Too Much.

Boiler House Texas Grill & Wine Garden
312 Pearl Parkway, Building 3

(way in the back, towards the River, behind the CIA)

No doubt the re-developers of the Pearl Brewery complex heartily welcome this trend-following down-home-chic new restaurant. Any addition to their tenant rolls is surely welcome; one that has cachet especially so, as it will draw both locals and tourists, and tourist visits will lend specious justification to the strong desire to snuffle around in the public trough for a ridiculous streetcar line on Broadway (as if tourists are stupid enough to walk three blocks in the summer heat). 

Well, the restaurants and bars at the Pearl are also sufficiently au courant to draw tne New-Age Masters of the local Universe, so this place fits right in, another gilt lily in the bouquet.

It got off to a bad start at the door. I can understand the hostess asking if I had a reservation, because sometimes people with reservations, who arrive to find a restaurant half-empty, don't mention the fact, and the house ends up needlessly keeping a table out of circulation. But when I said no, the young lady asked for a last name. Okay, I thought, a little odd that she'd specify a last name; maybe all those empty tables over there are reserved, and there's actually a waiting list consisting of those three couples at the bar. So I gave her my last name. 

Then she asked for my first name. Hmmm, I thought; my last name is not exactly uncommon; it's possible that someone with the same last name is already on the list. Okay, I gave her my first name. 

Then she said she needed a phone number.

Alright, the light bulb popped on: this is a marketing scheme. No, you can't have my f***ing phone number. You don't need to call me, I'm right here waiting to be seated.

Trying hard to not be in a bad mood (and, to my own surprise, generally succeeding), I and my wife followed the young lady to a table off to the side, where I was able to sit with my back to the television. A lot of good it did: in that half-lit space, the screen was blindingly bright as a searchlight scanning the sky, or one of those irritating new LED billboards along a freeway at night, and its flickering glare reflected off everything in the room.

The menus feature a lot of wines, as one would expect in a "wine garden." I'm not a big wine drinker, but I do like the occasional glass with a nice meal. I skipped to the food listings, to get some idea of what my choice might be before selecting something to complement the meal. I had come to this new restaurant because it showed up on the list of steak houses on Urbanspoon as a three-dollar-sign place, and because I had never heard of it, and don't like the idea of restaurants sneaking into my part of town without my knowledge.* The menu listed a couple of appetizers, seven small plates, five sides, and a half-dozen large plates, in addition to the "boiler cuts," which included a few steak options.

A grilled snapper topped that list, stuffed with crab for $50 ... on my menu. On my wife's, we discovered, the same dish was $32. The cheapest steak was antelope, for $44 ($41 on my wife's menu.) There was also an over-large steak for somewhere north of $90. So the viable choices for plain ol' beef steak were narrowed down to a ribeye, a New York Strip, and a filet mignon, each priced at more than $40: in other words, way beyond anything I'd have been willing to pay for a piece of meat unaccompanied by a glass of bourbon, a good cigar, and a massage with a happy ending. Plus, I was upset that, in the few weeks this joint had been open, the prices had already been bumped up, sometimes dramatically. So we decided to split a couple of small plates and a side, and made our choices accordingly. (And we had learned a lesson the last time we went to one of these modern-day tapas houses: there are very few drinks that go nicely with everything you order, so unless you plan to change wines (or beers) with each dish, it's better to stick to basics: water, or iced tea.)

The waitress (the only completely competent part of the service at the Boiler House) informed us that the dishes would be brought out as they came ready in the kitchen. This is an irksome trend in restaurants, at best a case of making lemonade out of lemons; it lets the business get by with a smaller kitchen staff, and obviates the need to hire those who learned that lesson in cookin' school on how to make things come out at the same time. It is another way of cutting operating costs at the employees' expense. It was charming when I encountered the practice at Feast; it was already tedious by the time I encountered it at the Monterey; now it's just downright slack, another silly trend that is ripe to find itself in the dustbin of fashion, but will probably continue.

The first small plate to drift out of the kitchen was pork pincitos, a pretty white plate with two skewers, each impaling a dozen or so small pieces of pig meat and lying in a green sauce applied with a minimalist's hand, and what looked and tasted like some home-grown artisan cilantro. The presentation was elegant, and the meat was nicely grilled, with a crusty seasoned coating along the edges, but too fatty. Way too fatty.

No city inspection yet.

The next thing that came out from the kitchen (after a longer interlude than I would have liked) was an order of clams casino. This was a compromise dish for us: it wasn't something either of us particularly wanted, but of the choices available it was sort of a least-bad option. (I wonder whether there's really much of a market for "bison Tartare.") There were six clams on a bed of seaweed, which our waitress admitted was edible, "but I wouldn't recommend it." The shellfish were prepared with a breadcrumb crust and a good blend of seasonings, and were almost worth the price charged ($11). But too salty. Way too salty.

Finally came the side dish we'd ordered, zucchini with quinoa and golden raisins. Here, at least, was a dish that was worth what they were asking for it ($8). It had an excellent taste, with the zucchini not overdone and the quinoa simmered to perfection. It was almost perfectly prepared, except that it was too oily. Way too oily.

I have no use for this place. Its appeal is all newness and snobby chic. Next time I want a steak, I'll drive out past the Loop and go to Outback or something like that. If I want a nice wine selection, there are a dozen good places out there (the closest being, I think, 20Nine, at the Quarry). Likewise if I just want elaborate artistry in the preparation of the food: you can't swing a dead armadillo in this town without hitting a place like that. And if I want tapas ... well, I've enjoyed the other such places I've been to in town, certainly more than I enjoyed this one, but frankly have found them all to share the flaw of a too-limited menu. Five or seven small plates isn't enough, especially if they're only on the menu to impress the clientèle with the chef's imagination in the fusion of exotic ingredients and his use of white space on the plate. There need to be twenty-five to forty choices to make the small-plates idea work well; and that, in turn, requires a chef who not only can create inspired dishes, or what passes these days for inspired dishes, but also can manage the menu with an eye toward the bottom line. It is possible, you know, to have a twenty-five-option small-plate menu and still not have to stock an entire HEB in the back room. 

 

* I generally don't go to new places until
they've lost their new-car smell, but had
recently been to the only other steak houses
in the area.

Skip Dessert

Two Step Restaurant & Cantina
9840 North Loop 1604 West

(at Braun Road, on the Northwest Side)

I have a friend, Roland, who lives out in the suburban sprawl of the northwest side, in one of those indistinguishably attractive, oak-studded subdivisions that litter the ground where the grid of streets in the older part of town gives way. He and I and my side-kick Rick made plans to see the new Bond flick, Skyfall, and since Roland has had surgery recently and can't drive, we went out to collect him. We had planned to have lunch at a restaurant near the theater, but some last-minute discussion revealed that none of us was really interested in the place we had planned on. Roland had been there numerous times and pronounced it "okay," hardly a recommendation; Rick had chosen it from a short-list I'd provided after half an hour's research on options in that area; and I had included it on the short-list because it was hyped as a "New Orleans-style cafe." Being a native Orleanian, I was interested. But then I found out that it's a chain restaurant outlet with no connection to New Orleans beyond the fancy of some Hollywood entrepreneur, and anyone who's read more than a couple of the reviews on this site knows that I consider chain restaurants to be the culinary equivalent of relative-humanist Tee-Ball. You know: everybody's good, nobody's better than anybody else, and everybody gets a trophy. A chain restaurant's fine when you're in a strange town at dinnertime, or when reliability is more important that artistry. Maybe someday I'll go to that "New Orleans-style cafe," but not this trip.

