Review: Cassis American Brasserie

Friday featured two new restaurant adventures, chosen to kick us out of our food rut. At lunch, we braved a torrential Florida downpour on a doomed food mission in Gulfport. A favorite beach dive closed several years ago, and I keep waiting for it to be replaced with something equally fantastic. No such luck. Its current incarnation as a faux-British pub is ripe for a visit from Gordon Ramsey.

Thankfully, dinner was an epic win. We ventured to Cassis American Brasserie, a newcomer to the upscale restaurant scene in downtown St. Pete. I've never been to Paris, but this place certainly felt like I imagine a bistro to feel--quite a bit larger perhaps, but pleasantly noisy and open. High ceilings, shiny white tiles, softly colored globes of light, and comfortable banquettes--and celebrity chef Emeril Lagasse, sitting just behind me, facing a massive tray from the raw bar. It all made for a thoroughly cosmopolitan, yet eminently comfortable, ambience. Dorian summed it up succinctly: "This place makes me want to move back to New York. NOW."

The food was more deftly prepared and presented than anything I've eaten before in the Tampa Bay area, save only for our first visit to Cafe Ponte in 2004. Dorian went for traditional bistro fare, selecting the onion soup gratinee and steak frites. Both were very good, if not outstanding. He said the steak was perfectly cooked, tender and very rare inside, and bathed in a rich demi glace. The frites were tasty but slightly limp, probably from being piled into a paper bag and left to sit for too long.



I was sorely tempted by the fried chicken with lobster mac and cheese, but I start training for a half marathon this week and couldn't justify the fat and calories. I went for much lighter choices--and was not sorry. A cool, refreshing cucumber-mint gazpacho arrived at my table, heaped with massive lumps of sweet, minimally seasoned blue crab meat. If Emeril hadn't been sitting so close, I might have licked the bowl.



My entree was beautiful and tasty--rainbow trout in brown butter, on a bed of roasted potatoes and crunchy haricot verts. There were a few plump shrimp on top, but they were completely extraneous. The sharp bite of capers in the butter surprised me, infusing every morsel of trout with briny joy. I've had a very similar dish recently, that took a richer route and added bacon, and that was perhaps more comforting; but those capers totally won me over.

I shouldn't have had dessert, but, you know...FRENCH food. A flaky (if slightly dry) pastry round, topped with tender, warm apple slices and swathed in caramel, is about as good as it gets. But the addition of homemade coriander ice cream, delicately spiced and melting, nearly put me into a happy food coma. I found it almost painful to choose a dessert, but I am so pleased with my choice.

We will definitely be back to Cassis for more. I want that fried chicken (though perhaps not until after my race in October), and I long to try the poached peaches with cassis sorbet and chantilly cream. I wouldn't mind making my way through the cocktail menu (my violet margarita was tart and very subtly perfumed). And they have brunch, too--I noticed an asparagus and goat cheese omelet. It wants to be inside my belly, and soon.

This is a great addition to the St. Pete food scene--and if it keeps attracting the chefs taping over at Home Shopping, it could soon become a foodie's paradise. My friend Jenn over at Jenn Likes It knows that Wolfgang Puck eats there frequently, and I'll bet word spreads around HSN quickly. Good luck to this fab eatery. We'll see you again.

Epcot Food and Wine Festival 2010

Yes, we have a small child. Yes, we both have the entire summer off of work. But the real reason that we keep our Disney annual passes is so we can go to the Epcot Food and Wine Festival every year. In fact, we renew our passes in October each year, so that if we ever decided not to renew, we'll still be able to go to the next year's festival. This just by way of background.

Friday last was the opening night of the 2010 festival, and we braved the crowds to get an early taste of the food. There were lots of returning favorites and some new booths to celebrate the festival's 15th anniversary. There is also a cookbook, which I am totally buying next time we go.

It's always tough to choose whether to start to the left or the right; this year, we chose right, and It Was Good. Before hitting up a country's booth, we stopped at a random beer tent for some Prosecco and cheese fondue. The fondue was superb: tons of bite from the Swiss, a little extra acid (lemon?) compared to most fondue, and accompanied by chunks of sourdough baguette and fingerling potatoes (also doused in lemon). The Prosecco was really nice for cutting through the richness of the fondue. Now if they'd just dispense with those ridiculous tiny plastic cups!

