Chus On Chow

My wife and I are huge fans of going to cafes in any city we visit.  But there are exceptions.

We were enjoying a sunny day off last Monday in Rochester and were heading out for breakfast at the popular Highland Diner, but had talked about trying to find locally roasted coffee.  Purely by chance, I happened to notice the Boulder Cafe on Alexander St. as we drove by.  It looked as though it was good-sized, and its sign and decor seemed to indicate a good product and atmosphere, so we decided to stop.

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Michael Angelo’s recently opened on James St. in Eastwood between Sacred Melody Plaza and Wegman’s.  This location has been the site of many restaurants, almost qualifying as a restaurant graveyard.  I did my share of whining when the Melt Shop closed, whose service and simple fare I enjoyed and rooted for.  But by now it’s almost morbidly fascinating to see every brave soul who tries their luck in this karma-challenged spot.  I know none of you could have guessed it, but they offer Italian fare. (more…)

Just recently I was relaxing and watching the boob tube, when I saw the new Domino’s Pizza ad.  At first I wasn’t sure what was going on.  As I recall, a fellow standing in a professional kitchen (possibly the CEO) was saying that customers had told the Domino’s management that their pizza wasn’t good.  The language he quoted was pretty blunt.  Wow.  He went on to say that they had taken this to heart and changed their recipes (and possibly the ingredients?).  Finally, he asked the viewer to please come in and try the new pizza.  It was hard to believe that this was an ad, with simple candor.  What a concept – no slick sales pitch, and even more amazing, an admission of error by a corporate boss.  Unbelievable!  And refreshing.  Finally somebody who gets it.  Now that I think about it, I wonder if it’s cheaper to make this type of ad than some dazzling, slick, completely phony production.

In the Internet age, with everyone blogging and commenting everywhere, and with news organizations publishing online countless times per day, it’s very hard for a huge business to hide.  If your stuff sucks, people will find out very quickly, whether or not you admit it.  As such, corporate heads can no longer count on preventing negative press from being seen, which they were able to do when distribution of news and information was very tightly controlled.  But it’s still the rare CEO who seems to grasp this.  I suppose that if upper management has been there a long time, and no longer is in touch with rapid changes that make up our modern reality, then you’ll still see the tired, outmoded ad techniques trickling down from their remote ivory tower.  Fortunately, this seems to be changing.

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Lonnie and I were very disappointed to find that the Melt Shop suddenly closed. Jennifer was extremely friendly, we enjoyed the food, and best of all, we could walk there. Even the decor was original and fun. It wasn’t entirely clear to us why they closed. I think it may have had something to do with the rent being increased, and if that’s true, I suspect that their profit margin may have been too tight to afford it.

Already, another sandwich shop has moved into that spot.  (At least I think that’s what it is – it has looked mostly empty each time I’ve gone by)  That location is like a revolving door, I’m afraid – many small restaurants right in a row. You have to wonder why they have the notion that they will succeed where so many others have failed, something I’ve written about elsewhere. For instance, no matter how many pizza joints there are all over, and how many have failed, we’ll always see more – it’s a nearly scientific fact.  Apart from most people’s unwillingness to do any market research at all, I imagine that having kitchen equipment there is the deciding factor. Maybe the landlord has no choice but to try to find other aspiring sandwich shop owners – other businesses may find the location to be a bad fit.

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Recently we were on vacation in the Thousand Islands region in northern New York state.  The weather was great, and our base was in Clayton, NY.  One sunny day we went on a jaunt to look at antiques and neighboring towns.  As we drove along, the car seemed to be buffeted by the wind, which was high that day.  But as drove further, it seemed to get worse, and much as we hated to admit it, the car started to hesitate, indicating that the wind wasn’t the problem at all.

We were between towns, not at all in the middle of somewhere, and we began to make agitated calls to information to see if there were any repair shops anywhere near us.  We managed to get a couple numbers from the operator.  Of course, when dialing information, accuracy suffers somewhat, and though we did scare up some actual people that answered, a look at our map revealed that they weren’t particularly close to us at all.

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Sometime ago alert reader Adrienne asked why our restaurant listings, while neatly categorized and showing contact information, didn’t seem to have much content.

I’ve finally gone through the restaurant listings and added some thoughts on almost all of the ones that were similarly spare.  They are fairly brief, and not fully fleshed-out reviews by any means, but I tried to make them so that they would give some meaningful impressions of each place, enough to encourage you to visit, and at least provide a basis for discussion.

See you at the restaurant!  Your hungry buddy, Dave

Many people have already discovered that OIP pizza is very good.  But their wings are exceptional.  We enjoy regular Buffalo wings, but they’re everywhere now.  OIP’s char-grilled wings are a very nice alternative, and they are what we prefer nowadays.   Getting twelve for dinner has become a frequent meal for us, and it’s right over in Eastwood Plaza, so we can easily walk over, a big selling point for us.  At this time, it’s our favorite “walk-to” Eastwood meal.  If we’re especially hungry, we’ll supplement it with pizza slices.

The staff is quite friendly.  The lighting is somewhat lurid fluorescence, so it’s definitely not a dating spot.  For the sports freaks out there, they have a huge TV.  For us, the lighting and TV aren’t our preferred decor, but the dining room is still nice enough that we like eating there.

