This restaurant is reviewed in the post “The quality factor: Three local gems.”
Category Archives: A RESTAURANT LISTING…
Chef Dan seeks out the little donkey
 |
| Salsarita’s chicken burrito with black beans, medium salsa, guacamole, lettuce, cilantro, red onions and cheese. Photo by Robin Garr. |
LEO’s Eat ‘n’ Blog with Louisville HotBytes
(Qdoba, Moe’s, Salsarita’s)
When a top chef takes a break from cooking for other people and ventures out to dine on someone else’s fare, what goodies is he likely to choose? Ethereally trendy foams and smears and other cutting-edge num-nums of molecular gastronomy?
Well, maybe.
But if you ask Chef Dan Thomas, sous chef at Big Spring Country Club and late of City Café, Café Metro and Equus, about the casual snack that smacks his piñata, a fond, distant look comes into his eyes and he literally licks his chops.
“Burritos,” he said. Continue reading Chef Dan seeks out the little donkey
Amerigo discovers Louisville
 |
(Amerigo Italian Restaurant, Voice-Tribune, Aug. 9, 2007)
Amerigo Vespucci, a minor mapmaker of fifteenth century Italy, may have visited the New World briefly a decade or so after Christopher Columbus set foot ashore in 1492.
Yet, thanks to another mapmaker who named the new continents after his cartographic colleague, the Americas are forever known by Vespucci’s slightly altered first name; while Columbus’s moniker attaches only to such relatively little-known patriotic hymns as “Hail Columbia” and, well, the capital of Ohio.
Now Amerigo gains a 21st century connection on the sign over the door of a six-unit, Nashville-based Italian-style restaurant chain that recently opened its first Louisville property. Housed in the building that was formerly home to Harper’s, Amerigo Italian Restaurant has built a substantial word-of-mouth buzz since its opening last month.
We’ve found a lot to like on early visits: Continue reading Amerigo discovers Louisville
Plus ça change at Café Lou Lou
 |
| One of the reasons Café Lou Lou’s new locale works is the retention of the original look, including striking art pieces. LEO photo by Nicole Pullen. |
LEO’s Eat ‘n’ Blog with Louisville HotBytes
The 19th century French satirist and polymath Alphonse Karr was not, as far as we know, a food critic. But when he penned the lines, “Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose” (“The more things change, the more they stay the same”), he might as well have been talking about Louisville’s Café Lou Lou.
A lot of us obligate urbanites were horrified to learn earlier this year that Chef Clay Wallace and co-owner Helen Ellis planned to move the popular eatery’s quarters from Frankfort Avenue in Clifton to St. Matthews, literally across the street from where Sears used to be.
Leaving the artsy, hippy-dippy diversity of Clifton for almost-suburban St. Matthews? How can this be, we wailed! Café Lou Lou can’t possibly stay the same! How can it survive in the whitebread land of SUVs?
As it turns out, the answer to these questions turns out to be, “Very nicely indeed.” Or, if you prefer, “Plus ça change.”
Continue reading Plus ça change at Café Lou Lou
A man, a plan, a great meal at 610 Magnolia
 |
| Chef Edward Lee at 610 Magnolia. LEO photo by Nicole Pullen |
LEO’s Eat ‘n’ Blog with Louisville HotBytes
What happens when one becomes so jaded that even the regular dinner at a culinary shrine seems routine? “Ho, hum, dinner at 610 Magnolia again!” Here’s my advice: Kick it up with a special dinner at 610.
Frankly, I don’t think I could ever attain such a level of ennui about the restaurant that’s arguably the region’s best. Chef Edward Lee’s regular menu is a never-ending series of surprises, with exciting new dishes every weekend. But every now and then, Lee pulls off something special. And these events – best tracked by signing up for the e-mail list on the restaurant Web site at www.610magnolia.com – are memorable indeed.
Take last week’s Palindrome dinner.
Say what?
Continue reading A man, a plan, a great meal at 610 Magnolia
It’s fast … it’s casual … it’s Asian!
 |
| The lettuce wraps at Yang Kee Noodle (top) and I Ching Asian Cafe are similar, but Yang Kee provides more lettuce and goodies on the side. Photos by Robin Garr |
(Yang Kee Noodle, I Ching Asian Cafe, Voice-Tribune, July 12, 2007)
If you like the fresh, healthy and enticing flavors of the colorful cuisines of East Asia, but feel a little wary about dining at ethnic eateries where the menu is printed in a language you can’t speak, then fast-casual Asian dining may be just right for you.
Coming from the West Coast, as so many modern food trends do, this spreading development is largely carried by franchise chains like Pei Wei (P.F. Chang’s little brother), Rice Boxx, Pick Up Stix Fresh Asian Kitchen, Chef Martin Yan’s Yan Can and Tokyo Joe’s.
Like the similarly swelling wave of “fresh burrito” chains, competition is keen in this niche, and the concepts are so similar that sometimes the only way to tell where you’re dining is to look at the corporate logo.
