Restaurants

Who's got the cheese?

Our house is backwards. If you want to know who played on Monday Night Football, ask me. If you want a review on a chick flick, ask my husband.

Likewise, when it’s time to leave the house, I’m the one who has been dressed and wearing make-up, legs shaved, and hair styled for at least 5 minutes. My husband is the one running around in his underwear assuring me he can shave in the car. So I should have known it was a recipe for disaster when I told my husband at 5 p.m. that we needed to be at Stone Creek by 5:30 or we wouldn’t make the Christmas musical in time, and he replied, “I’ll be ready in 5 minutes.”

We got in the car at 5:35.

Now my husband was of the opinion we could get in and out of this upscale restaurant on a weekend night during the holidays in time, but since we just proved I’m the better time manager, I nixed it. Which left us dangling with the all-important question: Where could we eat a decent meal along State Road 135  and still get to Center Grove High School before they turned down the lights? In desperation, we pulled into Four Seasons Restaurant.

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It's Christmas time again

I thought this post would be about the wonderful new catering service that prepared the madrigal dinner at Center Grove High School this year … but that didn’t pan out. Oh, I was there and the singing was awesome, but the first words out of my mouth after we crawled into the Trail Blazer were “I’m hungry.”

Technically, I wasn’t starving because the roll was good, but I wanted to end my evening on a better note than that roast beef/pork loin mystery meat and the cold cheese sauce poured over my red potatoes. Just before I’d dashed out the door, a friend’s Facebook status recommended a new place in Greenwood simply called The Coffee Shop.

I deserved what she deemed “best hot chocolate in the city.”

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I was 29 years old before I walked into a Chinese restaurant.

Egg Roll #1's sweet and sour chicken

Growing up, I knew all about foods my friends merely stared at: mush, fried Spam, grits, black-eyed peas. The child of a Southern cook, I was familiar with fried green tomatoes and okra, even if I couldn’t stand them. But an egg roll? Couldn’t tell you what it tasted like and didn’t really care … I was too busy exploring my new-found love of Mexican dishes.

Then we had a chance to travel to China, and I got it into my head that I should get comfortable with the food before heading to the airport. So I called a friend and begged her to serve as my interpreter in one of those hole-in-the-wall restaurants with a generic name, Egg Roll #1. I’d seen a lot of people flowing in and out of there, so it must be good.

She was more than happy to oblige, and suggested I would like sweet and sour chicken with fried rice, and the famous egg roll. She was half right: I loved the fried chicken nuggets and fried rice, wasn’t overly fond of that sticky sweet sauce poured all over it and couldn’t stand anything stuffed with cabbage.

It turns out the effort was wasted, since food in China tastes nothing like Chinese food. But I did launch a love affair with chopsticks.

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See what I did with this pattern?

If I polled Uptake’s blog readers on why they feel attached to a particular restaurant in their city, I’d bet good money most would talk about their food. Which means I’m out here all alone in why I enjoy eating at Oaken Barrel Brewing Co. off of Greenwood’s Main Street: They have a very interesting pattern in their seat fabric.

It’s not that I usually notice such minute details, mind you. But my friend was late for lunch a few years ago, and I found myself in a mental quandry, better known as “bored out of my mind.” I’d already flipped through the menu and picked out my meal. I checked the voice mail at the office to see if I had any calls to return. I gave a few minutes’ thought to what to buy people for Christmas, even though it was July.

Finally, I resorted to staring at nothing and that’s when I realized I was facing a rather interesting domino and crooked rectangle pattern. The colors were blah, but if I changed them to jewel tones — say plum and a burnt orange — it could make a very interesting background for a scrapbook page. I borrowed a pen from the waitress and began drawing this pattern on the napkin, my mind racing with how to recreate the little holes in the dominoes with a Dotterific pen, and perhaps sprinkle in a few brads for texture interest.

I didn’t notice when my friend arrived.

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Upscale potato soup

While visiting Australia a few years ago, my battle cry  became “Don’t ruin my hamburger with that stupid beet.” I feel strongly that you shouldn’t mess with such a perfect food by piling weird things onto it. A slice of cheese, a tomato, lettuce, bacon, onion, a pickle and you’ve maxed out the list of acceptable toppings.

But last night, I added something weird to that list. A fried egg.

This story actually starts nearly a year ago when we tried to get into the new Fireside Brewhouse on County Line Road and couldn’t even get a parking space in the lot. We’ve driven by several times since and waived off just by eyeballing the sheer number of cars in front of it. Then last night, with  rain pouring down, we saw a spot open right next to the door.

