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This archived review dates from 2007 or before. Use SEARCH above to find all recent reviews.
You don't have to have a sweet tooth to eat here, but it helps. The problem, said my wife, grumbling, is that there's no escape. We pored over the entire menu looking for something that isn't fruity or sweet, and didn't have much luck. While I'm being picky, let me complain that the bill of fare is not just relentlessly sweet but somewhat overwrought. What does it take to improve a simple grilled pork chop? Here, they are crusted with fennel and served on a potato gratin with Indiana goat cheese and caramelized brussels sprouts, all on a spiced cider demiglace. That, my friends, is a bit over the top. But say this in favor of this urbane new dining venue that replaces the old Bristol Bar & Grille in the Kentucky Center for the Arts: Every dish here is very well done, just as you would expect from an offshoot of the city's popular Zephyr Cove. Like the art center building, the dining room is stark and modern, with floor-to-ceiling glass windows forming two of the walls. A discreet strip of green neon runs across the tops of the windows, and the decor is high-tech but simple, with tables draped in heavy white and set with white polyester napkins, stainless flatware and simple beige plates. Votive candles and small glass vases with attractive sprays of daisies are set on each table, with larger but equally attractive flower arrangements spotted here and there. A low divider separates the large space into two triangular sections, both offering good views of the West Main Street streetscape, including the Humana building, 19th century building fronts, and a few homeless people pushing baskets down all-but-deserted Main Street after dark. A pianist plays pop standards at a level that's pleasant in the far room but that can be loud enough to interfere with conversation for those seated close to his grand piano. The menu bears some family resemblance to Zephyr Cove's, although they have given it a taste of down-home Kentucky character in place of Zephyr's California/international fusion style. It's not cheap: Five appetizers range from $7 (for Shelbyville fried green tomatoes) to $13 (for foie gras pancakes). Soups and salads are $5 for the "soup d'jour" to $9 for a Kentucky bibb lettuce salad, and a pair of sandwiches are $10 for the buffalo burger or a "cold Hot Brown." A dozen dinner entrees, subdivided into beef, lamb and pork, fish, poultry and fowl and vegetarian and pasta categories, range from $13 for a "Kentucky Carbonara" dish of ziti pasta with bacon and white cheddar mornay sauce (add $3 for chicken, $4 for shrimp) to a stratospheric $30 for buffalo filet (add $3 to stuff it with aged Gouda, or $9 to tack on a slab of foie gras). Some other interesting-looking options include Appalachian chicken ($18, with hash browns and okra); spiced duck breast ($23); chicken with cornmeal dumplings ($17) and an artichoke "farmstead stack" of roasted artichokes, green peppers, wild muhsrooms, butternut squash and Gouda cheese ($17). In keeping with its sister establishment's market-leading commitment to quality beverage service, this Cove, like the Zephyr, offers not just a wine list but a "Beverage Journal," with full pages of small-batch and single barrel Bourbon, single-malt Scotch, beers from around the world, Cognac, Armagnac and brandy, and a four-page wine list offering some 100 selections categorized by variety. It offers a good international choice, and to its credit, there's a wide selection in the $50-and-under range. On closer examination, however, the markup appears high, closer to 2 1/2 times retail than the already-pushy double-retail that has become standard at many of the city's high-end eateries. When I spotted such under-$10 items as the forgettable Michel Picard Beaujolais Villages going for $24 and Hugel Gentil from Alsace for $23, I gently closed the book and asked for a beer. (And as it turned out, the $5 draught rations of BBC Altbier and Bass Ale were served in smallish goblets. You'll find no bargains here: Mark down wine and beer as significant profit centers for the Cove.) We started with a shared appetizer, foie gras pancakes ($13), described in full as "seared Hudson Valley foie gras and scotch apple-butter flapjack napoleon with spiced Kentucky chestnuts muscat poppyseed vinaigrette. A vertical stack with a sprig of fresh thyme jutting from the top, it was good, but appeared domewhat different from the menu description. Thin rounds of what appeared to be black pumpernickel were sandwiched Dagwood-style with tiny but succulent bites of sauteed foie gras and thin slices of something that seemed more like crisp apple or pear than chestnuts. It was plated on a thin, sweet vinaigrette dotted with poppy seeds. The flavors went together well, but it was a smallish portion for the top-of-the-appetizer-line price. The Kentucky bibb salad ($9) was fine, fresh, tender Bibb lettuce tossed with dabs of mild Capriole goat cheese and chopped honey-spiced pecans, with a sweet-tart (happily not TOO sweet) fruity vinaigrette emulsion served on the side at my wife's request. My salad choice, the "Red and Green" Caesar ($7) comes in a witty presentation, and the servers enjoy lurking and watching as diners react to it: A cylindrical round of toasted cornbread the size of a hockey puck with a hole in the center is stuffed with baby red and green lettuces that appear to be growing out of it; it's dressed with a creamy, sweet Caesar dressing and a few slices of thin-sliced Parmesan, served on a thin pool of what appears to be a light grainy mustard and garnished with three pretty little silver-skin fresh anchovies. Salads are accompanied by warm multigrain rolls with tender dark-brown crust and a few raisins ... they're sweet, of course. Main courses were impeccably prepared and attractively presented. A tender, boneless farm-raised catfish fillet ($20) was flour-dredged and sauteed, then neatly topped with paper-thin new-potato slices arranged to look like scales, served on top of a good portion of tasty "succotash" made from corn kernels, peas and diced carrots and bits of country bacon, beautifully displayed on colorful circles of bright green pesto oil and a "corn jus" that seemed to be a flour-thickened puree of corn. My choice, the too-cutely named "Lick Skillet" pork chop ($22) was excellent, a large, tender grilled pork chop carefully covered with a fine-chopped paste that was billed as fennel but tasted an awful lot like tart green apples. It was served atop a deliciously rich square of creamy, rich potatoes au gratin, thin-sliced and cooked with Capriole goat cheese, sandwiched with a layer of halved, barely tender brussels sprouts that didn't appear to be caramelized, a departure from the menu's description that didn't bother me at all. It was served on a thin, dark-brown spiced-cider demiglaze, a rich, clear brown sauce that tasted like a wine reduction. Having saved dessert for last, we were already pretty full when we reached the dessert menu. "Lickskillit Bourbon bread pudding" ($6) caught my eye but seemed a bit much; but then we noticed that the "drunkin bananas" included cinnamon-walnut ice cream, which sounded pretty good. Could we have the ice cream but hold the bananas and the booze? Sure we could! (Although they didn't reduce the $5 price.) It was very good ice cream, too, creamy and rich and actually less sweet than the entrees. Coffee was disappointing, thin and weak, but a shared glass of Blanton's Bourbon ($7) made a pleasant and warming finish to linger over as we watched the last of sunset disappear from the evening sky as the last street person trundled her shopping cart into the distance. An evening at Kentucky Cove is pleasant, a civilized urban experience in the state's primary venue for the arts; but it will not be inexpensive. Our dinner for two, even when we split portions for the appetizer, dessert and after-dinner drink, came to $98.05, pushed well over the century mark by a $20 tip. $$$$ October 2001
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*** Kentucky Cove