Two Ends of an Indie Spectrum

I haven't posted in a while because I've been revisiting places this month that I've already blogged about, I have been on the road a lot, and I've just felt lazy.  But rejoice, devoted readers, for I have an update for you today.

Most of the time I blog about restaurants that I've booked on Open Table because of 1) the lazy factor cited above and 2) for the most part, restaurants that go to the expense of being part of the Open Table network are going to rank somewhat higher on the food chain than your neighborhood greasy spoon.  Occasionally I do find myself in smaller, indie concerns, and I've just been to two in a row that live at opposite ends of that spectrum.

Hola Jose

Curb Appeal

Last night, before viewing the scintillating, jiggly watersports of  the Broadway musical Flashdance at the Dallas Music Hall, we joined our friends at the pizzaLOUNGE across the street from Fair Park.  (nORMALLY i would make FUN OF weird and random CAPITALization SHENANIGANS but I am feeling CHARitablE.  Sort OF.) This dive offbeat dining den was decorated by a couple of friends who had apparently downed a six pack one morning and then went to a few garage sales on a sunny Saturday afternoon with about $65 in their pockets.  It so worked.  Walking into the place gives you both instant street cred and a holla big dose of chill, and made me think of hookahs and hookers even though there were neither anywhere in sight -- or at least not at 6:30.  The DNA of pizzaLOUNGE is hipster-beatnik and it never wavers from that pose.


Sofa King Slices

The bartendress/server was not our usual gal but a tatted up and pierced little thing sporting a sideways baseball cap and clothing that looked like she'd swiped it from the costume shop for Rent when it was in town.  I ordered a Ketel 1 martini up with a twist and she asked me what "up" meant.  I told her shaken over ice and strained into a glass and she narrowed her eyes at me as if I had insulted her people.  I offered to make it myself to show her how (wouldn't be the first time for Dining Dave to do some quick OTJ training) but she kindly told me to shut up and sit down.  Drinks came quickly and we ordered our usual, one large Sofa King pizza.  There is an inherent joke about that name because of how great it is and that's all I am going to write about that. They have awesome, secret-sauced pies with very high quality ingredients like imported sausage from Jimmy's and their hand-crafted crust is delicious and baked with puppy love devotion.  It's a super cheap date and fun and the polar opposite of pretentious.


Up, Up, and Away

This Was More Than $65

Then today I met an impossibly smart and sassy business contact (Hi Iris!) for lunch at a place she suggested called Ascension Coffee House. If pizzaLOUNGE is hipster-beatnik then Ascension is hipster-coolest-kid-in-the-cafeteria.  Its interior is light and airy and decorated by a professional armed with a lot more cash and a fine eye for detail.  The inside smells of freshly roasted coffee beans harvested from crazy tall plants by rare, albino chimpanzees raised in the farthest reaches of Middle Earth.  Their passions and obsessions focus on nuanced coffee-procuring and local produce-sourcing and artisinal cheese-mongering and saving the Sudan, mostly in that order.

I had an iced coffee and was asked if I wanted whole, 2%, non-fat or soy milk in it.  I said all four and our server feigned wry amusement, which was very polite of him.  They've got free WiFi but you aren't allowed to use it after 6 PM because WORK STOPS AT SIX.  (Word is this is a rule they really do enforce and not some outrageous lie I just made up to make you laugh.)  Lunch is either panini or salads but everything sounds quite good.  I ordered the Spanish Albacore Salad which promised Spanish tuna, arugula, egg and cornichons with olive caper relish and sherry vinaigrette. 

Where's the Tuna?

It was really very tasty but I had to resort to my bionic zoom lens to find the teeny little flecks of tuna that were parsimoniously assigned to my plate by a garde-manger who is probably borderline sadistic.  We are talking way less than one ounce of protein.  It reminded me of my impoverished childhood when at the end of a week, our large family might be out of groceries so my mom would take the One Remaining Navy Bean we had in the larder and tie a string around it.  Then all of us kids would line up in chronological order and the eldest would get to swallow the bean.  Then my mom would yank it back out and feed it to the next kid, and then the next.  Being youngest, sometimes all I got was Essence of the ORNB.

So tuna essence or not, the salad was super tasty because all of the other ingredients were so fresh and of such high quality.  The ambience of Ascension is welcoming and comfortable.  The dinner menu looks interesting and I definitely plan to return.  I might bring along some tater tots in my pocket for later, just in case.

Destination Dining: Hibiscus

Last night we snagged one of those rare prizes not often seen in the restaurant world--a reservation on a Friday night at Hibiscus earlier than 10:00 pm.  I saw that they had an 8:30 on Open Table so I pounced on it before someone else much brighter in the Dallas firmament of shiny happy people claimed it for their very own.  Hibiscus is an old stand by--most of the time when we want to dine there we just show up and push through the crowd to the service bar in back where they have 4 barstools and a lonely bartender anxious to make cocktails and conversation.  I guess Fridays have slowed down there a little because the restaurant was only about three fourths full but the big egos in the room made it seem like it was more at capacity.

