Veganism (well, nearly) in my kitchen...
I openly admit that while I tend to have an adventurous palate, quite often and depending on my mood, some meats can taste incredibly bad to me. That experience, in addition to my limited available time to locate great product, prep it, cook it, and eat it, as well as a growing belief that eating much meat is bad for body and planet, has yielded a great interest in vegetarian cooking. And I mean elegant, tasty, no-sacrifices cooking that is not of that 70's earthy-crunchy ilk (well, at least not all of the time). No mush, no chili, no rice 'n beans (well, at least not most of the time).
Just to complicate matters, a number of the usual vegetarian staples don't agree with me (I need to minimize dairy, eggs sometimes don't sit well, and I am allergic to avocados...), and my diet plan involves my eating about 60 grams of lean protein a day and very little simple sugars. Not all that easy without much meat. (Although I do eat a lot of Greek yogurt (which doen't bug my belly)).
So, I am still eating a serving of fish 1-2x a week, which I can rationalize by buying things that are more sustainable and aren't known to bioconcentrate mercury. I'll just admit it up front so that when you dine with me you don't think that I am a hypocrite. I also am still eating meat when I want it, particularly when dining out (still have a tough time resisting duck breast and bacon, but I don't need to keep them in the house...). And I loathe the sort of vegetarians (be they real, or, like me, not wholly committed) who preach their ethical crap to others, especially while eating.
Thus, the point of this is not to convert you to some religion in which even I do not believe, but to share with you tonight's feature in the ongoing saga: what I made for dinner.
My friend, Ross (shoutout to you, dude!), recently gave me the idea of using polenta as a vegetarian, fat-free "crust" for a quiche I often make. Likewise, my old pal and uber-carpenter Mike (shoutout atcha, too, baby!) has been giving me tons of higher protein, low sugar, low fat, still tasty, not mushblobs vegan cooking ideas, including the joys of silken tofu in lieu of dairy thickeners in recipes. So, guys, you (and the things going bad in my fridge) inspired tonight's recipe.
La Nuit de la Grande Citrouille, Charlie Brown!
(Aromatic maple pumpkin tart with sage-polenta crust and red wine laquered wild mushroom ragout with sage and brown butter)
(yes, I know the butter isn't vegan)
(and that that description is silly)
preheat oven to 350 degrees.
ingredients (all of this is rough, I didn't measure):
1/2 cup corn meal
1.5 cu water
salt
about a tablespoon of finely minced (back cut for dryness) fresh sage
one can, 15 oz., of Libby's pumpkin (just the plain pumpkin, not the preflavored pie mix)
3/4 cup of silken reduced fat tofu
about a teaspoon of finely minced Chinese ginger
a small dash of ground red cayenne pepper (I always put this in a pumpkin pie, as an aside)
a few shakes of five spice powder
one shake of nutmeg
salt
2 tablespoons maple syrup
2 cups of mixed wild mushrooms (we had shitake, crimini, and oyster)
2 tsp of olive oil
1 tsp of unsalted butter
the red wine (a medium bodied cab) that was left in my glass (I think a dry chardonnay would have been better, but I wasn't drinking that)
some more fresh sage (this is just rolled up and sliced finely into the pan with kitchen scissors) - circa a teaspoon
salt
maple syrup (and a little Pecorino Romano as a garnish would have been good, but I didn't want the fat)
easy:
in a saucepan, put the water and salt it to taste (I think I used about 2 tsp). boil it. whisk in the corn meal, cook it until it is done over medium heat (maybe a minute or so), toss in the sage, whisk it all together, and remove from heat. set aside to cool a bit.
spray a nine inch metal pie pan or whatever you have around with some cooking spray. I just use the olive oil kind since I like the taste.
Press, using a hand rinsed in cold water (no sticking), the polenta into the pie pan, then put this in the oven and cook it for about 15 minutes.
