Watch World Cup with a posse

LEO’s Eats with LouisvilleHotBytes

Soccer, the sport the rest of the world calls “football,” is celebrating its quadrennial World Cup (the real World Series) this month as the teams of 32 nations do battle in South Africa.
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Cricket’s Café adds flavor to Sunny Side

It’s a wrap at Cricket Café

LEO’s Eats with LouisvilleHotBytes

By Kevin Gibson

You want fries with that? Eh. I’ll admit I often save a little time and eat a chain burger or corporate taco. But I know there are alternatives out there if I need them.

Over in Sellersburg, Cricket’s Café offers such an option.
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We get scrod, and haddock too, at The Fish House

Scrod and Haddock sandwiches at The Fish House

Voice-Tribune review by LouisvilleHotBytes
(published 2/11/2010)

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So what’s a scrod? I’ll spare you the notorious Boston cabbie joke (although if you’re desperate to hear it, email me.) Anyway … scrod – or “schrod,” an older variation that’s dying out – is a foodie term that’s hard to pin down. Its definition varies depending on where you look it up.
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Potstickers comes unglued

Potstickers closed Jan. 17, 2010, after the Jan. 20 edition of LEO had gone to print. This review appeared in that edition of LEO. We publish it here in memoriam, and to help explain why we think it didn’t last.

When I heard that Chef Edward Lee of 610 Magnolia was behind a new fast-food noodle shop that opened last autumn in the midst of the club zone on Baxter, I was excited. I’ve got a lot of respect for Lee and his work, and 610 has been one of my favorite Louisville restaurants for 25 years, under Lee and his predecessor, Ed Garber.

After a couple visits to Potstickers, though, I’m puzzled and bemused. If Lee is really behind it — and I have no reason to doubt that — it’s got to be a hands-off operation.
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Cocos Lokos brings Cuban and more to Hurstbourne

Ceviche of the Day. Photo: Robin Garr.

Voice-Tribune review by LouisvilleHotBytes

Walk into Cocos Lokos, and a couple of things are likely to catch your eye.

First, if you think you detect a resemblance to Havana Rumba, that’s not terribly surprising. The manager and several members of the Cocos Lokos team left the popular Cuban spot in St. Matthews a couple of months ago to open this new spot in the Hunnington Place shopping center just off I-64 and Hurstbourne Parkway.

Second, you may be as pleasantly surprised as I was to see what a remarkable job they’ve done of making a shopping center space look, well, like it isn’t in a shopping center.
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Dissertation on chili and a fine new place to enjoy it

	Lunch at the Chili Pot. Photo: Robin Garr.

LEO’s Eats with LouisvilleHotBytes

If you think wine-snob dogma like “never drink white wine with red meat” or “never drink white Zinfandel with any meat” or “never drink a wine with a rating under 90” is tough, you’ve obviously never set foot in a room filled with baying chili-heads.

Tomatoes or no tomatoes? Beans or no beans? Chopped meat or ground meat? Chili powder, dried chilies or fresh? It’s like listening to medieval theologians arguing about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.

A recent visit to The Chili Pot, a great new spot in Okolona, filled me with the warming potion and prompted me to ponder the chili mystique.
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Otto’s takes on tough competition with “best burger”

The Otto BurgerPhoto: Robin Garr

Voice-Tribune review by LouisvilleHotBytes

The economy being what it is, I find myself ordering hamburger about as often as steak these days. But if I’m going to have a burger, I want it to be a good one. And happily, quite a few local beef emporia have made this wish an entirely possible dream.

Recently Otto’s Cafe, the first-floor coffee shop at the Seelbach Hotel, entered the hamburger sweepstakes with a take-no-prisoners news release that flatly declares Otto’s new hamburger the best in town.

“Now that consumers have tried the rest,” the Emailed statement boldly declared, “Otto’s at The Seelbach Hilton is inviting everyone to try the very best!”

Going on in considerable detail, the PR spun a tale of friendly corporate espionage: Culinary staff fanned out across the city like a squadron of food critics, ordering hamburgers and checking them twice, trying to see which were naughty or nice.