We look forward to Canada every year, even though their offerings are actually regular menu items from the Le Cellier steakhouse. Technically, we could get that spicy beer-cheese soup and maple-glazed salmon with lentils any time of year, but we never manage to dress up enough to eat there. The line was insane this time around, though, so we'll wait until we can escape to the festival on a weeknight.

Speaking of old favorites, we (rightly) stood in line for about half an hour at the Ireland tent for lobster and scallop fisherman's pie (creamy, rich, and brimming with chunks of sweet shellfish), molten chocolate cake smothered in Bailey's (past its prime as a trendy recipe, but still freaking delicious), and Meade's honey wine (which smelled like honey and tasted like ass).

Primarily, we started to the right this year to ensure we got to France as quickly as possible. In recent years, they have abandoned the goat cheese and caramelized onion tartlets of which I was so inordinately fond, but they still serve garlicky escargot inside three tiny, buttery, crunchy bread bowls. Couple them with a pomegranate Kir royale (or, in our case, several pomegranate Kir royales) and you've got yourself a lovely evening on the water, watching the sunset with the Eiffel Tower at your back.

Reluctantly, we moved on, only to discover that our festival experience took a downturn. I've always cautioned Dori against eating at the Italian restaurant at Epcot, both because I know that institutionalized Italian food has little chance of being decent and because said restaurant is called "Alfredo's"--and no self-respecting, authentic Italian restaurant would go for something that ridiculous. (1) Still, Dori pressed on, and we made our way through the Italian tent for cheese ravioli with bolognese and polpettini in tomato sauce. Seriously. And it was every bit as bland and disgusting and institutional as I'd feared; it was even served in what looked suspiciously like airline-food containers. Ugh.

Stuffed to the gills, but needing something to redeem our faux-Italian experience, so we stopped at the China tent for street-vendor-style BBQ chicken and crispy black pepper shrimp over chile-garlic noodles. The former was a little too dark-meat-y for my tastes, but it was perfectly charred on the outside and tender inside, and had the complex flavors of a homemade 5-spice rub: sweet, smoky, salty. The shrimp were largely unnecessary on my plate (and notable for their complete lack of black pepper), but the noodles on which they sat were tremendously good. Intensely spicy and garlicky, with sharp flecks of scallion and--oh, THERE you are, black pepper! I love you on the noodles, but the shrimp really could have used your help!

The garlic breath was really persistent from that point on, so we made our way to the dessert and champagne booth at the end to balance things out. Unable to properly decide on a dessert, we got all three offerings, plus two more itty bitty glasses of champagne, and took them to the water's edge to watch the fireworks. On our delicious little plate was a delicate trifle of strawberry, vanilla custard, and angelfood cake (Dorian's clear favorite, which surprised the hell out of me, as I'm usually the fruit dessert person), a pear-and-custard tart on an extremely short pastry crust (my favorite, as I'll eat anything with fruit and a buttery, flour-y pastry), and a dark chocolate cake with chocolate frosting (a yummy counterpoint to the fruit, but nowhere near as good as the pear thing).

Full of champagne bubbles, we settled in to watch Epcot's extremely lame fireworks display (we are so spoiled by the show at Magic Kingdom, which is fucking EPIC) with its stupid floating globe-on-fire, and let our food digest a bit. We headed out before the grand finale and drove home, sated and excited about our next visit, when we will start with Canada, Belgium (moules frites and a fruit-slathered waffle), Argentina (roasted corn empanadas), Poland (kielbasa and pierogies), and the US (bison chili with wild mushrooms). Maybe Australia (last year's barramundi with arugula salad and lemon oil) and another go at France. Haven't decided on South Africa, which kept last year's Grilled Beef with Sweet Potato and Mango BBQ Sauce (Dori's favorite) but ditched, mysteriously, their amazing Mealie (a corn chowder with a lethal drizzle of chile oil). Can't wait.

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(1) Disclaimer: I did also openly mock a restaurant in Delaware called "La Casa Pasta" on the same grounds, only to find out that it was the single best and most authentic Italian restaurant I'd even found in the US. So, I can be overly judgmental at times.

Review: Hickory Hollow

Well, okay, technically this meal took place on Tuesday, my Night of Shame this week, and therefore does not merit a Saturday review. But today we ate leftover steak taco filling with scrambled eggs (I told you!) and then had lunch/dinner at Tijuana Flats. For my non-Floridian friends, TF is a bit like the Bennigan's of Mexican food--a few half-steps up from Taco Bell, but nothing to write home (or a blog) about. So let's just pretend it was tacos on Tuesday and Hickory Hollow today. Fine? Fine.

