitchen. Delbar is an ambitious project, not helped by opening during the pandemic. The bright, multilevel interior is huge and intriguing, probably reflective of Kargar’s call to architecture before he discovered the restaurant industry. Just like Pascarella at Grana, he says the menu is inspired by the food his family’s women cooked.
The patio at Delbar is small, and when a thunderstorm forced me inside, I sat at the otherwise empty bar (wondering if the friendly, masked bartender was a viral sponge). I was eating alone, so I didn’t get to taste much of the menu. I ordered two dishes with which I had some familiarity. The main one was a Cornish hen coated in saffron and deep-fried whole in butter. You tear the bird apart with your hands and drag the meat through one serving of more melted butter and another of Iran’s signature pomegranate sauce. The flavors verged on decadent, but in truth the bird’s white meat was so dry that even an extra-long bath in the sauces was inadequate to add much moisture. I also ordered a plate of the traditional adas polo, a huge plate of saffron basmati rice with lentils and raisins. Traditionally the outer coat of the rice, topped with fried onions, is a bit crispy, but Delbar’s not so much. Here’s the thing, though. I took the leftovers home, tore the flesh from the bird, let it soak in some melted butter, sat it on the rice, then anointed it with pomegranate sauce. The result was much more appetizing. The crowded plating at the restaurant actually made doing this impossible. The rice was truly enough for more than two people, so order it with one of the mezzes, like “sour orange” prawns. Or make a meal of the mezzes, which also include falafel and spreads like hummus and labneh. Be aware, too, that every meal comes with a truly wonderful starter of charred, chewy flatbread with radishes, walnuts, an unusually good feta-type cheese, and herbs. Fold the mint and tarragon into pieces of the bread along with the cheese.
I did take a second meal home for the over-worked CDC scientist with whom I live, and I’m tempted to say it was better than my own, although I barely got a taste. He got a whole, silvery trout with walnuts, herbs, and pomegranate. He also got an order of the fried-eggplant spread with onion, mint, and cream of whey. He raved. Then he returned to the plague.
This may be the first Persian restaurant I’ve visited where I didn’t order lamb, but there are three dishes on the menu — a stew, chops, and shwarma. There are also kabobs, vegetables, and three rice dishes besides the one I ordered. A few adjustments will make the restaurant a favorite destination for lovers of Middle Eastern cuisine. —CL—
Grana, 1835 Piedmont Ave. N.E. 404-231-9000, granaatl.com, @granaatl.
Delbar, 870 Inman Village Parkway N.E., Suite 1, 404-500-1444, delbaratl.com, @delbaratl. Cliff Bostock A WITCH'S BROOM?: Roasted corn stands over lemon aioli beneath a headdress designed by the Wicked Witch of the West. 0,0,10 grazing GRAZING: Grana and Delbar provide two new opportunities for patio plague dining "
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GRAZING: Grana and Delbar provide two new opportunities for patio plague dining Article
Wednesday August 5, 2020 04:44 PM EDT
It was mid-July and I had not eaten in a restaurant in four months — not even outdoors. The idea was terrifying. I imagined people huddled on crowded patios, inhaling and exhaling the coronavirus like smoke in a hookah lounge. They would all be 23 and drunk, flaunting their dolphinlike lungs and uncreased skin, or they would be escapees from nursing homes blowing kisses through fingers coated... |
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string(8009) "I tried to go to a reopened restaurant last month. They made everyone wait in line six feet apart outside the door. They pointed temperature guns at everyone’s forehead. We had to sign a waiver promising not to sue them before we died in the ICU. Everyone passed. They administered IQ tests. Everyone failed. We were all sent home.
Kidding, but that’s honestly what I feel about dining inside a restaurant at this point in the pandemic. Granted, my decrepitude puts me at high risk, but I’m not clear how anyone would have a good time inside a restaurant during a time when COVID-19 continues to rise (at this writing) and experts predict a devastating second wave. An alarming number of reopened venues don’t follow guidelines, which are calculated to reduce risk but — let’s face it — tubs of hand sanitizer, facial masks, and tables in screaming-distance-only do not add up to a relaxing dinner. Fortunately, lots of normally full-service restaurants are offering take-out, including family-sized gourmet meals at great prices. Many are reopening safer patio dining only. But you go ahead and eat inside. Take a Xanax before you leave the house and have a cocktail when you get there.
In mid-June, the pandemic collided with what turned into an equally global protest against police brutality, specifically in the horrific murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis. In one protest, organized by Buckhead4BlackLives, an estimated 3,000 Atlantans marched up West Paces Ferry to the governor’s mansion. The march began in the parking lot where OK Café is located. In probably the most tone-deaf deed since Paula Deen explained that, yes indeed, she had used the N-word, Susan DeRose, co-owner of the restaurant, draped a banner outside with this message: “Lives that matter are made with positive purpose.” It was obvious mockery of “Black lives matter” and reeked of the thinking that also led her years ago to hang a huge carving of the old Georgia flag, which was basically a frame for the Confederate flag. The restaurant drew lots of negative attention for that, so DeRose moved it to a less conspicuous spot while installing a replica of the “Betsy Ross flag” in the original space.
Some people defended the banner, saying it was not inherently racist. Which is true if you completely disregard the context, but that’s rationally impossible. In interviews, including a lengthy one with the Atlanta Business Chronicle’s Chris Fuhrmeister, DeRose argued that she was protesting the violence that affected small business owners. I think it’s quite clear that Black Lives Matter is not an advocate of violent resistance even though some looters took advantage of the situation. DeRose’s banner reads like a recoded update of Ronald Reagan’s ranting about “welfare queens” in Cadillacs. Were there any doubt about what’s at play here, consider this excerpt from the Business Chronicle’s interview with DeRose:
“We are not apologizing for being good. We don’t need to make any apologies. We didn’t do anything wrong. We have no white guilt. We have white pride. We just have pride in our country.”
At this writing, the drama of white lunacy is still underway. In another jaw-dropping move, DeRose announced she was going to put the offending flag up for auction and donate the proceeds to the Atlanta Police Department. Let me explain this. Black people are not the instigators of violence in this protest against murder. The police, the murderers, are the instigators. They are responsible for inciting the violence that followed. The police declined DeRose’s offer because even they are wise enough to deduce that accepting cash for the sale of an offensive flag honoring enslavement of black people — the people they have brutalized — would be really dumb.
Some people have advocated a boycott of OK Café and DeRose’s two other Buckhead restaurants, Blue Ridge Grill and Bones. All three of these are Atlanta icons. It’s been years since I’ve been in any of them, but they all have good reputations despite the ire that some of DeRose’s former employees expressed on Facebook about their experience working in them. Some long-time big-monied customers also expressed shock as the story emerged. This is Buckhead, after all.
Among the many sad things about this story is its revelation of how entrenched racism remains among white authorities. I remember when I was a kid opening the Atlanta Constitution on weekends to read “Pickrick Says,” an advertisement for fried chicken that also advocated segregation. It was so over-the-top, I enjoyed reading it for its surrealness. The author was Lester Maddox, owner of the Pickrick Restaurant, who ran repeatedly for public office and was finally elected governor in 1967. He was most infamous for literally brandishing axe handles at black people who attempted to integrate the Pickrick after the Civil Rights Act of 1964. These axe handles, called “Pickrick drumsticks,” became popular souvenirs, even after Ole Lester closed his restaurant rather than comply with the Civil Rights Act. Understand: The axe handles were not merely symbols of violence against black people. They were literal tools of violence and, as such, resembled the batons with which protesters were beaten during the civil rights movement — and just last month, all across America.
In the South, we have long hidden much of our racism under our code of manners, creating a kinder, sweeter, genteel racism. I’ve told this story before, but nowhere was this more obvious than at Aunt Fanny’s Cabin, a restaurant to which my father dragged our family nearly every weekend when I was a teenager. Opened in 1941, it was located in Smyrna and its history was mythic. Aunt Fanny was a slave who was freed by her grateful owner. She became famous for her delicious Old South cooking that brought fried-chicken-lovin’ white and black folks to her door. She lived until she was 100.
The problem with this story is that it was a fiction concocted by the white owners who wanted to create a stage for the re-enactment of the good ole slavery days. Once you were seated there, a young black kid would come to the table with a large wooden menu with a hole at the top through which he poked his head. He’d sing-song the menu. Soon, one of the black servers — in a plaid dress and an Aunt Jemima-style do-rag — brought your feast to the table. The food really was good and us white folks sure did appreciate it. When the servers gathered ’round the piano to sing gospel music and “Dixie,” shaking Mason jars to collect money for their church, we loaded those things with nickels, dimes, and, yes, even quarters!
I couldn’t count the times my family went to this place, but I do recall the beginning of the end. My grandmother from Philadelphia came to visit and within 15 minutes she was horrified by the noise, the scene, and the food. God, I loved her. The servers at Aunt Fanny’s eventually refused to sing “Dixie,” and the restaurant finally closed in 1992. The city of Smyrna bought it and moved the faux slave cabin to use as a welcome center to host parties. That, perhaps, is the most brain-dead part of the story: A city appropriates a monument to racism to say howdy.
The history of racism runs deep in the metro area. There were plenty of other restaurants in this city that romanticized the Confederacy and plantation life, like Johnny Reb’s and Mammy’s Shanty, and it still remains true that most people have no idea how much our Southern cooking owes to Africa. But how in the world does a white woman hang a Confederate flag, chastise a civil rights group, and then make this claim: “The OK Cafe opened its doors July 8, 1987, and so great was the longing for a true southern restaurant that by the end of the first week it had become an Atlanta phenomenon with crowds standing in line to get in”? Hey, lady! Southern food is black! -CL-"
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Kidding, but that’s honestly what I feel about dining inside a restaurant at this point in the pandemic. Granted, my decrepitude puts me at high risk, but I’m not clear how anyone would have a good time inside a restaurant during a time when COVID-19 continues to rise (at this writing) and experts predict a devastating second wave. An alarming number of reopened venues don’t follow guidelines, which are calculated to reduce risk but — let’s face it — tubs of hand sanitizer, facial masks, and tables in screaming-distance-only do not add up to a relaxing dinner. Fortunately, lots of normally full-service restaurants are offering take-out, including family-sized gourmet meals at great prices. Many are reopening safer patio dining only. But you go ahead and eat inside. Take a Xanax before you leave the house and have a cocktail when you get there.
In mid-June, the pandemic collided with what turned into an equally global protest against police brutality, specifically in the horrific murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis. In one protest, organized by Buckhead4BlackLives, an estimated 3,000 Atlantans marched up West Paces Ferry to the governor’s mansion. The march began in the parking lot where OK Café is located. In probably the most tone-deaf deed since Paula Deen explained that, yes indeed, she had used the N-word, Susan DeRose, co-owner of the restaurant, draped a banner outside with this message: “Lives that matter are made with positive purpose.” It was obvious mockery of “Black lives matter” and reeked of the thinking that also led her years ago to hang a huge carving of the old Georgia flag, which was basically a frame for the Confederate flag. The restaurant drew lots of negative attention for that, so DeRose moved it to a less conspicuous spot while installing a replica of the “Betsy Ross flag” in the original space.
Some people defended the banner, saying it was not inherently racist. Which is true if you completely disregard the context, but that’s rationally impossible. In interviews, including a lengthy one with the ''Atlanta Business Chronicle''’s Chris Fuhrmeister, DeRose argued that she was protesting the violence that affected small business owners. I think it’s quite clear that Black Lives Matter is not an advocate of violent resistance even though some looters took advantage of the situation. DeRose’s banner reads like a recoded update of Ronald Reagan’s ranting about “welfare queens” in Cadillacs. Were there any doubt about what’s at play here, consider this excerpt from the ''Business Chronicle''’s interview with DeRose:
“We are not apologizing for being good. We don’t need to make any apologies. We didn’t do anything wrong. We have no white guilt. We have white pride. We just have pride in our country.”