None of the Asian chains have reached Louisville yet, but the concept is going strong in the East End, with two independent properties competing from shopping-center venues just a mile apart on Shelbyville Road.
Continue reading It’s fast … it’s casual … it’s Asian!
Asian adventures, New Albany style
 |
| The Onion Restaurant and Tea House has built quite a following since it opened in New Albany a few years back. LEO photo by Nicole Pullen |
LEO’s Eat ‘n’ Blog with Louisville HotBytes
(Onion Restaurant and Tea House, Tran Japanese Steakhouse)
It’s been a great pleasure, in recent years, to see such a surge of restaurant-related activity on the north side of the Ohio. The arrival of a growing variety of eateries in Southern Indiana is good news for “foodies” on both sides of the river.
In addition to the obvious – the boomlet of chain eateries on the riverfront and across the Clarksville strip – the region has been gifted in recent years with interesting, locally-owned independent restaurants that range from taquerias and Asian spots to casually sophisticated dining rooms. We’ll have more on that, and a deeper look at the New Albany restaurant renaissance in particular, coming soon.
One of the many epicenters of Southern Indiana eats activity, perhaps just a bit out of sight and out of the way for Kentucky diners, lies along Grant Line and Charlestown roads near I-265 on New Albany’s north side. Continue reading Asian adventures, New Albany style
Mexican hat trick: tacos three ways
 |
| Lining up for lunch at Taco Tico. LEO photos by Nicole Pullen |
LEO’s Eat ‘n’ Blog with Louisville HotBytes
(Taco Tico, Taco Bell, El Zarape)
Way back at the dawn of time (oh, all right, during the 1970s), back when most people in Louisville thought “nacho” was just a cool way of saying “righto” and even the cognoscenti pronounced “taco” as “tack-oh,” indeed even before the first Taco Bell rang the region’s chimes, there was Taco Tico.
(Actually, for the sake of historical accuracy, the first Taco Tico was founded in Wichita, Kan., in 1962. Glen Bell opened his first eponymous taqueria in Downey, Calif., that same year. Louisville, however, slow during that era to embrace culinary change, failed to embrace the fast-food taco for a while.)
Taco Bell, of course, prospered and grew. Now a property of Louisville-based Yum! Brands, it boasts about 6,000 outlets around the world. Taco Tico, on the other hand, topped out in the ’80s with about 120 outlets before falling off to about half that peak. It’s in just eight states, the lion’s share in Kansas and nearby states, with a handful in Kentucky.
But now, after a 10-year hiatus, Taco Tico is back in Louisville Continue reading Mexican hat trick: tacos three ways
Getcher red hots … with truffle aioli and fennel kraut?
 |
| Park Place chef Jay Denham is taking over for Anoosh Shariat, and he has implemented a new “ball park menu” that may be a preview of changes to come. LEO photo by Nicole Pullen |
LEO’s Eat ‘n’ Blog with Louisville HotBytes
We went to the Bats game the other night and enjoyed the best ballpark repast I’ve ever had: A succulent hot dog, a classy fish taco and an order of sizzling fries with a little special something.
This may seem high praise, considering my frequent rants about the mostly lackluster, overpriced fare served up at Slugger Field.
But that may be because this ballpark dinner didn’t come from the ballpark’s concession stands. We dined before the game at Park Place on Main, which with its sibling Browning’s occupies the renovated 19th century industrial building that houses the city’s lovable Slugger Field.
Browning’s, with its brewpub ambience, affordable menu and casual style, has always been a good place to grab a beer and a burger (or even something a little more fancy) before or after the game, although it boggles credulity that its excellent beers aren’t sold inside the stadium.
Park Place, on the other hand, is upscale and elegant, a place that I associate more with an indulgent dinner that extends over a leisurely evening than a quick pre-game bite.
Continue reading Getcher red hots … with truffle aioli and fennel kraut?
Jarfi’s artful fare now at two centers
 |
| Also featured this week: Wings To Go, a small chain spot in New Albany that makes a credible version of the original Buffalo chicken wing. Photo by Robin Garr |
LEO’s Eat ‘n’ Blog with Louisville HotBytes
(Jarfi’s @ Mellwood; Wings To Go)
One of Louisville’s more striking dining venues has to be Jarfi’s Bistro, which makes stylish use of its space in the Kentucky Center, the big, black modern building on West Main Street that suffered the tragic loss of its useful subordinate clause “… for the Arts” in a marketing decision a while back.
Jarfi, born in Morocco but international in his culinary inspiration, presides over a broad bill of fare at his eponymous eatery, a comfortably upscale place that’s equally well suited for an indulgent, lingering dinner, a quick pre-theater repast, or even an artful plate of sushi.
And now he’s branching out, quietly opening another, much more casual venue in an attractive if lower-profile center for the arts. Regular Eat ‘N’ Blog correspondent KEVIN GIBSON picks up the beat from the new Jarfi’s @ Mellwood in the Mellwood Arts & Entertainment Center. Here’s Kevin’s report:
Continue reading Jarfi’s artful fare now at two centers