Tag: Houston Restaurant Weeks

Restaurant Weeks NYC and Houston, and Chicken Paprikash: Summer Is Winding Down

New York City, 1995. I had arrived a few months earlier to begin a new job with a newspaper, and was visiting restaurants and bars that had been on my list for a long while. Sign of the Dove. La Grenouille. Elaine’s. Le Veau d’Or. McSorley’s. So many more, some long gone, others still thriving, pleasing guests night after night, attracting people from around the world to the streets and avenues of New York. That summer, I participated in NYC Restaurant Week; we made a few reservations at select places, and had (mostly) good experiences. It was a pleasure to sit and watch out-of-towners eat — I had already become a New Yorker, at least in my heart and mentality — and it felt good. The tables were ours. The latest version of NYC Restaurant Week runs through August 18, giving you 12 more days to pay $29 for lunch or $42 for dinner at places including Porsena, Hearth, Lupa, and ABC Kitchen. If you can, go.

La Grenouille, around since 1962.

Houston Restaurant Weeks (HRW) is also upon us, and it features 277 establishments giving a portion of their proceeds from special menus ($45 dinner, $20 lunch, with some exceptions) to the Houston Food Bank to help feed the hungry. I’ve tasted from some of the offerings, and will surely get to more, and encourage everyone to make some reservations. Go to a place you might not otherwise. Hunger is no laughing matter, and Houston is full of people who don’t know where their next meal will come from. Do some good, have some fun, and tip well.

Want some suggestions for HRW? Amalfi Ristorante Italiano & Bar and Sud Italia are home to some good pasta and proteins, and a visit to Ginger & Fork will introduce you to mushrooms and rice noodles that are not to be missed.

When you’re out and about during HRW, you’ll be wanting some wine to pair with your meals. Why not make it a full evening and have a glass of Rosé as an apéritif? Stoller Family Estate has produced one that I like (click here to read about it), but the Pink Universe is large, so you’ll have no difficulties choosing a good bottle. In addition, many of the restaurants participating in HRW have selected wines they think pair well with their menus, an easy opportunity for you to taste something new.

Tomatoes and Wagyu done well

Speaking of new, a dish was added to the menu at Tony’s last week, and it’s something you’ll want. The Carpaccio di Pomodoro is tomato and Wagyu heaven, and I featured it in a piece for PaperCity on my (current) Dream Team of dishes in Houston. You can read about it here. (There’s also some great tacos and pasta on my team.)

 

For those of you wanting a hearty meal at home, I offer Chicken Paprikash. I cooked it on Sunday, and based it on the recipe featured by Sam Sifton in The Times. Use a combination of sweet and hot smoked paprika, and make sure to go with bone-in chicken. Cooking it is simple — you’ll have to brown the chicken in a Dutch oven for a few minutes — and when the smokiness of the paprika meets the sour cream, your evening will be set. Pair your Paprikash with a bottle of this Pinot Noir and a salad of mixed greens, and the picture is complete.

We Drank Canned Wine, Tried Doughnut Sliders, Opened a Chardonnay … and What Fine Pastas

You go from table to table, hoping for memorable tastes and flavors, food prepared well, made with thought and care. There’s something edifying about the act of finding it, sharing it with others, appreciating it. You’ve learned to deal with the moments when the taste and flavors do not deliver, when shrimp is overcooked and enchiladas taste like sawdust and not much more, when this food writer or that restaurant reviewer lauds the cuisine of the latest farm-to-table restaurant or poke mecca and you wait a month to try it and find it lackluster at best. Taste is subjective, after all, isn’t it? One man’s bland bowl of borscht is another’s Proustian interlude, no? Those disappointing meals serve to whet your appetite for the next pleasurable repast, as vexing as they might be.

Recently, the good moments have come with satisfying regularity, the pastas done well, the branzino pleasing, the (yes) spicy tofu all that tofu can and should be. You looked on and listened as your friend (and Brockhaus sous chef) Chris savored the rigatoni bianco Bolognese you knew he would love, his sighs audible. Yes, it’s been a good week or two at the table in Houston, days that included a brunch at Tony Mandola’s Gulf Coast Kitchen that featured doughnut sliders that were just what I needed at the time, though I was unaware of the need before I tasted them. (Click here for a look.) The sweet and savory plate is a grand antidote to a night of celebration.

To that Bolognese, which has been my favorite pasta in Houston for a few months now. It’s at Tony’s, and if you have not tried it, you are missing something you shouldn’t.

I have a feeling that Marcella Hazan would have loved this. It’s rigatoni with a Bolognese bianco sauce.

I was hooked the first time I tried this dish; it’s complex, speaks of hours in the pot, the simmering and melding of the meat and vegetables and breaking down of the parts into a whole that transports. Each ingredient retains its place of pride — look at the carrots, their shape exact and right — but the technique that goes into making this course creates a tour de force of rich and subtle flavors, something full of rustic gusto and refined grace. Appreciate the saltiness of the cheese and the acidity of the olive oil. If all goes well, you’ll have this more than once.

Wine was also fine during these days and nights, and we even enjoyed some in cans. An unoaked Chardonnay and a red blend (Zinfandel, Syrah, and Merlot) from Ron Rubin Winery did us good, and we paired a Chardonnay from Mitsuko’s Vineyard with chèvre and bread.  (Ray Isle recently tasted some canned wines as well, and his review of them is a good read.)

If you can find a bottle of this, open it and drink.

During a dinner at the home of Russ and Judy Labrasca, Angela and I were treated to a 1997 Chimney Rock Cabernet Sauvignon, and a ’96 from Saddleback, the latter a lovely bottle, mellowed into a dream, the former drinking well though expressing charms of a more typical manner. Russ and Judy are a couple — Angela met them when she worked in Dallas, and introduced them to me not long after I arrived in Houston — I consider myself honored to know, friends without parallel. We drank those wines with hamburgers and Judy’s customary spread, and it was good.

With friends like these, one needs nothing more.

Houston Restaurant Weeks is upon us, the annual event that has done so much good for so many people in need of a square meal since it was founded, back in 2003. I sampled a few HRW menus this week, and came across another worthy pasta and a branzino of note, both on the menu at Amalfi Ristorante Italiano & Bar. The pasta, a tortelli, is filled with Asiago, potatoes, and pancetta, and served with beef short ribs. Tender, al dente pasta, top-notch cheese and pancetta, and, OK, the short rib is wonderful. The sea bass, my favorite item on Amalfi’s HRW menu, is accompanied by potato gnocchi, roasted artichoke, and a lemon cream sauce. Sea, lemon, olive oil, gnocchi … try these, and donate $7 to the Houston Food Bank in the process.

Let’s see what comes next …

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