So instead, we pulled into Two Step Restaurant & Cantina. I had only heard of the place because someone connected to the place had sent me an email a while back, inviting me to have lunch on the house. I declined that offer, on the probably spurious ground that someone might actually rely on these restaurant reviews, and the appearance of improper influence is every bit as inimical as actual improper influence.* So we had to pay for our lunches.

The place itself is in a couple of buildings surviving from one of the earliest settlements in the area, built about 1870 and subsequently joined together in a full re-modelling. The result is quite pleasant in concept and execution. You enter through a bar that is thoroughly Texan in appearance and atmosphere, if not in size, and have the choice of inside or outside seating in the dining area. The outdoors would be nice in the afternoon, except that the proximity of Loop 1604 makes me think the traffic noise may be too bothersome. (Nothing that a nice limestone wall wouldn't resolve....) On a late morning in November, though, it was just a little too cool to sit out there. But we sat by the large glass overhead doors that open onto the patio, so we got a lot of the effect without the chill or the traffic. Other parts of the dining room seemed as nice, being cozily dark and maintaining the bare limestone walls all round.

The service was as good as the atmosphere. We were greeted by a down-home-friendly someone who seemed to be the head honcho, offered a choice of seating, and given a quick run-down of things we might want to know. Our wants were looked after by a crew of uniformed staff (the uniform being house-logo T-shirts, and jeans): the guy from the front desk, and our particular waitress, Melissa, both of whom were attentive, helpful and charming; plus an assortment of less cheerful functionaries, who delivered this or that item and seemed to be in some kind of daze, as though they were not accustomed to daylight.

Our choices from the menu began with bacon-wrapped brisket-habanero stuffed jalapeños, an appetizer that comes with the warning of being "Super HOT!" They weren't. They were mildly piquant. The jalapeños themselves were large and slightly undercooked (which I liked, but Rick didn't), stuffed with the advertised mixture of shredded brisket with a dose of habanero that was too trivial to thrill. The whole thing was wrapped in a spiral of crisp bacon. Despite the disappointing lack of spicy heat, the overall taste and texture were both excellent.

Roland is on a special diet by his doctor's orders (the kind that would make me reconsider the morality of euthanasia, but it doesn't seem to phaze him), so he had only a house salad with vinaigrette dressing. He had no comment about it, but it looked very much like my salad, the "Texas-Sized Two-Step Salad," with a meat topping of choice: salmon, chicken or blackened catfish. I picked the salmon, which is billed as "cured house-smoked." I'm guessing that after they smoke it (which they do quite well) they keep it refrigerated at a very low temperature, because the meat is extremely dense and served very cold. Once I got past the jarring chill of it, I decided that it was done well, with a deep smoky flavour that complemented the innate salmon taste. There was enough of it, too, to satisfy. The greens underneath were reasonably fresh and varied, and included little bits of lagniappe like pumpkin seeds, corn, bacon and half a boiled egg. I chose the honey mustard dressing, which had the appearance and flavour of an in-house creation.

Rick's choice was the pulled pork sandwich, with french fries. It turned out to be a pretty good version of the classic sandwich, with plenty of tender lean pork and an excellent barbecue sauce, served on the side; and the bun was fresh and soft. The fries had an excellent flavour, and were fried to a nice crispness, though they were clearly of the pre-fab sort that arrive in a freezer pack already blanched.

Last city inspection: May 2012
26 demerits

It being five o'clock somewhere, Rick and I both indulged in frozen margaritas. These turned out to be somewhat pale and thick machined concoctions, with little flavour. And after the meal, Rick was unable to resist the offer of a slice of lemon-lime cheesecake. I thought it was reasonably good, with a nice tartness and a fair texture, though Rick considered it insufficiently creamy. The crust had coconut in it, which added an interesting element, and which I enjoyed. However, both these items — the drinks and the dessert — were seriously overpriced. The margaritas, at $7.25, were a good 40% more than I think would have been the norm for drinks of that size and modest quality; and the dessert, which I considered at the time "a four-dollar slice of cheesecake," was priced at $5.95, nearly 50% more than I think it should have been. The prices of the other items are only slightly above what I'm accustomed to paying for comparable food elsewhere; close enough to call the high side of reasonable; but those drink and dessert prices take the overall rating for value below an acceptable level, I'm sorry to say.

So I would recommend Two-Step only to people who don't drink, and who don't eat dessert. Other than that, it's pretty good.

on Yelp!

* This is why I didn't go into politics.
My friend Roland thought I was too full of myself, and said that he'd have accepted the offer and then written an honest review. I would have liked to have done that, but can't honestly be sure it would be possible. So it set me back, I don't know, twenty bucks?

Ouch!

Bakery Lorraine
511 East Grayson Street

(a short way east of Broadway)

The foodie community, which I reluctantly admit to being a less-than-fully-devoted groupie of, has been a-buzz lately with praise for this new venture in the fringe of the up-and-coming area around the Pearl Brewery. It was inevitable that I, who am helpless before a display of baked goods, would make my way there sooner rather than later. It all just sounded so good!

The two people behind the little business met while working together in northern California. One of them — her, I think, but I could be mis-remembering, and don't care enough to look it up, even though it would probably be only a matter of forty seconds and two, maybe three clicks of the mouse — anyway, one of them had the good taste, or good luck, to be from San Antonio, so they came here to dip their toes in the entrepreneurial waters. Well, 'cuz it's such a classy town and all. Or something like that.

Anyway. I first heard of them in connection with the Farmers' Market operating at the Quarry on Sundays, and read some excited puff-piece in (probably) the local disreputable weekly throwaway rag. Sounded good, it really did; but I have better things to do of a Sunday morning than go traipsing out to the Quarry when it would likely be crowded: the English Premier League is on TV on Sunday mornings. So I never actually got over there to experience the goodies that induced such undignified passion in the writer.

Then here comes news that they have a bricks-and-mortar location all their own, on Grayson Street. Closed Mondays, which is damned inconsiderate of them, but they're probably not soccer fans, and one must make allowances for such people. So it was a Tuesday, when I happened to be in the area anyway, that I finally encountered Bakery Lorraine.

A smell can be a powerful provacatrix. Some mornings, stepping out out into my back yard early in the morning, the whiff of a certain timbre of diesel fumes from the avenue instantly and unfailingly reminds me of Guanajuato, Mexico, one of my favourite places In The Whole World. (You know it's a magical place, when something as pungent as diesel fumes can evoke fond memories. But then, as my dog says, there are no good smells or bad smells; there are only smells.) Stepping into Bakery Lorraine, I was immediately and powerfully reminded of another place, a tiny boulangerie in a small town somewhere in Haute-Savoie. I haven't been there in decades, and haven't thought about it in nearly that long, but the aroma at Bakery Lorraine took me back there instantly.

Last city inspection: October 2012
3 demerits

It's not a particularly large variety of goodies on display in the fairly small double case that presents itself to the arriving customer. I'd say it has a capacity of less than a third of what you would find on offer at, say, the Bistro Bakery in Olmos Circle (which, however, lacks that evocative aroma of France, as well as the exceptional American pleasantry of the staff); and at that hour of the morning, around 10AM, it looked to have been pretty well picked over. But everything that survived the morning rush looked perfect, as though any croissant with slightly too much or too little golden brown crust, or any macaron with even the tiniest bulge or bump, would have been tossed in a bin out back.  There would, of course, be a thorough investigation to attribute responsibility, but that would take place in discreet privacy. Perfection, I'd say, is the watch-word here.

