Review: Mihalis Chophouse and Onyx Bar in Richmond Heights

In a warmly lit lounge, while enjoying “the best chocolate martini” of her life, she spied a distant blue glow floating toward her table, emanating from a martini glass just slightly too small to bathe in. Six shrimp, four clams, four mussels and a fistful of tender, moist crab adorned the top of this ice-blue, way-over-the-top serving dish. Carrie Bradshaw turned with a smile from her dining companion to the bounty of the sea. [Cue the music: ba-ba-bada-ba-ba-baa …]

Wait a minute: That was my sister, and we were nowhere near the island of Manhattan. This scene was taking place on McCausland Avenue, at a steakhouse. What insanity had been wrought upon us? A steakhouse is supposed to be dark, with plenty of wood, overpriced wines and servers dressed in tired tuxedo shirts and ties. At first, we suspected Stephen Hawking had played some kind of spatial or temporal joke on us. But, fortunately, this was not the case.

Mihalis Chophouse and Onyx Bar, long thought of as the never-ending construction project next to Olympia Kebob House and Taverna, is a bit of a dichotomy. Away from the lounge-y bar and mezzanine overlooking it (the area where the gianormo, glowing seafood martini was clearly meant to be consumed), the dining rooms offer a more restrained décor and clean visual lines. It’s in these rooms where the steaks and chops seem more at home.

Greek for Michael, Mihalis is the slick younger sibling of Michael’s Bar and Grill around the corner on Manchester Avenue. And, like Michael’s (I’m a big fan of the gyro salad), Mihalis spices up the menu with Greek items and ingredients that complement the overall menu, stopping well short of being a Greek restaurant.

Case in point: Have you ever gone to a Greek restaurant and thought, “This gyro is really good, but all I really want is bowl of the tzatziki sauce?” Mihalis affords just such an opportunity. A Greek version of chips and dip, the thick, warm, crunchy-on-the-outside and chewy-on-the-inside pita chips carried enough spice to battle well with the big bowl of yogurt-cucumber sauce.

In the Feta Garjdes, a nice hunk of this classic Greek cheese came crusted in sesame seeds, topped with huge grilled shrimp and roasted-tomato vinaigrette. The sweetness of the vinaigrette, touch of smoke from the grilled shrimp and nuttiness from the sesame seeds intermingled confidently with the sharp tang of the feta. Lightly battered chipotle-crusted calamari had enough smoke and spice from the pepper to stand up well against the pickled-lime aïoli dipping sauce. But the delicate clams, mussels, crab and shrimp of the aforementioned mondo martini were not so lucky, as everything this aïoli touched was enveloped by the citrus taste.

All too regularly, French onion soup is overcooked, resulting in limp, lifeless onions congregating at the bottom of an overly salty broth. Here, the onions still had body, and they were interspersed throughout a savory broth containing caramel notes. On the flip side, a sweet tomato tone in the bouillabaisse pushed aside most of the seafood flavors, including those of some excessively rubbery clams.

Although the grilled salmon topped with a smoked salmon horseradish and curried tzatziki sauce promised an interesting combination of flavors, it just didn’t come together. The smoked salmon overrode everything; the salmon was a little overcooked and the curried tzatziki sauce was unmemorable.

Ultimately, though, this is all window dressing. A chophouse must justify its existence with large, high-quality pieces of meat, and Mihalis delivers. All of the meat dishes we tried arrived cooked exactly to the temperature requested and were accompanied by a small mélange of Japanese eggplant, zucchini, Indian squash and onions.

At darn near 2 inches thick, the 14-ounce New York strip loin, topped with fresh basil leaves and a trace of herbed butter, lost little of its size to trimming. A nice sear provided textural contrast to the tender, juicy inside and a faintly bitter counterpoint to the creamy, fragrant butter. Thinner, but also weighing in at 14 ounces, the pork porterhouse was a beast of a cut of meat, taking up nearly the entire plate. A sweet, cinnamon-spiced chutney of dried fruit framed the tender pork well. Off the menu, another 14-ouncer lurked. The veal chop with a crab-cream sauce on a bed of pancetta mashed potatoes offered distinctive tastes that mingled without ever fusing, keeping the dish interesting and the taste buds alert.

On the tenderloin front there were two options. The Mihalis Filet was a study in minimalism, a superb cut of meat prepared as simply as possible: a good sear and short cooking time (rare to medium rare) let this most tender of cuts be its succulent self. Dressed up a bit, this dish is transformed into the Tellicherry Tenderloin of Beef. A filet cut, crusted in a surprisingly subtle six-peppercorn blend (of which Tellicherry is predominant), was drizzled with a silky cognac and Madeira sauce.

There were a couple areas where Mihalis took a left turn from the normal chop/steakhouse experience. First, the restaurant employs a living, breathing pastry chef instead of buying its desserts from a third party. A nice touch, to be sure, but is it worth it? After sampling the three funnel cakes made of cinnamon dough – one as the base, and two that A-frame a big scoop of ice cream, all blasted with powdered sugar –
I’m answering yes, definitely worth it. Second, instead of loading a wine list with overrated and overpriced wines, wine director John Sears has assembled a long and distinguished list that rarely exceeds $80 a bottle. Indeed, many are between $30 and $60.

The bottom line is that Mihalis brings some fresh thinking to a very traditional type of restaurant and makes it work. I mean, seriously, where else can you order a huge, glowing martini glass of seafood, a bowl of tzatziki sauce, a pork porterhouse and a funnel cake in the same sitting?