eat something

I still plan to finish my 2009 wrap up in photos, but first a few words on my new favorite way to eat steak in Houston.

Only days after I noted that Justin Basye coming to Stella Sola improves our chances of seeing  him in the kitchen of his own, an unfortunate chef shakeup did that just that. Now that the restaurant has been on solid footing for a few months the Stella Sola team is already making things in Houston more interesting.

Exhibit I: a re-imagined rib eye that instantly became my favorite way to eat red meat.

I am not a huge fan of steak houses, mostly because I see no reason to gorge yourself on a massive slabs of meat served at these places. The 20th bite tastes almost exactly the same as the 1st. There is just no point. But the Truck Stop Ribeye at Stella Sola makes things interesting.

It’s not a huge cut of meat, but a much more manageable portion which should keep your attention. Arugula, onions and marinated tomatoes ensure surprisingly acidic and bright flavors for a meat dish. The best part is that there are no boring parts of the steak, which is where a little bit of food science comes in.

 
The muscle marked #2 is Spinalis Dorsi

The reason the truck stop rib eye at Stella Sola tastes so good is because it’s an engineered steak, which is not to say it’s not a natural product. The cut used in this dish is the rib eye cap, also known as spinalis dorsi, revered for its big beef flavor and tenderness. The rib eye cap is matched only by the tenderloin  (which is as tender as it is boring) and the flat iron steak.

It’s possible that the reason you don’t see the rib eye cap on restaurant menus is because it gets picked by butchers and cooks long before you can get your hands on it. A more probable reason is that the spinalis dorsi just isn’t big enough to be a serving on it’s own. At Stella Sola the truck stop rib eye is constructed several spinalis dorsi muscles fused together with transglutaminase, also known as meat glue. The result is something that handles like a regular steak and tastes terrific.

The Truck Stop Ribeye isn’t the only reason to go to Stella Sola. Since its opening late in 2009, it has become one of my favorite new restaurants in town and the kitchen is staffed by some of the best young chefs in the city.  The crudo, the house cured meats, the fantastic lardo, the bone marrow and the pastas are all excellent.

As it sheds some of the Reef redundancies (which can be too apparent) from the menu and establishes its own identity, I expect Stella Sola to only get better in 2010. Plus, you have to love any place where the cooks are ready to whip out their meat and pose for photos at any moment.

It’s unlikely I’ll ever have a year quite like 2009. 11 cities across 9 countries, countless amazing meals in  some of the worlds best restaurants and grungiest of dives, none of it properly documented in this blog.

The year began with my personal rendition of a cajun cassoulet, built around smoked ham hocks, ox tails and duck confit. Yes, I cook.

This photo of a nettle sformatto from Quince in San Francisco taken in early January is only notable because it came with a stern warning from the manager that “the chef would prefer you did not photograph his cuisine”. This would be my second and final trip to Quince.

The food in Sydney is almost universally bland, but the hottest sauce at this stand still made my entire face hurt. I suppose I deserved that.

The liquid nitrogen treated Hemingway cocktail at the Bentley restaurant is one of many highlights in Sydney.

In-n-Out makes a great burger and it somehow tastes even better after a long night at Manresa. After much experimentation, I have decided that my perfect burger is a 3×3, hold the animal style.

Only 12 hours after we came back from Sydney, Isabell passed away after a long bout with cancer. She was my best friend.

This onion tart, as simple as it is incredibly complex, turned out to be the last time I’d have the opportunity to eat at Le Reve. The best restaurant in Texas served it’s last meal in 2009.

20 years after leaving the city where I grew up, I returned to Moscow. The bread tastes exactly the same, but there is now a huge number of street food stands dotting the city. Rotisserie chicken, doner kebabs, and shawarma seem to be popular.

By the end of our trip to St Petersburg my friend commented that he ate more sour cream than he ever had in his life. I told him he was exaggerating, just as a sour cream honey cake was delivered to our table. It was one of the best desserts I had in 2009, but I really really like sour cream.

I waited a long time to try Jose Andres’ food and it was worth the wait. One of my best meals in 2009 was at Bazaar.

The fist of my two trips to Louisiana yielded a visit to Al-T’s, a rather unremarkable place that has a stellar boudin ball. It’s hard to explain to non-Texans how great it is to live in Houston and be in close proximity to the full bounty of Gulf Coast cuisine. This photo certainly gives you a clue.

Cajun Charlie’s in Sulpur is conveniently located next to a cemetery. There were zombies in the parking lot.

In March I had my first tasting at Rainbow Lodge, where Randy Rucker did some of his best work this year. These octopus suction cups with fennel flowers was one of my favorites.

Zoe arrived in March. She’s really great.

The beet salad remained a staple on the menu at Voice, this time in a form of a homage to Michel Bras.