Meanwhile, make the filling: dump filling ingredients into a bowl and blend until smooth, then salt to taste. I used a stick blender. You use whatever you like.
when the "crust" is kinda set and dried a little, dump in the filling, smooth it out, and put it back in the oven.
I cooked it at about 350 (the oven in my apt is unreliable, but that is what my thermometer said. Incidentally, I set the oven to 390 F, so as ever, YMMV) for about 50 minutes whilst I accomplished other goals.
when it was done, I turned the oven off but left the pie in there while I made the mushrooms: put the olive oil in a skillet. get it warm but not super hot. put the mushrooms in, whole. toss in a pinch of salt. toss the mushrooms every so often to prevent sticking. when they're mostly done to your liking, toss in the sage. continue to cook. toss in the butter, let it brown very slightly, and lightly caramelize the outsides of the flat mushrooms. deglaze with whatever you were drinking at the time (kinda like a reverse monte au buerre), toss a bit more, the whole thing will thicken and be delicious.
to serve: cut a nice slice of your semisavory pie. put some of the mushrooms on top. pour on a teensy touch of real maple syrup, and finish with a sage leaf and a little Romano grana if you have it and are feeling fancy (or just eat it, if you are me, while watching William Shatner interview Jenna Jamison).
If you are a hungry person, 1/4 of the pie is a serving. roughly, this contains 14 grams of protein, 12.5 grams of sugars, and under 200 calories. plus the mushrooms, which, depending on how many you eat, are the source of fat in this dish.
Have vegetarian(ish) food ideas? a great recipe to share? tried this and it sucked? let me know!
off to Memphis tomorrow.
Showing posts with label foodie. Show all posts
Showing posts with label foodie. Show all posts
Thursday, January 8, 2009
Friday, August 8, 2008
One for Bambi (or... Famous Dave's!)
It has recently come to my attention, that when I talk with my friends from home about my experiences in Pittsburgh, particularly when discussing my culinary and fashion adventures, that I can turn a bit... snarky. So, just to prove that I am not eternally nasty (and perhaps thus give some credence to the negative things I do say) I will take a cue from Bambi.
I had previously thought it was Bambi's mother, but perhaps it was Thumper, who said, "if you can't say something nice, don't say nothing at all."
All double-negatives aside, I think at times there may be some value in that concept.
Just not as a blogging food critic. Nontheless, here's something nice for ya.
Famous Dave's.
Seriously. I would say that, to date, the dinner I enjoyed at Famous Dave's was, arguably, the best (I think it comes in a short second to The Red Room, actually, but more on that later...) that I've enjoyed in Pittsburgh.
I had never seen a Famous Dave's before my arrival in the Steel City, and from what I have observed, it seems to be a small local chain. The restaurant branch which I visited was in the Waterworks shopping complex, in Fox Chapel near the UPMC St. Margaret Hospital. I found myself in the neighborhood, later than anticipated, with one very mean and headachy husband (who had gotten quite hungry while he kindly and patiently found me a pink and purple tennis racket with a 4.25 in. grip for only $25! I call my racket "my little pony" now...) So, to Famous Dave's we went, since it was the closest edible-looking thing.
and
it was good.
actually, I'd say for a simple, honest, not-at-all fancy meal, it was a terrific bargain. Our server was prompt, friendly, and efficient. The table, floor, and ladies' room were all immaculate. But most importantly: the food was genuinely good.
Todd ordered a brisket and chicken dinner, which arrived complete with a cornbread muffin, a small ear of corn, and choice of two sides - he chose the amazingly sweet (too sweet for my palate) and buttery yams and the spiced green beans (which were the only thing we were served that I thought was bad - they were limp and not very tasty). But the real superstar was the meat. The brisket was beautifully seasoned and sauced, cut-with-a-fork tender, and not at all gristle-y or fatty. All tasty, soft, edible. The chicken was just as nice.