An admirable goal, but not one yet attained, in my estimation. I sampled three of the offerings that morning, and found one approaching perfection, one perfect in some ways, and one noticeably falling short.

The best of the buy was a morning bun, a spiral of dough with cinnamon and a generous sprinkling of sugar. The dough had a density to it that I found truly enjoyable, and the cinnamon-sugar that had pooled at the bottom during baking had cooled into a slightly chewy, slightly sticky ribbon that any child, even one as old as me, would love.

Next-best was the pain au chocolat, a traditional French pastry made from the same kind of buttery laminated dough as a croissant, but differently shaped (which only slightly affects the resulting texture). Normally, in making these pastries, the dough is rolled around a baton of chocolate; if that's the way Bakery Lorraine does it, something went wrong, as the chocolate was in three separate parts, as though two chocolate chips and half a baton had been used. I found the chocolate flavour rather ordinary, detracting from the overall experience.

The least pleasing of the three items I tried was, to my surprise, the tart. I chose an "Almond Joy" tart, made with chocolate filling in a roughly four-inch shell, topped with whipped cream, almonds and a sprinkle of shredded coconut. The shell was excellent: dense and firm, as it should be, with a clear buttery flavour. Other than that, though, the piece seemed unremarkable. The consistency of the chocolate filling struck me as being exactly that of the sugar-free instant pudding you get out of a Hill Country Foods box; and the whipped cream seemed to lack, oddly, creaminess.

If I had paid ordinary prices for these things, I'd have been reasonably satisfied with Bakery Lorraine, overall. But the pain au chocolat was four dollars, as was the morning bun. The tart, at $6, provokes the title of this post. This place is expensive. And for the kind of money you will spend at Bakery Lorraine, I think you have a right to expect better than I found there.

on Yelp!

A Taco Alternative?

The Donut Palace
1583 Thousand Oaks

(a couple of blocks east of U.S. 281)

Few things in the realm of food can count as a substitute for that San Antonio staple, the sacred breakfast taco. Donuts are among those few. This morning, heading out to the wilds of Government Canyon, and knowing that there are very few acceptable breakfast options along the way, we stopped in at this traditional little donut shop in the 281 corridor. It's just far enough off the freeway to have escaped the mercilessly crass commercialism on view there, tucked into the endcap of a little strip center filled with stores of a decidedly quirky  bent. 

We immediately rejected the kolaches. They appeared to all be of the pig-in-a-blanket variety, which holds no attraction to someone like me, who has been to West and eaten sausage-jalapeño kolaches of heavenly consistency, even day-old. I never cared too much for the link sausage wrapped in what seems to me to be refrigerator-case biscuit mix, and, I'm sorry, but a little jalapeño ain't gonna make that enough-better.

Last city inspection: March 2011
a perfect score!

We both went instead for the breakfast-sandwich croissant, which despite being re-heated in a microwave was quite good. The croissant itself was flaky and buttery; the egg, too, tasted of butter; the cheese was, well, ordinary, and the sausage (patty, not link) was reasonably good. I tried an apple fritter, too, which had the delicious texture of a cinnamon pull-apart bun, but almost no apple flavour to it. My friend Rick tried a chocolate glazed donut, which he pronounced better than Krispy Kreme. Considering that he dislikes Krispy Kreme, that could either be a plaudit, or the damnation of faint praise.

The coffee had a remarkably strong nut flavour without being in the least acidic or bitter. That alone would justify a recommendation for this little hole-in-the-wall, with its two tiny tables. But I'd still rather have tacos.

on Yelp!

Not Quite Guilt-Free

Souper Salad
5222 De Zavala Road

(just east of I-10, near Vance-Jackson)

I have a good friend who has recently been placed on a strict diet by his doctor. I went to have lunch with him — my friend, not his doctor — and salad was the order of the day. So I got on Urbanspoon, my preferred web site for such purposes, and found, much to my surprise, that there are very few salad-oriented selections out in his part of town. I don't know what I was expecting; I guess I just thought that all those young-professional types that make our sprawling modern suburban areas sprawl were going about munching on lettuce leaves and sprouts all the time. But of the 26 restaurants listed in the area under the "salad" heading, Souper Salad was the only place that offers leafy greens as its main focus. Perhaps someone of an entrepreneurial bent will smell an opportunity.

So: Souper Salad, by default.

My entirely reasonable prejudice, based on a lifetime of experience, against chain restaurants extends as much to Souper Salad as any other. I've been to a few locations, including another here in San Antonio, and have never been impressed. On the other hand, I've never been particularly revolted.

You get what you expect at Souper Salad, and a few little extras of an inexpensive and nutritionally questionable variety. Besides the big bowl of cut lettuce, there's a couple of Romaine salads, and the more irresistible and fattening things, like potato salad and pasta salad. All the usual toppings are available to jazz up your rabbit food, from red onion and peppers to various seeds, and other things suitable for scattering on the pile, including a good number of drizzly things to give it a little moisture. I was pleasantly surprised to find a low-cal Italian and a low-cal Ranch. A dieter's wet dream.

The buffet line is colourful and conscientiously attended, being kept clean, well-stocked and reasonably fresh. (In fact, I would say it is kept cleaner at this location than has been my experience elsewhere.) My only complaint is that most things are found only on one side of the buffet table or the other; and since customers tend to leave the tongs lying on the side of the food containers nearest to themselves, people on the other side can't easily reach these implements. I have arms just long enough to span the distance, with an unseemly and graceless lurch under the sneeze-guard; but most people, I'm sure, would absolutely have to go down both sides of the buffet in order to get all the things they want. 

Last city inspection: September 2012
a perfect score!

I was pleasantly surprised to find four soups on offer; two is, I think, the norm (although maybe the name of the place would be a clue here). I chose a meatball soup which, other than an excess of salt, was quite good, even considering how long these dishes have to be kept out on the serving line. There was also a good selection of breads, of which I chose cornbread and, as a treat, a small square of gingerbread. The cornbread was about as good as you could expect from a mass-production facility, but the gingerbread, sadly, turned out to be the low spot of the meal. To say it was rock hard would be an exaggeration; it was only drywall-hard, and only on top, I know not why. 

Pigging out on salad is just as bad as pigging out on any other type of food, but easy to do, and it's a relatively low-guilt indulgence. You think "I'll just have a tiny bit of this, and this, and this," and before you know it you're having to get a staff member to help carry your tray. But you don't feel bad, because it's just salad. And a sprinkle of cheese. Some chopped egg. A little soup, with beef and rice in it. A couple of small slices of thin-crust pizza. The bread, and the pasta salad, and potato salad (made with mustard, so of course it's like no calories). And then you can go back as many times as you like, plus there's desserts: cookies and puddings and non-dairy frozen stuff that comes out of an extruder, and all kinds of things to sprinkle on top of that.... 

If you're going to Souper Salad for lunch, you will get reasonably good food at a reasonably good price, and you will eat in a reasonably clean setting with reasonably efficient attendance by waitrons, who will keep you well-stocked with drink, and will keep the dishes from piling up embarrasingly. If you're going because you're on a diet ... well, take your will-power with you. Sadly, I left mine in the car.