In April I finally had a chance to try the iconic Ben’s Chili Bowl in DC, a few months before Ben passed away. My best meal on that trip was at Komi, but they were too full of themselves to allow photographs of food. Those people can bite me, but I’ll certainly be back.

I came back to Houston and found out that the best pupusas in the city are made exactly 1.4 miles away from my house. This is why I love living in Houston.

The canapé and cheese service were the best parts of my dinner at Cyrus in Healdsburg. You expect more from a ** restaurant.

One last meal at A16 before Nate Appleman left for New York and became a rather irritating TV chef. I sincirely hope A16 is as good without Appleman as it was with him in the kitchen.

My dinner at Coi turned out to be one of the best meals of the year and this dish may have been one of the best. Carrots, sorrel and burnt breadcrumbs was the most striking dish of the night.

Dessert tastings with Plinio Sandalio became one of the highlights of the year and an attraction for the few gastro-tourists Houston gets. Even something as terminally boring as cupcakes are special.

I’m not sure why it took me so long to get to Burns BBQ, the closest you can get to the level of cooking you find in Luling and Lockhart. I am glad I did before Roy Burns Sr. passed away in December.

View from the plane on the way to Denver, where sushi is (most improbably) some of the best in the country.

Biggest surprise of the year turned out to be Aburiya Raku in Las Vegas. Even after my trip to Japan, still some of the most stunning Japanese food I’ve ever had.

In May I finally had a chance to eat at Uchi in Austin, one of the best Japanese restaurants in the US. This simple house salad with hydroponic baby greens and Texas inflected edamame-jalapeno vinaigrette was one of my favorite items on the menu.

A day later driving through Lockhart I found some of the best BBQ in Texas (and therefore the universe)  at Smitty’s Market.

The kitchen crew at Rainbow Lodge really hit it’s stride in June, turning out the most inspired and consistent food in Houston.

Manabu Horiuchi landed at Kata Robata and made it possible to eat sushi without disappointment in Houston.

Next post - “2009 – a year in photos (July-December).

I wrote this on my way to Seasalter several weeks ago and finally had a chance to finish the post. More on the Sportsman later.

Last day in Europe ends with a day trip to The Sportsman, giving me a quiet hour on the train. I’ve been looking forward to the Sportsman the entire trip and it’s a perfect way to end my visit to Europe. First week in Paris and Copenhagen was a whirlwind of great (and sometimes unexpected) dining experiences. Second week in Amsterdam and London was all work and no play, other than a mandatory visit to St John, but the Sportsman has all the elements of what I seem to enjoy most these days. No restaurant empires, iconic chefs, posh dining rooms outfitted with caviar carts and lobster presses; only a chef with a vision (yes, I think that sort of thing is sometimes important) who still cooks in his kitchen, carefully chosen ingredients and a food cooked without compromise. Sounds improbable, but these places exist and I hope the Sportsman is one. (more on that later)

Road to Seasalter, UK.

As much as I enjoy traveling, I always look forward to coming back home and not only because I am hopelessly addicted to Tex-Mex and the incredible range of food found in Houston. What I’ve found lately is that there is also a young crop of chefs who show enormous promise and may shape what we eat in Houston for years to come. I’ve written about a few in the past, but failed to note Justin Basye, lately of Voice and now of Stella Sola, a new Texan/Tuscan (?!) restaurant yet to be opened by Bryan Caswell and Jason Gould.   

If there is one thing that the Tenacity dinners have taught me is that the executive chef isn’t always the only (or even most) talented guy in the kitchen. The supporting cast are incredibly passionate about food and have a voice of their own, which always takes a back seat to almost everything else - restaurant concept, cost constraints, access to tools and the need to execute someone else’s food, rather than create your own. I’ve only had Justin’s food once, but he seems like one of these guys.

Justin’s pig centric Tenacity dinner last year was one of my favorite meals of the year. The food was clearly influenced by the kitchens he has passed through. There are the bold Louisiana flavors of Restaurant August, clean precision of Voice and modern technique of Laidback Manor, but the dishes he presented that night were unique in being able to isolate a single flavor and pull it into the foreground.  Most tellingly, the dinner  had a well defined arc, something rarely found in even established restaurants with very experienced chefs.

Justin and his stellar cured meats are a great fit for Stella Sola. Most important, our chances of one day seeing him in a kitchen of his own have just improved.

Speaking of Voice, my tasting from the spring menu was outstanding. Even though Justin is leaving the kitchen, Michael Kramer remains one of the best chefs in Houston and delivers great food on the nightly basis. Other than the Mad Hatter chairs that feel like torture devices, it’s a great experience.

I have nothing new to say about the very public feud between Jason Gould and Scott Tycer. Plenty of ink has been spilled on this topic already and none of it changes the fact that this is a sad story with no winners (as is often the case when McKinsey consultants are involved).

What I will say is that today is Jason Gould’s last day at Gravitas and you should consider going in for dinner.

