Category Archives: BY LOCATION

Baxter, Bardstown, Highlands, QuickBytes

Keeping things balanced on Bardstown

Ballyhoo's Baja Grill
A fish taco (top) and a shrimp taco (with optional jalapeños) at Ballyhoo’s Baja Grill. Photo by Robin Garr.

LEO’s Eat ‘n’ Blog with Louisville HotBytes
(Ballyhoo’s Baja Grill, Just Fresh)

Bardstown Road has been established as Louisville’s primary “restaurant row” for so long now that things seem to have achieved a sort of natural balance: If one eatery closes, chances are something similar will be along soon to fill its niche.

So, when the short-lived Baja Fresh closed after only a few months of vending fast-food-style fresh burritos out of a shiny new glass building, and a similarly ephemeral branch of Bazo’s came and went from the old building that once housed Jupiter Café and is now home to Nio’s, no one really expected that Bardstown would be long bereft of fish tacos. Or, for that matter, that Qdoba and La Bamba would dominate the boulevard’s burrito market without challenge.

Sure enough, now comes Ballyhoo’s Baja Grill, a new spot that looks a lot like a franchised chain operation but that’s actually only the smallest of chains, being the third property of a Nashville-based outfit whose eateries at the other end of the old L&N line bear the trademark name “Chile Burrito Co.”
Continue reading Keeping things balanced on Bardstown →

$ Budget (under $30), BBQ, Burgers & Down-Home, Northeast Metro

Something old, something new at Norton Commons

Karem's
Karem’s in Norton Commons occupies a brand-new, three-story red-brick storefront that’s made to look a lot like an old one. Photo by Robin Garr

(Karem’s Grill & Pub, Shady Lane Café
Voice-Tribune, March 29, 2007)

One of the more unusual suburban developments in recent memory, Norton Commons – billed as a “traditional neighborhood development” or “TND” – brings a touch of nostalgia to Louisville’s outer suburbs.

It incorporates acres of parklike green space surrounding a squared-off grid of residential blocks made to resemble an old-fashioned urban neighborhood, with sturdy brick houses lined up side-by-side, most of them equipped with front porches where folks can come out to sit a spell and talk with the neighbors.

And just as in grandpa’s day, a short stroll (no need to get out the horseless carriage) will take you down to the quaint town square, with brand-new, three-story red-brick storefronts made to look a lot like old ones.
Continue reading Something old, something new at Norton Commons →

$$ Modest ($30-$50), Bistros, St. Matthews, Westport Village, and environs

Built like a Brix House Special

Bar at Brix
Brix Wine Bar, on Lagrange Road, is an attractive, worthy addition to the suburbs. Photos by Robin Garr.

LEO’s Eat ‘n’ Blog with Louisville HotBytes

(Brix Wine Bar, Diamante)

As soon as I saw the name of Brix Wine Bar, I knew I had to try it.

Brix – pronounced “bricks,” not the Frenchified “bree” – is a serious techno-wine word, a vineyard term for the level of sugar in wine grapes, a measure of ripeness at harvest. The higher the brix, the riper the grapes, the more sugar, the greater potential alcohol.

Only a real wine geek could come up with an oenophiliac name like that. It’s not like calling your wine bar “Merlot” or something.
Continue reading Built like a Brix House Special →

$ Budget (under $30), Commentary, Seafood & Water's Edge, St. Matthews, Westport Village, and environs

Yummy fried fish is no penance

St. Augustine's fish dinner
St. Augustine’s Catholic Church is well known for its Friday fish fries during Lent. The fish is good – you can choose baked cod, fried cod (above), whiting or buffalo – and some of the sides are excellent. Try the cheese grits, which sub pimento cheese for cheddar. Photos by Robin Garr.

LEO’s Eat ‘n’ Blog with Louisville HotBytes
(St. Augustine’s fish fry, Stan’s Fish Sandwich, KFC Fish Snacker)

It’s Lent again, the liturgical season when many people undertake modest symbolic sacrifices such as eating fish on Fridays. Crunchy, golden-brown, delicious, sizzling fried fish: You call that penance?

In Louisville, we don’t reserve fish for Lent. Most of us are crazy for seafood at any time of year, and that’s been so for generations, way back to the postwar era – post-Civil War, that is – when L&N express trains would rush fresh oysters on ice up from the Gulf to oyster bars like the still-extant Mazzoni’s.
Continue reading Yummy fried fish is no penance →

$$ Modest ($30-$50), Bistros, Downtown, NuLu and Butchertown

Critic yells ‘beer me’ as suds go upscale

Mussel soup
Bistro New Albany and New Albanian Brewing Co. teamed up for an “Extreme Belgian” dinner that paired Belgian beers with various dishes, such as this succulent mussel soup. Photos by Robin Garr.

LEO’s Eat ‘n’ Blog with Louisville HotBytes
(Extreme Belgian at Bistro New Albany; CarlyRae’s)

If you don’t think there’s any class distinction between wine and beer, you might consider whether you’ve even seen a drunk slouch into a bar and yell, “Wine me!” Beer, let’s face it, owns a downscale, blue-collar image that contrasts with wine’s perceived position as the drink the beautiful people sip.