At this writing, the drama of white lunacy is still underway. In another jaw-dropping move, DeRose announced she was going to put the offending flag up for auction and donate the proceeds to the Atlanta Police Department. Let me explain this. Black people are not the instigators of violence in this protest against murder. The police, the murderers, are the instigators. They are responsible for inciting the violence that followed. The police declined DeRose’s offer because even they are wise enough to deduce that accepting cash for the sale of an offensive flag honoring enslavement of black people — the people they have brutalized — would be really dumb.
Some people have advocated a boycott of OK Café and DeRose’s two other Buckhead restaurants, Blue Ridge Grill and Bones. All three of these are Atlanta icons. It’s been years since I’ve been in any of them, but they all have good reputations despite the ire that some of DeRose’s former employees expressed on Facebook about their experience working in them. Some long-time big-monied customers also expressed shock as the story emerged. This is Buckhead, after all.
Among the many sad things about this story is its revelation of how entrenched racism remains among white authorities. I remember when I was a kid opening the ''Atlanta Constitution'' on weekends to read “Pickrick Says,” an advertisement for fried chicken that also advocated segregation. It was so over-the-top, I enjoyed reading it for its surrealness. The author was Lester Maddox, owner of the Pickrick Restaurant, who ran repeatedly for public office and was finally elected governor in 1967. He was most infamous for literally brandishing axe handles at black people who attempted to integrate the Pickrick after the Civil Rights Act of 1964. These axe handles, called “Pickrick drumsticks,” became popular souvenirs, even after Ole Lester closed his restaurant rather than comply with the Civil Rights Act. Understand: The axe handles were not merely symbols of violence against black people. They were literal tools of violence and, as such, resembled the batons with which protesters were beaten during the civil rights movement — and just last month, all across America.
In the South, we have long hidden much of our racism under our code of manners, creating a kinder, sweeter, genteel racism. I’ve told this story before, but nowhere was this more obvious than at Aunt Fanny’s Cabin, a restaurant to which my father dragged our family nearly every weekend when I was a teenager. Opened in 1941, it was located in Smyrna and its history was mythic. Aunt Fanny was a slave who was freed by her grateful owner. She became famous for her delicious Old South cooking that brought fried-chicken-lovin’ white and black folks to her door. She lived until she was 100.
The problem with this story is that it was a fiction concocted by the white owners who wanted to create a stage for the re-enactment of the good ole slavery days. Once you were seated there, a young black kid would come to the table with a large wooden menu with a hole at the top through which he poked his head. He’d sing-song the menu. Soon, one of the black servers — in a plaid dress and an Aunt Jemima-style do-rag — brought your feast to the table. The food really was good and us white folks sure did appreciate it. When the servers gathered ’round the piano to sing gospel music and “Dixie,” shaking Mason jars to collect money for their church, we loaded those things with nickels, dimes, and, yes, even quarters!
I couldn’t count the times my family went to this place, but I do recall the beginning of the end. My grandmother from Philadelphia came to visit and within 15 minutes she was horrified by the noise, the scene, and the food. God, I loved her. The servers at Aunt Fanny’s eventually refused to sing “Dixie,” and the restaurant finally closed in 1992. The city of Smyrna bought it and moved the faux slave cabin to use as a welcome center to host parties. That, perhaps, is the most brain-dead part of the story: A city appropriates a monument to racism to say howdy.
The history of racism runs deep in the metro area. There were plenty of other restaurants in this city that romanticized the Confederacy and plantation life, like Johnny Reb’s and Mammy’s Shanty, and it still remains true that most people have no idea how much our Southern cooking owes to Africa. But how in the world does a white woman hang a Confederate flag, chastise a civil rights group, and then make this claim: “The OK Cafe opened its doors July 8, 1987, and so great was the longing for a true southern restaurant that by the end of the first week it had become an Atlanta phenomenon with crowds standing in line to get in”? Hey, lady! Southern food is black! __-CL-__"
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string(8953) " GRAZ 01 Web 2020-06-30T21:55:22+00:00 GRAZ_01_web.jpg __I kind of lost touch with The Loaf for a few years, like many people, but I plan to be a regular reader again.
And boy did I miss good ole Cliff Bostock. __ Bravo. I love this article. Thank you for the backdrop of restaurants that I am not familiar with and those that I am. I’m still in awe of the place in Smyrna. There is much work to be done, however, as you stated- the manners will overshadow many hearts that are unconverted. grazing blacklivesmatter Old times there must be forgotten GRAZ 01 Web 2020-06-30T15:45:00+00:00 GRAZING: Go away, go away, Dixie Land jim.harris Jim Harris CLIFF BOSTOCK cliffbostock (Cliff Bostock) 2020-06-30T15:45:00+00:00 I tried to go to a reopened restaurant last month. They made everyone wait in line six feet apart outside the door. They pointed temperature guns at everyone’s forehead. We had to sign a waiver promising not to sue them before we died in the ICU. Everyone passed. They administered IQ tests. Everyone failed. We were all sent home.
Kidding, but that’s honestly what I feel about dining inside a restaurant at this point in the pandemic. Granted, my decrepitude puts me at high risk, but I’m not clear how anyone would have a good time inside a restaurant during a time when COVID-19 continues to rise (at this writing) and experts predict a devastating second wave. An alarming number of reopened venues don’t follow guidelines, which are calculated to reduce risk but — let’s face it — tubs of hand sanitizer, facial masks, and tables in screaming-distance-only do not add up to a relaxing dinner. Fortunately, lots of normally full-service restaurants are offering take-out, including family-sized gourmet meals at great prices. Many are reopening safer patio dining only. But you go ahead and eat inside. Take a Xanax before you leave the house and have a cocktail when you get there.
In mid-June, the pandemic collided with what turned into an equally global protest against police brutality, specifically in the horrific murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis. In one protest, organized by Buckhead4BlackLives, an estimated 3,000 Atlantans marched up West Paces Ferry to the governor’s mansion. The march began in the parking lot where OK Café is located. In probably the most tone-deaf deed since Paula Deen explained that, yes indeed, she had used the N-word, Susan DeRose, co-owner of the restaurant, draped a banner outside with this message: “Lives that matter are made with positive purpose.” It was obvious mockery of “Black lives matter” and reeked of the thinking that also led her years ago to hang a huge carving of the old Georgia flag, which was basically a frame for the Confederate flag. The restaurant drew lots of negative attention for that, so DeRose moved it to a less conspicuous spot while installing a replica of the “Betsy Ross flag” in the original space.
Some people defended the banner, saying it was not inherently racist. Which is true if you completely disregard the context, but that’s rationally impossible. In interviews, including a lengthy one with the Atlanta Business Chronicle’s Chris Fuhrmeister, DeRose argued that she was protesting the violence that affected small business owners. I think it’s quite clear that Black Lives Matter is not an advocate of violent resistance even though some looters took advantage of the situation. DeRose’s banner reads like a recoded update of Ronald Reagan’s ranting about “welfare queens” in Cadillacs. Were there any doubt about what’s at play here, consider this excerpt from the Business Chronicle’s interview with DeRose:
“We are not apologizing for being good. We don’t need to make any apologies. We didn’t do anything wrong. We have no white guilt. We have white pride. We just have pride in our country.”
At this writing, the drama of white lunacy is still underway. In another jaw-dropping move, DeRose announced she was going to put the offending flag up for auction and donate the proceeds to the Atlanta Police Department. Let me explain this. Black people are not the instigators of violence in this protest against murder. The police, the murderers, are the instigators. They are responsible for inciting the violence that followed. The police declined DeRose’s offer because even they are wise enough to deduce that accepting cash for the sale of an offensive flag honoring enslavement of black people — the people they have brutalized — would be really dumb.
Some people have advocated a boycott of OK Café and DeRose’s two other Buckhead restaurants, Blue Ridge Grill and Bones. All three of these are Atlanta icons. It’s been years since I’ve been in any of them, but they all have good reputations despite the ire that some of DeRose’s former employees expressed on Facebook about their experience working in them. Some long-time big-monied customers also expressed shock as the story emerged. This is Buckhead, after all.
Among the many sad things about this story is its revelation of how entrenched racism remains among white authorities. I remember when I was a kid opening the Atlanta Constitution on weekends to read “Pickrick Says,” an advertisement for fried chicken that also advocated segregation. It was so over-the-top, I enjoyed reading it for its surrealness. The author was Lester Maddox, owner of the Pickrick Restaurant, who ran repeatedly for public office and was finally elected governor in 1967. He was most infamous for literally brandishing axe handles at black people who attempted to integrate the Pickrick after the Civil Rights Act of 1964. These axe handles, called “Pickrick drumsticks,” became popular souvenirs, even after Ole Lester closed his restaurant rather than comply with the Civil Rights Act. Understand: The axe handles were not merely symbols of violence against black people. They were literal tools of violence and, as such, resembled the batons with which protesters were beaten during the civil rights movement — and just last month, all across America.
In the South, we have long hidden much of our racism under our code of manners, creating a kinder, sweeter, genteel racism. I’ve told this story before, but nowhere was this more obvious than at Aunt Fanny’s Cabin, a restaurant to which my father dragged our family nearly every weekend when I was a teenager. Opened in 1941, it was located in Smyrna and its history was mythic. Aunt Fanny was a slave who was freed by her grateful owner. She became famous for her delicious Old South cooking that brought fried-chicken-lovin’ white and black folks to her door. She lived until she was 100.
The problem with this story is that it was a fiction concocted by the white owners who wanted to create a stage for the re-enactment of the good ole slavery days. Once you were seated there, a young black kid would come to the table with a large wooden menu with a hole at the top through which he poked his head. He’d sing-song the menu. Soon, one of the black servers — in a plaid dress and an Aunt Jemima-style do-rag — brought your feast to the table. The food really was good and us white folks sure did appreciate it. When the servers gathered ’round the piano to sing gospel music and “Dixie,” shaking Mason jars to collect money for their church, we loaded those things with nickels, dimes, and, yes, even quarters!
I couldn’t count the times my family went to this place, but I do recall the beginning of the end. My grandmother from Philadelphia came to visit and within 15 minutes she was horrified by the noise, the scene, and the food. God, I loved her. The servers at Aunt Fanny’s eventually refused to sing “Dixie,” and the restaurant finally closed in 1992. The city of Smyrna bought it and moved the faux slave cabin to use as a welcome center to host parties. That, perhaps, is the most brain-dead part of the story: A city appropriates a monument to racism to say howdy.
The history of racism runs deep in the metro area. There were plenty of other restaurants in this city that romanticized the Confederacy and plantation life, like Johnny Reb’s and Mammy’s Shanty, and it still remains true that most people have no idea how much our Southern cooking owes to Africa. But how in the world does a white woman hang a Confederate flag, chastise a civil rights group, and then make this claim: “The OK Cafe opened its doors July 8, 1987, and so great was the longing for a true southern restaurant that by the end of the first week it had become an Atlanta phenomenon with crowds standing in line to get in”? Hey, lady! Southern food is black! -CL- Reader Submitted YOU ARE WHAT YOU EAT: Be careful what you put in your mouth — and from where it comes. 0,0,10 grazing blacklivesmatter GRAZING: Go away, go away, Dixie Land "
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GRAZING: Go away, go away, Dixie Land Article
Tuesday June 30, 2020 11:45 AM EDT
Old times there must be forgotten
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string(8338) "I intentionally arrived 10 minutes early when I went to pick up my meal at the new Talat Market in Summerhill. I knew curb service was their modus operandi, but my sneaky plan was to go inside and at least get a look at the dining room, which was, of course, under coronavirus-shutdown. I leaned back in my car, opened the door, put my left foot out, and was startled by a scream. “Sir! Sir! Are you here to pick up an order? May I help you? Sir? What is your name, sir?”
I peeked outside and saw that the woman asking to see my papers was smiling, but holding her social distance at, oh, 30 feet. I identified myself. She paced into the restaurant and paced back out with a large paper bag that she held at arm’s length, reminding me of my second-grade friend Joel, who walked into class holding a dead squirrel at the same distance. I put the bag on the passenger’s seat, and, just as our second-grade teacher made Joel do, I furiously cleaned my hands with antibacterial soap before grabbing the steering wheel and nervously driving home.