For me, as my appetite is smaller, I ordered what has to be the most adorable thing on the menu: 5 little slider-sized sandwiches, each filled with a different little taste of a barbeque meat offering. I will confess that I enjoyed the spicy sausage the most, although it is a bit greasy. There were also little samplings of chicken, pork, brisket, and I forget the last one... or maybe there were only 4. The point, dear friends, is this: they were good! My one critique, if this is even a real negative, is that I found the little buns my babywiches arrived on to be too soft and potato-ish and too buttery-tasting for me. I think most people would find them delicious.
Oh, and just about everything on the menu comes with their special spicy pickle chips. Ordinarily, I do not like southern-style pickles since I find them to be too sweet, and I do not like pickles presented in a chip format since they're often not crisp. But, Dave, I can see why you're famous, because even the pickle chips were good. They were cold, crisp, and very tasty with a bit of sweetness that was tempered by the combination of vinegary acidity and a spicy bite of heat. After I downed all of mine, I ate most of Todd's. Those pickles are green gobs of joy.
Each of the branded sauces was special, had a reasonable amount of well-balanced heat (except, sadly, for their supposedly fire-hot XXHELLXX burn-yinz-mouf-down version, which I did not find particularly hot. Todd did. Then again, I put siracha on cucumbers as a salad. Incidentally, if you haven't tried cukes (cut a seedless or "Japanese" cucumber paper-thin with a mandoline) that way, you should, with a bit of kosher salt and a tiny chiffonade of fresh mint and fresh lime juice if you've got it). I tasted each one alone thought that they were all good, but I did find that for a nice balance of sweet, salty, acid, roastiness, and heat, the Famous Dave's eponymous classic sauce would be hard to beat. It was way tasty, I like it better than the stuff I have in my fridge. Feel free to send me some as a gift.
I was too full to eat all of the cuteburgers, but Todd ravenously devoured his entire meal (and the portion sizes were very generous!) and ordered dessert. If you are a sweets person (and as you know, I do not pretend to be one, so I know that I am hard on desserts), this dessert is for you: pecan-praline bread pudding with vanilla icecream. It was HUGE. So huge, that despite my usual two bites, and Todd's typically superhuman capacity for snacks, we left more than half of it on the table. I think one would feed a sugarjunkied family of four. Dang, that thing was sweet. But it smelled amazing, and had a rich flavor. It was too sweet for me (did I mention that it was stickily, toothrottingly sweet?), I admit, and I would have enjoyed it more, perhaps, if the bread pudding had been lightly smoked and caramelized on the grill or served with a shot of espresso. But even the icecream was of high quality (not that strangely yellow over-crystallized cheap catering-quality mass produced crap I would have expected), with a rich creamy texture and full, natural vanilla flavor.
So, if you find yourself in the vicinity of a Famous Dave's and you want something well-prepared, unpretentious, and flavorful to eat, I'd say to go for it. This is probably the best chain-style vests-with-flair kind of place I've ever tried.
Even if you buy into that Bambi line, you won't be forced into silence with this one. Yum Yum.
P.S. I forgot to mention the baked beans, which I chose for the side to my bbq-munchkins. They're far from vegetarian - there were huge honkin' pieces of pork in there - but they were delicious. The beans weren't overcooked or mushy at all, the sauce was thick and tasty, and the flavor was smoky, sweet, savory, and well balanced. And the beans were clearly well prepared, as they did not leave me feeling at all musical later.
I had previously thought it was Bambi's mother, but perhaps it was Thumper, who said, "if you can't say something nice, don't say nothing at all."
All double-negatives aside, I think at times there may be some value in that concept.
Just not as a blogging food critic. Nontheless, here's something nice for ya.
Famous Dave's.
Seriously. I would say that, to date, the dinner I enjoyed at Famous Dave's was, arguably, the best (I think it comes in a short second to The Red Room, actually, but more on that later...) that I've enjoyed in Pittsburgh.
