It was a chilly, cloudy Saturday morning in January. The temperature was hovering around 37º. Even so, the sidewalk tables in front of Frankfort Avenue’s beloved Blue Dog Bakery & Café were filling up just the same, hungry travelers clad in parkas and mittens, eagerly awaiting a steaming coffee drink and pastry treat.
Inside Blue Dog’s warm, cozy space was jammed with more eager supplicants. Counter service would begin any moment, and they were ready.
“It’s always like this,” Blue Dog’s new owner Libbie Ackerman Loeser said with a smile.
I felt pretty sad last month when I read El Mundo’s social-media post announcing management’s decision to “put the original, quirky, tiny Frankfort Avenue location on pause until the Spring.”
The good news was that El Mundo’s newer, larger Highlands shop, which opened during the Covid-19 pandemic, remains open. It has expanded service to seven days a week, and recently launched an impressive Saturday, Sunday, and Monday brunch.
Menus: Can’t live with ‘em. Can’t live without ‘em! You step into a restaurant, take your seat, and pick up the menu. How does this make you feel? Joy at anticipating a tasty meal, or fear that something is about to make you crabby?
Why must menus disappoint us in so many ways, from look and feel to organization and design to the way they communicate? The menu has just one job, and sadly, it doesn’t always get that job done.
I try not to miss much when it comes to developments in local restaurants. It happened this month, though, when I finally got to Sankalp Louisville for what proved to be one of the best Indian meals ever.
Where has this place been all my life? Or to be more specific, why was I so clueless about this large, stylish Indian eatery that had announced its opening in an Instagram post almost exactly 18 months ago?
Well, here we are. It’s 2024, another year has gone into the history books. We’re at that annual point when we talk about New Year’s resolutions (and how quickly we break them).
This is also when we fondly remember that jolly old Roman deity Janus. whose name gave us “January” because he bears a face on both sides of his head: One to look forward and one to look back.
Vietnam is a tropical country, mostly. In its southern reaches, around Ho Chi Minh City (formerly Saigon) and the Mekong Delta, it’s searing hot and sopping humid virtually all year.
So how did a country so torrid give birth to pho, that aromatic, beefy soup-as-entree that’s delicious all year ‘round but lovably warming during winter’s icy blasts?
What? another year has gone by already!? How in the heck did that even happen?
We’re another year away from the Covid-19 pandemic that came out of nowhere to scare the hell out of us, and we’ve become so blasé that only a tiny fraction of Americans have even bothered to get the updated and curated 2023-2024 vaccine. (It’s your call, but I’ve got mine.)
Moreover, a year later, the restaurant industry continues to grapple with business issues that the pandemic brought into clear sight …
When was the day the disco died? Surely the dance and the surrounding culture were already fading by the late 1970s. But historians trace its ultimate demise to July 12, 1979, when a wacky “Disco Demolition” night at Chicago’s Comiskey Park boiled into a riot that caused at least nine injuries, 39 arrests, and the forfeit of that night’s Major League Baseball game between the Chicago White Sox and the Detroit Tigers.
It was a momentous occasion, I’m sure. But riddle me this: Why am I recalling this sad event to introduce this week’s restaurant review? Stay with me. I’ll get there as fast as I can.
Today: Cloudy, gradually becoming overcast, with a high near 34. Gusty and variable winds, with rain, sleet, and snow showers through the period.
That’s the kind of dismal forecast that just shouts “Louisville Winter!” Blustery weather like thismakes me crave warm, consoling comfort food … and a warm, consoling comfort restaurant to enjoy it in.
What is tikka? Based on a Punjabi word meaning “small pieces of meat,” it’s an Indian dish of marinated, tandoor-roasted meat. Eat them right up, or serve them in a creamy sauce as tikka masala.
Okay, then, what’s a taco? You’re kidding me, right? Everyone knows what a taco is.
But what happens if for some inexplicable reason someone decided to put these two things together? Shazam! Now we’ve got Tikka Tacos, a curiously delightful new spot on Preston Street near Audubon Park.