Trend-Center

Revolucion
7959 Broadway

(in the back of the shopping center at Sunset)

The atmosphere in this coffee shop brings to mind huarache sandals and folk music. None of those things were in evidence when I visited with my friend Rick the other morning. We found instead a more-or-less ordinary new-age coffee shop with all the usual drinks available, plus a short menu of light, interesting-sounding foods, all variations on the tamale, including vegetarian and vegan options for those who like to talk about their food choices at length to uninterested listeners.*

The woman at the counter was extremely polite, explaining what she was doing in great detail as she entered our orders in her high-tech system. While the technology is still new enough (to me) to excite some mild curiosity, I could frankly care less about what buttons she was pushing, or why; as a customer, my interest extended no farther than hearing my order repeated back to me correctly (as it eventually was) and the correct charge assessed (as it was, in the end). I suspect she was talking as much to herself as to me, but the entire experience was more like a lesson, and one being given to a particularly slow group of third-graders. 

no city inspection listed

The coffee we both ordered took a remarkably long time to arrive, considering that what we had ordered was just plain ol' coffee. Turns out they don't have a pot of plain ol' coffee sitting ready; she had to brew it, and when it came she told us that if we wanted more, we could just let her know and she'd brew us each another cup. They must not get a lot of orders for, you know, regular ol' coffee.

I can't say I'm surprised, since it was assuredly not something I would want a second cup of. But then, my taste in coffees tends towards the weaker end of the spectrum than is popular in the Starbucks Era. I don't like coffee that dissolves utensils, though that seems to be what drives the market.

The food we ordered was certainly interesting. I chose a tamale filled with pork al pastor. Though it was not as big as I'd been led to believe in conversation at the counter ("about the size of a burrito," I'd been told), it was large enough to satisfy an unusually modest appetite. The masa was excellent, as was the filling, with a reasonable amount of meat in an adobo seasoning. The tamale was wrapped in corn husks and served on a small wooden platter. 

Rick chose a tamale of beef tinga, a sort of carne machacado wrapped in banana leaves. As the waitress put the platter down, she cautioned him that the dish was very hot. The masa on his much larger tamale was lighter and moister than on the tamale al pastor. Surprisingly, given the waitress's warning, we found that the filling of the tamale was still frigid. Having been reheated in the microwave at the back of the restaurant, the outside was steaming while the inside was nearly unaffected. Still, the flavour was reasonably good, though I think we both considered sending it back for another zapping. In the end, we didn't bother.

The utensils used at Revolucion are made of wood. Cheap wood. The first few bites, until the fork gets wet from your saliva, are kind of like licking a dry popsicle stick. Distinctly unpleasant. After the fork gets moistened, it's not so bad, but I'd have been happier if they'd spring for some eco-unfriendly plastic, or maybe some genuine metal. 

Coffee shops like this cater, naturally, to people in the local area; few customers are going to cross more than a mile or two of city to reach a place and make it their hangout; I certainly am not going to go back to Revolucion on a regular basis; and frankly, given the mediocrity of the food and strength of the drink, I probably will not go back even when I'm out that way. 

on Yelp!

* as distinct from those of us who prefer to write about it. You don't have to read what I write, but too often you have to listen to what people insist on saying.

Sushi By The Big Hole

Piranha Killer Sushi
260 East Basse Road

(in the Quarry Market, on the side by the Hole in the Ground)

Somebody spent a big pile of money outfitting this place. The cost of turning the old Sugarbakers pink-and-puce estrogen farm into a nearly-elegant über-chic vaguely Asian hard-surface sushi bar must have been enormous, as restaurant start-ups go. The result may prove worth the cost, if the boom in sushi outlasts the stylishness of the place. Though I am a late-comer to the sushi craze (another sure indication, if one is needed, that the fad has just about run its course; for most people, the inclusion, a couple of years ago, of sushi at the all-you-can-eat Asian buffet was sufficient omen), I appreciate the artistry of the compositions, the delicate and often complex weave of flavours, and the grace of dining in these mock-Edo halls. Sushi, as a cuisine, is on the verge, I suspect, of becoming mainstream, which will mean a loss of the marginal excess profits that have been drawing capable restaurateurs to the genre for the last ten or fifteen years. That in turn will mean the closure of some over-extended restaurants, and the middling continuation of the better-financed (or luckier, or timelier) ventures. 

Meanwhile, let's enjoy it. If you like seafood, and raw vegetables, and rice, and cream cheese, and tangy sauces in exotic combination, you like sushi. The novelty may have worn off, or nearly so, but the artistry continues, and while the meals produced at Piranha may not be Rembrandt or Titian equivalents, they are at least as good and as attractive, in the way of food, as the quality art that hangs on the walls in the living rooms of successful corporate officers, or provide gasps of surprise to fans of Antiques Roadshow. 

last city inspection: June 2012
perfect!

Service at Piranha is very good. Our waiter was ready with recommendations — good ones, as it turned out — and his light, conversational tone complemented his professional efficiency. He attended to everything a good waiter attends to, and anticipated our wants with the sort of expertise that speaks of experience. His work, the food, and the quality of the décor (the last marred only by the ubiquitous televisions on the walls, and to a lesser degree by the apparently obligatory scowls on the faces of the sushi chefs) made for a relaxing and enjoyable lunch.

I chose a bento box with grilled salmon; my friend Rick went for a dish of noodles with shrimp and chicken. Both meals were tasty, and larger than they need to be to satisfy. The amount of oil on Rick's noodles seems to be a requisite of Asian-style cooking, but I still don't like it: I would only want enough oil to keep the noodles from sticking, which I suspect could be easily done, without sacrificing flavour, with half as much.

Pennzoil Place, Houston
photo by Anders Lagerås

The salmon was very nicely grilled, though it, too, had too much oil on it for my liking. Still, the hint of grilled flavour went nicely with the innate flavours of the fish and the tangy sauce in which it lay. A large spring roll unlike any other spring roll I've ever had was artfully halved at an angle and served standing end-on, like the buildings of Pennzoil Place, in a thick, slightly sweet sauce. The tasty contents of the roll were oddly granular, and slightly crunchy.

A proper serving of white rice and what appeared to be two small salads rounded out the bento box.  The meal also came with a choice of (another) salad, or miso soup. I can honestly say that the soup was just like every other miso soup I've ever had, because I've only ever had it at one other place. I'm not sure it's something I really, really like, but what would I do with a third salad?

Not a Paradigm Shift, But a Revision

Cheesy Jane's
4200 Broadway Avenue

(just south of Hildebrand)

Just after this place opened, I tried it for lunch with a friend. I was utterly and completely unimpressed, not least because my burger happened to contain an unpleasantly large and undesirable piece of cow, on which I nearly broke a tooth. I also thought the burger was in the nothing-special category, and so it was no trouble for me to not go back.

Until the other day. I have a good friend who works in that part of Broadway, and he and I meet for lunch often enough that we are kind of running low on new and interesting places to try. You might not think so, just based on the restaurants I've reviewed in this blog — only four in that area — and regular readers will find it hard to believe that I've ever had an unexpressed thought where food is concerned; but the fact is I've been to almost every place around there and have had to repeat visits to most of them, and I usually don't write about them. Shocking, I know, but there it is.

So: Cheesy Jane's it was. It was, after all, time; they've been there for years, and while that's not a guarantee of real quality (see Chris Madrid's), it's an indication that something is being done right.