Hickory Hollow is located, like most stellar 'cue joints, in a foodie's No Man's Land: Ellenton, FL, across the street from an outlet mall and a few doors down from a Wendy's, an Applebee's, and a Hungry Howie's. There is no reason to go there, ever. Still, the Hollow never has less than a half-hour wait, even on weeknights, so you know they're good.

The Hollow offers Texas-style 'cue, but I've never bothered with it. The number of protein choices alone would make Gordon Ramsay apoplectic, and there are so many fresh-made sides that they have a separate menu for them--a wooden, pig-shaped menu, I might add, with the selection Velcro-ed on in little laminated strips. Classy. (1)

The tackiness of the Hollow is part of its charm, sure, but it also makes it easy to concentrate on your food instead. I've heard the smoked catfish, fresh ham, and brisket are good, but I've never been able to tear myself away from the pulled pork long enough to care. They have ribs and shrimp and sausage, too, but again--don't care. The pulled pork is PERFECT: tender and juicy, kissed with a spicy Carolina vinegar sauce, arriving on a plastic plate and pretending to be a sandwich. There's a bun there, sure--and it's a good one, buttered and grilled--but you can barely see it under the glossy meat. And you don't even have to ask for their slightly creamy, mostly vinegary slaw, because it's already there.

It's hard to choose 2 sides from the Pig Board--unless you're me. Their fried okra is about the best I've ever had, crisp and flavorful outside, full of crunchy okra whose seeds still pop between my teeth, and their sugar snaps swim happily in melted butter, bursting with tiny peas. Dorian swoons over their black-eyed peas, but I'm weirded out by their slightly minty flavor; he also reliably chooses the summer squash, which hides under some seriously sharp melted Cheddar.

Best of all, the Hollow offers corn fritters--ENORMOUS (baseball-sized) corn fritters, 4 for $2, a little extra if you want them dusted with powdered sugar. (2) You will not have room in your stomach for a fritter after you house your pork sandwich...so eat it first.

If there is any room at all left in your belly, or if, like me, you have a medical condition that requires you to eat dessert (3), go ahead and order that fruit cobbler you've been eyeing up at the other guy's table. They talk up their bread pudding, but it is the Stephen Baldwin to the cobbler's Alec: the latter is not only better looking, but far more talented. They change up the fruit several times a year to pretend that Florida has seasons, but it matters not what's under that flaky, sugar-studded crust: it's all eye-rollingly good. Get it or regret it.

Unless they have strawberry shortcake. Real berries, sliced and simply macerated in a tiny bit of sugar, spooned over a fresh, hot, VERY short cake that rivals the cobbler topping, nearly buried under a pile of homemade whipped cream: this is the dessert that dreams are made of. You can keep your chocolate. I want the shortcake from Hickory Hollow.

Really, though, I want everything from Hickory Hollow, and I want it all for under $30. Unless I also indulge in a beer from their prodigious selection (over 100 bottled brews--again, separate menu), I can make that happen. But remember to bring cash: they refuse all credit cards or personal checks, and their ATM charges like forty dollars in convenience fees.

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(1) The Pig Board is a good vignette of Hickory Hollow's decor; outside, it looks like any road-side 'cue shack, complete with a live goat and friendly turkeys, but inside...dear god. Chairs clad in a vivid turquoise vinyl, hideous pine paneling, strands of plastic flowers, tulle butterflies, and tiny white Christmas lights: horrors. Periodically, the butterflies give way to snowmen and ornaments, hearts and Cupids, or shamrocks and leprechauns, as the holiday calendar dictates.

(2) You do. You really, really do.

(3) It's called gluttony; look it up on WebMD.

Saturday Review: Red Mesa

St. Pete-ians and Tampons alike looooooove their Red Mesa, the quasi-Mexican, quasi-fine dining restaurant nestled idiosyncratically between Applebees and Word of Beer on 4th Street. Critics and locals have showered praise on this place since it opened in 1996. My personal experiences with Red Mesa have been uneven, to say the least. The first three times I ate there, I was like, "meh." It was years before I returned--and only then because some friends made me.

Don't get me wrong--this IS going to turn into a positive review, and I've had some FAB food at Mesa. There was the Famous Fruit Mole of '02, which I still describe to my friends through tears of lingering ecstasy. I persist in lamenting (1) the loss of the Grilled Pork Chop Stuffed with Goat Cheese/Apple/Walnut in OMFG-That's-Good smoky tomato broth. The specials menu reliably taunts me with huitlacoche quesadillas (2), guacamole trios, and inventive ceviches. Shrimp and feta queso fundido is swoon-worthy.

