Gunther & Co Sneak Peek

Mr Minx and I were invited to a sneak peek of the new Gunther & Co. restaurant in Brewer's Hill the other night. We left quite excited about the restaurant's potential and feel it will become a sure-fire hit for owner Nancy Hart and chef Jerry Trice.

A glance at the outside of what was once the boiler room of Gunther Brewing Company doesn't even begin to hint at how cavernous and attractive the restaurant is on the inside. Brick everywhere, a huge open kitchen with bar seating, and a living wall of plants--which functions both as decoration and an air-cleansing device--are main features. A rustically lovely private dining room on the mezzanine level, with views of the dining room below, would be a fab place for a birthday party or rehearsal dinner, or a simple gathering of friends. The front bar area, too, with its large windows and creative cocktail menu, should be a popular spot for both neighborhood folks and visitors like us who hail from the far reaches of Towson and beyond.

While we didn't get to have a sit-down meal this time around, we were treated to selections from various of Gunther & Co.'s menus. They'll be offering weekend brunch, weekday lunch, dinner Monday through Saturday, and a special Sunday supper. There's also a selection of items available from open to close that includes more snacky things like oysters and cheese, plus salads and a burger.

We started off with two kinds of oysters, giant Pemaquids from Maine, and more petite Wild Ass Ponies from Assateague Island. "Meet the Beet-Alls," featuring beet liquor, rhubarb bitters, and the artichoke liquor called Cynar, was just one of bartender Shaun Stewart's inventive cocktails on offer. We went on to sample the dumplings, delicious pockets of shrimp and lemongrass with a finely cut kaffir lime garnish and a ponzu soy dipper, and crunchy garlic toasts topped with a flavorful beef tartare garnished with egg yolk and radish. While it won't be served in exactly the same way we received it, the tartare will be on the apps menu (and is well worth trying!) There were also crisp-crusted little biscuits filled with pork and mango chutney and fabulous tea-smoked duck breast served with grilled oyster mushrooms and an orange-ginger sauce. A flatbread cooked in a wood-fired pizza oven and topped with smoked salmon, capers, chopped hard boiled egg, and arugula was an example of Gunther & Co.'s flatbread of the day.

For dessert, we tasted pastry chef Aja Cage's light buttermilk panna cotta with citrus and granola, and an ultra rich chocolate pavé with scoops of smooth butter pecan ice cream on the side. I'm slightly disappointed we didn't get to taste the vegan carrot cake with matcha glaze, but we'll just have to go back and get a full-sized serving of that goodness.

Gunther & Co., shortly to become Baltimore's favorite restaurant, opens this Friday, May 20th. The bar opens at 4pm, and dinner service starts at 5.



Gunther & Co.
3650 Toone Street
Baltimore, MD 21224
http://eatatgunther.com

Posted on Minxeats.com.

Liv2Eat

We tried Liv2Eat last month during the Dining Out for Life event. It was our first time there, despite including the restaurant in Baltimore Chef's Table. (Hey, if we ate at every place it was suggested we *had* to eat, we'd never eat at home.)

The restaurant space is bright and light, with both high and low tables that somehow make the rooms seem less crowded. The menu is short, full of seasonal goodies with no differentiation between appetizers and entrees except for the prices. It was also happy hour, which meant we scored less-expensive booze, but we passed on the $8 mussels and $10 burger. (The latter, made with Roseda beef, sounded like a pretty good bargain. Next time.)

I started off with the Sungold tomato gazpacho. While I normally like the grainy texture of an unstrained gazpacho, the smoothness of Chef Kevin Perry's version elevated the summertime soup. The flavor was bright and sunny, like its color; a refreshing way to start a meal on a warm-ish evening.

Mr Minx chose the jamon salad, a huge pile of mixed greens and herbs, Granny Smith apples, and toasted hazelnuts, tossed in a light tangy vinaigrette on a bed of thinly sliced cured ham. I couldn't decide if the salad needed the ham, or if the ham needed the salad; nevertheless, all of it was tasty and I was happy to help eat it.

Because this event was raising money for Moveable Feast, I ordered an expensive entree, two crab cakes, with potato puree and cabbage slaw (one cake was available at half the price). The crab cakes were excellent, pan-crisped and dressed with a wee bit of a creamy mustard sauce. The crab itself tasted like it had been freshly picked, and I could detect neither binder nor filler. The lightly vinegary slaw tasted like it was made by someone's grandma, and in combination with the potato puree reminded me of a summertime picnic.

