Houston Restaurant Weeks: Hearsay Gastro Lounge

Continuing the Houston Restaurant Week marathon, we made a return visit to Hearsay Gastro Lounge after a very long absence. It's not that we don't adore this place - it's just that there are too many other choices. We were SO happy we went - the place was packed, and the food was outstanding. 

First, the building. Lots of history dating back to 1852. Three fires, a few hotels, a factory and a couple of restaurants later, this place has a few stories to tell. And the way it's designed, you could absolutely be right in the middle of New York. 

Then, there's the food. The taste and portions were both amazing. Here we have crispy calamari, which was light and non-oily - just how it should be.

The beet salad with feta was dressed perfectly, and the beets were delectable. 

The salmon was seasoned and cooked perfectly, as was the asparagus (really crunchy and bright-tasting). That sauce - wow. Decadent! The risotto was super-creamy and provided perfectly flavored forkfuls along with the salmon. 

The massive burger and huge mound of fries looked a bit daunting to me, but Capri reports that it was perfectly done. While not the best fries I've ever had, they were perfectly respectable and made more interesting by the addition of Parmesan and rosemary.

As chicken picatta goes, this was a fine specimen with chicken that actually tasted like chicken, fairly pleasant mashed potatoes and an excellently lemon-y sauce. The spinach was the unfortunate victim of over-salting.

While I'm not a dessert person, this massive slab of cheesecake was one of the best I can recall. That perfectly light texture and a complete lack of graininess are key to this deliciousness, as is a crust of the exact right thickness. YUM! Greg enjoyed a gorgeous chocolate cake layered with mousse. 

This lunch experience reminded us that we need to visit Hearsay more often, and that it's a good thing Houston Restaurant Weeks is only for one month. My workouts can't keep up with the lunches!

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Houston Restaurant Weeks: RDG + Bar Annie

August is beastly hot in Houston. Fortunately, there's something in H'town that makes the sizzle month bearable: Houston Restaurant Weeks! Instead of just one week, we get to enjoy amazing restaurants throughout the whole month. This year, our strategy is to seek out the restaurants with outstanding lunch menus. By focusing on lunch instead of dinner, we get to enjoy more restaurants for the same budget, and often the portions are the same as they are at dinner. 

Best of all, this benefits the Houston Food Bank since a donation goes to them with every meal. Last year set a new record, with more than $1.2 million raised. Wowza. We Houstonians sure love our restaurants. 

We hit Eleven XI first, and I must say it was nothing short of outstanding. Every morsel of food was thoughtful, soulful and artful. I even went outside my usual parameters to enjoy a petite braised pork shank atop the best coleslaw I've ever had (it tasted almost like there were both fennel and mustard seeds mixed in). Greg mooned over his grilled oysters with heirloom tomatoes, pecan pesto, Parmesan and bacon. In total, we enjoyed three courses for a mere $20 each.  

This week, we enjoyed a very pleasant meal at RDG+Bar Annie. It's been ages since we've been there, partly since we have so many great restaurants closer to home and partly since there are just too many top-notch places to hit. We both started with the pea and mint soup finished with creme fraiche. The pea flavor was super-fresh, and the mint was obvious enough to really map to what you'd imagine as the classic British summer flavor. The watercress was a little unnecessary as the garnish, and the mouth feel was a tiny bit oily (maybe some ham protein in there? or maybe olive oil?). 

Greg opted for the hanger steak, a perfect medium-rare with an amazing demi-glace. I adored the striped bass with artichoke pesto, tomato butter sauce, shaved fennel and lemon. The fish was cooked perfectly, the fennel was wonderfully thin and the tomato butter sauce was frankly decadent. It almost tasted like the younger version of a remoulade. Who wouldn't love that? 

Greg finished with chocolate bread pudding (moist, pleasantly dense, not overly rich) and I enjoyed pecan pie topped with ice cream (balanced flavor with a nice sturdy crust). 

 

All I can say is that if you're going to be a foodie, this is one of the best places to do it!

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A lunch affair to remember

I don't normally go out for lunch (usually I'm at the gym), but a recent opportunity with Houston Foodie Friends was just too tempting to miss. And am I ever glad I didn't miss this one!