A mature woman with wrinkly hands and a dress two generations too young for her smoothly showed us to our table and entreated us to "enjoy." (I thought that cliche was reserved for when a server placed your entree, but apparently its use is becoming more widespread and therefore, even more meaningless.)  We were watered but not breaded and our grandmotherly server came over and suggested a drink.  We don't normally partake of distilled spirits but she seemed genuinely concerned about our hydration so we indulged her.  (If you believe that last sentence you have evidently just started following this blog.)  I say grandmotherly because she wore her uniform modestly, wasted no words except to call us dears, and held her hands clasped together in front of her when she walked (exactly like the Mother Superior in Change of Habit, my favorite movie about nuns starring Mary Tyler Moore and Elvis. ) That being said, I bet I have 20 years on her.

Chewsy Mothers Choose Jif

And Then There Were None

Off da Bone

After our drinks were presented we ordered and the food started coming right out of the kitchen.  I started with the charred octopus, which was tasty if rather reminiscent of a high end Goodyear tire in its mouth feel.  D had the wedge, which looked more like a boatload of onion rings strewn upon iceberg lettuce and doused in blue cheese.  He ate all of it. Plates cleared efficiently, cutlery redistributed and table crumbed, plop went the entrees and a side.  D had the short rib chop (I think it was sous-vided for like 25 years because the meat didn't just fall off the bone, it jumped off, lemming-style.   I had 5 perfectly pan-seared East Coast day boat scallops and we shared the truffliest,

Wedgie

cheesiest mac and cheese concoction in Christendom.
We could only down less than half of it, so we boxed it up to take home.  (It is still in the car fifteen hours later, which is what usually happens if we even manage to remember to take the box with us when we leave.)

Entrees dispatched, we declined dessert and opted for cappuccinos and
lattes, which were perfect.  G'ma brung 'round the tab, which we paid promptly.  The entire dinner was very, very good but the overall experience seemed like it might have been two spark plugs short of robotic.  Quick, efficient. anticipatory, out of there.  I think they are so used to turning the tables for maximum return that they forgot that sometimes a little lingering is a good thing, especially if there are 30 times as many would be diners elbowing their way into Sissy's Southern Kitchen next door.

The tab with tax, title and license was about $135 and we were in and out the door in 45, which comes to roughly $3 a minute.  Although it was good I think I would have been happier in the $1.17 to $1.42 per minute range.  I like you, Hibiscus, but next time I come I am going to speak in a slow, steady, Southern drawl, and chew every bite 100 times.  Grandma will be proud.

Meat Market in a Steak House

Last Saturday we ended up in a place that was definitely on my radar--not from a foodie standpoint but because driving by it most nights you can see its tremendous popularity with the Professional Urban McKinney Avenue Sophisticates (PUMAS.)  I tend to avoid these places since the mission is to mask one's surgically enhanced innate, smoldering hotness with an icy cool 'tude and to meet new people and potential one night stands spouses by studiously ignoring them.  I well remember the game--I am, after all, a high school graduate--but I wasn't good at it then and find it tedious now.

Surprisingly, we ended up at Del Frisco's Grille on McKinney in Dallas by a weird, Tourette's Syndrome induced random stroke of Open Table finger shopping and debarked at the valet stand aswarm with PUMAS in full Saturday night  regalia:  flirty, slinky tops on the girls over skin tight, cropped pants, jeweled high-heeled sandals and diamond earrings swaying under Dallas Blonde #11 hair color, and tight polos stretched by "arms day" at the gym tucked out of ripped $250 jeans and neon sneakers on the spiky, gel-haired gents.  They were all named Cameron or Travis regardless of gender.


I Think This Would Be a Cool Tattoo in Celtic Runes

The three bright-eyed hostesses immediately noted we were way too old for the bustling patio scene or four-deep bar, and banished assigned us to a table facing away from the restaurant looking into the kitchen.  (Actually we  were looking at the posterier of the chef who was expo-ing so we sort of scooted around and focused in a more diagonal direction.)  Above the cook line was a huge sign which I guess is DFG's motto:  DO RIGHT AND FEED EVERYMAN.  At first I thought it was retro and cool and then it seemed sort of Les Miserables and finally I dismissed it as just kind of silly since we weren't in Colonial America and the food wasn't free and 50% of the patrons were female.  Our server's name was Carl (I remember because he told us with his big, open, toothy smile three different times) and even though he said he'd be "taking care of us" (restaurant cliche #3) we ended up liking him because he really did manage our table with exactly my preferred combination of attention, professionalism, and self-deprecating good humor in precisely the right amounts.
It was hard to decide what to eat because every thing on the menu sounded really good. We ended up sharing Cheesesteak Eggrolls, which were like
Philly Cheesesteaks baked inside crusty rolls and then cut on the bias (moan inducing) and Steamed Edamame with Korean BBQ Spice and
Lime (scrumptious food you get to play with.) We had a couple of crafted cocktails (de rigueur in this hipster den) and eventually ordered dinner.  Since DFG is the spawn of legendary Del Frisco's Double Eagle Steak House, I ordered my absolute favorite slice of bovinity, the New York Strip.  Strangely, D ordered Orecchiette Pasta with Lemon Thyme Chicken & Fresh Parmesan.  To me, this seemed sort of like ordering Chinese food at a taco stand but evidently he was unaware of the Del Frisco brand and their prodigious reputation for unparalleled meat.