Is it ever going to end? Unless you have a second-grader’s immune system, it’s still risky to dine with other humans. While a lot of restaurants have reopened — 40 in the Buford Highway corridor! — most have not. By the time you read this, the city’s bars and clubs will have been authorized to reopen, so maybe alcohol will help spread Eric Trump’s neurological disorder that causes the pandemic to seem like a Democratic hoax which will disappear after the November election. In other words, if you are a Republican, eat, drink and be merry now. I concur!
Atlanta’s foodies have anticipated the opening of Talat with the same fervor as Little Bear, which I wrote about last month. They have a similar history, having both gained enormous popularity as pop-ups at Gato in Ormewood Park. Chefs/co-owners Parnass Savang and Rod Lassiter spent two years there before exiting last August to begin working on their brick-and-mortar plan while still popping up at various locations around the city. This was after Talat was named one of Bon Appetit’s best new restaurants of 2018 and Savang had been named a James Beard semi-finalist, as was Jarrett Stieber, owner of Little Bear. The two restaurants also share the ill fate of opening in the same neighborhood during the pandemic and having to limit their service to takeout. They’ve also both done well enough — they sell out quickly — to retain their small staffs.
I dined at Talat’s Gato location at least four times and, like everyone else, was floored by the food. Savang’s story has been microscopically recounted (see Eater Atlanta). He grew up in his parents’ Americanized Thai restaurant, Danthai, in Lawrenceville, and planned to flee the restaurant business after high school. But it was in his blood and, after two years, he embarked on a career that sent him to the Culinary Institute of America and had him working with some of the city’s best chefs, like Hugh Acheson and Ryan Smith (who was a huge inspiration to Stieber). While working at Kimball House, he convinced co-worker Rod Lassiter to join him as sous chef and co-owner of Talat, which means “market” and pays homage to the Thai markets he visited with his mother as a kid. He credits “staging” gigs at restaurants in Bangkok and Portland with distilling his vision for authentically inspired Thai food, more like the kind his parents actually ate at home instead of the Americanized version their restaurant served.
The Portland restaurant where he staged, Pok Pok, is famous for adapting Thailand’s street food, which is highly seasonal and varies by region with the same kind of intense cultural and agricultural differences as, say, Mexico’s Oaxacan province. A region’s dishes — here or in Thailand — are an expression of its particular culture interacting with the ground to which it is attached. Thus, Savang’s cooking transforms Thai food by bringing specifically located, native technique into contact with Georgia dirt. While local sourcing sounds like the agenda of nearly every young chef, it requires special deftness to bring those ingredients smoothly into cooperation with a culture on the other side of the globe. That is why I’d call this unusually authentic but other-than-authentic Thai cooking. It’s not the clumsy fusion food of the ’80s. It is a new cuisine. This, at least, is my reading of Talat’s food.
That said, beyond the greater spiciness, it’s not so easy to detect specific subtleties even though it’s easy as pie to know you are eating something extraordinary. The takeout menu, like many others around town, features multiple dishes — seven during my meal — for two people and costs an absurdly cheap $50 total. Let me get the warning over with: Scoring a meal — 52 are available daily, Wednesday-Sunday — is frankly a nightmare. You order online, starting at noon, two days before your preferred pick-up day. Here’s what happened to me: I got online at noon, was surprised to see a slot available, filled out all my information, hit “submit” and was booted back a page. I wasn’t sure if I’d been charged. I was so confused, I called and left a message and sent an email, but I decided to try again. Whoa! I was informed a later time was available. I filled everything out and — boom! — the same thing happened. My fingers flew into a typing rage a third time, and I scored! In short, meals were selling out between the time I entered my credit card number and hit the submit button.
My meal was expectedly wonderful, with few disappointments. Takeout presentation is not especially attractive or convenient. When you’re serving soups and curries, I guess there are few alternatives for transport, but I came very close to spilling the pork-based broth from its large plastic container that was thin and slippery. The soup included pork and shrimp sausage, glass noodles, wood ear mushrooms, daylilies, scallions, and cilantro. To serve, I suggest you pour the liquid first into two bowls and then divvy up the solids at the bottom of the container. The soup was a springtime wake-up to the palate by way of funky flavors pulled out of the ground by a hungry pig.
Next up was yum khao thawt — Savang’s signature crispy rice, stained with red chile jam, tossed with beets, peanuts, ginger, cilantro, shallots, and little gem lettuce. So red. I’m sure you see the Southern influence. Another plastic container contained more red, this time as a coconut-milk curry with asparagus, pineapple, spring onions, and Thai basil. The pineapple’s sweet notes were a bit much for me, even with the spicy zing, but I loved the fresh grilled asparagus, slightly bitter, replacing the green beans we usually see around town. You’ll want to serve this over the large portion of jasmine rice that comes with every meal.
Then there was the protein: crispy pork belly served with a garlic-pepper vinegar. This offered clean, clear, melting flavors, with the vinegar striking me, improbably, as an allusion to barbecue. Maybe my favorite dish was the luscious, stir-fried eggplant seasoned with garlic, fresh chiles, and Thai basil. It included an oyster sauce. I usually detest the heavy brown oyster sauces that obscure every other flavor on a plate, but this was light to the degree I didn’t even recognize it. Dessert was the menu’s explicitly Southern absurdity — your mama’s banana custard turned lividly green with pandan, an aromatic leaf common throughout Southeast Asia. Just in case the pudding and its vanilla wafers were too sweet, Savang threw some fried shallots on top. I have to say, the packaging of this gooey delight was a bit off-putting. Basically you have to scrape it off the bottom of its cardboard box … and you will scrape.
I did ride by the restaurant and peeked in the window of the sleek, gray building that was formerly a small market. You’ll enjoy the neon pineapple on the outside wall. The dining room seats about 30, includes a bar, and features a mural intended to complement a mid-century modern look. Check out the restaurant’s Instagram page, @talat_marketatl, for a view of everything. —CL—
(Talat Market, 112 Ormond St. S.E., 404-257-6255, talatmarketatl.com.)"
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I peeked outside and saw that the woman asking to see my papers was smiling, but holding her social distance at, oh, 30 feet. I identified myself. She paced into the restaurant and paced back out with a large paper bag that she held at arm’s length, reminding me of my second-grade friend Joel, who walked into class holding a dead squirrel at the same distance. I put the bag on the passenger’s seat, and, just as our second-grade teacher made Joel do, I furiously cleaned my hands with antibacterial soap before grabbing the steering wheel and nervously driving home.
Is it ever going to end? Unless you have a second-grader’s immune system, it’s still risky to dine with other humans. While a lot of restaurants have reopened — 40 in the Buford Highway corridor! — most have not. By the time you read this, the city’s bars and clubs will have been authorized to reopen, so maybe alcohol will help spread Eric Trump’s neurological disorder that causes the pandemic to seem like a Democratic hoax which will disappear after the November election. In other words, if you are a Republican, eat, drink and be merry ''now''. I concur!
Atlanta’s foodies have anticipated the opening of Talat with the same fervor as Little Bear, which I wrote about last month. They have a similar history, having both gained enormous popularity as pop-ups at Gato in Ormewood Park. Chefs/co-owners Parnass Savang and Rod Lassiter spent two years there before exiting last August to begin working on their brick-and-mortar plan while still popping up at various locations around the city. This was after Talat was named one of ''Bon Appetit''’s best new restaurants of 2018 and Savang had been named a James Beard semi-finalist, as was Jarrett Stieber, owner of Little Bear. The two restaurants also share the ill fate of opening in the same neighborhood during the pandemic and having to limit their service to takeout. They’ve also both done well enough — they sell out quickly — to retain their small staffs.
I dined at Talat’s Gato location at least four times and, like everyone else, was floored by the food. Savang’s story has been microscopically recounted (see Eater Atlanta). He grew up in his parents’ Americanized Thai restaurant, Danthai, in Lawrenceville, and planned to flee the restaurant business after high school. But it was in his blood and, after two years, he embarked on a career that sent him to the Culinary Institute of America and had him working with some of the city’s best chefs, like Hugh Acheson and Ryan Smith (who was a huge inspiration to Stieber). While working at Kimball House, he convinced co-worker Rod Lassiter to join him as sous chef and co-owner of Talat, which means “market” and pays homage to the Thai markets he visited with his mother as a kid. He credits “staging” gigs at restaurants in Bangkok and Portland with distilling his vision for authentically inspired Thai food, more like the kind his parents actually ate at home instead of the Americanized version their restaurant served.
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The Portland restaurant where he staged, Pok Pok, is famous for adapting Thailand’s street food, which is highly seasonal and varies by region with the same kind of intense cultural and agricultural differences as, say, Mexico’s Oaxacan province. A region’s dishes — here or in Thailand — are an expression of its particular culture interacting with the ground to which it is attached. Thus, Savang’s cooking transforms Thai food by bringing specifically located, native technique into contact with Georgia dirt. While local sourcing sounds like the agenda of nearly every young chef, it requires special deftness to bring those ingredients smoothly into cooperation with a culture on the other side of the globe. That is why I’d call this unusually authentic but other-than-authentic Thai cooking. It’s not the clumsy fusion food of the ’80s. It is a new cuisine. This, at least, is my reading of Talat’s food.
That said, beyond the greater spiciness, it’s not so easy to detect specific subtleties even though it’s easy as pie to know you are eating something extraordinary. The takeout menu, like many others around town, features multiple dishes — seven during my meal — for two people and costs an absurdly cheap $50 total. Let me get the warning over with: Scoring a meal — 52 are available daily, Wednesday-Sunday — is frankly a nightmare. You order online, starting at noon, two days before your preferred pick-up day. Here’s what happened to me: I got online at noon, was surprised to see a slot available, filled out all my information, hit “submit” and was booted back a page. I wasn’t sure if I’d been charged. I was so confused, I called and left a message and sent an email, but I decided to try again. Whoa! I was informed a later time was available. I filled everything out and — boom! — the same thing happened. My fingers flew into a typing rage a third time, and I scored! In short, meals were selling out between the time I entered my credit card number and hit the submit button.
My meal was expectedly wonderful, with few disappointments. Takeout presentation is not especially attractive or convenient. When you’re serving soups and curries, I guess there are few alternatives for transport, but I came very close to spilling the pork-based broth from its large plastic container that was thin and slippery. The soup included pork and shrimp sausage, glass noodles, wood ear mushrooms, daylilies, scallions, and cilantro. To serve, I suggest you pour the liquid first into two bowls and then divvy up the solids at the bottom of the container. The soup was a springtime wake-up to the palate by way of funky flavors pulled out of the ground by a hungry pig.
Next up was yum khao thawt — Savang’s signature crispy rice, stained with red chile jam, tossed with beets, peanuts, ginger, cilantro, shallots, and little gem lettuce. So red. I’m sure you see the Southern influence. Another plastic container contained more red, this time as a coconut-milk curry with asparagus, pineapple, spring onions, and Thai basil. The pineapple’s sweet notes were a bit much for me, even with the spicy zing, but I loved the fresh grilled asparagus, slightly bitter, replacing the green beans we usually see around town. You’ll want to serve this over the large portion of jasmine rice that comes with every meal.
Then there was the protein: crispy pork belly served with a garlic-pepper vinegar. This offered clean, clear, melting flavors, with the vinegar striking me, improbably, as an allusion to barbecue. Maybe my favorite dish was the luscious, stir-fried eggplant seasoned with garlic, fresh chiles, and Thai basil. It included an oyster sauce. I usually detest the heavy brown oyster sauces that obscure every other flavor on a plate, but this was light to the degree I didn’t even recognize it. Dessert was the menu’s explicitly Southern absurdity — your mama’s banana custard turned lividly green with pandan, an aromatic leaf common throughout Southeast Asia. Just in case the pudding and its vanilla wafers were too sweet, Savang threw some fried shallots on top. I have to say, the packaging of this gooey delight was a bit off-putting. Basically you have to scrape it off the bottom of its cardboard box … and you will scrape.
