Top Chef: Oh, Carla, Where Were Thou?

Like gillions of other people last night, my partner Fey and I watched the season finale of Top Chef: New York on Bravo. As much as I hate to admit it, I've become a huge fan of these contest shows, and am probably more vested in their outcomes than I should be. When Aaron "Big Daddy" McCargo, Jr. won The Next Food Network Star competition over Dallas' intensely more talented Lisa Garza, I stopped watching the network in a fit of pique for almost two weeks.

But I digress. Top Chef. Once Ariane had to pack her knives and go home, I thought I would no longer care about the competition. But the underdog performance of Washington, D.C. caterer Carla Hall caught my imagination.

Get this--a competitor who is nice. Who helps people. Who cares about people (other than herself). And who wins! Fey and I fell in love with her, and were hoping against hope that the egos of Hosea and Stephan would cancel each other out, allowing our favorite to quietly steal the prize.

But alas, that was not to be. Carla. Carla, Carla, Carla! What were you thinking? The challenge was easy: make the best three course meal of your life. Time and time again, you had it pounded into your head--Be Yourself. Do Your Thing.

Carla, you had the chance to easily take it all. But you let yourself be swayed by a sous chef (who, incidentally, did not win the previous season....) and away from your strengths. It broke my heart to watch, and while I'm still happy that Hosea won over Stephan (who wouldn't be?), I'm still depressed that you didn't pull through at the last minute and score a Victory for Goodness and Light.

Carla Hall Talks to the Washington Post

The Great Valentine's Day Food-a-Thon, Part Three

I should have learned long ago to avoid romantic restaurants on Valentine's Day. Varanese is one of our favorite Louisville restaurants, mainly because it manages to be high end and sophisticated without ever losing that feeling of a small business. Owner John Varanese invariably comes out and says hello when we're there, and we have servers who remember us from visit to visit. The menu is great and the desserts are to die for.

So of course, Varanese seemed the perfect destination for Valentine's Day, right?

Not…really.

You see, one of the downfalls of going to a popular restaurant on a popular holiday is that, well, it's crowded. Even with reservations, which we wisely secured weeks beforehand, we were crowded into a packed room. The room felt tiny, and I felt like a giant lumbering ox as I navigated the tightly-spaced tables.

Quite obviously, because of the enormous amount of people dining, we were not really able to get the kind of service we'd come to expect from Varanese, which is a shame, because in my opinion, they have one of the finest staffs in the city. Everything felt rushed, and any semblance of romance the night might have held was washed away in the production line feel of the meal.

Still, to be fair, it's about the food, and the food is what I'm here to discuss. For Valentine's Day, the restaurant offered a special menu of aphrodisiacal entrees, appetizers, and desserts as well as an attenuated version of their regular menu. For some reason, neither Fey nor I felt drawn to anything on the holiday menu, so we started off with a batch of home-made potato chips, then had the grilled salmon with cream cheese grits from the regular menu for our entrees. The chips were quite good—the quick turnaround in the kitchen meant they didn't have time to sit around getting cold, and the chips we got were still hot and crispy. The dipping sauces were good, especially the dill sauce.

I'm not sure how I managed to go to Varanese so often without ever noticing the grilled salmon on the menu, but I now have a new favorite. The salmon on its own was quite tasty—perfectly grilled. However, it was just a touch salty for my taste. But when paired with the cream cheese grits, it was a perfect bite—balanced and delicious. Of course, I am a grits fan from way back—I prefer mine savory, with salt and butter (as opposed to the hideous concoction of sugar and grits some people eat). I'd never even considered putting cream cheese in grits—fried eggs, bacon, sausage, you name it, but never cream cheese. I am now in love with the concept and can't wait to try it on my own.

As it is, the salmon and grits were the high point of my meal. I didn't heed Fey's warning, and chose a dessert off the holiday menu—chocolate strawberry cake. Fey went with our favorite—the mocha crème brulee with chocolate and caramel spring roll.

Fey is wise, and I would be wise to heed her warning.