Parking is tight. I got the last place out front, though there may be places on the side street or perhaps in another lot I'm not aware of. This may be a problem for a lot of people in the area, but my friend is just old enough to remember how to walk to lunch. The atmosphere inside is diner-casual, and the place is exceptionally clean. There's a vaguely '50s air to the whole operation, but I don't think it's an intentional theme; certainly not heavy-handed like so many places would opt for. I was seated promptly between a family of four and a couple of AT&T employees discussing corporate politics. The seating was tight enough that I could have followed the entire conversation of the phone-company people, had I so desired, but owing to the general noise level of the place, it would have required a level of concentration that I wasn't willing to attempt. Besides, the conversation of a couple of pre-teen girls on the other side would undoubtedly have been more interesting. Luckily, though, my friend arrived before I became immersed in whatever it is six- and eight-year-old girls discuss on a weekday when they should be in school, and I was able to enjoy an adult conversation about nothing at all. It was truly a Seinfeld moment.

Service was prompt, despite the density of the lunch crowd, and our waiter was only slightly harried, giving the impression that he was just this close to bursting into flame, yet still completely in control of things. Before my friend arrived, I had time to study the menu, and noticed the little legend on the back that said their milk shakes and malts, of which they seem very proud, are available with non-fat yogurt. That, and the array of flavour choices, convinced me that this was a time to try a peanut-butter-and-jelly yogurt shake. For my meal, I chose the Cheesy Jane Sampler, a tray of miniature burgers of different sorts, served with french fries. Well, thought I, what better way to find out what's kept this burger joint afloat for so many years. My friend, who seems to have an inexplicable aversion to beef, ordered some la-di-dah sandwich made with some other kind of meat. It's been a few days, and I don't remember if it was tuna or chicken or what. And let's be honest: who cares? 

Last city inspection: November 2011
3 demerits (excellent)
(the city's health department mis-spells
the restaurant's name)

The milk shake was surprisingly good. It actually did taste like peanut butter and jelly, and it had a very good consistency and no unpleasant yogurt taste or aroma. (I don't actually like yogurt, but I can live with it. It's like cauliflower or rye bread, only I wouldn't want either of those in a milk shake.) It's not quite the grand-slam home run like a shake at, say, Olmos Pharmacy, but it's pretty close, and you get the metal mixing cup with that extra bit that makes you feel like you're getting a little lagniappe. Always a good feeling.

For my meal, I was expecting tiny sandwiches that would be crushed in the ring by a White Castle hamburger. We call them "sliders" these days, an unpleasant name to refer disparagingly, I presume, to sandwiches that were considered full-sized in my youth, but are now barely an amuse-bouche. You can order a basket with one or two sandwiches, but I went for the full three: "sissy, porky, and bean burger." The "sissy," I deduced by the process of elimination, is a plain ol' hamburger with plain ol' accoutrements. It was good, but still in that nothing-special category: the bun was soft and yeasty, the meat was well-cooked, and the trimmings were reasonably fresh. 

The "porky" has a piece of Canadian bacon, a few sautéed mushrooms, and an appropriately-sized piece of Swiss cheese. These ingredients added a pleasant layer of flavour to the otherwise good-but-ordinary sandwich. The bean burger was a still more interesting creation, despite being just a little hamburger with some refried beans and Fritos on it. The combination of simple ingredients — ordinarily not my favourite by any stretch — was actually quite pleasant, to the point where I may someday order a bean burger on purpose. It was easily the best of the three I sampled. 

All of these sandwiches were accompanied by a reasonably sized portion of well-made french fries, and I think everybody knows just how hard it is to find well-made fries. These were, I suspect, twice-cooked, as they should be, in clean oil at the right temperature for the right amount of time. They were salted enough that I was satisfied, but not so salty that most people wouldn't add more to them. (I can count on the fingers of one hand the times I've added salt to anything at a restaurant since I started writing this blog three years ago, and still have three fingers left over.)

The prices are reasonable for this type of food. My meal, including that delicious milk shake, was right at fifteen dollars with tax and tip. If you forego the milk shake, you can no doubt get out for considerably less, but you might want to think hard before going that route. Definitely a good milk shake.

Ordinary, Well Done

Stone Werks Big Rock Grille
5807 Worth Parkway

(in The Rim retail sprawl, off I-10 beyond 1604)

If you went to Stone Werks' original location years ago, when it was across from the Quarry on Jones-Maltsberger, and were dissatisfied with it, you might still want to check out its new incarnation of Big Rock Grilles. There are three of them in town now: the one at Broadway and Basse; one at Loop 1604 and Blanco; and this one, in the precious Rim shopping wasteland. They still do basically the same things, but they're doing it much better now.

The large, high-ceilinged dining room, tastefully appointed, is a far cry from the almost tawdry, cramped space of the restaurant's previous Stone Werks. The owners seem to have spared no expense in creating a pleasant environment, and except for the television sets in every corner, they have succeeded. 

The menu is extensive, with all the things you would find at, oh, every upscale burger joint in the Western world, and all briefly described with just a hint of pretension. Every variation of meat-in-bun dining that occurred to the creative minds behind the company, that could appeal to the post-modern suburban diner, and that could be replicated reliably, finds a niche on their list. And if you want something not listed, short of, perhaps, Soylent Green, you can probably get it: if they have it in their kitchen, it's yours for the asking.

We planned to see a film at the nearby megamovies, so we met early for lunch, just after the restaurant opened; they hadn't even had time to change the television feed away from the irritating satellite channel that tells you over and over how to use your remote; I seem to recall that channel being used as torture in some movie or other. No matter: I asked that it be changed, and it was, to something more easily ignored. In any case, because of our early arrival there was no shortage of seating — we weren't quite the only people there, but it was close. And our waiter was on us in a heartbeat, and a helpful young man he was, describing dishes and making recommendations, and admitting (and this is always important) that he didn't know when he didn't know. (And, of course, if he could find out, he did.)

Last city inspection: August 2012
8 demerts

We decided to split two burgers: the Bacon & Smoked Gouda, and the Lamb Burger. Both were good despite the prices. My lunch-mate had never, he says, had lamb before and didn't know what to expect. His verdict was that he couldn't really tell that it was any kind of different meat in the sandwich, and I can't disagree. The burger pattie did have the distinctive taste of lamb, but it was a weak and puny flavour unable to compete with the more powerful flavours of the other ingredients. A meek lamb is no match for a good bit of goat cheese, much less the exquisite flavour of prosciutto. Even a slice of red onion was a lion to our lamb. All in all, the ingredients in this sandwich make an interesting, even fascinating combination; but I don't doubt that it would be a better sandwich over all if it came with beef instead of lamb, and for at least a couple of dollars less.

The bacon cheeseburger was every bit as good as the lamb burger, though less filled with unusual ingredients. The bacon was properly cooked, to be crispy but not dry; the smoked flavour of the gouda was rich, and its texture was creamy and smooth; and the vegetables that complement the sandwich were fresh and flavourful. The beef was of a good quality, too, as was the bun, and it was just messy enough.

A Little Different

La Siberia
3018 Fredericksburg Road

(at Olmos Drive)

I went here in furtherance of my plan to review all the restaurants in the Hildebrand Corridor, that stretch of road from Trinity University to Monticello that is unusually thick, for the North Side, with Mexican and Tex-Mex kitchens. The first thing that struck me as unusual about the place is that it, possibly uniquely for this area, is not open for breakfast. (Surprising, because the sign in the front window advertises desayunos; but maybe it's an old sign.) It was thus somewhat unsurprising that they don't have breakfast options on their menu ... so, no chilaquile tacos today!