I did ride by the restaurant and peeked in the window of the sleek, gray building that was formerly a small market. You’ll enjoy the neon pineapple on the outside wall. The dining room seats about 30, includes a bar, and features a mural intended to complement a mid-century modern look. Check out the restaurant’s Instagram page, @talat_marketatl, for a view of everything. __—CL—__
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string(9143) " GRAZ JUN B2f Web CRISPY PORK BELLY: Chef Parnass Savang seizes Southern and Thai dishes and brings them into highly edible accord. PHOTO CREDIT: Cliff Bostock 2020-06-04T15:07:39+00:00 GRAZ_JUN_b2f_web.jpg grazing But the reward is the same GRAZ JUN B2f Web 2020-06-04T15:14:59+00:00 GRAZING: Talat Market: Where scoring a takeout meal is harder than getting laid in a pandemic jim.harris Jim Harris Cliff Bostock cliffbostock (Cliff Bostock) 2020-06-04T15:14:59+00:00 I intentionally arrived 10 minutes early when I went to pick up my meal at the new Talat Market in Summerhill. I knew curb service was their modus operandi, but my sneaky plan was to go inside and at least get a look at the dining room, which was, of course, under coronavirus-shutdown. I leaned back in my car, opened the door, put my left foot out, and was startled by a scream. “Sir! Sir! Are you here to pick up an order? May I help you? Sir? What is your name, sir?”
I peeked outside and saw that the woman asking to see my papers was smiling, but holding her social distance at, oh, 30 feet. I identified myself. She paced into the restaurant and paced back out with a large paper bag that she held at arm’s length, reminding me of my second-grade friend Joel, who walked into class holding a dead squirrel at the same distance. I put the bag on the passenger’s seat, and, just as our second-grade teacher made Joel do, I furiously cleaned my hands with antibacterial soap before grabbing the steering wheel and nervously driving home.
Is it ever going to end? Unless you have a second-grader’s immune system, it’s still risky to dine with other humans. While a lot of restaurants have reopened — 40 in the Buford Highway corridor! — most have not. By the time you read this, the city’s bars and clubs will have been authorized to reopen, so maybe alcohol will help spread Eric Trump’s neurological disorder that causes the pandemic to seem like a Democratic hoax which will disappear after the November election. In other words, if you are a Republican, eat, drink and be merry now. I concur!
Atlanta’s foodies have anticipated the opening of Talat with the same fervor as Little Bear, which I wrote about last month. They have a similar history, having both gained enormous popularity as pop-ups at Gato in Ormewood Park. Chefs/co-owners Parnass Savang and Rod Lassiter spent two years there before exiting last August to begin working on their brick-and-mortar plan while still popping up at various locations around the city. This was after Talat was named one of Bon Appetit’s best new restaurants of 2018 and Savang had been named a James Beard semi-finalist, as was Jarrett Stieber, owner of Little Bear. The two restaurants also share the ill fate of opening in the same neighborhood during the pandemic and having to limit their service to takeout. They’ve also both done well enough — they sell out quickly — to retain their small staffs.
I dined at Talat’s Gato location at least four times and, like everyone else, was floored by the food. Savang’s story has been microscopically recounted (see Eater Atlanta). He grew up in his parents’ Americanized Thai restaurant, Danthai, in Lawrenceville, and planned to flee the restaurant business after high school. But it was in his blood and, after two years, he embarked on a career that sent him to the Culinary Institute of America and had him working with some of the city’s best chefs, like Hugh Acheson and Ryan Smith (who was a huge inspiration to Stieber). While working at Kimball House, he convinced co-worker Rod Lassiter to join him as sous chef and co-owner of Talat, which means “market” and pays homage to the Thai markets he visited with his mother as a kid. He credits “staging” gigs at restaurants in Bangkok and Portland with distilling his vision for authentically inspired Thai food, more like the kind his parents actually ate at home instead of the Americanized version their restaurant served.
The Portland restaurant where he staged, Pok Pok, is famous for adapting Thailand’s street food, which is highly seasonal and varies by region with the same kind of intense cultural and agricultural differences as, say, Mexico’s Oaxacan province. A region’s dishes — here or in Thailand — are an expression of its particular culture interacting with the ground to which it is attached. Thus, Savang’s cooking transforms Thai food by bringing specifically located, native technique into contact with Georgia dirt. While local sourcing sounds like the agenda of nearly every young chef, it requires special deftness to bring those ingredients smoothly into cooperation with a culture on the other side of the globe. That is why I’d call this unusually authentic but other-than-authentic Thai cooking. It’s not the clumsy fusion food of the ’80s. It is a new cuisine. This, at least, is my reading of Talat’s food.
That said, beyond the greater spiciness, it’s not so easy to detect specific subtleties even though it’s easy as pie to know you are eating something extraordinary. The takeout menu, like many others around town, features multiple dishes — seven during my meal — for two people and costs an absurdly cheap $50 total. Let me get the warning over with: Scoring a meal — 52 are available daily, Wednesday-Sunday — is frankly a nightmare. You order online, starting at noon, two days before your preferred pick-up day. Here’s what happened to me: I got online at noon, was surprised to see a slot available, filled out all my information, hit “submit” and was booted back a page. I wasn’t sure if I’d been charged. I was so confused, I called and left a message and sent an email, but I decided to try again. Whoa! I was informed a later time was available. I filled everything out and — boom! — the same thing happened. My fingers flew into a typing rage a third time, and I scored! In short, meals were selling out between the time I entered my credit card number and hit the submit button.
My meal was expectedly wonderful, with few disappointments. Takeout presentation is not especially attractive or convenient. When you’re serving soups and curries, I guess there are few alternatives for transport, but I came very close to spilling the pork-based broth from its large plastic container that was thin and slippery. The soup included pork and shrimp sausage, glass noodles, wood ear mushrooms, daylilies, scallions, and cilantro. To serve, I suggest you pour the liquid first into two bowls and then divvy up the solids at the bottom of the container. The soup was a springtime wake-up to the palate by way of funky flavors pulled out of the ground by a hungry pig.
Next up was yum khao thawt — Savang’s signature crispy rice, stained with red chile jam, tossed with beets, peanuts, ginger, cilantro, shallots, and little gem lettuce. So red. I’m sure you see the Southern influence. Another plastic container contained more red, this time as a coconut-milk curry with asparagus, pineapple, spring onions, and Thai basil. The pineapple’s sweet notes were a bit much for me, even with the spicy zing, but I loved the fresh grilled asparagus, slightly bitter, replacing the green beans we usually see around town. You’ll want to serve this over the large portion of jasmine rice that comes with every meal.
Then there was the protein: crispy pork belly served with a garlic-pepper vinegar. This offered clean, clear, melting flavors, with the vinegar striking me, improbably, as an allusion to barbecue. Maybe my favorite dish was the luscious, stir-fried eggplant seasoned with garlic, fresh chiles, and Thai basil. It included an oyster sauce. I usually detest the heavy brown oyster sauces that obscure every other flavor on a plate, but this was light to the degree I didn’t even recognize it. Dessert was the menu’s explicitly Southern absurdity — your mama’s banana custard turned lividly green with pandan, an aromatic leaf common throughout Southeast Asia. Just in case the pudding and its vanilla wafers were too sweet, Savang threw some fried shallots on top. I have to say, the packaging of this gooey delight was a bit off-putting. Basically you have to scrape it off the bottom of its cardboard box … and you will scrape.
I did ride by the restaurant and peeked in the window of the sleek, gray building that was formerly a small market. You’ll enjoy the neon pineapple on the outside wall. The dining room seats about 30, includes a bar, and features a mural intended to complement a mid-century modern look. Check out the restaurant’s Instagram page, @talat_marketatl, for a view of everything. —CL—
(Talat Market, 112 Ormond St. S.E., 404-257-6255, talatmarketatl.com.) Cliff Bostock STUDY IN RED: Red chile jam colors crispy rice, and beets take it a shade deeper. PHOTO CREDIT: Cliff Bostock Peanuts challenge rice in a battle for crunchy superiority. 0,0,10 grazing GRAZING: Talat Market: Where scoring a takeout meal is harder than getting laid in a pandemic "
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GRAZING: Talat Market: Where scoring a takeout meal is harder than getting laid in a pandemic Article
Thursday June 4, 2020 11:14 AM EDT
But the reward is the same
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string(10409) "Every plague has its silver lining. For the first two weeks of March, I unsuccessfully tried to get a table at Jarrett Stieber’s greatly anticipated new restaurant, Little Bear, in Summerhill. Then the plague arrived and turned the restaurant — six years in the making — into a takeout joint. So, the silver lining is that you and I get to more easily score five or six courses of Stieber’s prix fixe menu.
But that’s the only silver lining I’ve encountered lately. When I wrote my last column in March, the mayor had not yet locked down the city. Since then, the coronavirus has created a tsunami of misery, sweeping through all sectors of the economy. Layoffs, furloughs, cutbacks, closings, and firings have been especially difficult for restaurants. Most operate on a slim profit margin to begin with and — let’s be honest — most employees are poorly paid and living paycheck-to-paycheck. For many, it’s a transition or side job while they seek a more stable career opportunity. Since the crash, many forms of assistance, from free meals to fundraised cash, have become available to unemployed restaurant workers, but we are standing on the precipice of a second Great Recession, which caused reorganization of the entire economy. We’re likely destined again for a new “normal.”
As it happens, “normal” is not a word that would suit Jarrett Stieber, regardless of the economy. I, like most of Atlanta, have been intrigued by his cooking ever since he opened the pop-up, Eat Me Speak Me. He started out miserably unappreciated by the public at Candler Park Market and The General Muir in 2013. High points of that time included cooking blood sausage on a panini press and being overshadowed by matzoh balls. In 2014, he moved EMSM to Gato and it arguably become the city’s favorite pop-up. In 2017, he moved the operation to SOS Tiki Bar, which he vacated last year to get Little Bear rolling.
While many other restaurants have cut staff and turned to takeout, Stieber’s business is doing so well that he has not had to lay off any of his small crew or reduce pay. There are many reasons why. The food is of course the preeminent one. It’s often described as “whimsical.” Stieber guesses that’s partly because of the menu’s humor. An example is the standing title of his shareable prix fixe menu: “Just fuck me up, fam’,” sarcastically referring to the true experience of family dining. The restaurant’s proprietor, by the way, is the greatly anthropomorphized Pyrenees mountain dog that Stieber and his wife Hallie own. His real name is Fernando but his nickname is, yes, Little Bear. (Please, no ABBA jokes.) Maybe the clearest example of linguistic whimsy is the front window’s announcement that the restaurant has won a rating of 2.5 tires from Michelin Tire Dining. It’s goofy but it all adds up to a pointedly satirical attitude toward the pretensions of fine dining.
The funny thing is that Stieber is a James Beard semifinalist and, on the surface, his food resembles contemporary fine dining: smallish plates of strictly local produce and proteins, unexpected flavor combinations, artful presentation. Consider the Spanish-inspired menu featured during the week I fetched a meal there. One dish was a rectangular portion of a Spanish-style tortilla made with baked eggs and mild turnips, covered with a “ropa vieja sauce” and “an egregious amount of olive oil.” WTF is ropa vieja sauce? I’ve eaten a ton of ropa vieja, a favorite Cuban dish, but I don’t think of it as a Spanish dish or as a sauce. Stieber clarified in an email: “We thought it would be fun to include some flavors from places Spain forced their will on… Ropa vieja as more of a red-wine, braised meat gravy sauce to serve on another dish sounded fun to us.” So, there you have it: a classic tor-tilla that deliciously dishonors Spanish colonialism.
There were also the inevitable patatas bravas, but Stieber makes them with sweet potatoes, cooking them to addictive crispy-creamy perfection in a concoction of pork fat, coffee, and chili oil, then drizzled with aioli. The protein of the week was Catalan-style pork meatballs combined with a fetish of Catalonia — roasted green onions under salbitxada, a usually red sauce turned weirdly green by Stieber. The opening soup, caldo de Gallego, was absolutely the best version I’ve ever had. I opened the container and the odor of fennel blasted the room like the sins in Pandora’s box. It was made with red peas instead of white beans and was hellishly fiery. Stieber swears it wasn’t intentional, but the meal ended with a pastry, a pestiño — fried, honey-glazed dough flavored with benne and anise, which echoed the licorice flavor of the fennel that began the meal. It was apparently also coincidental that pestiños are only available during Christmas and Holy Week in Spain and were indeed served by Little Bear during Holy Week. The meal also included a stunning salad of gem lettuce, dill, radishes, and shavings of sharp idiazabal cheese, made from sheep’s milk. There was, finally, a second dessert of traditional almond cake, dusted with powdered sugar, allegedly flavored with strawberries.