I had never seen a Famous Dave's before my arrival in the Steel City, and from what I have observed, it seems to be a small local chain. The restaurant branch which I visited was in the Waterworks shopping complex, in Fox Chapel near the UPMC St. Margaret Hospital. I found myself in the neighborhood, later than anticipated, with one very mean and headachy husband (who had gotten quite hungry while he kindly and patiently found me a pink and purple tennis racket with a 4.25 in. grip for only $25! I call my racket "my little pony" now...) So, to Famous Dave's we went, since it was the closest edible-looking thing.
and
it was good.
actually, I'd say for a simple, honest, not-at-all fancy meal, it was a terrific bargain. Our server was prompt, friendly, and efficient. The table, floor, and ladies' room were all immaculate. But most importantly: the food was genuinely good.
Todd ordered a brisket and chicken dinner, which arrived complete with a cornbread muffin, a small ear of corn, and choice of two sides - he chose the amazingly sweet (too sweet for my palate) and buttery yams and the spiced green beans (which were the only thing we were served that I thought was bad - they were limp and not very tasty). But the real superstar was the meat. The brisket was beautifully seasoned and sauced, cut-with-a-fork tender, and not at all gristle-y or fatty. All tasty, soft, edible. The chicken was just as nice.
For me, as my appetite is smaller, I ordered what has to be the most adorable thing on the menu: 5 little slider-sized sandwiches, each filled with a different little taste of a barbeque meat offering. I will confess that I enjoyed the spicy sausage the most, although it is a bit greasy. There were also little samplings of chicken, pork, brisket, and I forget the last one... or maybe there were only 4. The point, dear friends, is this: they were good! My one critique, if this is even a real negative, is that I found the little buns my babywiches arrived on to be too soft and potato-ish and too buttery-tasting for me. I think most people would find them delicious.
Oh, and just about everything on the menu comes with their special spicy pickle chips. Ordinarily, I do not like southern-style pickles since I find them to be too sweet, and I do not like pickles presented in a chip format since they're often not crisp. But, Dave, I can see why you're famous, because even the pickle chips were good. They were cold, crisp, and very tasty with a bit of sweetness that was tempered by the combination of vinegary acidity and a spicy bite of heat. After I downed all of mine, I ate most of Todd's. Those pickles are green gobs of joy.
Each of the branded sauces was special, had a reasonable amount of well-balanced heat (except, sadly, for their supposedly fire-hot XXHELLXX burn-yinz-mouf-down version, which I did not find particularly hot. Todd did. Then again, I put siracha on cucumbers as a salad. Incidentally, if you haven't tried cukes (cut a seedless or "Japanese" cucumber paper-thin with a mandoline) that way, you should, with a bit of kosher salt and a tiny chiffonade of fresh mint and fresh lime juice if you've got it). I tasted each one alone thought that they were all good, but I did find that for a nice balance of sweet, salty, acid, roastiness, and heat, the Famous Dave's eponymous classic sauce would be hard to beat. It was way tasty, I like it better than the stuff I have in my fridge. Feel free to send me some as a gift.
I was too full to eat all of the cuteburgers, but Todd ravenously devoured his entire meal (and the portion sizes were very generous!) and ordered dessert. If you are a sweets person (and as you know, I do not pretend to be one, so I know that I am hard on desserts), this dessert is for you: pecan-praline bread pudding with vanilla icecream. It was HUGE. So huge, that despite my usual two bites, and Todd's typically superhuman capacity for snacks, we left more than half of it on the table. I think one would feed a sugarjunkied family of four. Dang, that thing was sweet. But it smelled amazing, and had a rich flavor. It was too sweet for me (did I mention that it was stickily, toothrottingly sweet?), I admit, and I would have enjoyed it more, perhaps, if the bread pudding had been lightly smoked and caramelized on the grill or served with a shot of espresso. But even the icecream was of high quality (not that strangely yellow over-crystallized cheap catering-quality mass produced crap I would have expected), with a rich creamy texture and full, natural vanilla flavor.