Overall, though, Mesa--much like Nicole Kidman--does not live up to its rep. Anything that sounds like something on a typical Mexican restaurant menu (cheese enchiladas, chile rellenos, skirt steak tacos) proves simple and bland. The rice and black bean "congri" that accompanies damn near everything on the menu is just lame. Chunks of dry, fatty pork float in a greasy, bland chili verde sauce in one of the most popular (!) dishes, and chipotle shrimp are too spicy and flavorless (quite a feat) to do any justice to Mesa's customary prowess with the smoky (3) chiles.

If you work for Red Mesa and are reading this, I swear to you that The Praise Begins Now.

Where Mesa really shines is at Sunday brunch. Typically a restaurant's throw away service, brunch here plays to the kitchen's strengths--every egg dish is accompanied by two or three of those genius salsas, with varying heat levels, textures, and flavor profiles, and there are enough choices on the menu to satisfy the hungover hipsters, their discerning children, and the wealthy oldsters who cram into the booths and freeze their asses off. (4)

Typically, I waffle between the Migas (fluffy eggs scrambled around strips of crunchy poblano peppers, caramelized onions, and crisp tortillas, served with a brothy, smoky salsa and so-so refried beans) and the Shrimp and Grits--different from anything you'll find in South Carolina's Low Country, but the best I've ever had. This morning, I chose the latter, and they arrived pitch-perfect, as usual: plump, unbelievably sweet shrimp doused in a creamy chipotle sauce with more of those poblano and onion rajas, soaking into a volcano of velvety grits. They thoughtfully sprinkle on some sliced scallions, adding crunch and verve, and a shredded aged cheese of such deliciousness that I can hardly stop salivating long enough to describe it. (5)

Other winning dishes: chilaquiles roja, which confirms my suspicion that Red Mesa should just soak shit in salsa and bringitrightheretomytableNOW, huevos rancheros (more sophisticated than usual and all the better for it), and guava-stuffed French toast. Also, their fruit salad is dressed with a lime syrup that's even yummier because it cancels out any potential fruit-related health benefits. Burritos are more filling than they look. Potato-chorizo hash sounds better than it is (which kills me, because potatoes + chorizo = my happy place). Coffee is strong and delicious, and their kids' menu is brief (a good thing), healthy, and reasonably priced--and it's not patronizing: the tots get the same spicy sausage as their taller dining companions.

Did I mention that it's ridiculously cheap? On a Friday night, our bill for 2 has never been less than $60; after a brunch-for-three so big we're on hammocks for the better part of the afternoon, the receipt freaks me out with its $24 bottom line.

Service is always spot on at Red Mesa, even at brunch when servers at lesser establishments are often hungover and angry about having to be perky at 9 am while a bunch of noisy kids grind strawberries into the carpet.

If you've been disappointed with Red Mesa in the past (I'm looking at you, Lemdrichs), try again on a Sunday. If you've never been, start with brunch...and maybe end there, too. For dinner, I'd recommend gettin' yer fancy shoes on, hiring a babysitter, and braving the scene at their hipper downtown spot, Red Mesa Cantina. Their drinks are strong, their tacos are cheap, and the crowd will make it easy to pretend you're still cool.

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What, you don't like footnotes? Too bad--I'm an academic. Suck it.

(1) Along with the server who has an uncanny knack for getting our table every single time. Which reminds me: a testament to Red Mesa's Doing Something Right is the insane degree of server loyalty. There are about five servers whom I see every time we go in there, be it a Friday night, a Wednesday lunch, or a Sunday morning. They've been there ten years, at least. That's unheard of in this fickle town.


(2) Holy crap, these were good. WHY ARE WE NOT EATING MORE CORN FUNGUS, AMERICA??

(3) How many times am I going to use the word "smoky" in this post? Only 3. But I should use it more, because Red Mesa's smoky is the most epic and craveable smoky in town. (Oh, look--that's 5. Boo-yah.)

(4) I'm serious: bring a sweater.

(5) Come to think of it, next to salsas, cheese may be Red Mesa's biggest win. There must be 7 or 8 "garnish" cheeses in that kitchen, and they shred/grate/crumble/melt each one onto its ideal partner EVERY SINGLE TIME. Even on the humblest of Mesa plates, I've never been disappointed by the cheese.