Looking to dine on a $30 peppered Black Angus fillet and sip a smooth 1998 Château Giscours Margaux while wearing shorts and sandals? Soulard’s Restaurant and Bar is the place. The casual atmosphere and laid-back (but by no means uninformed or lax) service is a boon to those who want quality without the fuss.
The Badock family opened the restaurant in 1977. Mother Marge manned the kitchen, with help from Mississippi native Catholean Gully, and eventually they melded their cooking styles into a home-cooked, Southern-style menu. Nowadays, chef Russel Byers keeps the tradition alive, inflecting his own creativity.
The appetizer list is seafood-heavy, with two kinds of shrimp, seared tuna, crab cakes and fried calamari. The last two were nicely prepared, appropriately seasoned and full of flavor. The crab cakes were plump and round with a light sear and came perched atop a bed of capellini with a lemony tomato sauce. The crab tasted fresh. The meat wasn’t mushy. The sauce was bright. I was satisfied. The calamari was hot and crisp, liberally doused with a thick, sweet and tangy Dijon sauce. The tender rings were mixed with raw spinach leaves, saving the dish from feeling heavy.
Sadly, the flash-fried spinach, which is served with toasted ravioli, was laden with oil. Spinach can’t hold up to more than a literal flash in the pan (or fryer), and, judging by the shimmering pool left at the bottom of the dish, the greens overstayed their welcome in the oil.
That Black Angus fillet is one of Soulard’s signature dishes, and with good reason. The large grounds of pepper weren’t overwhelming but instead offered a subtle piquant note against the buttery beef. A cognac sauce with mushrooms was used sparingly – too sparingly in my opinion. I would have liked more of the rich and savory sauce.
Entrées come with a choice of salad or soup, plus a side vegetable or a twice-baked potato. The house salad – a bed of lettuces topped with tomato, onion, croutons and blue cheese – is great drizzled with the house dressing, whose slight sweetness is balanced by lots of dried herbs and a little peppery bite. One night, despite the beastly heat outside, I ordered the roasted garlic soup. It was thick and bold with garlic – tasty, but better suited to colder days.
Pairing seafood with cheese is considered downright offensive by many chefs, but at Soulard’s, blue cheese-encrusted scallops works well. The strong flavor of the cheese could have so easily smothered the delicate flavor of the scallops, but the kitchen applied the cheese with discretion, and it added a refreshing little jolt to the clean, fresh taste of the scallops – a decadent bite.
A chicken breast, served with an apple-sausage risotto and covered with a white wine and mushroom sauce, was seared a nice caramel-brown. Somewhere in the preparation, someone used a heavy hand with the salt – we couldn’t quite pinpoint which element of the dish was the culprit. It wasn’t so salty as to send it back – in fact, I liked the saltiness of the dish – but in general Soulard’s doesn’t underseason its food. If you’re sensitive to salt, you may want to request that the kitchen tread lightly.
On our first visit, our server handed us a coupon for 40 percent off any bottle of wine with the purchase of two entrées, hence the $69 ’98 Margaux. But even without a coupon, the well-rounded wine list offers a range of nice selections, including less expensive bottles and wines by the glass.
It was nice to sip such a fine wine in the mirror- and brick-lined dining room fitted with white tablecloths and soft lighting. It was even nicer to do so while wearing flip-flops.
BACK FOR SECONDS Don’t-Miss Dish: The peppered Black Angus fillet, fried calamari and crab cakes.
Vibe: Upscale cuisine in a casual, laid-back atmosphere. Flip-flops welcome.
Entrée Prices: $22.50 to $29.95
Where: Soulard’s Restaurant, 1731 S. Seventh St., St. Louis, 314. 241.7956
When: Breakfast: Sat. – 8 to 11 a.m.; Lunch: Mon. to Sat. – 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.; Dinner: Mon. to Thu. – 4 to 9:30 p.m., Fri. and Sat. – 4 to
10:30 p.m.
This article appears in Sep 1-30, 2010.