This is the first time I've ever had a dessert at Varanese I just plain did not like. The cake was bland, there wasn't a strong enough flavor of either chocolate or strawberry to make the point, and I came out of the experience wishing I had both the money and the calories back for a do-over. Thank goodness my sweetie is generous and shared her crème brulee with me. Because it's Valentine's Day, and that's what sweethearts do, right?

Please do not take this review to mean in any way, shape or form that I no longer love Varanese. It is still one of my favorite places to eat in the city, and Fey and I will continue to enjoy ourselves there as long as they let us past the bouncer. I think, though, in the future, we'll choose a less popular night.

Epilogue: The Taco Bell Tradition

I started this series by mentioning how badly I screwed up Valentine's Day last year. There is no way to comprehensively describe how badly I screwed up, but let's just say from now on I will always schedule Valentine's Day off from work at least two months in advance.

One thing that came out of last year's fiasco was our Traditional Taco Bell Valentine snack. Hard to believe, but none of the restaurants in Elizabethtown could seat us in a decent amount of time last year (reservations don't exist in the country, btw). Seriously, there was a forty minute wait at Golden Corral! Golden…Corral…folks.

So, we did what any rational couple would do in that situation—we put our name in at the best we could find (which was Red Lobster) and then went to the local Taco Bell for a snack and to wait. It turned out to be incredibly fun, and Fey and I decided that every year on Valentine's Day, we would have a bite from Taco Bell to commemorate our desperate attempt at salvaging the holiday.

Mmmmm….tacos…..

The Great Valentine's Day Food-a-Thon, Part Two

Day Two of our Valentine's Day extravaganza came with a choice for me—lunch at Just Fresh on Bardstown, or a trip to Dakshin to enjoy their buffet. I have to admit—Just Fresh sounded really tempting. Since I've been eating better, I really love this healthy little chain. Not only are the ingredients fresh and flavorful, but the staff at the Louisville branch of this chain will happily work with me to accommodate my food issues.

However…

If you recall my last post, you will remember that this is The Valentine's Day To Make Up for Last Year, and my needs/wants/desires do not count. It's all about Fey. And when I asked Fey which she would prefer (without telling her first of my preference), she chose Dakshin.

So Dakshin it was.

Here is where I must reveal my Secret Shame to you, dear reader. I am a wuss. I love flavorful foods, ethnic foods, various and unusual spices and ingredients. But I cannot handle heat at all. Coming from South Louisiana, this makes me a bit of an oddity. Sauce piquant, jambalaya, red beans and rice—I rarely order these dishes in restaurants because they usually make them too fiery for my wimpy palate.

Indian food is the same way, and Dakshin is no exception. I've learned a trick, however, to surviving a potentially five-alarm buffet—"Follow the Children."

Yes, it's pathetic. Yes, it's embarrassing. But it works. Parents aren't usually going to let their kids eat overly peppery foods, and kids (bless their highly sensitive young taste buds) aren't usually going to go for it on their own accord.

Since the restaurant was filled with families having a nice Saturday lunch, I had many survival guides for my meal. I followed a lovely little Indian girl of about six to the buffet and wound up with the following combination:

• Vegetable cutlets: a spicy mashed potato/vegetable croquette. A little on the hot side, but still delicious.
  
• Medhu Vada: fried lentil doughnuts. These were great (along with the iddly) for taking the burn out. And they tasted pretty darned good.
  
• Iddly: These are white cakes made of rice and lentils. Alone, they would be bland and unmemorable. But at the first sign of heat on my palate, iddly became my new catch-phrase for pain relief.
  
• Uppma: a very flavorful mashed potato and vegetable dish that was just a hint hotter than the other items I had, but ooh so worth it.
  
• Hakka noodles: basically, this was veggie lo mein, and it was delicious. I filled up twice on this one.
  
• Madras Fish Curry: I just took a piece of fish out of the sauce and ate it. I found that most of the heat is in the sauce, and the fish alone was exquisitely seasoned.
  
• Butter Masala Dosai: now, one of the things I loved about our meal was the dosai. The servers did not leave them on the buffet, but carried platters to the tables so diners could get them hot and fresh. I actually went back to get the name of this item, because I want to order it next time we visit. It's basically a rice and lentil crepe stuffed with uppma. The crepe is crispy, not soft, and you can eat it with your hands. This was hands down my favorite item of the day.