So, if you find yourself in the vicinity of a Famous Dave's and you want something well-prepared, unpretentious, and flavorful to eat, I'd say to go for it. This is probably the best chain-style vests-with-flair kind of place I've ever tried.
Even if you buy into that Bambi line, you won't be forced into silence with this one. Yum Yum.
P.S. I forgot to mention the baked beans, which I chose for the side to my bbq-munchkins. They're far from vegetarian - there were huge honkin' pieces of pork in there - but they were delicious. The beans weren't overcooked or mushy at all, the sauce was thick and tasty, and the flavor was smoky, sweet, savory, and well balanced. And the beans were clearly well prepared, as they did not leave me feeling at all musical later.
Monday, July 28, 2008
Nine on Nine - Part Three (Are We Done Yet?)
If you know me, then you know how I like to test limits. Imagine a two-year-old with a new babysitter. Now grow her up and take her out to dinner...
and so, such is what happened at Nine on Nine.
When the waiter finally approached our table to check on the food, he clearly expected that our mouths would be too full to tell him how it sucked. But, I didn't eat it, so I was prepared to offer up my little test. I said to the waiter, “I am not going to eat this, so I don't need you to do anything about it, but if I were the chef here I would certainly want to know that the pasta is completely raw. Not al dente, but raw. This dish in inedible.” I was nice about it, but he clearly knew I thought the food was bad. The amazing part was his reply. “Oh, ok.” and then HE NEVER CAME BACK UNTIL HE TRIED TO SELL US DESSERT! huh? What kind of fine dining establishment leaves a patron clearly and obviously unhappy? I was curious what they'd do with my making their fixing it optional. And apparently, the bare minimum, aka nothing.
As I often say to my friend Kathleen, words are nice but what really matters is action. And from the folks at Nine of Nine, I got shockingly no action whatsoever.
We did not order dessert, I was too disappointed to be bothered.
Apparently, that which defines “fine dining” in Pittsburgh is your being served a bunch of free shit with your meal. In addition to the amuse and the intermezzo, we were served (with the bill) a PB and J themed sweets plate (freebie #3 for those of you who are counting). This was a cute idea. Peanut butter truffles (too big, rock hard and still a little frozen, but with good flavor albeit amateurish – reminiscent of the peanutbuttercuppish chocolates my mom made in the 80's) alongside white-grape jellies (plain and sweet) were offered. As my mother always said, there's no such thing as a free lunch. And in the case of Nine on Nine, all three of the freebies actually detracted from the meal.
The total came to about $100 for 2 drinks, one app, two entrees before tax and tip.
Now, I don't mind at all paying $300 to Ken Oringer for an occasional meal - because when he's in the kitchen, I enjoy sublime food art. But for this hoity-toity pig's swill... well, actions matter more than words, so
We don't plan to go back.
Summary judgment for Nine on Nine: not worth the time and money. Dishes are overthought and underexecuted. Some aspects of menu planning seem odd. Service was bizarre and negligent. Did a nice job with fish skin and fennel and not much else.
and so, such is what happened at Nine on Nine.
When the waiter finally approached our table to check on the food, he clearly expected that our mouths would be too full to tell him how it sucked. But, I didn't eat it, so I was prepared to offer up my little test. I said to the waiter, “I am not going to eat this, so I don't need you to do anything about it, but if I were the chef here I would certainly want to know that the pasta is completely raw. Not al dente, but raw. This dish in inedible.” I was nice about it, but he clearly knew I thought the food was bad. The amazing part was his reply. “Oh, ok.” and then HE NEVER CAME BACK UNTIL HE TRIED TO SELL US DESSERT! huh? What kind of fine dining establishment leaves a patron clearly and obviously unhappy? I was curious what they'd do with my making their fixing it optional. And apparently, the bare minimum, aka nothing.
As I often say to my friend Kathleen, words are nice but what really matters is action. And from the folks at Nine of Nine, I got shockingly no action whatsoever.