So, what, besides the satirical approach, makes this food actually different from fine dining? For one significant thing, there’s the cost. The menu I’ve described was $55 for two. On the brink of recession, that may not sound inexpensive — and you better tip $15 minimum — but it’s as many as seven dishes of entirely local ingredients for two! Still, to me the truly notable thing is the artistry. Stieber, chef de cuisine Jacob Armando, and executive sous chef Trevor Vick work just the opposite of most kitchens. Instead of going shopping with a recipe, they go shopping and then dream up a recipe. Stieber describes the process:
“The thought process for making a dish is pretty simple, actually. Unlike most restaurants, we order from the farms we buy from first, then use what we get to put together our menu instead of thinking of a dish then ordering whatever product we need to make it happen. So from there, we kind of use the ingredients like pieces in a puzzle so we can make dishes that have a balance of color, texture, and eye appeal. Usually the formula is basically to balance those elements, then make sure there’s something a little unusual or unique so that we can remain creative and stand out. That twist could be an unusual flavor combination, a different technique, or preparation for something which might be done a different way more often, etc. Another thing we like to do is layer condiments/sauces in our dishes so that every bite has the intended starting flavor of the dish, and you don’t have to struggle to get a solid bite, but, as you eat the dish and drag things around, elements mix together and create new flavors by the end.”
This is an impressive description of how creativity spurns originality, similar to the Greeks’ explanation. In their view creativity is not internally generated but arises outside of us. They personified that process as an encounter with the muse. In the same way, Stieber is saying that inspiration begins with the available ingredients. That’s often demonstrated as a game on the nightmare known as food TV, but the process is impossible to sustain in a high-volume restaurant, using ordinary ingredients. I don’t mean to suggest that Stieber is a complete savant. He’s been cooking half his life, having begun at 15 when he haunted Alon’s before getting a paid job there at 16. Also a musician, he enrolled at UNC-Asheville to study music recording but rapidly realized he wanted to continue playing and writing music, not engineering it. He came back to Atlanta, where his practical parents told him he was going to need a real job to back up his music making. So he landed at Le Cordon Bleu in Tucker. That was in 2007. While there, he got a job at Hector Santiago’s restaurant, Pura Vida, which was my favorite restaurant in the city during its few years of preternatural existence. It was there that Stieber learned how an uninhibited, inventive chef can radically transform the experience of dining.
After Stieber graduated, he migrated from kitchen to kitchen in Atlanta. Restaurants on his resume include Restaurant Eugene, Holeman & Finch, and Empire State South, all of which employed Ryan Smith, now the chef/owner of Staplehouse. If you’re familiar with Smith’s brilliant work, you’ll instantly spot its influence in Stieber’s. The main difference, I think, is rigor. As I told a friend, Stieber’s cooking is what you would get if Hector Santiago fucked with Ryan Smith’s food. It’s a bit messier, compellingly so, but almost in a conversely studied way. Sort of like perfect “messy hair.” In fact, I jokingly accused Stieber of being OCD. He explained — elaborately — why he was not.
Stieber doesn’t deny that his particular method — refined for seven years with Eat Me Speak Me — is risky, so that he’s constantly testing, tweaking, giving up, and restarting. But creativity always risks occasional failure and, even more painful, mediocrity. The only problem I had with my Little Bear experience was trivial — the effect of takeout itself. The crew arranges every dish in detail in its own sturdy black takeout box, so transferring anything to a plate is going to disrupt the beauty. I did find most of the food more tepid than I like, but we all know that hot food in a box ain’t pretty by the time you get it home. The restaurant also vends “Fernando’s Liver Stimulus Package” — boutique wines, spritz kits, beer, and cider.
I suggest you order now, because when Donald Trump reopens the gates to Moneyland, you won’t get a table at Little Bear. —CL—
Little Bear, 71-A Georgia Ave. S.E., 404-500-5396, littlebearatl.com. Open for takeout only, Wednesday–Sunday. You can order by phone, 10:30 a.m-8 p.m., for pickup 5-8 p.m. Vegetarian and vegan options are available when ordered a day in advance. The menu and photos are posted weekly to Twitter and Instagram, @littlebearatl. Unemployed restaurant workers who need a meal may DM chef de cuisine Jacob Armando via Instagram, @fourtimespicy. He is preparing and delivering free meals on Tuesday nights."
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But that’s the only silver lining I’ve encountered lately. When I wrote my last column in March, the mayor had not yet locked down the city. Since then, the coronavirus has created a tsunami of misery, sweeping through all sectors of the economy. Layoffs, furloughs, cutbacks, closings, and firings have been especially difficult for restaurants. Most operate on a slim profit margin to begin with and — let’s be honest — most employees are poorly paid and living paycheck-to-paycheck. For many, it’s a transition or side job while they seek a more stable career opportunity. Since the crash, many forms of assistance, from free meals to fundraised cash, have become available to unemployed restaurant workers, but we are standing on the precipice of a second Great Recession, which caused reorganization of the entire economy. We’re likely destined again for a new “normal.”
As it happens, “normal” is not a word that would suit Jarrett Stieber, regardless of the economy. I, like most of Atlanta, have been intrigued by his cooking ever since he opened the pop-up, Eat Me Speak Me. He started out miserably unappreciated by the public at Candler Park Market and The General Muir in 2013. High points of that time included cooking blood sausage on a panini press and being overshadowed by matzoh balls. In 2014, he moved EMSM to Gato and it arguably become the city’s favorite pop-up. In 2017, he moved the operation to SOS Tiki Bar, which he vacated last year to get Little Bear rolling.
While many other restaurants have cut staff and turned to takeout, Stieber’s business is doing so well that he has not had to lay off any of his small crew or reduce pay. There are many reasons why. The food is of course the preeminent one. It’s often described as “whimsical.” Stieber guesses that’s partly because of the menu’s humor. An example is the standing title of his shareable prix fixe menu: “Just fuck me up, fam’,” sarcastically referring to the true experience of family dining. The restaurant’s proprietor, by the way, is the greatly anthropomorphized Pyrenees mountain dog that Stieber and his wife Hallie own. His real name is Fernando but his nickname is, yes, Little Bear. (Please, no ABBA jokes.) Maybe the clearest example of linguistic whimsy is the front window’s announcement that the restaurant has won a rating of 2.5 tires from Michelin Tire Dining. It’s goofy but it all adds up to a pointedly satirical attitude toward the pretensions of fine dining.
The funny thing is that Stieber is a James Beard semifinalist and, on the surface, his food resembles contemporary fine dining: smallish plates of strictly local produce and proteins, unexpected flavor combinations, artful presentation. Consider the Spanish-inspired menu featured during the week I fetched a meal there. One dish was a rectangular portion of a Spanish-style tortilla made with baked eggs and mild turnips, covered with a “ropa vieja sauce” and “an egregious amount of olive oil.” WTF is ropa vieja sauce? I’ve eaten a ton of ropa vieja, a favorite Cuban dish, but I don’t think of it as a Spanish dish or as a sauce. Stieber clarified in an email: “We thought it would be fun to include some flavors from places Spain forced their will on… Ropa vieja as more of a red-wine, braised meat gravy sauce to serve on another dish sounded fun to us.” So, there you have it: a classic tor-tilla that deliciously dishonors Spanish colonialism.
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There were also the inevitable patatas bravas, but Stieber makes them with sweet potatoes, cooking them to addictive crispy-creamy perfection in a concoction of pork fat, coffee, and chili oil, then drizzled with aioli. The protein of the week was Catalan-style pork meatballs combined with a fetish of Catalonia — roasted green onions under salbitxada, a usually red sauce turned weirdly green by Stieber. The opening soup, caldo de Gallego, was absolutely the best version I’ve ever had. I opened the container and the odor of fennel blasted the room like the sins in Pandora’s box. It was made with red peas instead of white beans and was hellishly fiery. Stieber swears it wasn’t intentional, but the meal ended with a pastry, a pestiño — fried, honey-glazed dough flavored with benne and anise, which echoed the licorice flavor of the fennel that began the meal. It was apparently also coincidental that pestiños are only available during Christmas and Holy Week in Spain and were indeed served by Little Bear during Holy Week. The meal also included a stunning salad of gem lettuce, dill, radishes, and shavings of sharp idiazabal cheese, made from sheep’s milk. There was, finally, a second dessert of traditional almond cake, dusted with powdered sugar, allegedly flavored with strawberries.
So, what, besides the satirical approach, makes this food actually different from fine dining? For one significant thing, there’s the cost. The menu I’ve described was $55 for two. On the brink of recession, that may not sound inexpensive — and you better tip $15 minimum — but it’s as many as seven dishes of entirely local ingredients for two! Still, to me the truly notable thing is the artistry. Stieber, chef de cuisine Jacob Armando, and executive sous chef Trevor Vick work just the opposite of most kitchens. Instead of going shopping with a recipe, they go shopping and then dream up a recipe. Stieber describes the process:
“The thought process for making a dish is pretty simple, actually. Unlike most restaurants, we order from the farms we buy from first, then use what we get to put together our menu instead of thinking of a dish then ordering whatever product we need to make it happen. So from there, we kind of use the ingredients like pieces in a puzzle so we can make dishes that have a balance of color, texture, and eye appeal. Usually the formula is basically to balance those elements, then make sure there’s something a little unusual or unique so that we can remain creative and stand out. That twist could be an unusual flavor combination, a different technique, or preparation for something which might be done a different way more often, etc. Another thing we like to do is layer condiments/sauces in our dishes so that every bite has the intended starting flavor of the dish, and you don’t have to struggle to get a solid bite, but, as you eat the dish and drag things around, elements mix together and create new flavors by the end.”
This is an impressive description of how creativity spurns originality, similar to the Greeks’ explanation. In their view creativity is not internally generated but arises outside of us. They personified that process as an encounter with the muse. In the same way, Stieber is saying that inspiration begins with the available ingredients. That’s often demonstrated as a game on the nightmare known as food TV, but the process is impossible to sustain in a high-volume restaurant, using ordinary ingredients. I don’t mean to suggest that Stieber is a complete savant. He’s been cooking half his life, having begun at 15 when he haunted Alon’s before getting a paid job there at 16. Also a musician, he enrolled at UNC-Asheville to study music recording but rapidly realized he wanted to continue playing and writing music, not engineering it. He came back to Atlanta, where his practical parents told him he was going to need a real job to back up his music making. So he landed at Le Cordon Bleu in Tucker. That was in 2007. While there, he got a job at Hector Santiago’s restaurant, Pura Vida, which was my favorite restaurant in the city during its few years of preternatural existence. It was there that Stieber learned how an uninhibited, inventive chef can radically transform the experience of dining.
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After Stieber graduated, he migrated from kitchen to kitchen in Atlanta. Restaurants on his resume include Restaurant Eugene, Holeman & Finch, and Empire State South, all of which employed Ryan Smith, now the chef/owner of Staplehouse. If you’re familiar with Smith’s brilliant work, you’ll instantly spot its influence in Stieber’s. The main difference, I think, is rigor. As I told a friend, Stieber’s cooking is what you would get if Hector Santiago fucked with Ryan Smith’s food. It’s a bit messier, compellingly so, but almost in a conversely studied way. Sort of like perfect “messy hair.” In fact, I jokingly accused Stieber of being OCD. He explained — elaborately — why he was not.