Fey, on the other hand, tasted everything on the buffet, because she's not a wimp. She swears the way to get past the fire is to take a spoonful of yoghurt and swish it around your mouth. This actually works--in fact, most cultures that enjoy tongue-seering spices often have their version of yoghurt--sour cream, mayo, you name it. It's a basic survival trait, and Fey is very smart to use it. And while that may be true, I think I'll continue to stick to the Kindergarten Method of Indian Food Survival. An ounce of prevention is worth an ounce of yoghurt, with no messy pain to get in the way.

Side note: One of the presents I bought Fey for Valentine's Day was one of those god-awful dancing/singing toys they sell in Walgreen's. You know, the obnoxious ones that play Love Me Tender or Tequila? I hate them, but Fey loves them, and (see above) it was all about Fey. This particular fellow, quickly dubbed Oscar, was a bright pink and purple monster who played Muh-num-a-nump (beep beep be-dee-deep) from Sesame Street. Oscar quickly became a favorite of the wait staff, and several stopped by our table to hear him sing…over and over and over.

I am such a great girlfriend.

Our pagan store jaunt and dinner at Varanese, coming up in part three.

The Great Valentine's Day Food-a-Thon, Part One

Every once in a while, you really do a holiday up right—the perfect gift, the perfect meal, the perfect everything. Last year's Valentine's Day? Not so much for me. In fact, I screwed up pretty seriously, so this year I was looking to make up for it in a big way. So I took off the day from work and Fey and I decided to have a Foodie Bliss Valentine's Day in Louisville. The entire thing lasted two days, and while we wound up broke for the rest of the week, it was more than worth it.

Our festivities started out, as all good holidays should, with dessert. We stopped at Sweet Surrender Bakery on Frankfort Ave. Sweet Surrender is a rarity in this day and age—they offer sinfully delicious products, ecologically sound work practices, and good-old fashioned good service to boot. Fey had the chocolate strawberry cake (hands down the best dessert of the weekend) and I had a conversation heart sugar cookie (both pictured below).

Chocolate Strawberry Cake and Conversation Heart Sugar Cookie (above)

We then headed off to Corbett's on Brownsboro Road. Corbett's is old-school fine dining, with glorious table settings (see below), exquisite food, and excellent service. Fey started with fried calamari and I had the roasted garlic and mushroom bruschetta (pictured below). I have to admit, I was torn between a salad and the bruschetta, but I'm glad in the end I got the latter. The roasted garlic and mushrooms were slightly salty with a tender texture that matched well with the crispy toasted bread.

Table Setting (Corbett's)

Roasted Garlic and Mushroom Bruschetta (above)

For once, Fey and I decided to get the same entree—sauteed shrimp, linguini, spinach, tomato, lemon, feta and herbs (see picture below). I gave my feta and shrimp to Fey, and she held the spinach and tomato, but we both enjoyed the delicate flavors and textures.

Sauteed Shrimp with Linguini (above)

Dessert was excellent, although not as good as that cake from Sweet Surrender. There were two lunch offerings, the banana bread pudding with bourbon sabayon and carrot cake with orange cream cheese icing (both pictured below). I got the bread pudding and Fey got the carrot cake, and we each thought we got the better of the deal. I normally pass on banana desserts, but this was so incredibly good I didn't mind at all. Fey's carrot cake was spicy and dense, and the icing was very rich.

Carrot Cake (above)

Banana Bread Pudding (above)

We ate dinner at Fazoli's that night, mainly to save up cash for Day Two's extravaganza, which included lunch at Dakshin and dinner at Varonese. More on that in part two!

Note: All photographs in the post (c)2009 by Fey Becker.

Evil, Thy Name is Pancake Puppy

There are so many levels of wrong with Denny's Pancake Puppy dessert. The mutant cross between a pancake, beignet, and hush puppy, this delectable treat is addictive in its delicious, oh-so-bad for you simplicity. Crusty, humble fried pancake bites, coated in cinammon sugar and served with warm syrup for dipping, these may indeed be the cruelest thing to come out of a Denny's since...the Denny's.