My handsome dining companion went for the sirloin steak, served medium rare, with more of that excellent potato puree. The menu listed arugula as a side, and our thoughtful server suggested that Mr Minx request something else, since he had just finished a large salad. The chef provided sauteed spinach and a mix of mushrooms, both of which were appropriate accompaniments to the meat. And Mr Minx enjoyed every morsel, including the slightly sweet yet meaty-flavored sauce.

The desserts that evening included cookies and milk and flourless chocolate cake, but we passed in order to pig out on ice cream at The Charmery, another Dining Out for Life participant.

We enjoyed our meal at Liv2Eat, and the service was friendly and thoughtful. What more can one ask?

Parking is a bit of a challenge in that neighborhood, because it's largely residential, so you may have to park around the corner or a couple of blocks down the street and walk a bit. It's well worth it, and burns off a couple dozen calories in the process.



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Pittsburgh!?!?*

* This should be said in the manner of Joe Flacco in a 1st Mariner Bank commercial.

So I went to Pittsburgh. For a funeral, which seemed entirely fitting. It was a quick trip, much of it spent on the road, but my traveling companion, Kim, and I made the experience as fun as possible. And we squeezed in two restaurant meals.

I had quizzed a friend, whose spouse hails from the city that supports the Baltimore Ravens worst enemy, about restaurant recommendations. She offered up several, a few of which came with the caveat that she had not tried them but had heard good things. Another restaurant, the Pleasure Bar, came with praise from both her and her husband. We decided to check it out.

The name conjures up visions of a cozy and dark space that serves up both good food and fine libations. Instead, the corner restaurant in Pittsburgh's Little Italy seemed rather generic and certainly not cozy. The menu comprised Italian-American favorites like ravioli, eggplant parm, and stuffed shells. We started out with an appetizer order of fried calamari. It was ok, nothing special, and possibly not house-made. Lemon wedges would have been more useful than slices.

I wasn't in the mood for Italian food, but was contemplating the eggplant parm. Then I spotted the crab cakes. Yes, I know that it's a really dumb idea to order crab cakes anywhere outside of Maryland, but I wanted to know how badly they could be fucked up in a place like Pittsburgh.

Turns out, pretty fucked up.

Before I ordered, I asked our waitress about the origin of the crabmeat. When she went off to the kitchen to ask, I predicted she would tell us that it came from such-and-such distributor. And indeed she did. She said something about the meat being combined with their crab cake mix, which should have set off warning bells in my head. Instead, I chose to believe that it referred to breadcrumbs, egg, seasonings, and mayonnaise. After I explained that I wanted to know where the crab lived before being caught, she apologized for her mistake and ran back to the kitchen. When she returned, she said it came from "various parts of the Atlantic." She even added that she didn't really like crab cakes, but the ones at the Pleasure bar were soooo good, she would eat them.

I ordered them anyway.

In all honesty, they didn't taste bad. They did taste of bell peppers, which I don't care for and which do not belong in a Maryland crab cake. But this was Steeltown. It was the filler that was the real problem. I found a number of spongy, red-tinged objects in the cakes, and after careful analysis, I determined that they were...fake crab meat. That surimi crap that comes in cheap California rolls. I can almost forgive this, since it still sorta kinda is at least a seafood product. But the overall texture of the crab cakes was unpleasantly mushy. Had the ramekin on the side been filled with a nice remoulade sauce, there would have been a bright side. Alas, it was grainy "Alfredo" sauce.

Please indulge me in a small side rant here. The Italian chefs I know all rail on serving cheese with seafood; I just roll my eyes at this. So why is this Italian restaurant serving "Alfredo" sauce (that is, a bland white sauce with some cheese thrown in, and nothing like the real thing) with crab cakes?

Sigh. Serves me right, dunnit?

Kim ordered the rib eye steak, which, at the same $19 as my crab cakes, was a steal. You can't really tell from my cellphone pic, but it looked like it had been steamed rather than grilled or pan fried. And a goodly portion of it was gristle.

Oh well, better luck next time. Guess we should have stuck to the Italian-American food.

The next day, after the funeral, we headed back downtown to a gastropub called Meat & Potatoes, one of the recommended restaurants that had the "but we haven't tried it" caveat. We've tried it, and I have to say...we'd try it again. (Not that we ever plan to revisit Pittsburgh, but stranger things have happened.)

Burger - Caramelized onions, havarti, tomato jam, arugula, french fries

We were those terrible people who walk into a restaurant fifteen minutes before the kitchen is scheduled to close. But we ordered quickly! It was lunchtime, so their menu offerings weren't quite as interesting as those at dinner, but we quickly settled on the burger and the bibimbap.