What they do have is a fairly extensive menu of Tex-Mex food, with some items not often found on menus at other places around town. I don't know the origin of the name, but I suspect it has to do with the white cream sauce used on many of the house specialties. You know: Siberia ... snow ... white ... cream sauce. Well, it's just a guess.

(photo from the restaurant web site)

The house specialty is tostadas. You can get your average Tex-Mex tostada here, but why would you? Try the Siberia: shredded chicken on a guacamole base, topped with crema, as in the picture here. 

For my meal, I chose a dish called chipotle especial. It consisted of the shredded chicken topped with another sauce, a cheese-tinged cream sauce with a hearty dose of chipotle for seasoning, served on a platter with rice, beans, corn tortillas, and totopos, the deep-fried corn tortillas that are used in tostadas. My sidekick Rick went with the beef fajita plate, also served with rice and beans, and flour tortillas.

His meal is easily dealt with. The meat was plentiful, properly cooked with peppers and onions to a slightly crunch-edged perfection. I thought the seasoning on it was a bit subdued ... understated ... weak. Still, in the universe of beef fajita meat in Paradise South, it was just a notch above average, and the quality of the meat itself contributed to that good opinion. 

My meal came with a first course of consommé, a large bowl of rice and vegetables in broth with a pleasant aroma of cilantro. Since cilantro is generally overdone, to the point where I condemn its use in my food, calling it "pleasant" is a great compliment to the cook. 

Everything on my plate was delicious. The refritos were creamy, and with none of that vaguely soapy taste that lard sometimes produces in the mix. The Spanish rice, though monochromatic, was tender and moist, with the slight flavour of chicken broth to it. (It's always best to have Spanish rice early in the day, as it does dry out; and we were there right at opening time, 11AM.) The chicken was plentiful, all white meat, finely shredded, and covered on the plate with that chipotle sauce, which was slightly thick and very flavourful. The totopos, broken into pieces, made an excellent device for transmitting the meat and sauce from plate to mouth, though the fried tortillas themselves were nothing to get excited about. 

Last city inspection: July 2012
13 demerits

The other accoutrements of a meal at La Siberia were average: a basket of reasonably good chips, a small bowl of reasonably good salsa, reasonably good coffee, and reasonably good tortillas, both flour and corn. The flour tortillas were clearly made in-house, but the corn tortillas had the uniformity that indicates machine-production. All these things were good enough to pass muster without detracting from the superior aspects of the meal.

The only complaint I have about the food, really, is that it must have had a lot of salt in it, as I have spent the afternoon craving water like a rabies victim. It's not as bad as when I lose all self-control and eat a slice of pizza from Pizza Hut, but it's still annoying. (I suspect it was the consommé.)

The place itself (which, I think, used to be a KFC store) is clean and comfortable, if unremarkable for its décor; let's call it functional and well-kept. It's not a large place, but neither is it cramped. One unusual aspect of the layout is that all the tables (all two-tops) are arranged in airliner-style: tables for four on the right, tables for six on the left. It looks odd, but I'm sure that, too, is functional.

The service is attentive and not overbearing. Our waitress was less comfortable with English than I am with Spanish, so we used both languages interchangeably. I didn't order a grilled tractor, and with that I am content. 

Prices are reasonable, about what you'd expect to pay. I noticed one dish that was more than ten bucks, but most are in the seven- to eight-dollar range.

A Better Expression

Corner Bakery Café

255 East Basse Road

(in the Quarry, at the southern end, closest to the Basin)

This sort of minimal-service restaurant is approaching done-to-death territory. Stand in line, order at the counter, and your food is brought to you at the table. National chains from Jason's Deli to Zoë's Kitchen to Pei Wei use it, as do local chains like Hearthstone Bakery Café and even single-outlet shops like Mina and Dimi's, the excellent Greek place out by Lackland. Theoretically, it exemplifies the benefits of capitalism: reduced wage and benefits costs translate eventually into lower prices for consumers.* I always wonder when those lower prices are going to kick in. I'm still wondering.

But the unremarkable prices aside, Corner Bakery Café does this type of restaurant a little better, in some ways, than its competition. The food here is well-prepared and there are many interesting choices, as at most similar restaurants. The added feature that I appreciate is that, here, the menu board shows basic nutritional information about the various dishes. I was thus able to make my choices with more confidence that I would not be surprised to find unexpected fatty additions to my lunch. It also reminded me, at the moment of crisis, that I would rather have a light, low-calorie lunch than a gigantic sandwich or other heavy dish.

The caloric information on the menu board prompted me to order a soup-and-salad trio, consisting of spicy Thai coconut soup, edamame salad, and tuna salad. It had less effect on my friend Rick — who, to be fair, is less obviously in need of self-restraint on that score; he ordered a Reuben sandwich. We also agreed to split a peanut-butter whoopie pie, because I kept my eyes off the menu board and on the display case long enough to forget the concept of will-power. Plus I deserved the reward for having been good already in ordering my main meal. Does this remind anyone else of an Aesop's fable? I have The Lion and the Lamb in mind.

As we were fixing our own drinks, the counter attendant came over and apologetically told Rick that they were "out of Reuben." I'm not going to speculate on what, exactly, that means — perhaps their cabbage didn't rot on schedule — but the upshot was he chose instead a turkey club sandwich as his lunch.

We naturally started with dessert, as Life Is Short. It was unimpressive, which was doubly disappointing, as the Corner Bakery, you would think, would excel at baking. This whoopie pie was two under-flavoured sticky, soft chocolate cakes held together by a peanut-butter-flavoured center. Now, my own experience of whoopie pies (or, as I prefer to think of them, woofie pies) comes from the forests of Maine, where they were apparently invented by people who get more than ordinarily excited about naming desserts. (I know some partisans misguidedly argue that whoopie pies originated with the Amish, but if that were true — and it isn't — no one would ever have known.) Anyway, the Corner Bakery's whoopie pie was too sticky and too chewy and too mild to be mentioned in the same breath as one you might get at any general store in Penobscot County.

The other foods were similar in their adequacy. The spicy Thai coconut soup was indeed spicy, and had a rich tomato base, but the coconut flavouring was so faint that I had to ask an employee to look at it and tell me what kind of soup it was. The edamame salad was reasonably fresh and crisp, and the unexpected serving of plain ol' green salad that I found on my plate beside it was also nice enough. Nothing special, though.  The tuna salad was a little on the dry side, but if you like a little crunch in your tuna salad (I'm not wild about it, myself) you'll appreciate the chunks of celery and red onion, sufficient to sharpen the dish without being overbearing. I would, though, have liked a cracker or a piece of bread to have with it.

Rick's panini-pressed turkey club was pretty good in flavour; sourdough bread, lots of turkey, some tasty bacon (and yes, I know, "tasty bacon" is redundant, but I like the rhythm of the phrase), and the tomato in it was juicy and flavourful. It also had a seasoned mayonnaise sauce that added just the right amount of moisture, and complemented the flavour of the other ingredients nicely. Overall, it was the best thing we had at that lunch.