Damn you, late night diners, and your evil, evil temptations!

Blame the Ice Age

It was a caveman who made me an almost-vegetarian. I kid you not. Somewhere, in the annals of time, a prehistoric human named Uggh bears responsibility for the fact that I no longer eat chicken, pork, beef, etc.

Here's my philosophy. Back in the old times, long before Trader Joe's or Whole Foods Market or Gourmet magazine, humans had to hunt and seek for their food. Literally. They had to drag their butts out of their caves, pick a few bugs off their mate in a wholesome goodbye, and go off to the Great Unknown to find sustenance.

In good times, Uggh and her buddies (yeah, the women provided most of the food, even way back then) were not stupid. They went with what was available—wild grains, nuts, berries, greens. As far back as 50,000 BCE, cave dwellers were leaving their trash behind—seeds of wild dates and nuts from the period have been found in Northern Iraq. They also ate fish, shellfish, mushrooms, eggs, and insects—easily attainable protein sources that didn't require a lot of violence to acquire. The "hunter-gatherers" of Neolithic times were more scavengers than hunters. The first steak dinner in history was probably some poor animal charred in a natural fire, found by a tribe of marauding humans.

But sooner or later, bad times always come. Around 20,000 BCE, the Ice Age hit and, well, things got a bit ugly. Uggh and her hunter-gatherer friends weren't going to find food just lying around—even the sturdiest of plants are going to have trouble surviving the frozen wilds. Let's face it, not even the saber-tooth tigers, mammoths, and mastadons could stand more than about 10,000 years of the stuff—they went extinct around 10,000 BCE.

So Uggh and her tribe were confronted with what we in the South like to call A Situation. There were quite a few humans running around the planet at this time, and precious little freely growing foodstuffs to share amongst them. So our human ancestors did what they normally do in times of crisis—they improvised.

The first thing they did was take the risk factor out of food. That means agriculture. No more random searching for wild seeds and nuts—our little human population decided to plant their own dang seeds and nuts, nurture them, and harvest them. Yup. Our ancestors were pretty clever about that sort of thing. Along with agriculture came side benefits like communities, settlements, culture, etc.

Good stuff.

But not everybody lived in Paradise. Many of our ancestors lived in very cold climates, where growing your own millet wasn't really an option. And they were hungry. And they were inclined to survive, as most species are.

So they did what any species will do to survive--that being, well, anything. Soon, instead of waiting for nature to provide a nice roasted corpse, they started getting their own. They invented weapons. They created macho rituals surrounding the hunting of larger and larger animals to slice up and eat.

And it was good.

Really, I'm a vegetarian, and I think this was good. Our ancestors survived, and it was good, and all those lives that were sacrificed to keep the human race going were not lost in vain. Humans, being very clever and resourceful animals, made use of all parts of the animals—the bones, the fur, the teeth, the flesh. In a way, much of our civilization is based on what we created from animals. We should be grateful. And for a long time, we were.

But things got easier, the weather got warmer, and humans got smarter. Soon, somebody figured out that, if we can do it with plants, we can do with animals. And the first domesticated animals for eating came about. Yay. Now we don't even have to risk our lives to get a chop or a steak—just go out in the back field and kill a sheep or cow.

And more time passed, and things got easier. Sooner or later, you didn't even have to kill your own sheep or cow. You had a butcher to do that for the entire village. You'd go to his shop, and see the bloody carcasses hanging in all their glory, and wow, you had dinner for a month.

When I decided to become a vegetarian, the process for acquiring meat was thus: pick up the phone. Dial restaurant of choice. Order. Pay money. Meat of some variety (usually in the form of pizza or Chinese food) will come to your house in under 30 minutes, or it's on us!

The day I became a vegetarian, I thought a lot about cave men. About what it took to acquire and prepare meat to consume. I thought a lot about what it meant to take another life—to hunt, kill, and slaughter another living creature.

And I thought about what I, personally, would be able to kill.

Plants? Unfortunately, yes. They are so far from what I understand as sentient that I can do it. And please don't start on screaming vegetables, etc. I know they are alive. I am aware of this. And it sickens me that anything has to die so I can live, even a potato.