BiBimBap - pork belly, black fried rice, pickled cucumbers, carrots, korean hot sauce, sunny side-up egg

The burger was huge, delicious, juicy (despite being cooked to medium well, as requested by Kim) and the accompanying fries were crispy and nicely browned. The tasty bread and butter pickles on the side were likely house-made. My bibimbap was outstanding. While I'd have liked more rice to absorb all of the hot sauce and pickle juice from the cukes, the flavors were bold and the huge slab of pork belly was moist and nicely fatty. (My mouth is watering as I'm typing this.) The egg yolk could have been runnier, but overall, this dish was terrific.

Cinnamon panna cotta

We splurged on dessert, because, well, we were grief-stricken (not by the previous night's meal, but by the funeral) and needed comforting. There were three choices, including a chocolate pot de creme, but I went for the cinnamon panna cotta and Kim chose the unpleasantly-named peanut butter Oreo dirt.

Peanut Butter Oreo Dirt

The panna cotta had a nice cinnamon flavor and I really enjoyed the fall-ish caramelized fruit topping, Kim's evil concoction was pretty tasty, too, and almost large enough for two servings.

So....

The Pleasure Bar wasn't pleasurable, but I'll cop to making bad choices. Meat & Potatoes was delicious, however, and I wouldn't mind checking it out again. If I didn't have to go to Pittsburgh to do so.






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The Tavern Room @ Fleet Street Kitchen

The Bagby Group's white tablecloth Fleet Street Kitchen has added a new, more casual, spin to their dining experience by transforming the area just beyond the restaurant's large front windows into the Tavern Room. In this discrete space, the tablecloths and multiple tasting menus that may have intimidated some diners are gone. In their place are bare wood and an accessible menu of small and large plates. While lush multi-course meals of fine modern American cuisine are still the backbone of Fleet Street Kitchen, it's now also an attractive place to stop for a snack of bone marrow and a beer or a light supper of charcuterie and cheese.

Mr Minx and I were invited to participate in a media dinner to taste several of the Tavern Room's offerings. We were brought several share-able items from the "tastes" and "small plates" sections of the menu, and then each of us were asked to choose one large plate or entree and one dessert for our personal consumption.

Before I get into the food, I want to mention the punches, which are served exclusively in the Tavern Room area of the restaurant. Unlike the spiked ginger ale with rainbow sherbet we may have encountered in our youth, beverage director Tim Riley's concoctions are more exotic, and of course, more delicious. We snagged samples of the sublimely smoky "Cry of Delores" (which includes mezcal, apple brandy, sherry, smoked tea, and citrus), and the refreshing Kentucky Navy (with bourbon, rye, spearmint tea, black walnut bitters, citrus, and cider). We found them both to be dangerously easy to drink. While the punches come in large Mason jars intended to serve 2-4 people, it wouldn't be all that hard to guzzle more than intended. [hic!]

Now the food: we started out our meal with samples of the roasted bone marrow, which came with thin slices of baguette toast. I grew up eating bone marrow, and was pleased with this taste of my childhood, amped up with the flavors and textures of finely chopped mushrooms and fennel.

Bone marrow, roasted mushroom duxelles, fennel

The tasting plate called "pig face & pickles" had intrigued me most when I had originally perused the menu, so I was happy to see it come to the table. We had a portion of eye socket meat among the selection of moist porcine flesh that fans of pork belly are sure to enjoy. Acid from the pickles cut through the luscious fat, and sauce gribiche (a tartar sauce-like concoction made with hard-cooked eggs) added additional tang.

Pig face & pickles: Chefs choice of jowl, snout, chin, cheek, pork rind, tongue and ears, sauce gribiche 

Crisp-crusted blobs of soft pretzel encased aromatic bites of merguez sausage...

Merguez pretzel bites: Lamb sausage, fennel-fines herbes mustard 

...and a lip-smacking-good beef short rib glazed with a rich veal jus were also served. Additionally, we tasted the ocean trout crudo with creme fraiche and blood orange attractively arranged on crostini, and a plate of sunchokes glazed with hazelnut butter. While the sunchokes were, shall we say, not pretty, their artichoke flavor and potato texture made for an unusual snack. The crudo was fresh and light and a touch of summertime among all of the more boldly-flavored and earthy dishes.

Braised beef short rib, creamed spinach, red currents, veal jus

For his entree, Mr Minx chose the duck confit, which came with a medley of beans that pushed the dish in the direction of cassoulet. I know better than to ask him to share duck confit, but my husband did offer me a small taste of the tender meat and crisped skin.