Last city inspection: April 2012
16 demerits

Besides the nutritional information on the menu boards, where the Corner Bakery really excels is in the ambiance of the place. The interior is very comforting, with a high techno-chic black ceiling with old-fashioned light fixtures, large windows surrounding the dining area, café curtains, and a dark hard-wood floor to give the place the charm of a Gilded-Age bistro. The booths and tables are mahogany stained wood, adding to the illusion of grace and charm, and a room divided topped with fluted glass completes the theme. There is a deck surrounded by trees just out to the south, which, when the weather moderates, should be a wonderful place to relax. The traffic of Basse Road and, more surprisingly, US 281, are separated by only a short distance from the deck, but because of the drop in terrain and the curtain of trees, they seem invisible to customers. I made it a point to step out on the balcony and gauge the noise level from the road, and was pleasantly surprised to find it inoffensive.

* Of course, in theory, over time the relative higher profits for this type of restaurant, and the relative lower profits for the traditional type, will drive more restaurateurs to switch to the minimal-service restaurant, reducing the number of traditional table-service restaurants and creating greater competition among minimal-service restaurants, thus shaving profits and lowering prices to consumers. Maybe we're just getting to that stage.

Taking the Sushi Plunge

Osaka Japanese Steak & Sushi
4902 Broadway

(in Alamo Heights, catty-corner to the Gucci-B)

Let me make two things perfectly clear up front: One, I don't eat raw meat. Steak Tartare is proof that people will eat anything if you give it a fancy French name; and raw fish — especially the potentially lethal kind — is doubly disgusting. Two, I am no early-adopter. Not for me the latest trend, the brand-new gizmo, the current fashion. I'm almost comfortable with the idea of the Internet, but I just got a smart phone and don't much care for it, and have yet to spring for a red-velvet whoopie pie. Early-adopters are people with either, as we used to say, more dollars than sense, or a terrible emptiness in the pit of their souls.

It is thus no great surprise that I have waited until now to sample a sushi restaurant. It would not have been my choice even now, but a friend of mine who works in the hoity-toity part of Broadway wanted to do lunch, and he suggested it. I took that as a sign from God that it was Time.

The restaurant occupies what was once the Luby's Cafeteria next to the old Broadway Theater, and occupies it in truly fine style. It's a gorgeous interior, spacious yet intimate. The sushi bar is toward the back; comfortable booths line the wall and a few tables fill the left half of the room. The right half is filled with those community-seating tables you see on TV sit-coms every time the hip character goes on a date; the kind where everybody sits across from the one person in the world who makes them most uncomfortable, while a talented chef plays daringly with food and sharp knives a few feet away. The décor suggests The Exotic East, it doesn't scream it. 

The service is good, but too self-consciously reserved to really get top marks. The waiter, when he made his appearance, was unctuous, and spoke in a voice more suited to a reference librarian. He was, though, helpful in explaining the many terms unfamiliar to a neophyte, and when my table-mate asked for a fork, his gasp of disapproval was barely audible. As for me, I have stated elsewhere that I consider the fork to be one of the great inventions of Western culture, and when eating in Chinese or Thai or Vietnamese restaurants, I refuse to be reduced to using sticks; but I found sushi to be easily eaten with chopsticks. Unlike, say, a dish of kee mao or pad wun sen, sushi holds together well under the press of chopsticks. It's pretentious and patronizing to use them, but ... well, on this occasion I decided to be just that pretentious and patronizing. I still don't like those stupid spoons they use, though, with the square bottoms.

Speaking of stupid spoons, our meals began with a bowl of a fine soup of unspecified variety, a light broth with an elegantly sparse dose of scallion and some other vegetable in it, and the delicate flavour of seafood about it. It came as part of the "Bento Box," sort of a sampler that is perfect for someone who is new to the whole sushi thing. I ordered it in imitation of my more experienced dining companion.

The sushi rolls I chose were the Tiger Roll and the Philadelphia Roll. I was careful to make choices that contained no raw meat in them. The Tiger is so called not because it is made with tiger meat — I'm pretty sure you can't get that anymore, thanks to all those damn animal-rights activists — but because it is topped by a pair of sauces, one reddish-brown, one dark yellow, that are laid over the white roll in stripes and resemble, with a little imagination, the beautiful coat of a Bengal tiger. The meat contained within is actually shrimp, which is made clear (in case you forgot what the menu said) by the two shrimp tails sticking out of the ends like tiny handlebars.

The Philadelphia, contrary to first assum doesn't consist of thinly carved beef with caramelized onions and peppers; it is smoked salmon with Philadelphia cream cheese, cucumber and avocado.

The City of Alamo Heights keeps its
restaurant inspections a closely-
guarded secret, as a matter of
national security.

Both of these sushi rolls were delicious, and the best feature of them, like the soup, was the delicacy of the flavours in combination. This, to me, is where oriental dishes — and I'll include South Asian dishes in this distinction as well — have it all over occidental concoctions.

Completing the dish were two pork dumplings, called gyoza, and a small, crisp salad with just a whisper of very light dressing. There was a dash of green wasabi paste in the center of the dish, where everything else could accidentally get into it. I like a little kick to my food, but the consistency of this paste was such that I could not subdivide it into small enough portions, with chopsticks, to be really enjoyable: it was an all-or-nothing accoutrement. (I used it all.)

Lunch prices make Osaka a good value, too, comparable to what you'd spend at other types of oriental restaurants, plus you get that exquisite atmosphere to relax in.

Having finally taken the plunge and tried sushi, I'm in the mood for another long-matured trend. Maybe I'll go for a red velvet whoopie pie. I can maybe find where to get on one my smart phone.

Creative Writing? Or Just Creative Marketing?

Zoë's Kitchen
999 East Basse Road

(in the Lincoln Heights shopping center, at Broadway)

One of my main gripes about chain restaurants is that they tend to homogenize their dishes to please the mythical Average Person. Seasonings become muted, piquancy dulls. They tend to add fat and salt because, on average, people like the taste of fat and salt. Artistry may have a place in a chain restaurant's test kitchen, but if a combination of flavours or techniques is too intricate for the mere functionaries who inhabit kitchens in the field, the artistic culinary creation will never appear on a menu. It's too expensive, not only to the corporate bottom line, but potentially to the restaurant's reputation (which amounts to the same thing): if John Doe gets a spicy dish at your location in Omaha (like that would ever happen), he's not going to have it when he visits the location in Pensacola. In fact, he's not going to visit the Pensacola store, because he'll have decided that he doesn't like your restaurant all that much. And he'll tell his friends, when they suggest your restaurant for an evening out, "Can we go somewhere else instead? Because I'm not wild about that place."

So when I went into Zoë's Kitchen, in its new location at Lincoln Heights, the first thing I saw was a list of locations on the back of the plastic menu card. Ah-Ha, I said to myself, This is a Chain Restaurant. (I'm quick, that way.) I decided, like a Soviet-era court or Fox News, to give it a fair, open, impartial and unbiased trial before condemning it.

Then I spotted the little text on the menu, repeated on the overhead board (and on the web site), that says that each location's menu is different. I thought, Hey, maybe this is a different kind of chain. So I had a nice meal: my wife and I split spinach roll-ups with grilled chicken and a pita pizza. She had a Greek salad, I had a side of roasted vegetables.

No city inspection yet.

