Secret supper club goes deeper underground
St. Louis’ Clandestine Chef took his underground dinner party truly subterranean on Saturday, holding his invite-only affair known as Entre in the vintage wine cellar of a posh cottage in Augusta. This month’s fete featured an all-vegetarian menu: brioche toast with black garlic, goat cheese, tomato, microgreens and a balsamic glaze; a cucumber-mint sorbet floating…
The Scoop: Two new dude-friendly pubs
The Tilted Kilt Pub & Eatery is now open in Arnold. The costume-themed sports restaurant features traditional pub fare like fish and chips, burgers, and shepherd’s pie; comfort foods such as meatloaf and pasta; and beers from around the world – all served by a staff dressed in what the restaurant describes as “provocative kilts.”…
Monarch staff to step up
It’ll be bar business as usual at Monarch when Ted Kilgore leaves the Maplewood restaurant for Niche Taste Bar, set to open in July. “We already have such a well-trained staff,” said Monarch co-owner Jeff Orbin. “We’re going to promote from within.” Kilgore, St. Louis’ only master mixologist, will consult as needed, Orbin said. Photo…
The Scoop: Second Feraro’s on the way
Jon Feraro is bringing a little Jersey style to South County. The chef and co-owner of Feraro’s Jersey Style Pizza in Soulard plans to open a second location, at 11726 Baptist Church Road, formerly home to That’sa Nice’a Pizza. The menu will be slightly smaller than the busy Soulard spot’s but will still include Jersey-style…
Sake Central
Good sake is hard to find, but tonight you’ll find some of the best specimens at Miso on Meramec in Clayton. New head sushi chef Eliott Harris will be teaming up with visiting sake specialist Ataru Kobayashi to offer a multicourse extravanganza with sake pairings. Hosted by Pinnacle Imports, the event costs $50 plus tax…
The Scoop: News from Chaumette
Hank Johnson, owner of Chaumette Vineyards and Winery, has announced the addition of a new poolside restaurant: The Spa Café at Chaumette. Executive chef Adam Lambay, who also helms the stoves at the winery’s Grapevine Grill, will offer guests a “spa-inspired menu of international influences,” including a trio of gazpachos, red pepper hummus, wine barrel-smoked…
Feed your head: Food Inc.
Every now and then I used to play a game with myself at the grocery store. I would pretend I was just off the boat from Cold War-era Russia and absolutely bedazzled by the array of brightly packaged foods and vibrantly colored produce available in the supermarket. “Look!” I would gush to my imaginary comrade…
The Scoop: Bella Vita, The Wedge to close
The last day of business at Bella Vita Wines will be Saturday. In a message on its Web site, the year-old Rock Hill wine bar said, “We don’t need to tell you what this recession has done to so many businesses, especially new businesses.” Also, the Riverfront Times reported that it looks like The Wedge…
The Scoop: Mixing it up
Master mixologist Ted Kilgore will be moving from Monarch Restaurant to Niche Taste Bar, which is slated to open next month. “While I was not looking to make a move, the project is right up my alley,” Kilgore said. Details to follow. Photo by Carmen Troesser
Color Yourself on Vacation: Annatto adds tropical splash to your cooking
Memories of tropical vacations often revolve around food: snacking on tostones with cerveza under a small beach palapa or eating fragrant coconut curry at an open-air restaurant across from the Malecón. If you’re not putting your passport to use this summer, why not bring a taste of the tropics into your kitchen? Exploring tropical cuisine…
Spirited competition
Hats off … er, on … to Jennifer Myerscough of Baileys’ Chocolate Bar, who last weekend won a cocktail challenge benefiting Opera Theatre of Saint Louis. Contestants were asked to make a cocktail based on the opera The Ghosts of Versailles. In her winning entry, Myerscough (pictured here being crowned by judge and Sauce publisher…
Martha and Mathew
Congratulations to Niche Restaurant’s Mathew Rice, whose wedding cake and red velvet sandwiches are featured in the summer issue of Martha Stewart Weddings. Click here to see the buttermilk-vanilla cake with homemade rhubarb jam that Rice made for St. Louis stationer Cheree Berry’s wedding. Look for the issue on newsstands soon. Photo courtesy of www.marthastewart.com
The Scoop: Desserts on Delmar
A new dessert bar/lounge called The In Spot will debut this Saturday at 5854-A Delmar Blvd. Details are hazy, but the spot’s Web site promises food, including appetizers, kabobs, sandwiches and “a full menu of gourmet desserts selected from the best pastry chefs around the country”; drinks, including wine, cocktails, coffee and milkshakes; and live…
Magic number
Think of Magic Hat Brewing, think of No. 9, right? But on Friday, your lucky number is 8 – as in $8 pitchers of the not-quite pale ale at Triumph Grill. Also on tap from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m.: No. 9 samples and the Midtown restaurant’s foodie-friendly happy hour specials, including half-price appetizers.