Confit duck leg, heirloom summer beans, preserved summer tomatoes, mirepoix, bacon duck jus 

I chose the lamb neck, mostly because I had never eaten lamb neck before, but also because I love lamb. I'm trying to come up with an apt comparison to another cut of meat, but I'm falling short. I suppose the meat texture was a bit like braised short rib or brisket, moist and easily broken into stringy shreds. There was also a nice fat cap that covered almost the entire top of the meat. I rather enjoyed it. It was glazed with a thick and flavorful veal jus that had the sticky quality of a much-reduced stock--a sign that while this is "tavern" food, it's also being served in a high-end restaurant.

Braised lamb neck, glazed baby carrots, fines herbes, carrot beurre blanc, lime, veal jus

The desserts, by new Bagby Group pastry chef Aja Cage, were elevated versions of old favorites like chocolate pudding and eclairs. Mr Minx had the warm apple clafoutis, which seemed more like a sponge cake than the traditional custardy fruit-filled dessert, but it and its accompanying salted caramel sauce were terrific.

Warm apple clafoutis, apple chip, salted caramel, pink peppercorn ice cream

My trio of eclairs, which were freshly filled, had crisp choux pastry shells and rich innards. The chocolate especially was decadent. The orange filling was a bit lighter, and the pistachio (which seemed more like salted caramel to me) was somewhere in between.

Trio of eclairs: chocolate, pistachio, and tangerine

Honestly, as far as I'm concerned, the Bagby Group can do no wrong. We love Ten Ten, eat at Bagby's Pizza as often as possible, and have so far visited Cunningham's three times. And now, with the new menu of elevated-rustic goodies at the elegant Fleet Street Kitchen, we think that they have a new hit on their hands.

The Tavern Room @ Fleet Street Kitchen
1012 Fleet Street
Baltimore, MD 21202
(410) 244-5830





Posted on Minxeats.com.

The Fork & Wrench

For several weeks I'd been looking forward to eating at The Fork & Wrench. And wouldn't you know it, the day that my Dad and I both had free (he was my date for the evening) was the day the Sun review came out. Luckily, we managed to snag the last available un-reserved table for the evening.

We'd just come from Of Love & Regret, so we were only looking to try entrees at F&W. I really really really wanted the scallops, which the menu described as coming with a chilled pea panna cotta, watermelon radish chips, and Meyer lemon. I'm drooling just thinking about it. And I wanted the wild mushroom saute, too. But our waiter practically begged me to try the duck, instead, and accompany it with a glass of malbec. Since he gave me the puppy-dog eyes, I acquiesced and chose the duck over the scallops. But I did order the mushrooms (and still wanted the scallops).

Seared Magret Duck Breast, Mushroom Farro “Risotto,”
Brown Butter Carrots, Pea Tendrils, Duck Jus

Our waiter told us that he worked in the kitchen as well as the dining room and seemed excessively proud of this dish. It was very pretty. But the duck itself was underseasoned, and as evidenced by the photo, still retained quite a bit of fat. Also, the skin wasn't crisp. People who think they don't like duck really should try magret, which is definitely red meat and is remarkably "beefy." A shame mine was lacking salt (and there was none on the table). The accompaniments, however, were delicious, and I especially liked the texture of the farro risotto. The glass of malbec I was prompted to order was fine. Nothing that set my taste buds a tingling. Just fine.

And I never did get those mushrooms. Why don't servers write things down anymore? Is this memorization thing supposed to dazzle the customer? I am not impressed.

Brined pork chop, Grilled with Brown Sugar-Honey Glaze,
90 Minute Egg, Apples, Onions, Butter-poached Asparagus

Dad's pork chop was very nice, particularly the apple and onion side. The egg was a bit odd, as it was still quite "snotty" in texture and the dish didn't need another dollop of protein (especially since I ate it). One could argue that it was really an accompaniment for the asparagus, but there were only three slender spears, and they were already cooked in butter.... Anyhoo, a tasty dish.

We decided to split dessert, which was silly, since the portion size of our scoop of brown butter ice cream was so tiny. I loved the flavor, which was subtle, and really liked the tiny Florentine cookie, but thought it could have used a couple toasted almonds.

I think I've heard more about Fork & Wrench's decor than the food, so I made sure to pop my head into all of the dining rooms on the way out. I liked the space on the first floor behind the bar the best, mostly because of the light coming in from the back patio. The rest of it was a hipster's vision of shabby chic, with a soupcon of steampunk thrown in. I'm not big on faux-shabby or faux-rustic, so I suppose I was a bit disappointed.

Soo.... Not exactly the best first impression, although I could tell from the risotto and from Dad's dish that the kitchen (run by former Vino Rosina sous, Sajin Renae) has some mad skillz. Next time, I'll come back with a reservation and order exactly what I want to eat.

Fork & Wrench
2322 Boston Street
Baltimore, MD 21224
(443) 759-9360
theforkandwrench.com



Posted on Minxeats.com.