Gravitas isn’t closing, but it’s certainly not going to be same after Jason Gould departs this week. More so than ever before it has become his kitchen and the more uniquely Australian touches I saw on the menu the more I was wanted to return.

 
I visited Sydney twice, but somehow some of the best Australian food I have had has been in Houston, at Gravitas. No matter how hard I tried, I could not find kangaroo on the menus in Sydney. I raced over to Gravitas when I heard Gould put skippy on the Queen’s birthday menu and it was more than worth the trip.

Same visit also gave me my first taste of a pavlova, another dish that I never came across in Australia, despite their proximity to New Zealand (they do have a Krispy Kreme, however).

 
This week I returned to try the Gravitas Aussie burger, which was another Australian specialty that left unfulfilled. My first Aussie burger was at Hungry Jacks, an Australian version of Burger King. Not even the canned beets and a rubbery fried egg could overcome the fact that I was essentially eating a Whopper. Still, the prospect of beets on a burger is irresistible to someone of Eastern European background.

The second time was in an Australian “steakhouse”, which makes Outback look like a pantheon of prime beef.  Thanks in part to the awful beef, the burger somehow turned out even worse than the one at Hungry Jacks.

Gould’s version served at Gravitas isn’t perfect, but it is a huge improvement over the Aussie burgers I had before and definitely worth ordering. I can do without the pineapple that interferes with the pronounced beet flavor I was seeking, though I am sure that violates some sort of “authenticity” laws. I also wish the bread was less bready so it would be possible to eat the burger without fork and knife, but the combination of beef, fried egg and beets is undeniably great and really delivers a whole new burger experience.

 
Don’t miss the roasted red pepper and corn falafel that may appear on the prix fixe menu tonight. It’s the best falafel preparation I have had since I was hooked on the soft, almost creamy version served at Las du Falafel in Paris and it’s very different than the dry hockey pucks we’re used to in Houston.

 
I really like the way the orange creamsicle, from Rebecca Mason’s new dessert menu, glows like a geometrically correct iceberg in the photos. Thanks to the bright flavors and a contrast in textures, it tastes pretty good too. May want to order that one as well.

 
Public drama aside, I like the food at Textile and Gravitas enough to wish that both restaurants do well. I also hope that Jason Gould finds a place in Houston where he can cook his food on his own terms. He is clearly a gifted chef and I think his Australian departures at the “American Bistro for Houston” really gave the place a distinct character that will be missed when he leaves.

Mean, you can catch Jason Gould doing his thing one last time at Gravitas on Thursday, August 27th. Go.

A few days ago there was a lot chatter about an article published by the Dallas Morning News critic (and recent LA transplant) Leslie Brenner that went into a long list of deficiencies she sees in the Dallas restaurant scene. Houston eaters piled on and quickly adopted her gripes as their own. I had to disagree.

I may be a merciless bastard with an obnoxious streak, but I also love living in Texas and find this a thrilling place to eat. It’s not that don’t enjoy my dining  adventures in supposed “great restaurant” cities - I do. It’s just that by the end of the trip I usually wonder how the locals manage to survive without the wild range of cuisines and flavors I have such easy access to in Houston, and Texas in general.

I could go into a protracted explanation, but maybe the best way to illustrate my point with a few photos of what I ate today.

My day began in San Antonio with a decidedly Tex-Mex rendition of a chilaquiles wrapped in some of the finest flour tortillas in the state, at Blanco Cafe.

 
OK, so maybe my day didn’t really begin at Blanco Cafe, but it should have and it did last week. Plus today I had the time to swing by the City Market in Luling on the way home, which has some of the best BBQ in Texas (and therefore the Universe). 

 
The historic pit room at City Market has many charms, but I like it most because it makes my clothes smell like smoke on the way home.  Smelling like wood smoke beats smelling like a great restaurant city any day of the week.

You just know you’re about to eat something sublime standing in line at this place and once you unfold the brown butcher paper bag, this is what you find (no further explanation or sauce is necessary):

 
At dinner time I found myself back in Houston, at Beaver’s. Apparently some people find this place overrated, but I keep finding excellent, creative dishes built around the best local ingredients there that makes me think that maybe Beaver’s is in fact underrated and maybe a bit misunderstood, instead.

Tonight’s special was absolutely stunning – raw Gulf Coast escolar with cucumber essence, few citrus slices, julienne of radish and pickled chili peppers. The dish was kicked up to a whole new level by the addition of black garlic, which has an earthy pungency that  black truffles can only dream of.

Retrace my steps through Texas and you may find yourself wondering why anyone would complain about the restaurants in Texas.

I’ll concede that this may not be happening in Dallas, but in Houston we get to witness a quiet emergence of a whole new direction of Gulf Coast cuisine, driven by the up and coming chefs at Reef, Rainbow Lodge, Beaver’s, Catalan and several others. These chefs will be shaping the direction of cooking in this region for years to come. How can eating here be any less than thrilling?