Stieber doesn’t deny that his particular method — refined for seven years with Eat Me Speak Me — is risky, so that he’s constantly testing, tweaking, giving up, and restarting. But creativity always risks occasional failure and, even more painful, mediocrity. The only problem I had with my Little Bear experience was trivial — the effect of takeout itself. The crew arranges every dish in detail in its own sturdy black takeout box, so transferring anything to a plate is going to disrupt the beauty. I did find most of the food more tepid than I like, but we all know that hot food in a box ain’t pretty by the time you get it home. The restaurant also vends “Fernando’s Liver Stimulus Package” — boutique wines, spritz kits, beer, and cider.
I suggest you order now, because when Donald Trump reopens the gates to Moneyland, you won’t get a table at Little Bear. __—CL—__
''Little Bear, 71-A Georgia Ave. S.E., 404-500-5396, littlebearatl.com. Open for takeout only, Wednesday–Sunday. You can order by phone, 10:30 a.m-8 p.m., for pickup 5-8 p.m. Vegetarian and vegan options are available when ordered a day in advance. The menu and photos are posted weekly to Twitter and Instagram, @littlebearatl. Unemployed restaurant workers who need a meal may DM chef de cuisine Jacob Armando via Instagram, @fourtimespicy. He is preparing and delivering free meals on Tuesday nights.''"
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string(11397) " GRAZ B10 LITTLE BEAR: The nondescript exterior in Summerhill reflects the tamer side of Jarrett Stieber's carefully imperfect aesthetic. It's like the black takeout boxes that contain food fit for eating with your very best magic mushrooms. Photo credit: Cliff Bostock 2020-05-11T17:50:48+00:00 GRAZ__b10.jpg grazing Jarrett Stieber ‘radically’ transforms the dining experience GRAZ B10 2020-05-01T04:09:00+00:00 GRAZING: Little Bear: In planning for six years, open two weeks, currently takeout only jim.harris Jim Harris Cliff Bostock cliffbostock (Cliff Bostock) 2020-05-01T04:09:00+00:00 Every plague has its silver lining. For the first two weeks of March, I unsuccessfully tried to get a table at Jarrett Stieber’s greatly anticipated new restaurant, Little Bear, in Summerhill. Then the plague arrived and turned the restaurant — six years in the making — into a takeout joint. So, the silver lining is that you and I get to more easily score five or six courses of Stieber’s prix fixe menu.
But that’s the only silver lining I’ve encountered lately. When I wrote my last column in March, the mayor had not yet locked down the city. Since then, the coronavirus has created a tsunami of misery, sweeping through all sectors of the economy. Layoffs, furloughs, cutbacks, closings, and firings have been especially difficult for restaurants. Most operate on a slim profit margin to begin with and — let’s be honest — most employees are poorly paid and living paycheck-to-paycheck. For many, it’s a transition or side job while they seek a more stable career opportunity. Since the crash, many forms of assistance, from free meals to fundraised cash, have become available to unemployed restaurant workers, but we are standing on the precipice of a second Great Recession, which caused reorganization of the entire economy. We’re likely destined again for a new “normal.”
As it happens, “normal” is not a word that would suit Jarrett Stieber, regardless of the economy. I, like most of Atlanta, have been intrigued by his cooking ever since he opened the pop-up, Eat Me Speak Me. He started out miserably unappreciated by the public at Candler Park Market and The General Muir in 2013. High points of that time included cooking blood sausage on a panini press and being overshadowed by matzoh balls. In 2014, he moved EMSM to Gato and it arguably become the city’s favorite pop-up. In 2017, he moved the operation to SOS Tiki Bar, which he vacated last year to get Little Bear rolling.
While many other restaurants have cut staff and turned to takeout, Stieber’s business is doing so well that he has not had to lay off any of his small crew or reduce pay. There are many reasons why. The food is of course the preeminent one. It’s often described as “whimsical.” Stieber guesses that’s partly because of the menu’s humor. An example is the standing title of his shareable prix fixe menu: “Just fuck me up, fam’,” sarcastically referring to the true experience of family dining. The restaurant’s proprietor, by the way, is the greatly anthropomorphized Pyrenees mountain dog that Stieber and his wife Hallie own. His real name is Fernando but his nickname is, yes, Little Bear. (Please, no ABBA jokes.) Maybe the clearest example of linguistic whimsy is the front window’s announcement that the restaurant has won a rating of 2.5 tires from Michelin Tire Dining. It’s goofy but it all adds up to a pointedly satirical attitude toward the pretensions of fine dining.
The funny thing is that Stieber is a James Beard semifinalist and, on the surface, his food resembles contemporary fine dining: smallish plates of strictly local produce and proteins, unexpected flavor combinations, artful presentation. Consider the Spanish-inspired menu featured during the week I fetched a meal there. One dish was a rectangular portion of a Spanish-style tortilla made with baked eggs and mild turnips, covered with a “ropa vieja sauce” and “an egregious amount of olive oil.” WTF is ropa vieja sauce? I’ve eaten a ton of ropa vieja, a favorite Cuban dish, but I don’t think of it as a Spanish dish or as a sauce. Stieber clarified in an email: “We thought it would be fun to include some flavors from places Spain forced their will on… Ropa vieja as more of a red-wine, braised meat gravy sauce to serve on another dish sounded fun to us.” So, there you have it: a classic tor-tilla that deliciously dishonors Spanish colonialism.
There were also the inevitable patatas bravas, but Stieber makes them with sweet potatoes, cooking them to addictive crispy-creamy perfection in a concoction of pork fat, coffee, and chili oil, then drizzled with aioli. The protein of the week was Catalan-style pork meatballs combined with a fetish of Catalonia — roasted green onions under salbitxada, a usually red sauce turned weirdly green by Stieber. The opening soup, caldo de Gallego, was absolutely the best version I’ve ever had. I opened the container and the odor of fennel blasted the room like the sins in Pandora’s box. It was made with red peas instead of white beans and was hellishly fiery. Stieber swears it wasn’t intentional, but the meal ended with a pastry, a pestiño — fried, honey-glazed dough flavored with benne and anise, which echoed the licorice flavor of the fennel that began the meal. It was apparently also coincidental that pestiños are only available during Christmas and Holy Week in Spain and were indeed served by Little Bear during Holy Week. The meal also included a stunning salad of gem lettuce, dill, radishes, and shavings of sharp idiazabal cheese, made from sheep’s milk. There was, finally, a second dessert of traditional almond cake, dusted with powdered sugar, allegedly flavored with strawberries.
So, what, besides the satirical approach, makes this food actually different from fine dining? For one significant thing, there’s the cost. The menu I’ve described was $55 for two. On the brink of recession, that may not sound inexpensive — and you better tip $15 minimum — but it’s as many as seven dishes of entirely local ingredients for two! Still, to me the truly notable thing is the artistry. Stieber, chef de cuisine Jacob Armando, and executive sous chef Trevor Vick work just the opposite of most kitchens. Instead of going shopping with a recipe, they go shopping and then dream up a recipe. Stieber describes the process:
“The thought process for making a dish is pretty simple, actually. Unlike most restaurants, we order from the farms we buy from first, then use what we get to put together our menu instead of thinking of a dish then ordering whatever product we need to make it happen. So from there, we kind of use the ingredients like pieces in a puzzle so we can make dishes that have a balance of color, texture, and eye appeal. Usually the formula is basically to balance those elements, then make sure there’s something a little unusual or unique so that we can remain creative and stand out. That twist could be an unusual flavor combination, a different technique, or preparation for something which might be done a different way more often, etc. Another thing we like to do is layer condiments/sauces in our dishes so that every bite has the intended starting flavor of the dish, and you don’t have to struggle to get a solid bite, but, as you eat the dish and drag things around, elements mix together and create new flavors by the end.”
This is an impressive description of how creativity spurns originality, similar to the Greeks’ explanation. In their view creativity is not internally generated but arises outside of us. They personified that process as an encounter with the muse. In the same way, Stieber is saying that inspiration begins with the available ingredients. That’s often demonstrated as a game on the nightmare known as food TV, but the process is impossible to sustain in a high-volume restaurant, using ordinary ingredients. I don’t mean to suggest that Stieber is a complete savant. He’s been cooking half his life, having begun at 15 when he haunted Alon’s before getting a paid job there at 16. Also a musician, he enrolled at UNC-Asheville to study music recording but rapidly realized he wanted to continue playing and writing music, not engineering it. He came back to Atlanta, where his practical parents told him he was going to need a real job to back up his music making. So he landed at Le Cordon Bleu in Tucker. That was in 2007. While there, he got a job at Hector Santiago’s restaurant, Pura Vida, which was my favorite restaurant in the city during its few years of preternatural existence. It was there that Stieber learned how an uninhibited, inventive chef can radically transform the experience of dining.
After Stieber graduated, he migrated from kitchen to kitchen in Atlanta. Restaurants on his resume include Restaurant Eugene, Holeman & Finch, and Empire State South, all of which employed Ryan Smith, now the chef/owner of Staplehouse. If you’re familiar with Smith’s brilliant work, you’ll instantly spot its influence in Stieber’s. The main difference, I think, is rigor. As I told a friend, Stieber’s cooking is what you would get if Hector Santiago fucked with Ryan Smith’s food. It’s a bit messier, compellingly so, but almost in a conversely studied way. Sort of like perfect “messy hair.” In fact, I jokingly accused Stieber of being OCD. He explained — elaborately — why he was not.
Stieber doesn’t deny that his particular method — refined for seven years with Eat Me Speak Me — is risky, so that he’s constantly testing, tweaking, giving up, and restarting. But creativity always risks occasional failure and, even more painful, mediocrity. The only problem I had with my Little Bear experience was trivial — the effect of takeout itself. The crew arranges every dish in detail in its own sturdy black takeout box, so transferring anything to a plate is going to disrupt the beauty. I did find most of the food more tepid than I like, but we all know that hot food in a box ain’t pretty by the time you get it home. The restaurant also vends “Fernando’s Liver Stimulus Package” — boutique wines, spritz kits, beer, and cider.
I suggest you order now, because when Donald Trump reopens the gates to Moneyland, you won’t get a table at Little Bear. —CL—
Little Bear, 71-A Georgia Ave. S.E., 404-500-5396, littlebearatl.com. Open for takeout only, Wednesday–Sunday. You can order by phone, 10:30 a.m-8 p.m., for pickup 5-8 p.m. Vegetarian and vegan options are available when ordered a day in advance. The menu and photos are posted weekly to Twitter and Instagram, @littlebearatl. Unemployed restaurant workers who need a meal may DM chef de cuisine Jacob Armando via Instagram, @fourtimespicy. He is preparing and delivering free meals on Tuesday nights. Cliff Bostock LITTLE BEAR: The nondescript exterior in Summerhill reflects the tamer side of Jarrett Stieber's carefully imperfect aesthetic. It's like the black takeout boxes that contain food fit for eating with your very best magic mushrooms. 0,0,18 grazing GRAZING: Little Bear: In planning for six years, open two weeks, currently takeout only "
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GRAZING: Little Bear: In planning for six years, open two weeks, currently takeout only Article
Friday May 1, 2020 12:09 AM EDT
Jarrett Stieber ‘radically’ transforms the dining experience
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string(9979) "It’s hard to write enthusiastically about restaurants when they’ve become precarious stages for a public health drama. As I am writing this, Mayor Bill de Blasio has ordered New York City restaurants and bars to close and, just as I turn this in, Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms has mandated the same for Atlanta. The coronavirus pandemic is causing mass hysteria unlike any most Americans have seen since 9/11.
It will get better. I am unfortunately old enough that I remember several scary national dramas. One that keeps coming to mind is the Cuban Missile Crisis, when neighbors were building fallout shelters to survive a nuclear attack by the Soviet Russians. Like now, everyone was hiding at home except to rush to the grocery store to buy canned food to eat while the expected radiation kept them underground. Many parents kept their kids out of school for a few weeks. Years later, it was clear that the nuclear flames of catastrophe were greatly fanned by our government’s lack of preparedness and its wounded ego. Sound familiar? Fast forward to the early ’80s and we had a president — a showman like today’s — who ignored the AIDS epidemic for several years, giving the disease a head start. Conservatives, backed by evangelicals, used the crisis they first ignored to validate their homophobia and authoritarianism, even threatening to put gay men in concentration camps. That is what worries me most. Authoritarians like Trump amplify crisis and fear to seize more power. Trump is gloating, for example, because the crisis has led the Fed to feed his greed.