March was wine month at Smith & Wollensky, which meant that you could enjoy a flight of wine with your meal at a modest cost. Even though Smith & Wollensky is a chain, the standards by which they operate are extremely high. And normally, so are the prices but they do reflect the quality of the food.

Fortunately, since the staff knew that it was a group of foodies visiting, they took us on a VIP food journey. Of course, there were the obligatory starters: truffled chicken salad in wonton cones, tomato and mozzarella skewers with balsamic drizzle, crabcakes, mini beef wellingtons.  

And there is THAT bread. Apparently it is a labor of love with many steps for them to make this decadent stuff, with a lovely outer crust dusted with rosemary and pleasantly large salt crystals, served with some of the best butter you'll find anywhere.

The cobb salad was equally decadent, and didn't just have regular bacon - we're talking thick cubes of pork belly. Expertly mixed with evenly distributed dressing, the creaminess of the avocado wove itself through every bite.

While the salmon wasn't something I tried, the presentation with micro-greens and creme fraiche was colorful and showy.

And they treated us to this ridiculous assortment of desserts. I don't even want to know how many calories were loaded onto this tray, but the six of us made quite a large dent in this one!

The most memorable dessert here, hands-down, was the coconut cake. Not only was it beyond fresh, but also it was topped with a headdress of massive strips of coconut. What's not to love? 

Between these wonderful treats and a parting gift of a bottle of the signature steak sauce, I knew I was spoiled. And needed to get myself to the gym toute suite.



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The blue trees: Dr. Seuss and Brothers Grimm mash-up

This is a blue tree. Rather, this tree is blue. I painted this with biologically-safe, water-based ultramarine mineral pigments. I wouldn't normally go around slapping pigments on trees, but this was a special installation from performance artist and sculptor Konstantin Dimopoulos and I was a volunteer. 
 
The Blue Trees is part of an ongoing series he's creating, and in the case of Houston it's meant to draw attention to the millions of lovely trees we lost to Hurricane Ike and the drought. On a grander scale, it's also meant to call attention to the perils of deforestation. 

They said they had more than 100 volunteers over the three days of painting, but if I were guessing I'd say closer to 200 folks showed up to be part of this social installation. This is the scene upon arrival. Note the (blurry) bluebonnet in the foreground - our national - er, state - flower. 

Dimopoulos himself was overseeing the painting. He's an interesting character. Born in Egypt, he has a Greek name, spent many years in New Zealand and now lives in Australia. And his accent is all Aussie. He's charming, well-spoken and visionary. And wears a lot of blue.

Here is Konstantin, being interviewed by one of the affiliates. No, they didn't plan out that kneeling choreography...

The horseshoe of crepe myrtles stands stoically, peaceful and unmoving in the center of a hub of traffic. The blue adds a layer of odd tranquility, with the final effect feeling like a collaboration between Dr. Seuss and the Brothers Grimm. 

Houston loves art, and I love Houston for supporting projects like this one!
  

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Ladies who lunch

These pictures are of zucchini. Yep, that's  right. Veg. Coated in lovely tempura goodness with garlic chips, mint and citrus aioli. And boy, was this ever so good. This fritte was part of a recent lunch Corey and I enjoyed at Coppa Ristorante Italiano in Houston, where Chef Brandi Key is at the helm and turning out thoughtfully composed modern Italian fare.

That fritte was more than just a run-of-the-mill small plate. I'm thinking it began with  super-fresh zucchini that went in for a quick blanch before being plunged into an ice bath, then patted dry. It was then coated with just the right amount of batter and fried for just the right amount of time, resulting in coyly translucent, delicately crunchy batons of lovely deliciousness. 

Piled campfire style on the plate, they were sprinkled with frizzled mint leaves and garlic chips. Finally, to bring it all together, a citrus aioli made with fresh oranges couldn't have been more of an unexpected, yet welcome contrast. I only wished for more garlic chips, which I didn't get to try as Miss Corey ate them all!

The pizza was a blend of different mushrooms, accompanied by melted leeks, tallegio cheese and topped with Arugula. It was a lovely texture with a fairly sturdy though chewy crust, and the mushrooms leeks were particularly enjoyable. While respectable by all pizza measures, it would be even better with a slightly thinner crust, and more of a cheese feel which we thought was strangely absent. But oh my, was it ever gorgeous to look at ...  