Signed on
Good news for folks on a gluten-free diet: There are a bunch of GREAT local restaurants ready to serve you. If you see the sign for GREAT, or Gluten-Free Resource Education and Awareness Training, it means the restaurant has been trained to prepare foods for those with celiac disease, a genetic intolerance to the gluten…
Dinner series cum laude
33 Wine Shop and Tasting Bar in Lafayette Square has launched a dinner series called The Dorm Room. Don’t let the name fool you – this monthly event (to be held in 33’s new east flank) will offer the polar opposite of Hot Pockets and frozen pizza. Using only a hot plate and a microwave,…
The Scoop: Now open
Five Bistro is now open in its new digs at 5100 Daggett Ave. on The Hill.
The Scoop: Fiala comes downtown
Jim Fiala will debut his fourth area restaurant early next month as part of Gateway Foundation’s new Citygarden sculpture park at Eighth and Chestnut streets. Dubbed The Terrace View, the restaurant will feature Mediterranean cuisine.
Adventures in pork
Attention, pork enthusiasts: Newman Farm near Myrtle, Mo., will be offering a tour of its certified humane Berkshire pig operation tomorrow. Half of the day will be spent learning how the family farm raises its herds, and the second half will feature a butchering demonstration. Co-owner Rita Newman is cooking up lunch, and Reinaldo Alfonso,…
Chocolate-Strawberry Terrine
8 servings
He Said/She Said: Warm and chewy for the win
Emily: A little dough, a little salt – and voilà – you’ve got pretzels. The perfect snack. Dennis: But how chewy are they? What’s the salt-to-surface-area ratio? Cheese or mustard for dipping? All of these questions and more must be answered to uncover the ideal soft pretzel experience. E: Boys make everything so complicated. Dennis’…
Undersea Adventures: Many ways to eat your (sea) vegetables
More than 70 percent of the Earth is covered by water, and beneath it grows a veritable cornucopia of fresh produce. For many cultures, this bounty from the sea is as important as land-grown vegetables. Sea vegetables are as diverse and varied in flavor and color as topsoil veggies, and taste different depending upon where…
Million-dollar banh mi
Christine Warta is living a dream 25 years in the making. At the age of 14, the Clintonville, Wis., native began submitting recipes every year to the Pillsbury Bake-Off. Now living in Belleville, Ill., Warta is counting on votes to make her dream come true – taking her recipe for Banh Mi Chicken Sliders all…
Where have all the Juneberries gone?
The Juneberry season sure was short this year. (See Ripe for the Pickin’ in the current issue.) Foragers had less than a week to beat the birds, squirrels and other feisty critters to these prized fruit jewels of late spring. Not to worry though, mulberries are still hanging around. Get them while the pickin’s still…
The Scoop: Now open
Restaurateur Bob Candice checked in to report that Candicci’s is once again serving up its pastas, chicken, veal, steaks and seafood, this time in West County. The restaurant, last housed in downtown Clayton, began serving guests after its soft opening last week. Stop in to 100 Holloway Road in Ballwin to check out the new…
The Scoop: A first for Ferguson
Looks like Ferguson is getting in on the wine bar trend. Cork, a wine bar (the burg’s first such nightspot) owned by Mike Lonero, will soon set up shop at 423 S. Florissant Road. Lonero, who also owns Ferguson’s Vincenzo’s Italian Ristorante, said neighborhood oenophiles should expect 75 to 100 wines (a quarter of those…
Another local option
It’s hard to throw a tomato in this town without hitting a summertime farmers’ market, and the North City Farmers’ Market opens its third season tomorrow with a notable smash. The market, located at 14th and St. Louis streets – right across from Crown Candy Kitchen – kicks off from 9 a.m. to noon with…
Explicit details
As promised, we’ve got details on the release party for Explicit American Pale Ale, the newest brew from Charleville Vineyard & Microbrewery in Ste. Genevieve. Join Charleville’s Tait Russell and Tony Saballa on June 17 at The Royale in South City, where, starting at 5 p.m., you’ll be able to taste this copper-colored, hop-forward ale…
Review: The Library in St. Louis
Spend enough time bouncing around the multitude of watering holes in Soulard, and you’ll realize that any new addition to the neighborhood in terms of barrooms is big news to a drinking populace. Word in St. Louis’ mini version of the French Quarter travels fast. It reached my barstool several Saturday nights ago, delivered by…
Seven Ways to Eat Kohlrabi This Summer