My apocalyptic political fears aside, what are reasonable responses? A growing number of states and municipalities have closed restaurants and bars, but not entirely. It’s important to keep in mind that it’s not food itself that poses a hazard. The closings are mainly related to the need to create “social distance” to reduce the ease of transmission. Thus, customers suffer no risk by ordering food to go or for delivery. Many restaurants that did remain open for full service before the mayor’s decision, had taken precautions, such as clearing space by reducing the number of tables, and radically increasing sanitation practices. When I sat at Starbucks soon after the panic began, staff members were wiping tables clean every 30 minutes. Nonetheless, an employee told me that the iconic coffee shop may limit business to window takeout (like so many others). [On March 21, Starbucks issued the following statement: “We have temporarily closed our in-store cafes, but select grocery and drive-thru locations remain open. Starbucks Delivers on Uber Eats is also available in select markets. Visit our store locator for the latest store hours and open locations. — editor]
It’s also important to keep in mind that a radical reduction in clientele has devastating effects in an industry with a relatively narrow profit margin. Too many restaurants are employing the well-known tactic of denial. When I asked Jason Hill, owner-chef of Wisteria, if he had lost business as of March 15, he said, “We all have. Anyone who says different is lying.” He is nonetheless optimistic, noting that people have emptied grocery stores. “Because of that alone, we will all be slow for a few days.” He hopes diners will return, at least for take-out, when their cupboards are bare and their panic has subsided. Meanwhile, please don’t fall for creepy offers of $40 hand sanitizers or buy discount coupons for restaurant meals without calling ahead.
If you want a view of the way people in the industry are being affected personally, check out Bon Appetit’s ongoing reports from industry workers on their website. One of the writers is the always pull-no-punches Deborah VanTrece, owner-chef of Twisted Soul in Atlanta. She explains that she is at high risk herself because of asthma. While dealing with the duress of that, she saw her reservations drop 60 percent. Many report even greater loss of catering gigs. I’ve heard these complaints from other restaurateurs but they often are quickly followed with — I’m paraphrasing — a statement like, “Please don’t identify me; I don’t want to discourage customers and employees with disastrous predictions.”
VanTrece, however, points eloquently to the possibly immense personal cost of the epidemic: “Emotionally, I’m like, ‘What the fuck? What the fuck?’ To have gone through all I’ve gone through: trying to get a brick and mortar opened in the first place, being an African American woman in a man’s field, fighting my way through that to get into a position of respect and being able to mentor others, figuring out where the money’s gonna come from, struggling to survive the past few years, looking for good employees. Finally I’m up there at the top of my game. Who could’ve imagined a virus might be the thing to take small businesses like mine out of the game?”
It’s particularly difficult to see the way restaurant closings and cutbacks threaten the general well-being of industry workers. They are at high risk of infection, of course, but they are also notoriously low-paid, so losing hours has a quick and dramatic effect on many. One source of assistance to food service workers in crisis is Giving Kitchen (404-254-1227, #givingkitchen). The organization has invited those diagnosed with coronavirus in need of financial assistance to contact them quickly. They can also help those who have otherwise been affected by the epidemic. Giving Kitchen has assisted more than 4,000 workers since 2012, and I urge you to make a contribution.
A source of news and advice for staff and customers alike, is a new social media campaign, #AtlRestaurantsUnite, created by restaurant owners. You’ll find tips on everything from maintaining financial stability to creating social distance inside a restaurant. [https://garestaurants.org|The Georgia Restaurant Association provides industry updates. The incredibly prolific Beth McKibben of Eater Atlanta has been reporting the epidemic’s effects virtually minute-by-minute.
This will pass. The consequences may be overwhelming. Some estimates of infection — not death! — run as high as 60 percent of the population. Please help by continuing to patronize restaurants in any way you can (did I mention gift cards?). Make donations. Restaurants and bars have made Atlanta a vibrant city. If you act out of fear instead of kindness and reason, you will fuel those of our society who enlarge fiscal and political power by scapegoating and lying.
GOING LATINO
I’ve hit two new Latino spots in the last month. First up is My Abuelas (“Our Grandmothers”), a Puerto-Rican café at the Spindle Kitchen. The owner-chefs are Luis Martinez and Monica Martinez, who have been hosting pop-ups for nearly two years. If you’re not familiar with the Spindle, it’s a bike shop attached to a dining space in the Studioplex. It has hosted innumerable pop-ups and short-term tenants, but My Abuelas will be there for a year.
My Abuelas is not the first Puerto Rican venue in Atlanta. Hector Santiago of Pura Vida (R.I.P.), El Super Pan, and the new (more Mexican) El Burro Pollo set the bar here, but My Abuelas may give him a run for the money. The Abuelas menu is brief and changes frequently. During my recent visit, three entrees were offered. Two of them were vegetarian lasagna (pastelon), one vegan and one not. The third entrée, which my companion and I both ordered, was pernil — marinated, roasted pork. It was super juicy but I missed the crunchy skin that usually distinguishes the dish. It was served with tasty red beans and rice and basically tasteless, dry tostones. I have to say that the kitchen needs to work on presentation. Our (paper) plates were dominated by the bowl of rice and beans, while the pernil seemed to be hiding off to the side, masquerading as a smooth stone. It proved to be a larger portion than it looked. And that’s a good thing, given that the entrees are $15 each. Part of that is due to the restaurant’s use of sourced ingredients.
You can easily reduce the cost by grazing on starters and sweets. I ordered a chicken empanada that was huge and — no joke — among the best I’ve ever eaten. Others are available stuffed with meat or a meat substitute. Two of these would make an adequate lunch — especially if you order dessert, which you should. La Dolce Madness, a bakery, has joined My Abuelas at the Spindle. Definitely try the tres leches, a huge serving that you will devour all on your own. Because of a mix-up in our orders, Monica Martinez gave me a free, cakey pastry with, I think, a guava topping. It deserves praise, but I can’t imagine anything better than the tres leches.
My Abuelas, 659 Auburn Ave., 404-823-2046 thespindleatl.com
I’ve also visited Lazy Llama Cantina, a Tex-Mex pub that has replaced Hobnob at the corner of Piedmont and Monroe. Although I was annoyed that nobody could explain the name of the place, I did like most of the food. Consulting chef Jeffrey Gardner has created a menu of impressive tacos. I especially recommend the al pastor and the carne asada. These, like everything else, are composed in the kitchen so that you don’t get to ruin them by dumping, say, red sauce on top of green sauce fetched from a salsa bar.
I also liked a gigantic quesadilla filled with charred corn, browned mushrooms, red and green peppers, and a very small amount of cheese. I’ve sampled one dessert — the churros. They are fried until super-crunchy and served with chocolate and caramel sauces. The bar has a gigantic menu of tequilas, and the staff is great. They serve brunch on weekends, and there are regular nightly events. There are 20 TV screens for watching sports and about 12 portraits of llamas you can talk to after the mescal kicks in.
Lazy Llama, 1551 Piedmont Ave., 404-968-2288, lazyllamacantina.com"
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string(10303) "It’s hard to write enthusiastically about restaurants when they’ve become precarious stages for a public health drama. As I am writing this, Mayor Bill de Blasio has ordered New York City restaurants and bars to close and, just as I turn this in, Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms has mandated the same for Atlanta. The coronavirus pandemic is causing mass hysteria unlike any most Americans have seen since 9/11.
It will get better. I am unfortunately old enough that I remember several scary national dramas. One that keeps coming to mind is the Cuban Missile Crisis, when neighbors were building fallout shelters to survive a nuclear attack by the Soviet Russians. Like now, everyone was hiding at home except to rush to the grocery store to buy canned food to eat while the expected radiation kept them underground. Many parents kept their kids out of school for a few weeks. Years later, it was clear that the nuclear flames of catastrophe were greatly fanned by our government’s lack of preparedness and its wounded ego. Sound familiar? Fast forward to the early ’80s and we had a president — a showman like today’s — who ignored the AIDS epidemic for several years, giving the disease a head start. Conservatives, backed by evangelicals, used the crisis they first ignored to validate their homophobia and authoritarianism, even threatening to put gay men in concentration camps. That is what worries me most. Authoritarians like Trump amplify crisis and fear to seize more power. Trump is gloating, for example, because the crisis has led the Fed to feed his greed.
My apocalyptic political fears aside, what are reasonable responses? A growing number of states and municipalities have closed restaurants and bars, but not entirely. It’s important to keep in mind that it’s not food itself that poses a hazard. The closings are mainly related to the need to create “social distance” to reduce the ease of transmission. Thus, customers suffer no risk by ordering food to go or for delivery. Many restaurants that did remain open for full service before the mayor’s decision, had taken precautions, such as clearing space by reducing the number of tables, and radically increasing sanitation practices. When I sat at Starbucks soon after the panic began, staff members were wiping tables clean every 30 minutes. Nonetheless, an employee told me that the iconic coffee shop may limit business to window takeout (like so many others). [[On March 21, Starbucks issued the following statement: “We have temporarily closed our in-store cafes, but select grocery and drive-thru locations remain open. Starbucks Delivers on Uber Eats is also available in select markets. Visit our store locator for the latest store hours and open locations. — editor]
It’s also important to keep in mind that a radical reduction in clientele has devastating effects in an industry with a relatively narrow profit margin. Too many restaurants are employing the well-known tactic of denial. When I asked Jason Hill, owner-chef of Wisteria, if he had lost business as of March 15, he said, “We all have. Anyone who says different is lying.” He is nonetheless optimistic, noting that people have emptied grocery stores. “Because of that alone, we will all be slow for a few days.” He hopes diners will return, at least for take-out, when their cupboards are bare and their panic has subsided. Meanwhile, please don’t fall for creepy offers of $40 hand sanitizers or buy discount coupons for restaurant meals without calling ahead.
If you want a view of the way people in the industry are being affected personally, check out [bonappetit.com/story/food-businesses-covid-19|''Bon Appetit''’s ongoing reports from industry workers on their website]. One of the writers is the always pull-no-punches Deborah VanTrece, owner-chef of Twisted Soul in Atlanta. She explains that she is at high risk herself because of asthma. While dealing with the duress of that, she saw her reservations drop 60 percent. Many report even greater loss of catering gigs. I’ve heard these complaints from other restaurateurs but they often are quickly followed with — I’m paraphrasing — a statement like, “Please don’t identify me; I don’t want to discourage customers and employees with disastrous predictions.”
VanTrece, however, points eloquently to the possibly immense personal cost of the epidemic: “Emotionally, I’m like, ‘What the fuck? What the ''fuck?’'' To have gone through all I’ve gone through: trying to get a brick and mortar opened in the first place, being an African American woman in a man’s field, fighting my way through that to get into a position of respect and being able to mentor others, figuring out where the money’s gonna come from, struggling to survive the past few years, looking for good employees. Finally I’m up there at the top of my game. Who could’ve imagined a ''virus'' might be the thing to take small businesses like mine out of the game?”
It’s particularly difficult to see the way restaurant closings and cutbacks threaten the general well-being of industry workers. They are at high risk of infection, of course, but they are also notoriously low-paid, so losing hours has a quick and dramatic effect on many. One source of assistance to food service workers in crisis is Giving Kitchen (404-254-1227, #givingkitchen). The organization has invited those diagnosed with coronavirus in need of financial assistance to contact them quickly. They can also help those who have otherwise been affected by the epidemic. Giving Kitchen has assisted more than 4,000 workers since 2012, and I urge you to make a contribution.
A source of news and advice for staff and customers alike, is a new social media campaign, #AtlRestaurantsUnite, created by restaurant owners. You’ll find tips on everything from maintaining financial stability to creating social distance inside a restaurant. [https://garestaurants.org|The Georgia Restaurant Association provides industry updates. The incredibly prolific Beth McKibben of [http://atlanta.eater.com|Eater Atlanta] has been reporting the epidemic’s effects virtually minute-by-minute.