The ambiance of the place is pleasant enough; sort of a mélange of 70s colouring with 80's techno-chic. The main decoration (other than a somewhat disturbing canvas juxtaposing "grill" and "braise" with "Davey Crockett") appeared to be, and possibly were, pictures done by elementary school children on the theme of "I Love Zoë's Kitchen." The dining room was clean, except for a few un-bused tables, and airy, with a high industrial-style ceiling and large windows forming two walls. Service was of the minimalist variety; the concept of Zoë's Kitchen was copied from Pei Wei, minus the mock Asian gilt, so there is no seedy order-taking at tables here: you stand in line, order at the counter, then put a placard bearing your number on your table so the porters can unite you with your food when it's ready. The employees are a cheerful lot of college-aged kids, glad to have a job in this economy and no doubt hoping it doesn't turn into a career. Prices are about right for the type of food on offer.

The veggie pita pizza was the best of our selections. It is, essentially, a personal-sized pizza formed by loading an assortment of vegetables onto a pita bread, spritzing it with oil and scattering it with cheese to hold everything together, and baking it until the bread was just solid enough to support the toppings. Not an over-large serving (that's a good thing, by the way), but certainly enough to satisfy a normal appetite. And the blend of textures — the crispiness of the crust, the creaminess of the mozzarella cheese, the smoothness of the softer vegetables, the resilience of the onions and mushrooms — and of flavours, from the caramelized onions to the feta cheese, were both excellent, making this a dish I would gladly have again.

The spinach roll-ups were less perfect, but still good. For starters, I wouldn't bother, next time, with the grilled chicken. It didn't add anything except volume to the dish, being somewhat on the bland side, and its texture was just slightly on the dry side. The tortilla in which the creations were wrapped was just a plain ol' flour tortilla, not as good as you would get at HEB, but okay. It was filled with a tasty sautéed spinach mixture, and those slices of chicken, and grilled on a sandwich press, I reckon, to seal it closed. It did indeed hold together, but I suspect the person attending the sandwich press was distracted at a crucial point by an attractive member of the opposite sex, or possibly by some water-cooler talk regarding the ongoing London Olympic Games, because the roll-ups were overcooked. Not burned, by any means, but well past the stage of "done." The dish is served with a tiny ramekin of sauce that is meant, according to the menu, to be salsa. My wife and I discussed whether it was that, or marinara sauce, or ketchup; that should give you some idea of its appeal.

The Greek salad was a fresh concoction with all the appropriate ingredients, again not over-large but a respectable size. The roasted vegetables I chose as a side consisted of broccoli grilled in oil with mushrooms and red onion. It was about a cup in volume, which I suppose is a standard amount, but even though it was oilier and saltier than I like my veggies to be, I felt like I should have gotten more of that. 

About that line on the menu, the one that made me think I was getting something innately local: what it actually says, in the on-line version (I forget what the exact words on the plastic version were), is not that each store has its own menu. It says, 

We invite you to open our menu. Explore our aromatic, satisfying lunch and dinner items and our convenient meal options. Since our stores, just like our customers, are unique in their own way, we suggest that you enter your zip code and go directly to what is sure to become your favorite, neighborhood Zoës Kitchen. 

That's not quite the same thing. And indeed, every store does not have its own menu. I compared the menus online for this location with those from New Orleans and Charlotte, North Carolina (locations chosen at random) and found them to be exactly the same: not one single dish is added or subtracted from one location's menu to the next. Now, that doesn't necessarily mean that the cook in the kitchen in Old Metairie prepares a chicken pita pizza just like the Charlotte cook does ... maybe they throw a little filé on the bread. Maybe the Charlotte cook adds in a little, I don't know, hominy. But it sure looks to me like the concept of a chain of restaurants offering different tastes in different parts of the country is just that: a concept, not a real thing. This leads me to conclude that Zoë's Kitchen is a chain like all other chains, and the food served will in some way be dumbed down. 

That's too bad. 

Funky By The Book

Somewhere on the internet there's a web site that tells you how to create a funky restaurant. There must be, because everything's on the internet, and because all the funky restaurants in the world are basically the same. You take a large space in an arty part of any town; furnish it sparsely with cheap plastic chairs and assorted tables culled from curbs and attics around the neighbourhood; put up a few posters promoting déclassé art events and counter-cultural concerts; adopt whatever the current trend in eating is — right now it's "locavore" and vegan — and hire people who would not look out of place clustering in Washington Square or Golden Gate Park late on a spring night when nothing's going on. When I happened on a place like that as a college kid, I thought it was cool. After 35 years, with nothing changed but the posters and the eating trends, it doesn't seem so cool anymore.

But I'm sure today's 20-something crowd is into countercultural coolness as much as it was back in my day. The self-appointed Arts crowd feels much the same, no matter their individual ages, as they have not ever really grown up; eternal youth, or at least the naïveté of youth, being a prerequisite for full membership in the Arts Community, other than at the Patron level.

Hence The Station Cafe: straight out of the funky restaurant manual, at 108 King William Street, near St. Mary's Street, in Southtown. Having heard good buzz about the place, I took a friend to dinner there the other night. They're open until 9, the door says, though at 7pm they were already stacking chairs on the tables. My only disappointments were that, as a culinary experience, it wasn't more interesting, and as a funky restaurant, it was so completely predictable.

The Station started life half a dozen years ago as "The Filling Station,"* in a tiny little building built to house a gas station. It took over some space in the next building, leaving the bar operation behind, and dropped the "Filling" from the name. Its menu consists mostly of sandwiches, hot and cold, and pizzas, with a few accompaniments offered to round things out. I have not evaluated their pizza; the ingredients available consist entirely of The Usual Suspects, so I will have to leave it for another occasion to decide for myself whether their home-made dough and sauce are enough to raise it above the ordinary.

Last city inspection: October 2011
A perfect score!

I did, however, try the soup as a first course. It being Monday, the soup was Southwestern Corn Chowder. Chowder is, by definition, a thick soup. This was not. So technically I suppose it's chowder-in-name-only. But on the plus side, it was damn good soup, and as long as it's good they can call it whatever the hell they want. It had excellent seasonings, and an interesting combination of textures from the corn, broth and, if memory serves (sometimes it doesn't), eggplant chunks. A cup of soup can be added to any sandwich order at a discounted price, which prevents me complaining ... sigh ... about the $3 menu price for a cup of the stuff.

That, I'm sorry to report, was pretty much the highlight of the food. The rest of it wasn't so much bad as just kind of so-so. My friend and I split two sandwiches: the chicken parmesan and the Cajun turkey. The bread used for the sandwiches is good; very good, even, and of the artisanal sort one would expect in this sort of place. But you have to do something better with it. The Cajun turkey sandwich had sufficient quantities of meat on it, and veggies, and the home-made sauce ("with 19 herbs, spices and flavorings") was interesting, but there was nothing discernibly Cajun about it. If there were traditional Cajun spices mixed in with the other stuff, they done got lost up da bayou wit' a blow comin' on, cher. The chicken parmesan was exactly what the menu said it was: a roasted chicken breast with marinara sauce and mozzarella cheese. Hard to say how good the mozzarella was, or the chicken, for that matter, because the bland marinara sauce was ladled on so thick that it was all I could taste; if that same sauce is used on the Station Cafe's pizzas, that's not a good sign. Sadly, the chicken parmesan sandwich is also an exception to the sink-sandwich rule, which says that the taste of a sandwich is inversely proportional to its messiness, and the best sandwiches need to be eaten over the sink. This sandwich had all the messiness of the best sandwiches, with none of the flavour or texture.

*There was a restaurant called that in Austin back in the 1970s; I don't think there's any connection, beyond the fact that both were located in former gas stations.