Fish? Yes. I fished when I was a kid. I went crawfishing at my grandfather's pond, and ran crab lines in the Gulf of Mexico. I knew how to catch them and clean them, and I knew precisely what it meant to look into the eyes of the creature you were about to eat.

Chicken? Um, no. I have never been a fan of chickens, per se. They're mean, nasty, smelly birds who will peck you as soon as say hello. They're loud and bothersome. But kill one? Me? Take my hands and kill a chicken? Not going to happen.

Same with pigs, goats, cows, you name it.

And I decided that day, May 15, 1999, that unless I was prepared to look it in the eye, kill it, clean it, and cook it, I didn't have the right to eat it.

I also decided that if the next Ice Age came and the only thing between me and starvation was my ability to off a chicken, that bird was going down.

But we're not there yet.

A Tale of Two (sorta Three or Four) Restaurants

One of the best things about weekends (well, the weekend after payday, that is) is that we get to eat out more than once. It's our big thing, our entertainment for the week. And now that Fey is thoroughly committed to the idea of trying every good restaurant in Louisville, weekends are an adventure.

Friday was especially sweet, since a friend of the family fixed my car and it's running the best it has in five years. We decided to start at the beginning of Fey's Big List with Amici in Old Louisville. Amici was a lesson for us, because we refused to listen to our instincts.

Fey didn't like the place from the moment we entered--the decor, the feel, the prices. I wanted to give it a break (although I'm sure the fact that I didn't feel like getting back out into Friday night traffic might have had something to do with it.) I was incredibly unimpressed with the service--our server actually forgot my drink order while bringing Fey's. I eventually had to get another server to bring me my drink.

We discussed our options over bad cheese biscuits and cold Italian bread. Should we stay? Should we try someplace else? Eventually, we decided to use our Super Secrit Appetizer Test. You see, if a questionable restaurant doesn't win us over with appetizers, we pay our bill and head out to another restaurant for entrees.

I got the cream of mushroom soup (around $3.50) and Fey got the antipasto ($11.50). My first bite of soup was not inspiring--there was an odd taste to it, which could have been oil or something. However, each successive bite got better until the overall taste rating was satisfactory to me. Fey's antipasto was...well, uninspired. But it had the benefit of having the "best mozzarrella" she'd ever tasted. So here we were, at a crossroads. Do we give the place a chance based on decent, but not overly inspired appetizers? At this point, it behooves me to admit, I was swayed by their vegetarian offerings. It's the rare Italian restaurant where I have the opportunity to eat something besides spaghetti marinara, and the thought of vegan pizza or vegan meatballs had me tempted.

So, we decided to go for it.

Bad idea.

The first rule of Eating Healthy is "If you have to try too hard, it's not worth it." In other words, vegan meatballs and whole wheat spaghetti may be much better for you than the real deal, but it's a rare chef who can make them taste good. And the chef at Amici did not pass this test. Fact is, there is enough wiggle room in Italian cuisine that a great chef can offer tasty vegetarian options without resorting to bad commercial pasta and meatballs made from (among other things) Gimme Lean sausage mix. Still, I have no one to blame but myself for this meal. My gut told me to stick with regular pasta marinara, but I just had to try the "healthy stuff." My bad. Won't make that mistake (to the tune of $14.00) again.

Fey opted for something a little less healthy, the Orchard Pork Medallions. At $17.50, this entree looked at least interesting. The menu described it as "Pan seared pork medallions served with caramelized onions, Anjou pears and an apple-cider brandy reduction served with flavorful horseradish mashed potatoes." According to Fey, the flavor combinations did not work at all, the reduction was thin and watery and more apple juice than reduction. To my non-carnivore eyes, it looked...well, yucky. It was brown and goopy and had no structure at all. It looked like everything was just thrown together. Now, as a good Cajun girl, I know ugly food can be delicious. But Fey assured me, this was not the case with the pork medallions.

We left most of our entrees on our plate. Amici tries, which I like, to offer options to its customers. It tries, which I like, to recognize diners with food restrictions.