Don’t just take it from us.  My brother is from Buffalo and lives about a mile from the famous Anchor Bar, home of Buffalo wings.  After having the OIP wings, he said, “I like these better”.

There are several OIP’s in central NY, and I’ve heard vague rumors that they differ in quality.  This can happen with any chain.  While we think the Eastwood one is great, I’d be curious to hear more about this.

I saw a slick ad on TV last week.  It was clearly about coffee, and invoked quality and international-ness, so it got my attention.  Then the massive letdown – it was…McDonald’s?  My mute button mercifully did its duty.

A disturbing vision came to mind – a very sleepy person stumbles into a “restaurant” with its slick, soulless corporate decor.  She goes to the counter, and orders a coffee from the depressed person who must keep this job because of the terrible economy.  The employee slightly nods and pushes a button.  Thirty feet away a pouch of freeze-dried powder empties into a pre-heated metal vessel, water is injected, and within seconds the mixture is brought to a boil.  A bell goes off, a plug opens, and the boiled mixture drains down a tube, finally empting into the paper cup the employee has attached to the end of the pipe.  The customer leaves with the cup of coffee, considering it a victory because she has beaten Starbucks’ price by 20 cents, and looks forward to beginning to wake up sometime later.

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I had just read Marco Pierre White’s autobiography, The Devil in the Kitchen, so I was very interested to find out about the notorious chef’s new TV show, Chopping Block. Despite its typical “one team get’s voted off the show” theme, at least it’s got the foodie angle, which is our weakness.

Each team was put in a restaurant space and had the responsibility of creating menus and re-decorating the spaces, which were somewhat shabby.  Marco imparts his words of wisdom with a gravitas that wouldn’t be out of place in a top English actor.  Yet, in some ways this may be a disadvantage.  His tone is so serious and unremittingly grim that it’s tough to take after awhile.  The inevitable meltdowns that occur in a high-pressure kitchen would go down much easier with a touch of humor.  To me, the shenanigans that result under a restaurant’s high pressure environment are just insane, and could provide fertile ground for some laughs.  Among chefs, practical jokes are almost compulsory, and in his book Marco describes taking a friend’s cellphone, using its camera to take a picture of his junk, making this photo the wallpaper on the phone, and quietly returning the phone.  This particular prank couldn’t make it onto TV, but please, somebody tell a joke!

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Syracuse in winter can give you cabin fever.  When I complained about having it on Friday night, Lonnie had the excellent idea of making a jaunt over to the west side of Syracuse for some barbecue.  I usually don’t say no to barbecue, unless I’m just finishing my third portion.

No serious discussion of barbecue in Syracuse can take place without mention of the Dinosaur, which has become the de facto standard of Syracuse BBQ.  Its excellence is taken for granted, and we go there a lot.  I don’t even bother to mention it much in my blogs, as it has mountains of publicity already.  But, as Yogi Berra might have said, it’s so crowded that no one goes there anymore.  So on this particular night we decided to try something new.

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Lonnie mentioned buying local ground beef from Kelley Meats in the previous post, and last night I decided to make a quick meal with it.  Hamburgers seemed like a good idea.  I recently learned a way to make them which almost guarantees juicy burgers, which I learned it from America’s Test Kitchen, the TV show.  They came out great, and Lonnie was raving about them.  Here’s how it goes:

• 1 lb. ground beef
• breadcrumbs
• milk
• salt
• pepper

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Philly is such an amazing place for food.  People there feel that it’s comparable or superior to New York!  Though that’s a sure way to start a big argument, I will say that someone could pretty easily have a great restaurant meal every day in Philly for a year and still have a whole lot of great places left to try.  Here are a few little victual vignettes.

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This morning we were fortunate enough to have coffee at Ray’s Cafe in Philly’s Chinatown.  Hario coffee pots (and their characteristic brewing methods) are revered amongst coffee cognoscenti, and they have several of them at Ray’s.  Best of all, they’ve had them since before they were trendy.  I’m not geeky enough to know the models, but they look very elegant, like glistening, artistic versions of golden lab equipment.  The ones they mainly use are small, apparently one-cup pots, and a couple of them are several feet tall.  Lonnie knows more about coffee than I do, and I’m sure she’ll chime in if I’m wrong.

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No, not the Spanish Armada, but Amada, the best Spanish restaurant in town, where we had lunch. It’s a beautiful place, and immediately after passing through the front door, we passed through a lovely plush curtain, a more stylish and unusual way to keep out the cold air than having a second door. Immediately inside was a very Spanish scene: several serrano hams hanging tantalizingly above the bar, lots of dark wood dominating the decor, custom-built wine racks on the walls, and a gorgeous carved marble top on the bar. Some modern design touches to go along with the traditional Spanish feel, such as gauzy white curtains in parts of the room. Very sturdy yet sleekly modern chairs and tables with shiny varnished wood.

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Restaurants must have one of highest failure rates of any type of business.  As I understand it, it’s about 50%.  Those are not odds that I like.  From a selfish perspective, I’m glad people are still willing to give it a try anyway – that way, I can eat there, at least until they go out of business. (more…)