This will pass. The consequences may be overwhelming. Some estimates of infection — not death! — run as high as 60 percent of the population. Please help by continuing to patronize restaurants in any way you can (did I mention gift cards?). Make donations. Restaurants and bars have made Atlanta a vibrant city. If you act out of fear instead of kindness and reason, you will fuel those of our society who enlarge fiscal and political power by scapegoating and lying.
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GOING LATINO
I’ve hit two new Latino spots in the last month. First up is __My Abuelas__ (“Our Grandmothers”), a Puerto-Rican café at the Spindle Kitchen. The owner-chefs are Luis Martinez and Monica Martinez, who have been hosting pop-ups for nearly two years. If you’re not familiar with the Spindle, it’s a bike shop attached to a dining space in the Studioplex. It has hosted innumerable pop-ups and short-term tenants, but My Abuelas will be there for a year.
My Abuelas is not the first Puerto Rican venue in Atlanta. Hector Santiago of Pura Vida (R.I.P.), El Super Pan, and the new (more Mexican) El Burro Pollo set the bar here, but My Abuelas may give him a run for the money. The Abuelas menu is brief and changes frequently. During my recent visit, three entrees were offered. Two of them were vegetarian lasagna (pastelon), one vegan and one not. The third entrée, which my companion and I both ordered, was pernil — marinated, roasted pork. It was super juicy but I missed the crunchy skin that usually distinguishes the dish. It was served with tasty red beans and rice and basically tasteless, dry tostones. I have to say that the kitchen needs to work on presentation. Our (paper) plates were dominated by the bowl of rice and beans, while the pernil seemed to be hiding off to the side, masquerading as a smooth stone. It proved to be a larger portion than it looked. And that’s a good thing, given that the entrees are $15 each. Part of that is due to the restaurant’s use of sourced ingredients.
You can easily reduce the cost by grazing on starters and sweets. I ordered a chicken empanada that was huge and — no joke — among the best I’ve ever eaten. Others are available stuffed with meat or a meat substitute. Two of these would make an adequate lunch — especially if you order dessert, which you should. La Dolce Madness, a bakery, has joined My Abuelas at the Spindle. Definitely try the tres leches, a huge serving that you will devour all on your own. Because of a mix-up in our orders, Monica Martinez gave me a free, cakey pastry with, I think, a guava topping. It deserves praise, but I can’t imagine anything better than the tres leches.
''My Abuelas, 659 Auburn Ave., 404-823-2046 [http://thespindleatl.com|thespindleatl.com]''
I’ve also visited __Lazy Llama Cantina__, a Tex-Mex pub that has replaced Hobnob at the corner of Piedmont and Monroe. Although I was annoyed that nobody could explain the name of the place, I did like most of the food. Consulting chef Jeffrey Gardner has created a menu of impressive tacos. I especially recommend the al pastor and the carne asada. These, like everything else, are composed in the kitchen so that you don’t get to ruin them by dumping, say, red sauce on top of green sauce fetched from a salsa bar.
I also liked a gigantic quesadilla filled with charred corn, browned mushrooms, red and green peppers, and a very small amount of cheese. I’ve sampled one dessert — the churros. They are fried until super-crunchy and served with chocolate and caramel sauces. The bar has a gigantic menu of tequilas, and the staff is great. They serve brunch on weekends, and there are regular nightly events. There are 20 TV screens for watching sports and about 12 portraits of llamas you can talk to after the mescal kicks in.
''Lazy Llama, 1551 Piedmont Ave., 404-968-2288, [http://lazyllamacantina.com|lazyllamacantina.com]''"
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string(10870) " My Abuelas Restaurant at the Spindle Kitchen PUERTO RICAN PRIDE: The interior of My Abuelas at The Spindle. Photo credit: Cliff Bostock 2020-04-06T16:00:58+00:00 GRAZ_G9JLrQx8THuvzjIDZDLq0A_web.jpg grazing My Abuelas Restaurant at the Spindle Kitchen 2020-04-06T15:32:15+00:00 GRAZING: Eat calmly: Your panic is weaponized by the authoritarians jim.harris Jim Harris Cliff Bostock cliffbostock (Cliff Bostock) 2020-04-06T15:32:15+00:00 It’s hard to write enthusiastically about restaurants when they’ve become precarious stages for a public health drama. As I am writing this, Mayor Bill de Blasio has ordered New York City restaurants and bars to close and, just as I turn this in, Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms has mandated the same for Atlanta. The coronavirus pandemic is causing mass hysteria unlike any most Americans have seen since 9/11.
It will get better. I am unfortunately old enough that I remember several scary national dramas. One that keeps coming to mind is the Cuban Missile Crisis, when neighbors were building fallout shelters to survive a nuclear attack by the Soviet Russians. Like now, everyone was hiding at home except to rush to the grocery store to buy canned food to eat while the expected radiation kept them underground. Many parents kept their kids out of school for a few weeks. Years later, it was clear that the nuclear flames of catastrophe were greatly fanned by our government’s lack of preparedness and its wounded ego. Sound familiar? Fast forward to the early ’80s and we had a president — a showman like today’s — who ignored the AIDS epidemic for several years, giving the disease a head start. Conservatives, backed by evangelicals, used the crisis they first ignored to validate their homophobia and authoritarianism, even threatening to put gay men in concentration camps. That is what worries me most. Authoritarians like Trump amplify crisis and fear to seize more power. Trump is gloating, for example, because the crisis has led the Fed to feed his greed.
My apocalyptic political fears aside, what are reasonable responses? A growing number of states and municipalities have closed restaurants and bars, but not entirely. It’s important to keep in mind that it’s not food itself that poses a hazard. The closings are mainly related to the need to create “social distance” to reduce the ease of transmission. Thus, customers suffer no risk by ordering food to go or for delivery. Many restaurants that did remain open for full service before the mayor’s decision, had taken precautions, such as clearing space by reducing the number of tables, and radically increasing sanitation practices. When I sat at Starbucks soon after the panic began, staff members were wiping tables clean every 30 minutes. Nonetheless, an employee told me that the iconic coffee shop may limit business to window takeout (like so many others). [On March 21, Starbucks issued the following statement: “We have temporarily closed our in-store cafes, but select grocery and drive-thru locations remain open. Starbucks Delivers on Uber Eats is also available in select markets. Visit our store locator for the latest store hours and open locations. — editor]
It’s also important to keep in mind that a radical reduction in clientele has devastating effects in an industry with a relatively narrow profit margin. Too many restaurants are employing the well-known tactic of denial. When I asked Jason Hill, owner-chef of Wisteria, if he had lost business as of March 15, he said, “We all have. Anyone who says different is lying.” He is nonetheless optimistic, noting that people have emptied grocery stores. “Because of that alone, we will all be slow for a few days.” He hopes diners will return, at least for take-out, when their cupboards are bare and their panic has subsided. Meanwhile, please don’t fall for creepy offers of $40 hand sanitizers or buy discount coupons for restaurant meals without calling ahead.
If you want a view of the way people in the industry are being affected personally, check out Bon Appetit’s ongoing reports from industry workers on their website. One of the writers is the always pull-no-punches Deborah VanTrece, owner-chef of Twisted Soul in Atlanta. She explains that she is at high risk herself because of asthma. While dealing with the duress of that, she saw her reservations drop 60 percent. Many report even greater loss of catering gigs. I’ve heard these complaints from other restaurateurs but they often are quickly followed with — I’m paraphrasing — a statement like, “Please don’t identify me; I don’t want to discourage customers and employees with disastrous predictions.”
VanTrece, however, points eloquently to the possibly immense personal cost of the epidemic: “Emotionally, I’m like, ‘What the fuck? What the fuck?’ To have gone through all I’ve gone through: trying to get a brick and mortar opened in the first place, being an African American woman in a man’s field, fighting my way through that to get into a position of respect and being able to mentor others, figuring out where the money’s gonna come from, struggling to survive the past few years, looking for good employees. Finally I’m up there at the top of my game. Who could’ve imagined a virus might be the thing to take small businesses like mine out of the game?”
It’s particularly difficult to see the way restaurant closings and cutbacks threaten the general well-being of industry workers. They are at high risk of infection, of course, but they are also notoriously low-paid, so losing hours has a quick and dramatic effect on many. One source of assistance to food service workers in crisis is Giving Kitchen (404-254-1227, #givingkitchen). The organization has invited those diagnosed with coronavirus in need of financial assistance to contact them quickly. They can also help those who have otherwise been affected by the epidemic. Giving Kitchen has assisted more than 4,000 workers since 2012, and I urge you to make a contribution.
A source of news and advice for staff and customers alike, is a new social media campaign, #AtlRestaurantsUnite, created by restaurant owners. You’ll find tips on everything from maintaining financial stability to creating social distance inside a restaurant. [https://garestaurants.org|The Georgia Restaurant Association provides industry updates. The incredibly prolific Beth McKibben of Eater Atlanta has been reporting the epidemic’s effects virtually minute-by-minute.
This will pass. The consequences may be overwhelming. Some estimates of infection — not death! — run as high as 60 percent of the population. Please help by continuing to patronize restaurants in any way you can (did I mention gift cards?). Make donations. Restaurants and bars have made Atlanta a vibrant city. If you act out of fear instead of kindness and reason, you will fuel those of our society who enlarge fiscal and political power by scapegoating and lying.
GOING LATINO
I’ve hit two new Latino spots in the last month. First up is My Abuelas (“Our Grandmothers”), a Puerto-Rican café at the Spindle Kitchen. The owner-chefs are Luis Martinez and Monica Martinez, who have been hosting pop-ups for nearly two years. If you’re not familiar with the Spindle, it’s a bike shop attached to a dining space in the Studioplex. It has hosted innumerable pop-ups and short-term tenants, but My Abuelas will be there for a year.
My Abuelas is not the first Puerto Rican venue in Atlanta. Hector Santiago of Pura Vida (R.I.P.), El Super Pan, and the new (more Mexican) El Burro Pollo set the bar here, but My Abuelas may give him a run for the money. The Abuelas menu is brief and changes frequently. During my recent visit, three entrees were offered. Two of them were vegetarian lasagna (pastelon), one vegan and one not. The third entrée, which my companion and I both ordered, was pernil — marinated, roasted pork. It was super juicy but I missed the crunchy skin that usually distinguishes the dish. It was served with tasty red beans and rice and basically tasteless, dry tostones. I have to say that the kitchen needs to work on presentation. Our (paper) plates were dominated by the bowl of rice and beans, while the pernil seemed to be hiding off to the side, masquerading as a smooth stone. It proved to be a larger portion than it looked. And that’s a good thing, given that the entrees are $15 each. Part of that is due to the restaurant’s use of sourced ingredients.
You can easily reduce the cost by grazing on starters and sweets. I ordered a chicken empanada that was huge and — no joke — among the best I’ve ever eaten. Others are available stuffed with meat or a meat substitute. Two of these would make an adequate lunch — especially if you order dessert, which you should. La Dolce Madness, a bakery, has joined My Abuelas at the Spindle. Definitely try the tres leches, a huge serving that you will devour all on your own. Because of a mix-up in our orders, Monica Martinez gave me a free, cakey pastry with, I think, a guava topping. It deserves praise, but I can’t imagine anything better than the tres leches.
My Abuelas, 659 Auburn Ave., 404-823-2046 thespindleatl.com
I’ve also visited Lazy Llama Cantina, a Tex-Mex pub that has replaced Hobnob at the corner of Piedmont and Monroe. Although I was annoyed that nobody could explain the name of the place, I did like most of the food. Consulting chef Jeffrey Gardner has created a menu of impressive tacos. I especially recommend the al pastor and the carne asada. These, like everything else, are composed in the kitchen so that you don’t get to ruin them by dumping, say, red sauce on top of green sauce fetched from a salsa bar.
I also liked a gigantic quesadilla filled with charred corn, browned mushrooms, red and green peppers, and a very small amount of cheese. I’ve sampled one dessert — the churros. They are fried until super-crunchy and served with chocolate and caramel sauces. The bar has a gigantic menu of tequilas, and the staff is great. They serve brunch on weekends, and there are regular nightly events. There are 20 TV screens for watching sports and about