Ultimately, however, Amici fails on execution. Fifty dollars later, we left unsatisfied, disappointed, and feeling pretty stupid for ignoring our better sense. Scratch that one off the list. We wound up at Varanese for mocha crème brulee and pampering from the awesome staff there. It was ten dollars of comfort (since we didn't actually eat our entrees at Amici, I didn't begrudge myself the calories) to counterbalance a very upsetting dinner.

So, burned and stinging, we roll into Saturday not really excited about our prospects. Fey did her research--checked reviews, checked prices, checked everything--and we settled on North End Cafe. This was perfect. I knew where it was, so no chance of getting lost on the way. The food looked safe enough. And I'd heard good things about it.

Seems the entire restaurant (we learned after our hour long drive up from Elizabethtown) was booked for a private party. Too bad the management didn't bother to put a sign on the door. I only figured this out when I saw the wedding book on the table and asked a server, "hey, um, is this a private party?" Yeah. Move North End Cafe a little lower on the To-Do List.

After some soul-searching and a stilted conversation with a clerk at a convenience store, we decided to head out to Bardstown Road and try out Dakshin Indian Restaurant. At this point, it was 10 pm on a Saturday night, we were both exhausted and hungry. Needless to say, when we pulled up into a strip mall and saw the cheesy neon sign, our spirits were a little dashed. Fey went in to check out the lay of the land.

When she exited, her exact comment was this: "It smells like heaven in there, but I hate the atmosphere." I parked the car. I wasn't about to let something like atmosphere keep me from a place that smelled "like heaven." (Oddly enough, we recounted later, Amici didn't have a smell at all. That's not a really good sign, is it, in retrospect?)

And Fey was right. The atmosphere was a bit cheesy, with the enormous flat screen televisions playing Bollywood music videos and the booths that seemed a bit reminescent of a Luther's BBQ from the 80s. But, lord have mercy, it smelled good.

Another positive sign--there wasn't a single white person in the room except us. And the menu did not offer any explanations as to the food. Any restaurant that assumes you already know what all the exotic stuff on the menu is...well, it's catering to people who know the cuisine. Good sign.

Bad for us, though. Fey asked the incredibly attentive server if he had a "white girl's menu" or if he could help us make sense of the numerous options. An older menu was quickly produced, that had descriptions of the offerings. We got vegetable samosas ($3.99) to share, as well as aloo naan ($2.50). The samosas were spicy enough to have a kick, but not so spicy as to burn our mouths, and the texture was perfect. I wasn't as happy with the veggie pakoras ($3.99), but that's probably because I bit into a big hunk of bell pepper, which I loathe. Of course, the non-bell pepper portion of the pakora was wonderful--Fey and I both loved it. The naan was delicious--crispy and flavorful and satisfying.

For entrees, Fey stayed with the tandoori chicken ($9.99), which came in a generous portion on a sizzling platter and looked perfectly cooked to me. Fey pronounced it the best tandoori she'd ever had, and praised it no end. I went with the vegetable pulao with korma ($6.99). I will admit that I was a wimp and was not able to eat it all--it was a little on the spicy side. However, the flavor of what I could eat was so delicious that I couldn't bear not to take it home and try to, well, wimp it down as a leftover. Yes, I'm offended with my own limp palate, but I digress.

In the end, we were stuffed (even with me bringing the bulk of my entree home) and our bill came only to about $40 (with tip).

The moral of our tale, boys and girls? Go with your gut. And if a place smells like heaven, try it out.

I am such a geek!

There are some things in the world that I love--food and history rank at the top of the list. When I find something combines the two, I get all twittery. And the good people at Botham Bakery in the UK have provided us with A History of Bread.



Ahhh....



I think I know what I'll be reading this weekend.



Yes, I am a dork.

Flashback: Old Skool Ain't Always Bad

I have this craving for the new and exciting. It's a Gemini thing--always seeking that which is new and different and kinda scary/weird/cool to experience.