When my steak arrived the aroma was so intoxicating I wanted to just pick it up and cram it into my gaping maw.  Instead, using a tremendous amount of self control and a handy pair of wrist restraints, I picked up my knife and fork and carved off a slice.  That steak was so tender and juicy I could have cut it with Governor Chris Christie's big fat hand, not that I ever would have for fear he'd swipe it like my other New Jersey friend Kathleen, who is known internationally via the Interpol database as a top flight food and wine thief (see Entree Envy, December 14, 2012.)  It didn't really look like much, just sort of an herb-crusted, brownish slab of meat on a white plate next to a little thimble-sized twice baked potato, but OMGosh I believe that was the best durned cow part I've ever had the pleasure of masticating.

Who'd a thunk you could get such extraordinary, prime meat in one of Dallas's prime meat markets?

Destination Dining: Cook Hall at the W

Operating a successful restaurant in a hotel is tricky.  If it has its own outside entrance it helps a lot, but you still have to deliver an energized dining experience in a fun setting to get local people to try it and like it and perhaps return.  Tom Colicchio's Craft is an amazing culinary experience in New York City, but its magic never transferred when the W Hotel opened with a Craft inside it in the brilliant upscale ambitious sad ghost town of Victory Park near downtown Dallas.  Maybe the opening chef should have shaved his head and yelled at people more.

Anyhoo, Craft died a slow, lingering death due to complications associated with a complete lack of visibility and prices higher than a church lady's glory knot on Sunday (the higher the hairdo, the closer to heaven it is said, amen.)  A while back Cook Hall, a clearly corporate board room conceived gastropub, arose from Craft's ashes in the hopes that its friendly price point, cheerful light bulbs and je ne sais quoi W-ness would soar where Mr. C had crash landed.

Not so much.  The room is very handsome, though most of Craft's masculine industrial chic DNA is still visible.  But they've added a big bar and strung a bunch of naked light bulbs and tacked some doo-dads around so it feels less formidably grand.

Sexy Happy Light Bulbs 

The menu is a dopey, fun read--it's the now ubiquitous "small plates" dining concept where everything is meant to be shared by urbane, chattering friends who can text and flirt and eat all at the same time (I do not possess this skill, and can brandish my grease-smeared iPhone to prove it.)  There's a smart caddy with a bunch of utensils placed next to a high stack of seven-inch plates on every table so voracious revelers are free to taste and try and savor without cross contaminating saliva.

Really, the food is quite good, better than you would think after perusing the kind of corny menu descriptions.  There was a terrific charcuterie with prosciutto and salami and pickles and some kind of tart marmalade along with toasted baguette slices.  I had two oysters that were freshly shucked and soulfully swimming in their own sweet, mollusky brine.  There was truffled mac and cheese (not very original but tasty and unheart-healthy nonetheless) and a wonderful seafood pasta with plump shrimp and snappy clams.  D ordered some sort of risotto too--so for awhile there we were speeding along in the HOV lane of the Carb Freeway.

Charcuterie, Anyone?

We had a couple of drinks and the tab was about $75 all in.  But we'll never go back.

Why, you ask, why?  Nice atmosphere, good food, moderately priced, posh W-ness...what's the problem, man?  It was the totally amateurish, hotel zombie server we had whose name I can't recall because we just kept referring to him as Waldo, as in Where the Heck is He?  The guy was one of those useless, third rate restaurant waiters who can pointlessly float around his station with his eyes wide open but not see a thing, like our empty water glasses, or that we had 34 dirty plates and utensils piled up on our table.  We would have had another cocktail but he was too busy doing absolutely nothing when he wasn't hiding in the kitchen probably texting his friends about where they could meet up after work. An assistant manager and a food runner dropped off our plates as they became ready but Waldo was studiously intent on being as useless as possible to all 6 of his tables.

Finally full of dinner and totally over the complete lack of attention, I waved him over but apparently, I was dead to him, so I stood up on the banquette and waved both arms in  semaphore, signaling we were hot to trot while he idled by the host stand.  Nope.  Finally I used my cell to call the hotel operator and asked to be transferred to Cook Hall.  Waldo answered so I cursed asked him very nicely to bring us our check.  He seemed astonished that I had stripped him of his invisibility cloak, but he managed to go to the POS system and print out our check, which he then dropped on the cluttered table as he fled the room.  For twenty-five minutes.  Not kidding, there was no one in the restaurant on a Saturday night at about 9 o'clock who could close us out and free us of purgatory.

Cook Hall, you have some real talent in the kitchen and a comfortable, cozy ambience, but with silly, untrained, uninspired and insipid servers, you will never make it as a freestanding restaurant.  That takes real Craft.