We did not order dessert, I was too disappointed to be bothered.
Apparently, that which defines “fine dining” in Pittsburgh is your being served a bunch of free shit with your meal. In addition to the amuse and the intermezzo, we were served (with the bill) a PB and J themed sweets plate (freebie #3 for those of you who are counting). This was a cute idea. Peanut butter truffles (too big, rock hard and still a little frozen, but with good flavor albeit amateurish – reminiscent of the peanutbuttercuppish chocolates my mom made in the 80's) alongside white-grape jellies (plain and sweet) were offered. As my mother always said, there's no such thing as a free lunch. And in the case of Nine on Nine, all three of the freebies actually detracted from the meal.
The total came to about $100 for 2 drinks, one app, two entrees before tax and tip.
Now, I don't mind at all paying $300 to Ken Oringer for an occasional meal - because when he's in the kitchen, I enjoy sublime food art. But for this hoity-toity pig's swill... well, actions matter more than words, so
We don't plan to go back.
Summary judgment for Nine on Nine: not worth the time and money. Dishes are overthought and underexecuted. Some aspects of menu planning seem odd. Service was bizarre and negligent. Did a nice job with fish skin and fennel and not much else.
Nine on Nine - Part Two
This is part two of my review of Nine on Nine. Part one appears below.
So, after we had drinks (well, we ordered drinks, I will confess that mine was too unpalatable to drink, and the server took it away without offering me anything else even though it was 80% full. Frankly, it was flavorless and just not worth the calories)...
For an appetizer, we went for the “Filet on Filet” - an obvious and lame play on the name of the restaurant. We were served a sad, bland pile of macerated meat (without onion, egg, capers, lemon... ) dressed with some greens atop some slightly dried-out-on-the-edges halfway-to-braseola pieces of meat. For a mostly-vegetarian, it is rare that I order beef, but as some of you may know, I prefer my meat raw if I am going to eat it. The quality of the ingredient was there, but the flavor was so bland, I actually asked the waiter to bring me some lemon. The addition of acid really improved the dish.
Freebie #2 (freebie #1 was the amuse, in part one) was then presented as an intermezzo of “watermelon soup” which was a shotglass of room-temp watermelon puree with water and a bit of mint.
I pondered the cosmic question: spit or swallow?
It was repulsive. I admit that I spat it out at the table, manners be damned. It was that nasty.
Now for the piece de resistance: for my entree, I ordered the barramundi. By eavesdropping on a nearby table (populated by loud marble-mouthed yinzers, but hey, they got service so they clearly know something I do not) I learned from their server that the barramundi was supposed to be served with a house-made saffron-tinged pasta and kalamata olives, and topped with fennel. Right up my alley. So I ordered it. What I was served was a major disappointment. The fish was just slightly overcooked, but it was flavorful and served with a crisp skin that I appreciated. The fennel was nicely seasoned and absolutely delicious. And that is where the praise ends. Where were the olives? (I will confess to you that when I altered and reheated the leftovers – which were at least 85% of my dish, I did find one (one olive!) the next day). But the biggest let-down was the pasta. It was painfully undercooked and cold.
House-made pasta! For you at home who have never made pasta, I will share that the reason I was so stunned by this is that homemade pasta is so naturally moist, you just flash it in salted boiling water until it is heated through, and typically worry about overcooking it – so, how in the realm of the laws of physics and the culinary universe they managed to undercook it, well, I will never know. And I am no pasta pussy. I understand the concept of al dente. It just was an unflavored (not a sprig of saffron, I would testify - mystery ingredient #2), dry, cold, stiff, inedible mass. To be sure I wasn't being overcritical, I fed a bite to Todd, who exclaimed, “ew. what was that?”
What was that, indeed?
So, after we had drinks (well, we ordered drinks, I will confess that mine was too unpalatable to drink, and the server took it away without offering me anything else even though it was 80% full. Frankly, it was flavorless and just not worth the calories)...