But need this be so? In an age when artisanal brewpubs and microbreweries abound and the term “quality American beer” is no longer an oxymoron, it’s arguable that beer – fine, crafted beer made in a wide variety of styles – deserves as much connoisseurish attention as wine enthusiasts are accustomed to lavishing on their grape juice.
Continue reading Critic yells ‘beer me’ as suds go upscale →

$$ Modest ($30-$50), Bistros, Hurstbourne, Middletown, Jeffersontown

Mimi’s: Popular chain lands on Hurstbourne

Mimi's
Mimi’s occupies the renovated former quarters of Don Pablo’s on Hurstbourne. Photo by Robin Garr

(Voice-Tribune, March 8, 2007)

When it comes to dining out, I’m usually inclined to look for a well-run locally owned and operated eatery, where the chances are that the person who has to meet the payroll is the same individual who cooks your dinner or greets you at the door.

In the practical reality of today’s corporate world, however, franchise and chain restaurants abound; in the suburbs, it’s fair to say that chain eateries significantly outnumber the locals. Drive the length of Hurstbourne, for instance, and once you’re past Tony Boombozz, the elegant Limestone and the Bristol, you’ve pretty much exhausted your independent-owner options.

But let’s face it: Bean counters and quarterly balance sheets to the contrary notwithstanding, the chains must be doing something right, as these eateries generally pack in crowds of seemingly happy customers. Continue reading Mimi’s: Popular chain lands on Hurstbourne →

BY PRICE FOR TWO, Downtown, NuLu and Butchertown, Frankfort Ave., Clifton, Crescent Hill, Italian (and Pizza), QuickBytes, South End, St. Matthews, Westport Village, and environs

NO-ni and more wacky pizzas

Danny Mac's pizzas
A couple of pies from Danny Mac’s: At left, the wacky bacon chicken ranch with a base of ranch dressing in lieu of tomato sauce. At right, a more traditional version with sausage, onions and peppers. Photo by Robin Garr.

LEO’s Eat ‘n’ Blog with Louisville HotBytes
(Cafe Lou Lou, Primo, Tony BoomBozz, California Pizza Kitchen and Danny Mac’s)

Pizza fundamentalists, not unlike the other kind of fundamentalists, insist that there is only one true way. Any variation on the strict Neapolitan tradition – save possibly for a select few authorized New York City variations – is not merely blasphemous but perverted. Let the congregation answer: “Amen!”
Continue reading NO-ni and more wacky pizzas →

$ Budget (under $30), Seafood & Water's Edge, St. Matthews, Westport Village, and environs

More Friday fish at Seafood Connection

Play video
Click the image link to watch a 1-minute video visit to Seafood Connection on a busy Friday in Lent.

Just about every fish-sandwich spot and seafood eatery in town is jammed on Fridays during Lent, and one of my favorites, Seafood Connection in St. Matthews, is certainly no exception.

It’s a casual spot, with a small 10-seat lunch counter within a fine fish shop, but the quality of Chef Mike Hungerford’s fare makes it worth a special trip for fish sandwiches, fish tacos, lobster rolls, crab cakes, even a salmon “Reuben” and more.

We dropped by today for a fish sandwich, a bowl of clam chowder, and this quick video tour.

$ Budget (under $30), Baxter, Bardstown, Highlands, Pacific Rim, South End

Hot, hotter, hottest

Green chicken curry
Chile flakes paint Vietnam Kitchen’s Gào xào ca ry cay (green chicken curry) a pointillist’s palette of fiery red. It is as hot as the furnaces of Hades. Photo by Robin Garr.

LEO’s Eat ‘n’ Blog with Louisville HotBytes
(Thai Smile 5, Sala Thai, Vietnam Kitchen)

A man like me who eats and drinks for a living really needs to be serious about exercise, and I’m not talking about namby-pamby exercises like golf or light jogging, where you barely break a sweat.

No, to survive in the professional dining game, you need to work out until you’re breathing hard, dripping sweat, red in the face, nose running and virtually screaming with the pain of it all. No pain, no gain, after all.

Happily, I’ve discovered an appealing way to achieve this state without having to work out: Simply include in your diet a minimum daily requirement of fiery food. Continue reading Hot, hotter, hottest →

$ Budget (under $30), Frankfort Ave., Clifton, Crescent Hill

Kingfish on Fridays

Kingfish
Hearts of oak: Faux Olde Englishe and whimsical nautical decor provide the River Road Kingfish an atmosphere surprisingly reminiscent of the Galt House. Photo by Robin Garr.

Fat Tuesday is inexorably followed by Ash Wednesday and 40 days of Lent; and even for those of us who don’t religiously adhere to the custom of fast and abstinence, enjoying a platter of sizzling fried fish is a tradition of the season that’s easy to indulge in.

The other night, rushing the season a bit, we wandered over to the Kingfish restaurant near the foot of Zorn Avenue (3021 River Road, [502] 895-0544) for a pre-Lent preview at one of Louisville’s most enduring fish restaurants, a chain founded in 1948 and named, believe it or not, after a character on the then-popular Amos and Andy radio show.
Continue reading Kingfish on Fridays →