Review: Kitchen K in St. Louis

While many so-called civic leaders and real-estate executives are at risk of carpal tunnel injury and laryngitis from patting themselves on the back and bragging loudly about all they've done for downtown, the Guru thinks most of them go home to St. Louis County in mid-afternoon, leaving Washington Avenue and its environs to flounder in their emptiness and squalor.

Thankfully, there are exceptions, like Pablo Weiss, whose leadership at Kitchen K shows there still can be life in the Mart Building, at 10th Street and Washington Avenue, where a couple of recent dinners were highly pleasant experiences, with imaginative, tasty and interesting meals in an interesting environment.

But despite glowing stories in the newspapers, the Washington Avenue area is lonely. Calling it the Loft District is a height of optimistic hyperbole. A few hardy souls have the imagination and the courage to live in the neighborhood, and some encourage others to eat, drink and live there. After many years of mud and rubble between the sidewalks, the streets show signs of repair, and there are is some of late-night activity – mainly on weekends - but much of downtown remains empty.

A recent afternoon venture to the Des Lee Gallery on Washington Avenue offered a fascinating exhibit of this emptiness. Our party of three had the place to ourselves for the 80 or 90 minutes we visited. We went next door for a snack and found more emptiness, broken only by a couple of people who entered, picked up carry-out orders and disappeared into the dusk.

The neighborhood needs coffee shops, a grocery, a laundry so that people can not only live, but also find the necessary amenities to make daily life a comfortable series of events. There's a gym, but no drug store or movie. The ArtLoft Theatre attracts people, but as soon as the curtain falls, they're gone to their cars and the neighborhoods where they live. It appears that those who attend theater, who may want to sit afterward over coffee and dessert to discuss the performance, don't find a welcoming aura at clubs that feature loud and raucous music.

Kitchen K could be an oasis, because food service goes until 11 p.m. on weekends and the bar two hours longer. There is plenty of room for quiet conversation, but given St. Louisans' active distaste for walking, the idea of a 12-block stroll (six in each direction) probably is frightening. A shorter walk, by the way, leads to the Tap Room.

Kitchen K comes from the same hearts and minds that gave us Hot Locust, and some of the dishes remain. The earlier restaurant called it "ropa vieja," or "old clothes," the Cuban slang term for braised beef, sometimes with vegetables as in a stew. In Kitchen K's menu vocabulary, it's a more familiar Sloppy Joe, but it's made with brisket, and with Cuban spicing, and under any name, it's delicious. On a night we visited, it arrived on a deliciously toasted Kaiser roll with some fine potato salad.

As noted, the dining area at Kitchen K is two rooms large, with a hostess station in the middle for division. A high ceiling and big windows overlook Washington Avenue, where even buses pass by more frequently than people on weekdays. On weekends, the warmly lighted restaurant draws visitors, on their own or invited by the pioneers who live in the neighborhood. The decor is on the industrial side, and there are bars in each room, the one on the west side for drinking, the one to the east for dining and watching the cooks in action.

In some restaurants, it's a premium space. It's fun to watch the kitchen staff at work, and a chance to engage in sporadic conversation. There also are plenty of tables along the windows and a competent staff that seems to have good understanding of the menu, the preparation and the wine list.

The menu, which changes every month or so and includes an insert for specials that shows some daily changes, demonstrates almost as many different heritages as our nation. There's Italian, of course, and Mexican, Jamaican, Cuban, Cajun, Buffalonian (as in wings), French, Indian, Hawaiian, Thai, Chinese, Japanese and others, and plenty of interesting combinations, too, like a mango-chorizo salsa glaze on pork tenderloin, or banana-guava ketchup on sweet potato fries, which are showing up on more St. Louis menus every week.

There are appetizers, salads and sandwiches, and entrees, plus desserts from the excellent Sugaree bakery in Dogtown. And in good St. Louis fashion, there are more beers (22, 5 on draft) than wines (18, 8 white, 7 red, 3 sparkling). The wine list, with almost all of them available by the glass, is good and reasonably priced, with a fruity, on-the-light-side Ramon Bilboa Tempranillo from Spain and a rich, hearty, long-lasting Foppiano cabernet sauvignon from California a pair of delightful accompaniments to dinner. A California Johannisberg Riesling was pleasant, too, and a perfect match for a Thai salad, where the spice of the lemon grass and cilantro bounced off the chiled soba noodles.

Chicken wings were fresh and tasty, and the addition of some habanero sauce was a hit of fire here and there, though not so much as to print "habanero" in red on the menu. A splendid touch was a shrimp-and-sweet potato bisque. The combination worked perfectly, the flavors were distinct and also a delightful blend, and the soup was rich, but avoided excessive sweetness. It was wonderful. On the debit side, the soup should have been hotter.

The late, great Jack Miller, who made the St. Louis Community College at Forest Park cooking program a glorious addition to the city's work force and a boon for almost everyone's stomach, used to say that the first step toward restaurant success was the oh-so-simple, "Serve the hot food hot and the cold food cold." Old and familiar as the line may be, it still should be sewn into every toque.

Entrees were superior. Salmon, supposedly cooked in rice paper with red curry spicing, arrived sans paper but crisply grilled while still tender and moist inside. It was accompanied by delicious, smooth, tangy cucumber-mint raita, an Indian sauce that cools the effect of too-hot curry or, if the curry is not too hot (as in this case), it's a perfect side dish. Pork tenderloin was perfectly grilled so as to remain juicy and tender, and the glaze of mango-guava salsa brought another layer of flavor. It was a delight, and came with a large handful of fresh, delicious pea-pods and some terrific roasted potatoes that had been rolled in herbs for added flavor.

A tenderloin steak, with an ancho rub and a chile-orange demi-glace, was another winner. Ancho peppers add a smoky flavor and do not overpower a dish with heat, and the citric acid and sweetness of the orange brought a pleasing taste and texture to the meat. Good mashed potatoes came alongside. Anchos also are a splendid touch to beef short ribs served with yams and Cuban black beans.

The Kitchen K food selection is wide, and there are numerous vegetarian dishes like a garden grill on panini, herb pesto sauce for fettuccine, an eggplant-goat cheese melt and an appetizer of portobello mushrooms stuffed with artichokes and asiago cheese.

Chicken gumbo, posole (hominy) in a vegetable broth and red or white chile are good beginnings to a winter meal.

In the St. Louis style, portions are plentiful, so it was an easy ending to share a chunk of outstanding fudge cake with raspberry sauce.

Kitchen K is the sort of restaurant that any downtown needs – fresh, tasty food at moderate prices. If all of Washington Avenue showed such promise, we all could smile with pleasure and pride.