Review: The Tavern Kitchen & Bar in Valley Park

The Tavern Kitchen & Bar, 2961 Dougherty Ferry Road, Valley Park, 636.825.0600, tavernstl.com

In Valley Park, where the eateries lean more toward chains and sports bars than destinations of distinction, chef Justin Haifley runs a gem of a restaurant. Perhaps the name is a throwback, but The Tavern Kitchen & Bar ain’t your father’s tavern (or my father’s, whose hand-pattied burgers and cheap Bud kept Kansas City college students fed and quenched for years). What tavern has a sous-vide immersion circulator?

Haifley, who spent 10 years with Roy Yamaguchi’s Hawaiian fusion restaurants (not to mention stints cooking for Tommy Hilfiger, Jay-Z and Beyoncé, and Sean Combs), came home to St. Louis at the urging of Tavern co-owners Brant Baldanza and Jon Fogarty, two high school friends of Haifley’s and owners of the Corner Pub & Grill, located in the same shopping area as The Tavern. Haifley’s cooking is upscale, but not aggressively so. The menu calls it “exquisite comfort food,” a close-to-spot-on description of what Haifley and his staff dish out from the huge open kitchen to what seems like an endlessly packed house. A basic burger becomes exquisite when the blend of chuck roll, brisket and sirloin is ground in the kitchen, topped with Irish Cheddar cheese and slathered with bacon jam, a spread made from bacon, onion and spices; fish and chips transcend the ordinary when fresh-cut cod is coated in a beer batter of Schlafly American Pale Ale; pasta made in-house – pappardelle, linguini, tagliolini – rivals anything in a town where pasta reigns.

Snag a stool at the kitchen counter and watch chaos theory come to life. Orders come in, orders go out. In between, about 10 whirling dervishes sling pans, extinguish shooting flames, flip a steak someone else started, shout “hot oven,” toss handfuls of Parmesan into salads and pasta, juggle hot cast-iron plates, carefully arrange food for final plating, peel some hard boiled eggs, quickly sharpen a knife before slicing into the pork tenderloin, and otherwise maneuver around each other like sailors on a submarine. The dance troupe Pilobolus could learn a thing or two from such choreography. And there’s Haifley at the helm, coolly coordinating the flow, checking each ticket with his big, black Sharpie before releasing the dish to the public.

One could have bacon with every course. And we did. There’s an appetizer of Bacon & Eggs, a nice chunk of fatty-meaty pork belly paired with a “one-hour” egg atop a buttery brioche round and garnished with pickled red onion. The slow simmer in the immersion circulator gives the egg a much creamier, custardy consistency than any normal poaching could, resulting in a luxuriant blanket of bright yellow creaminess spreading over the toasted brioche. The baby spinach salad, here with crimini mushrooms and Gruyère along with chopped egg, was doused with a warm bacon vinaigrette. Like the excellent arugula salad with its Banyuls (a French dessert wine) vinaigrette, salads are dressed to complement the greens, not overpower. For entrées, were one keeping with the bacon theme, there’s that bacon jam burger, of course, or bacon-wrapped meatloaf. We opted for the house-made tagliolini (think thinner fettuccine) with pancetta topped with Parmesan and a soft fried egg, creating its own luscious DIY sauce. Just when you think “no more bacon,” there’s dessert: hot, deep-fried doughnut holes you dunk in maple-flavored whipped cream. You can quibble about the bacon sprinkles on the whipped cream, but, really, why bother?

Those less inclined toward porcine dishes have other options, including vegetarian and gluten-free selections (but they are off the menu, so ask). Entrées cover the “comfort food” rubric, with plenty of twists. Beef short ribs, braised and tangy with honey mustard, are further enhanced with a bed of pungent Maytag blue cheese polenta. A smattering of quartered Brussels sprouts completed the plate, but picked up too much piquancy of the mustard and sharp cheese. Fisherman’s Stew, or cioppino, arrives in a steaming cast-iron cauldron, chock-full of mussels, clams, large shrimp and a piece of halibut in a light, fragrant tomato-red pepper sauce. My only quibble was the sauce: One more ladle next time, please.

Straight-ahead meat dishes – pork tenderloin, free-range chicken and three steaks – are in a separate menu category and include a choice of one side. The apple-rosemary pork tenderloin came sliced on the bias, perfectly pink on the inside, resting on a bed of braised red cabbage and topped with a frisée salad for additional flavor notes. One note notably missing was rosemary, however. The cheesy tater tot casserole, one of six interesting sides, came piping hot in a little cast-iron skillet and is worth getting, if for no other reason than to say you did. The other reason is because it’s really good. As was the Farmers’ Market Vegetable of cheesy cauliflower, also served searing hot in cast-iron, and not a bit mushy.

No self-respecting tavern serving food, upscale or dive, would be without toasted ravioli. Usually, it is best to bypass the offer. But Haifley takes succulent, lemony lobster chunks, deep-fries them in large, light wrappers and serves them five to an order with a rich truffle-Parmesan cream sauce on the side. French onion soup (served only during lunch) and New England clam chowder are both good: the former rich with beefy broth and assembled to order, the latter creamy and chewy with plump clams. Along with the doughnut holes, dessert includes chocolate soufflé and carrot cake, both baked to order in, you guessed it, those cute little cast-iron skillets. Each was topped with a scoop of ice cream. The addition of peanuts on the soufflé made for a hot-cold, salty-sweet rich treat.

There’s nothing wrong with taverns; Dad’s paid for college. But at the end of the night, when a cook leafs through a copy of Thomas Keller’s Ad Hoc at Home cookbook resting on the kitchen counter, you know The Tavern is a tavern in name only. And there’s nothing wrong with that, either.

Where: The Tavern Kitchen & Bar, 2961 Dougherty Ferry Road, Valley Park, 636.825.0600, tavernstl.com
When: Lunch and dinner: Tue. to Fri. – 11 a.m. to
9 p.m.; Dinner: Sat. – 5 to 11 p.m., Sun. – 5 to
9 p.m.; Brunch: Sun. – 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.
Don’t-Miss Dish: Bacon & Eggs, Apple-Rosemary Pork Tenderloin
Vibe: A big, open kitchen invites curiosity, and counter seating invites conversations with cooks. The Tavern recommends reservations; heed the suggestion seriously.
Entrée Prices: $10 to $27