Few vegetables carry a name as delicious as kohlrabi. I’d never tried it before last summer, but when I spotted bunches of apple-green bulbs fairly glowing from the Scharf Farm stand at Soulard Farmers’ Market, I knew I had to have them – whatever they were. “What are these?” I asked farmer Allen Scharf. “Kohlrabi.”…
Review: Porter’s Steakhouse in Collinsville
Even the tried and true needs a good revamping every so often. In the case of Porter’s Steakhouse in Collinsville, the face-lift was long overdue. I never frequented Porter’s in the old days – the old days being anywhere from 1982, when it was called The Black Swan, to last year – but the remodeling…
Recipe: Franco’s Steamed Mussels
Landlocked St. Louis may not be near a beach, but the taste of the sea is as close as Soulard, where Franco’s Matthew Abeshouse puts a modern spin on a bistro classic by adding sweet cipollini onions and briny sea beans to steamed mussels. Up the French factor by serving the mussels with their traditional…
Easy Enoki Mushroom Soup
4 Servings
Juneberry Jam
Makes 1¾ cups
Pineapple sage tisane
1 serving
Pineapple sage pound cake
makes 1 pound cake
Annatto-Infused Oil
• Heat the olive oil and annatto seeds in a skillet over medium heat until they begin to simmer gently. Reduce heat to low and continue to gently simmer for 5 minutes. • Remove the skillet from heat and allow the oil to cool. • Use a fine mesh strainer to strain the oil into…
Pineapple sage syrup
1 cup
Happier Hours: Steals and deals for foodies
Lovely recession we’re having. No, seriously – a deal tastes much better these days. Who’s in for happy hour? While the best things in life are indisputably free, we also consider anything under $5 to be superlative. Happy hours get happier when the food has finesse and the cocktails do more than quench thirst. Add…
Ripe for the Pickin’: Juneberries are busting out all over
Juneberries are one of those foods that you can’t buy from the grocery store or a farmers’ market. You’ve just gotta pick ’em yourself. I’d never heard of a Juneberry – aka serviceberry, shadbush or saskatoon – until my husband found a reference to Amelanchier, a genus of deciduous shrubs and small trees, in a…
Not your grandma’s wine
Sipped any sherry recently? I’m guessing your answer is no, since most Americans tend to think of sherry as either as an overly sweet wine sipped by little old ladies or as a cooking wine – and therefore avoid it like the plague. Sherry is, without a doubt, misunderstood and underappreciated. “It’s one of the…
Pleasant surprises at Porter’s
For many years, the steaks at Porter’s Steakhouse have been well worth the drive to southern Illinois. But the beef’s not the only reason to head to Collinsville. In the local wine world, sommelier Jeff Callahan is an übermensch, having established a solid reputation many years ago for his ability to pair food and wine.…
Pondering life in the woods
I am obsessed with the meditations of a dead man. Thoreau’s Walden or Life in the Woods sits on my nightstand, a bookmark stuck between dog-eared pages where those famous lines are highlighted in yellow: “I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and…
Rolling with sushi at Sansui
As culinarily brave as our boys are, they needed some time to work up to their first sushi experience, so on our first trip to Sansui in Warson Woods, we were determined to take things slow. For the boys, this meant ordering something familiar – gyoza, aka pot stickers – and something readily identified – a…
The Scoop: We didn’t see that one coming
Pick up the June issue of Sauce, which hits the streets today, and you’ll find S.C. Truckey’s thoughtful review of The Bully, the pub that debuted in The Billy Goat’s former home on Vandeventer back in January. Only problem is that the restaurant has closed, as of today. Oops. Owner Sam Taha cited “lack of…
Belly up to The Bully
Editor’s note: Unfortunately, The Bully has closed. Click here for more information. When a landmark restaurant closes and a new place opens in the same spot, it’s a bit difficult for patrons to transition from old to new. People are prone to contrasting items or wishing that things were “the way they used to be.”…
Chocolate-covered creativity
“I found the golden ticket,” he said as he handed me a caramel. Brian Pelletier remarked more than once during our interview that he has the best job in the world, and I believe him. Pelletier is the chocolatier behind Kakao Chocolate, which until this month was available at just a few shops and farmers’…
Bang for your buck: Mattingly
Happy Monday! At the start of every week, Mattingly Brewing on South Jefferson Avenue snubs the recession with an all-day happy hour. (Read about other happy hours around town in this month’s cover story.) Slices of hand-tossed cheese pizza cost 99 cents from 11 a.m. until 9 p.m. – and toppings like prosciutto, pineapple and…
Franco’s Steamed Mussels
2 servings