That was as good as an engraved invitation to me.

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We were regulars at Casa Miguel’s in Greenwood, Indiana when Mike and Angie Lee owned this little house converted to a restaurant. We tried to support the folks who bought the Mexican concept when the Lees retired, but it just wasn’t the same. My husband swore they fiddled with the recipes. I simply felt sad walking in to everything the same, but different.

Albatross Pizza Emporium soars

So when the sign changed to Albatross Pizza Emporium, we knew we’d drop in for a test run, if only to do our “support your community” duty.

OK, we’re done with the charity  on this one. Albatross earned our full-blown patronage because we loved the pizza. And it didn’t hurt that the owner, Julianne Featheringill, made it a point to stop by our table for comments, suggestions and just a good old-fashioned chat.

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Welcome, Monical's Pizza

I hate it when my brother gets something I don’t.

Never mind that we’re both in our 40s, adults with professional careers, mortgage payments and all those life balance questions middle-age Americans struggle with. He had a Monical’s Pizza on his side of Indianapolis and I didn’t. And he was always waving it in our face, saying things like, “Hey, you guys want to go over to Monical’s for dinner? The kids love that place.”

See what I mean? That kind of superiority from the kid brother eats at you over time.

Well, nana nana boo boo. Guess who just opened their doors in Greenwood? Yep, now I, too, can enjoy their thin and pan crust pizzas whenever I want to, and I don’t even have to drag along kids. But don’t tell my sibling this secret: I failed to notice this new addition to our restaurant families until last week.

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It’s not especially fun to be female when your birthday rolls around. Oh, I couldn’t give a fin flip about my age — but as the organizer, scheduler and event planner in this house, it means I have to coordinate my own party.

Mouth-watering salmon at Bonefish

The calls usually start at the beginning of the week: “So, where are we going to celebrate your birthday on Friday?” Now this is a tricky proposition, because you never want to name something out of your guests’ budget comfort zone. On the other hand, they looked rather aghast when I threw out the idea of ordering some pizzas and whooping it up in the back room at Donatos. After all, since my teen-age friend landed a job there, we’ve done that on plenty of ordinary nights.

I had already eaten at On the Border this week (uh, twice), and I spent a few minutes considering Famous Daves, because nothing says happy birthday like BBQ stains on your jeans. Still, the fact that we were looking for dinner at 6:30 in Indianapolis on a Friday all but required me to choose a restaurant that takes reservations. Once I realized that, the dilemma was over. We were heading to Bonefish Grill.

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My favorite deli

It’s true I had lunch today at Paradise Cafe. I have my share of receipts from Panera Bread, and I hung out at Atlanta Bread Company when it was still with us. But when it comes to sandwiches and baked goods, I’ll choose independently owned Ricci’s Deli for my lunch stop a majority of the time.

Yep, Ricci’s is my personal hole-in-the-wall choice, and I have the lifetime refillable mug to prove it.

Over the years I’ve learned that the potato soup here is a gamble (some days it rhymes with Campbell), the egg salad sandwich is not, and the chili over pasta kicks butt and takes names. I’m such a fan of this mess on a plate that the cooks still throw it together for me on request even though it officially hasn’t been on the menu since probably 2005. Likewise, they know my husband well enough to secretly start making a reuben before he places his order at the register, too.

So you’d think all this familiarity would mean I have my order down cold. You’d be right until it comes to picking out a muffin. You see, Ricci’s sells day-old muffins for half price, which I think is a heck of a deal — if only I could learn the difference between a chocolate chip and blueberry one. Read More »

Cozy atmosphere

My husband has finally done it. He wanted to surprise me for our Friday lunch last week, using those famous words, “Trust me. I know what I’m doing.”

When he pulled up outside a run-down strip center across from our old neighborhood — a collection of stores including a Bob’s Tu Your Door pizza, a laundry mat and a barber shop I don’t think anyone has walked into in five years — I balked. No way was I going into Simple Brew Cafe. I could make food that bad at home for free.

We sat there in the parking lot for a few moments, arguing over whether dirty brick and daily specials painted on the window constituted a dump (my husband helpfully offered to walk into Bob’s, which earned him a dirty glare from the passenger’s seat of the Trail Blazer. Anyone who can’t spell “to” isn’t serving me pizza) when he pulled out his trump card: Alan recommended it.

Sigh. Alan is in the construction business. Just like cops know where the best overnight diners are, and truck drivers can give you the lowdown on greasy spoons, construction workers know breakfast joints. 

I got out of the SUV.

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