Disappointed by prefab frozen patties, dried-out, pounded and pressed burgers devoid of juicy deliciousness (I’m just passing along the story here, folks), the Otto’s burger creators concluded that high-quality fresh-ground, hand-packed beef parked on a house-baked bun was the way to go.
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Who put these foodie sugar plums in my stocking?

Caffe Classico’s Saffron Asiago risotto cakes

LEO’s Eats with LouisvilleHotBytes

New happenings at Caffe Classico and The Comfy Cow

With visions of sugar plums dancing in our heads, and neither a kerchief nor a stocking cap in sight, a long winter’s nap has been the furthest thing from Mamma’s, er, Mary’s and my heads as the holiday season draws near.

We’re obligate foodies, we’re ready for eats, and we see no conflict between celebrating Christmas the old-fashioned way, with joyous services on Christmas morning, followed by a late lunch, making the trek over the creek and through the woods to Vietnam Kitchen. It’s a perennial favorite among the many Asian eateries that remain open on Christmas Day.
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Irish Rover’s hearty fare warms a winter night

Smoked salmon and potato gratin.

LEO’s Eats with LouisvilleHotBytes

The leaves on our big, old magnolia tree were rattling eerily, and the skies were a dismal gray. The icy wind cut through my parka as if it were a throwback baseball shirt.

The first day of winter may not arrive until Monday morning, but it already feels a lot like winter around here, and last week I had a powerful lust for comfort food in a cozy setting. I posted queries on the LouisvilleHotBytes Forum and my Facebook page and found lots of friends with similar hankerings. These foodie buddies quickly racked up a score of good ideas.

Jack Fry’s, Equus and Jack’s, Baxter Station, Palermo Viejo, Havana Rumba and the L&N Wine Bar & Bistro all received multiple nominations as top spots in the cozy ’n’ filling sweepstakes. Bourbons Bistro, August Moon, Pat’s Steak House, Gasthaus, Selena’s, Come Back Inn, Bristol Bar & Grille, Napa River Grill and Cumberland Brews all had their partisans, too.

But one local establishment dominated the competition like Tiger Wo … well … let’s just say that the Irish Rover earned a solid lead in my casual online opinion poll.
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One gyros, two gyros, many gyros

LEO’s Eats with LouisvilleHotBytes
(REVIEWED: A.J.’s Gyro Café; It’s All Greek To Me)

Let’s get one thing clear: The Greek word “gyros” is a singular noun. Like other similar Greek words that occasionally appear in English — kudos, logos, ethos — you don’t delete the final “s” if you’re having only one. A “gyro” is a kind of helicopter.

The menu at a new Greek-style eatery in Southern Indiana provides us a clear, simple overview: “Gyros is singular.”
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Run Thanksgiving like a restaurant at home

INDUSTRY STANDARD:
Insider Info For Those Who Dine Out
With Columnist Marsha Lynch

Who doesn’t love Thanksgiving? Oh, my — I see a few of you raising your hands. That’s probably because it’s being held at your house, and you remember being up to your elbows in a sink of soapy water at 9 p.m. last year, muttering “Never again. Next year, we’re going out to eat.”
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TanThai sets new standard in Thai food

LEO’s Eats with LouisvilleHotBytes
(Photo by Robin Garr.)

Foodies, food lovers and food geeks who’ve been around town for a while will recall the happy shock that comes with the discovery of an ethnic spot that stands out from the pack: A new arrival with food preparation and style that hint at something special going on in the kitchen.

So it was with Vietnam Kitchen, almost a generation ago now, around the same time as the Mayan Gypsy truck went land-based with its first bricks-and-mortar location. More recently, we’ve seen it with Saffron’s for Iranian and Red Pepper for hardcore authentic Chinese.

In each case, the food, the mood and the service — but especially the food — signal that this place is, well, different.

Now welcome another ethnic standout, TanThai Cuisine of Thailand. It’s been in its shopping-center quarters on Charlestown Pike, north of New Albany, for close to a year now. But word of mouth travels slowly when there’s a broad river to cross, and TanThai remains unfamiliar to most of Louisville’s ethnic-food fanciers.
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