But while my Sun and Ascendent are in the air, my Moon is solidly ensconced in Capricorn, and there is a huge part of me that just loves traditional places and foods. Which brings me to Stone Hearth. When we first moved to Kentucky, I was terrified that my days of eating in decent restaurants was over (little did I know then of the thriving food scene in Louisville). I was certain my dining choices would be limited to fast food chains and flavor-free buffets stuffed with overcooked veggies and loads of fried meat-substances.


There was one place in Elizabethtown, however, call Stone Hearth. We avoided it at first, mainly because it looked expensive and we were not exactly rolling in the dough. However, when I got a steady job the school board, my boss took me to lunch at Stone Hearth for Secretaries Day.


I have to admit, my first thought after lunch was, I need to get Fey in here.


Since that first encounter, Stone Hearth has become one of our places in E-town, somewhere to go for a good meal, great service, and fantastic decor without having to drive to Louisville. The food is consistently good, and while the prices are slightly higher than your average chain...so is the quality.


But we were talking about traditional things, and that is the focus of this article. Stone Hearth is traditional. It's Old Skool (as they say): white tablecloths, crystal glasses, low lighting. Your entrees are brought out on a rolling cart. The salad bar is decorated with floral arrangements. The soundtrack (at a tasteful volume) is right out of my parents' vinyl collection- Frankie, Deano, and Rosemary Clooney...with the occasional Micheal Buble thrown in for good measure. I often suspect mob deals are being made back in one of those dark, dark booths.


Granted, this is the sort of restaurant my grandparents frequented. And you know, that's not such a bad thing. There's a lot to be said for old-fashioned service, solid menu items, and a dignified atmosphere.


We always try to order an appetizer, when the budget allows. Fey's favorites are the brie-filled phyllo tarts and the Red and White crab dip (oooh, those lavash crackers are to die for!). I loved the portabello fries when they have them, although it's kinda on the Do Not Indulge list now.


The core of Stone Hearth's menu, though, is high-end Middle America—beef, chicken and other meats. They do have a fairly decent seafood section, particularly the salmon. I had it grilled for supper one night, and I was stunned at how good it turned out. (We live in Kentucky—not exactly the place to get fresh fish.) Fey usually orders the prime rib (which they will trim to her satisfaction), however last night she got the crab-crusted salmon in lobster bisque, which was absolutely delicious. The salmon was perfectly cooked, the crab cakes were crispy and not too bready, and the lobster bisque was delicious.

Dessert comes offered on a doily-lined tray, usually when you are so stuffed you don't even want to think about not-actually-Derby Pie, or Italian Wedding Cake, or that delicious hand-whipped cream topping which Fey sometimes just orders on the side by itself.

Of course, during it all, your servers (ask for Marie—she's awesome and tells great stories) bring you bread. An entire article could be written about Stone Hearth's bread. First you're given a warm, home-made roll with strawberry butter. Later, you get what I believe they call a butterflake roll. It's the unholy love child of a croissant, a muffin, and a dinner roll, and it's addictively evil. These are my downfall, especially when I'm trying to control calories and portion sizes. I could forego dessert for two more of these things. Seriously.

In the end, though, the best thing that sells Stone Hearth is the service. We go often enough to have our favorites, and the staff know us and our food issues. Jennifer last night, remembered our drink orders (I always get Diet Pepsi and Fey, unsweetened iced tea) from Christmas. Marie, as I mentioned before, is a pro with a fantastic European accent and a warm and funny personality. Paul and Charles always make us feel like old friends, and well…you get the message.

Stone Hearth is a little oasis of civility in an increasingly crass and thoughtless world. It may be old-fashioned with perhaps not the most cutting edge of cuisine, but that's not such a horrible thing, is it? There's a lot to be said for the way things were, and when nostalgia tastes this good, I'm all for it.

Little Lost Cajun in Kentucky

A few weeks ago, Fey and I tried a Louisville Cajun restaurant called Furlong's. I liked it so much, I wrote a post about it on LouisvilleHotBytes. Lo and behold, the owner is a member there, and posted my review on their website! Oh, yeah, I've finally found my calling. Writing about food.