For an appetizer, we went for the “Filet on Filet” - an obvious and lame play on the name of the restaurant. We were served a sad, bland pile of macerated meat (without onion, egg, capers, lemon... ) dressed with some greens atop some slightly dried-out-on-the-edges halfway-to-braseola pieces of meat. For a mostly-vegetarian, it is rare that I order beef, but as some of you may know, I prefer my meat raw if I am going to eat it. The quality of the ingredient was there, but the flavor was so bland, I actually asked the waiter to bring me some lemon. The addition of acid really improved the dish.
Freebie #2 (freebie #1 was the amuse, in part one) was then presented as an intermezzo of “watermelon soup” which was a shotglass of room-temp watermelon puree with water and a bit of mint.
I pondered the cosmic question: spit or swallow?
It was repulsive. I admit that I spat it out at the table, manners be damned. It was that nasty.
Now for the piece de resistance: for my entree, I ordered the barramundi. By eavesdropping on a nearby table (populated by loud marble-mouthed yinzers, but hey, they got service so they clearly know something I do not) I learned from their server that the barramundi was supposed to be served with a house-made saffron-tinged pasta and kalamata olives, and topped with fennel. Right up my alley. So I ordered it. What I was served was a major disappointment. The fish was just slightly overcooked, but it was flavorful and served with a crisp skin that I appreciated. The fennel was nicely seasoned and absolutely delicious. And that is where the praise ends. Where were the olives? (I will confess to you that when I altered and reheated the leftovers – which were at least 85% of my dish, I did find one (one olive!) the next day). But the biggest let-down was the pasta. It was painfully undercooked and cold.
House-made pasta! For you at home who have never made pasta, I will share that the reason I was so stunned by this is that homemade pasta is so naturally moist, you just flash it in salted boiling water until it is heated through, and typically worry about overcooking it – so, how in the realm of the laws of physics and the culinary universe they managed to undercook it, well, I will never know. And I am no pasta pussy. I understand the concept of al dente. It just was an unflavored (not a sprig of saffron, I would testify - mystery ingredient #2), dry, cold, stiff, inedible mass. To be sure I wasn't being overcritical, I fed a bite to Todd, who exclaimed, “ew. what was that?”
What was that, indeed?
Saturday, July 19, 2008
Steeltown Girl on Saturday Night...
I hearken back to Flashdance and sing along... "just a steeltown girl on a saturday night..."
This newly minted Steeltown girl likes to eat out - I am just kinda lazy and am not always up to cooking. I also enjoy a leisurely dinner with friends. So when I recently relocated to Shadyside, one of Pittsburgh's more chic neighborhoods, flush with well-reviewed dining hotspots, I figured I would never lack for a hip place to eat.
but
then I started going out.
and
lots of the food here is bad.
or, worse than full-on bad. I have, to date, only had one meal in Pittsburgh's "finer dining" establishments that I felt was better-than-mediocre.
so I hope that you'll join me as I explore and offer my unbiased reviews of wine, cuisine, and a few other musings as I get to know my new home of Pittsburgh. Just wait... I am no midwestern girl, which is to say that I am not always nice.
This newly minted Steeltown girl likes to eat out - I am just kinda lazy and am not always up to cooking. I also enjoy a leisurely dinner with friends. So when I recently relocated to Shadyside, one of Pittsburgh's more chic neighborhoods, flush with well-reviewed dining hotspots, I figured I would never lack for a hip place to eat.
but
then I started going out.
and
lots of the food here is bad.
or, worse than full-on bad. I have, to date, only had one meal in Pittsburgh's "finer dining" establishments that I felt was better-than-mediocre.
so I hope that you'll join me as I explore and offer my unbiased reviews of wine, cuisine, and a few other musings as I get to know my new home of Pittsburgh. Just wait... I am no midwestern girl, which is to say that I am not always nice.
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