Did I mention that zucchini fritte? Here's another shot in case you missed it.

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Taste testing at Sysco

I love watching chefs work. It's like catnip for a foodie like me. So, of course I was in heaven when I had an opportunity to learn about offerings from Sysco, the country's largest food distributor with headquarters here in Houston. Let's see ... observing the cooking, learning about the food and sampling non-stop for two hours in a pristine commercial kitchen - yes please!

This is Chef Ojan Bagher, corporate executive chef at Sysco. He's highly professional, creative and a pleasure to watch. He put together some pretty outstanding dishes for us, most of which he made up that morning to suit the kind of catering my friend is doing. I'm going to give him an A plus!

Here is a little sampling of what we tried:

Grilled andouille, goat cheese mousse and baby arugula with a gorgeous texture and just small enough ...

Seared diver scallops on a bed of red onion jam, with caramelized grape tomatoes ...

A teres major filet, my first time trying this cut of meat and I must say it was a pleasant surprise. This is with simply done fingerling potatoes, and with a highbrow salsa which tasted like the Mexican response to Romesco ...

Grilled mahi mahi and colossal shrimp with andouille cream sauce - decadence ...

... and I must include this pic from a recent visit from Chef Robert Irvine, second from left (Dinner Impossible, Restaurant Impossible), who is the new spokesperson for Sysco. How cool is that?

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Born on the bayou: something's brewing in Houston

The craft beer rage is at fever pitch. Draft Magazine reports that 2,000 craft breweries are operating in the US today, and it looks like Americans just can't get enough of small-batch, high quality brews. I think part of this is the coolness factor to beer literacy, but also with gastronomy being where it is today, more exotic dishes lead to more discriminating palates. Here in the Buffalo Bayou region, we're proud of our local suds. 
 
Despite having worked as a brewery tour guide, I don't actually consume much beer, but I like the culture and history surrounding it. Call it 'the story of beer.' 

Houston has its share of craft brewers: 
Saint Arnold Brewing Company
Karbach Brewing Company
City Acre Brewing Company
Buffalo Bayou Brewing Company
8th Wonder Brewery  

We checked out an event recently at the Buffalo Bayou Brewing Company, a new-ish company housed in a warehouse in the middle of a Heights neighborhood. The event was centered around the launch of a food trailer (always a cause for celebration), and was made positively festive by live music.

Imagine my delight at being able to bask in the warm sunshine, while at my former home in Boston folks were sledding and shoveling. Out of respect, I toasted them with a delicious sip of 1836. It's great stuff and the description they give it is:

If you ask what 1836 stands for, we'll ask you to put down our beer and leave our country. 

 

Ha! 1836 is when Houston was founded on the banks of Buffalo Bayou (at a place known as Allen's Landing). Good trivia to have on hand. And we couldn't resist their awesome t-shirt:

 

Do you have local breweries you visit and tour? What makes them special for you?

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For the love of art: Wade Wilson Art is awash in color

Houston is a city where you can get up-close and personal with some exceptional art created by brilliant talent from all over the world. 

Consider the gallery of Wade Wilson. He has a keen eye for talent, and especially for artists who are adept at large-scale works filled with rich layering, texture and dimension. Any opening there is a guaranteed hit, because there will always be a piece or five which speak to you. Oh, and the people who attend the events are also colorful and engaging.

Recently we checked out a multi-artist show, and this gallery continues to feature serious artistic merit.

Houstonian Justin Garcia is a master of mixing oil, acrylic and compound texture. Standing close to his canvases, you see bubbling and crackling on the surface. It's just so yummy. His philosophy is that 'art is the doorway to discovering the answers that lie behind our innate curiosity.'

Hans de Bruijn, a conceptual expressionist, was trained at the Royal Arts Academy in The Hague. He does wonders with juxtaposed positive and negative images, with layers upon layers of paint. I found his work to be playfully abstract yet architectural, and his brushstrokes lush and seductive. 

Thomas Glass loves the art of collage, and reminds me a little of Picasso plus Miro plus Cezanne. His works are huge riots of color, with plenty of little surprises to keep you absorbed in studying his work.
 

Houston boasts dozens of art galleries in its thriving art community. Get out and put yourself in the middle of it - you'll be glad you did. Pin It Now!