Us vs. Natural Disasters: The Deathmatch

I hardly expected my first post here to be about natural disasters, but there you are. I have spent the last week camped out on a sofa at my partner Fey's grandmother's house thanks to what has been dubbed "Ice Storm 2009" by the local media. Yup, in the course of a day or so, 500,000 homes and businesses in Kentucky were frozen dark, roads made slick with black ice, trees bent into gnarled, frozen arches over power lines.

Yeah, it was fun. And I still (seven days later) do not have power.

What does this have to do with food, you ask? Lots. You see, I grew up in Louisiana, Where Hurricanes Come to Party. And when you grow up in a hurricane strike zone, you learn a little bit about survival. And the first key to survival (after weatherproofing your house and stocking up on C and AA batteries) is acquiring Disaster Food.

Disaster Food is a cuisine specific to those areas of the world where weather turns nasty. It is designed to be edible regardless of how long the lights are out, and laughs in the face of stoves gathering dust and refrigerators that are warmer on the inside than outside.

Traditional Disaster Food includes such wonderful, non-perishable foodstuffs as dry cereal (sweet, of course, so you don't need milk), junk food, chips, canned meats, dried foods like jerky, bagged popcorn, and that sort of thing. Pop-Tarts and Cap'n Crunch Peanut Butter Crunch were always my Disaster Food of Choice.

But this recent disaster, Ice Storm 2009 (sounds like it should have theme music, doesn't it?) has thrown me for a loop. Why? Well, first, I no longer eat meat (except for fish, which means I forfeit the luxury of using the convenient term "vegetarian"). Second, I got the fool idea in my head round about October 2008 that I would start eating healthier.

The good news is that I've lost 25 pounds, feel better, and my doctor is once again speaking to me civilly. The bad news is that, when disaster strikes, I'm hard up for food.

On about Day Two of Ice Storm 2009 (I'm thinking something John Williamsy for the theme music—lots of strings and winds…), Fey and I went to the local store to find supplies as our two weeks worth of groceries languished in a refrigerator we no longer dared enter. The first challenge lay in finding a store that was open. Our regular haunts were closed—no power, no DSL to transmit credit card payments, etc. Finally, we found ourselves at one of the smaller, local grocers.

When shopping for Disaster Food, you need to have your wits about you. It's a difficult task, fraught with pitfalls and foolish temptations. The first thing you have to do is shake yourself out of panic mode. It's easy to think, when a hurricane the size of Texas is heading for your back door or seventeen inches of snow is expected to blanket your little hamlet overnight, "Oh, lordy, I'm never gonna get out of here alive." That's when you go into panic mode. You start grabbing—Spam, Cheeze Whiz, store brand toaster pastries—this is the stuff God put in this store to help you survive. These are the things that will keep you from becoming part of the marauding band of post-apocalyptic zombies smashing their way through the countryside, devouring all that is Good and Righteous.

Panic mode lasts anywhere from five minutes to two hours, depending on your temperament. Then you look at your overflowing cart and, if you're lucky, come to your senses. It's then that you start examining each item for its usefulness and, perhaps, lightening the load.

Fey and I managed to get most of the Little Debbie snack cakes out of the cart before we checked out, and I sacrificed the dollar-shelf tin of sesame snack mix (in favor of a larger tin of roasted peanuts). We nixed the counter grill because (a) we had nowhere to use it in our townhouse and (b) neither of us know the first thing about charcoal grilling. I didn't budge, however, on the Lance's Cream Cheese and Chive Crackers, and Fey didn't give me a choice on the Peanut M&Ms.

Still, there are ways of eating at least a little bit healthy when you're in the throes of Nature's Wrath. Fruit (fresh if you can get it, dried if you can stand it) and nuts are always good items. I've been living off a bag of red apples from the local discount store all week—they're good for me and keep my hands off the Little Debbie Swiss Rolls. Fey made good use of a summer sausage and a box of low-fat Triscuits.

We did not, however, get the PopTarts or Cap'N Crunch.

We are grown-ups, you know.

So, one week later, I'm four pounds heavier (my salad mixings went bad on Day Three, and it's hard to exercise on ice unless you're Nancy Kerrigan). I've eaten more food than I normally do, and I'm ready for the ice to melt and the power to come back on.

Disasters were much more fun when I was a kid.