Category Archives: BY PRICE FOR TWO

$$$$ Luxury ($80 and up), Bistros, Hurstbourne, Middletown, Jeffersontown, LEO's Eats, New and noteworthy, underSlideshowEntries, White tablecloth, deluxe

Brasserie Provence shows grace and good eats in dinner rush

“Je vais avoir le canard,” said my friend Anne, summoning a French teacher and one-time expat’s easy fluency.

Our server looked puzzled, though. “Maybe you could point it out on the menu,” he said, blushing a little. “I’m still learning the dishes.”

I’m not picking on the guy, though. He showed Hemingway-esque grace under fire as our party of four spent the evening on a lavish meal at Brasserie Provence. We enjoyed his service, a fine Loire Cabernet Franc and an excellent, mostly authentic Provencal meal while allowing plenty of slack for a kitchen slammed by capacity crowds on its first full weekend. Continue reading Brasserie Provence shows grace and good eats in dinner rush →

$$$ Upscale ( $50 - $80), Bistros, Downtown, NuLu and Butchertown, LEO's Eats, underSlideshowEntries

Rye will make you eat your brussels sprouts and beg for more

Somewhere out there in this wonderfully diverse world, there is bound to be at least one human who truly loves, loves, loves brussels sprouts.

I have not yet met this person. Let’s face it, a brussels sprout is nothing but a tiny cabbage, with all of the faults that its bigger sibling is heir to, but – in my opinion, at least, and apparently that of many others – few of the virtues. Overcook them and they get stenchy. Undercook them and they stay hard, without the saving grace of crunch. And no matter what you do with them, it seems, they remain, well, tiny cabbages.
Continue reading Rye will make you eat your brussels sprouts and beg for more →

$ Budget (under $30), Breakfast and lunch spots, sandwich spots, LEO's Eats, QuickBytes, St. Matthews, Westport Village, and environs, underSlideshowEntries

We sing the praises of Shady Lane Café

I’d like to sing the praises of Shady Lane Café, but I expect that café owner Susi Smith, an outstanding professional singer, could warble it far better than I; and her husband and co-owner Bill Smith, who’s not only a mean hand on the short-order grill but also a poet of some repute, could probably sling some better verses on the topic than I, iambic pentameter or free verse, either way.
Continue reading We sing the praises of Shady Lane Café →

$$ Modest ($30-$50), Mexican, Cuban, Caribbean, QuickBytes, St. Matthews, Westport Village, and environs, underSlideshowEntries, Voice-Tribune review

Don’t judge the name. Try Hay!! Chi Wa Waa

Hey, Chihuahua? What kind of a name for a restaurant is that? With a wacky Señor Gonzales accent? Really? Are they talking about the state of Chihuahua in Mexico, or calling a little dog? Or maybe, just possibly, poking a thumb in the eye of “Yo quiero Taco Bell“?
Continue reading Don’t judge the name. Try Hay!! Chi Wa Waa →

$$$ Upscale ( $50 - $80), Baxter, Bardstown, Highlands, BBQ, Burgers & Down-Home, Bistros, Germantown, LEO's Eats, underSlideshowEntries

Food Network loves The Coach Lamp, but who loves Food Network?

Okay, I am just going to come right out and say it: I am so over Food Network. Have been for years, really.

She’s like an old flame, full of bad memories of a romance that I try to suppress now that I’m no longer quite so young and stupid. Oh, I loved her back then, I truly did. It was late coming to Louisville, and I lusted after it in my heart when I read my friends’ stories online about her seductive wiles. And when she finally came to town, sometime around the turn of the millennium, as I recall, I was smitten, so smitten. Continue reading Food Network loves The Coach Lamp, but who loves Food Network? →

$$ Modest ($30-$50), Baxter, Bardstown, Highlands, Bistros, Breakfast and lunch spots, sandwich spots, Frankfort Ave., Clifton, Crescent Hill, slideshow, Voice-Tribune review

North End Cafe: Now a local institution

North End Cafe has just about become a Louisville institution, and it didn’t take all that long to do so. Co-owner and Chef Christopher Seckman celebrated the 10th anniversary of the original North End Cafe on lower Frankfort Avenue last spring – it’s a place of enduring popularity. Now the second North End Cafe, located at the Douglass Loop in the former Club Grotto location, appears to be going strong after a year and a half.
Continue reading North End Cafe: Now a local institution →

$$$ Upscale ( $50 - $80), Bistros, LEO's Eats, St. Matthews, Westport Village, and environs, underSlideshowEntries

Vibrant Village Anchor Pub & Roost thrives in old Anchorage

When Village Anchor Pub & Roost and its companion watering hole, The Sea Hag, opened three years ago this past summer, I thought they were pretty cool. But I wondered if they would stick.
Continue reading Vibrant Village Anchor Pub & Roost thrives in old Anchorage →

$$$ Upscale ( $50 - $80), Bistros, LEO's Eats, St. Matthews, Westport Village, and environs, underSlideshowEntries

What’s a Brix? Good chow and libations in the ‘burbs

So, what’s a Brix? Let’s ask the Intertubes!

“Degrees Brix (symbol °Bx) is the sugar content of an aqueous solution. One degree Brix is 1 gram of sucrose in 100 grams of solution and represents the strength of the solution as percentage by weight (% w/w). If the solution contains dissolved solids other than pure sucrose, then the °Bx only approximates the dissolved solid content.”

Right! I knew that! Well, I knew the gist of it, anyway. You see, “brix” is wine-geek talk of the highest order, viticultural trade jargon you don’t really need to know at all, unless you’re the boss of a vineyard. It’s the kind of word that separates insiders (who know it’s pronounced “bricks”) from the rest of us, who probably think it’s French and would say it “bree” if we thought about it at all. Continue reading What’s a Brix? Good chow and libations in the ‘burbs →

$$$ Upscale ( $50 - $80), Bistros, Downtown, NuLu and Butchertown, underSlideshowEntries, Voice-Tribune review

Marketplace: Top Chef, No Hype

We live in the age of the chef-driven restaurant. Across the nation and around the city, chefs have become outside personalities, featured on stage, screen and TV. Louisville has been no exception to this principle, with our top chefs turning up on Food Network, competing in chefly combat and scrambling after awards, honors and, of course, sweet, profitable publicity for Louisville’s eateries and for the city.
Continue reading Marketplace: Top Chef, No Hype →

$$ Modest ($30-$50), LEO's Eats, St. Matthews, Westport Village, and environs, underSlideshowEntries, World Food

It’s the rice, but not just the rice, at Taj Palace

Little things mean a lot. Even something as little as a grain of rice can mean a lot. Of course, it takes 7,200 grains of rice to fill a cup, or so sayeth the Google, but that’s not important right now.

Let’s talk about rice, and in particular the spectacular rice at Taj Palace. Trust me on this, folks. I love Indian food, and I’m a fan of Taj, which has survived a journey around three East End locations. I go there fairly often. But the other night, sampling a bite of simple, extra-long-grain basmati rice from a side platter, I suddenly experienced what philosophers call an epiphany, a sudden, almost spiritual insight into the deeper meaning of things. Specifically, rice. And Taj Palace.
Continue reading It’s the rice, but not just the rice, at Taj Palace →