Restaurateurs of the Year – Shad Kirton & Darren Warth of Smokey D’s

These partners grew their barbecue business the slow, smart way. They built a client base catering from a virtual shack in Saylor Township, where alcohol licenses are relative bargains. Then they opened a skywalk venue, later a second downtown store while establishing their brand on the competition circuit. This summer Warth completed his personal grand slam of winning all four categories at the American Royale, the U.S. Open of competitive barbecue. Kirton then won the largest prize in competition history, a $100,000 Grand Master award on national TV.

After that, the partners moved their mother store two blocks, into a sprawling three room, 500 seat restaurant on I-35/80. From Day One, that place was so busy that demand kept three 1000 pound smokers operating around the clock. That meant that smoked meats were always sliced fresh, never cooled and “re-thermaled.” Kirton and Warth added a talented full time pastry chef. Their biggest problem now is parking as truckers and Tweeters spread the word about this magnetic restaurant.

Most amazing of all, these guys have done it all without incurring any debt!

Chef of the Year & New Restaurant of the Year – David Baruthio & Baru

Soon after Baru’s opening last spring, this reviewer compared owner-chef David Baruthio to the holy trinity of Alsatian culinary genius in America (Vongerictern, Keller and Joho) and wrote that his palate, and Iowa’s first Pacojet, coaxed amazing textures out of foams, mousses, terrines and ice creams. Since then, things have gotten even better. Rising star Andrew Newburg has been promoted to Chef de Cuisine and Jessica Dunn to Pastry Chef.

They have taken on more challenges, freeing Baruthio and partner Sara Hill to explore new territory. They teamed up with Sunstead Farms in a very French manner. Instead of having deliveries made, David goes to the farm and does his own harvesting. Hill, an accomplished artist, began cutting granite to adorn Baru’s stunning dinnerware repertoire. Baruthio made trips to Alsace to keep up with the evolving gastropub scene there. He also tweaked his menu to Iowa tastes, adding home cured Speck (juniper cured ham) and Alsatian sausages among other things.

“Iowa is a challenge. Sweetbreads wouldn’t sell till we mixed them with escargot. We could not sell squab. It was a fabulous dish, boned and cooked sous vide, but no one would order it. On the other hand, we can’t get enough pheasant. Iowans loves steak so much we had to add more,” he explained.

Restaurant of the Year – La Mie

Joe and Christina Logsdon’s French patisserie has long been serving fresh artisan breads and pastries that can take one’s breath away. They break their own butter and fold it in, carrying their dough from sheeting to usage – a two to three hour process that few American bakeries bother with anymore. They also hand roll baguettes and practice true lamination – two other lost arts. That’s been enough to make La Mie one the state’s favorite spots for breakfast and lunch.

This year, the Logsdons added a dinner service that perfectly fit the spirit of 2010 and filled two local voids in the food scene: for healthy, low priced bistro fare; and for pairings geared to white wine drinkers. Dinners began with exquisite, complimentary bread service that might include French cheeses, tapanade, or seafood spreads. Starch options introduced healthy things like “teff with sunflower and flax seeds plus rye berries,” “buckwheat groats,” “savory oatmeal,” or “delicata of squash.” Most seafoods were poached in bone stocks and, as a balm to the year’s hard times, they cost only about $15, while most other dinners were priced $10 or less.

Zeitgeist of the Year – “What recession?”

2010 was a year of defiance when brave souls opened new restaurants three times the pace of the previous year. Many brought first of a kind experiences to town. Zingaro became Des Moines’ original pop-up café, Africa Cuisine introduced Somali – Kenyan menus, Baru debuted Alsatian cuisine, Babylon became the first Iraqi café, Open Sesame the first Lebanese, Pollos Rostizados brought our first charcoal fired rotisserie chicken shop, Accordion introduced live accordion music, and La Paris Café became our first Indo-Chinese café-French Bakery-sports bar-espresso house hybrid. Saraj Restaurant & Bakery, Red, Copa Cavana, Pad Thai, Bagni di Lucca, Mullet’s, Big City Burger & Greens, Tres Hermanos, Bagni di Lucca, Flour, Oasis, Ray Earl’s, Sonora Tacqueria, El Blue Burrito and Tamale’s Industry also made impressive debuts.

Best Move – Smokey D’s

Wellman’s Pub, El Chisme, El Rey Burrito, Gino’s, Village Bean, Raul’s, Jethro & Jake’s, and Mama Lacona’s all successfully upgraded to grander venues but Smokey D’s move, only two blocks on the ground, augmented their brand and their business by an exponential factor.

New Store of the Year – All Spice

Rare spices, vinegars and oils attracted many of the top chefs in town to East Village.

Design of the Year – Mullet’s

Big City Burger & Greens, Red, Jethro & Jake’s, and Copa Cavana all came online with stunning designs but riverfront Mullet’s hooked this prize with the best patio in town.

Best New Product – Madhouse Brewing Company’s Pale Ale

In a great year for Iowa beverages, Madhouse edged out Templeton Rye’s new batch of whiskey and Olde Main Brewing’s hard cider.

Farm of the Year – Fox Hollow

Tai Johnson-Spratt expanded her heritage bird farm by a dozen new breeds for local restaurants and farmers market shoppers.

Sandwich of the Year – B&B’s Pork Tenderloin

This southside legend won an eight week bracket style poll as the city’s best.

Best New Non-Traditional Venue Restaurant – Graziano’s Sausage and Tommy Farrell’s Italian Beef concession at Welss Fargo Arena.

Hottest New Chain – Trader Joe’s

At last, the ultimate store for bargain hunting status seekers.

Top Political Player – Farm Bureau

Their candidates kicked butt across the board in November elections.

Trend of the Year (national) – tie: food trucks & limited time releases

Food vending trucks became so popular that national chains Qdoba, Sizzler, Dairy Queen and Gold Star Chili jumped into the market. Limited time releases (original recipe Pepsi, McRib, etc.) created artificial urgencies that drove consumption.

Trend of the year (local) – desperate landlords

Mama & Sons, Two Rivers, Grandma’s Apron, Beefburger Barn, India Grill, Ciao, Corigliano’s Big League Pizza, and Fourth Down all opened and closed within a year‘s time.

Thanks for the Memories

La Pizza House, Jimmie’s American Café, QV’s Cavatelli, Phat Chef’s, Los Compadres, Winston’s Pub & Grille, Café Su, Battani’s, Simo’s, Grand Piano Bistro, Le Jardin, Something Good Soul Food, Pho All Seasons, Cecil & Rosie’s, Pad Thai, Richard Mosqueda, Stella’s Blue Sky Diner, Royal Grill

Dinner Entertainment of the Year – Thankful Dirt

Kudos to Fire Creek Grill, El Bait Shop, Royal Mile, and AK O’Connor’s for bringing this talented couple to the dinner scene.

Cookbook of the Year – “One Big Table” by Molly O’Neill

A veritable encyclopedia of American home cooking, this will become a classic.

Best Advertising (national) – “The Storm of 1781”

Jameson Irish Whiskey’s improbable commercial, about an octopus and a funeral, won critical acclaim and pushed market share every time it was re-released.

Best Advertising (local) – Mullet’s tie-ins with baseball

Grand slam product placement.

Worst Advertising – “Quiznos‘ Singing Kittens”

So annoying they beat a McDonalds’ ad that used an overweight, sickly looking actor as spokesman for coffee.

  

A decade ago Napster began changing the world by allowing users to download songs they liked as opposed to buying entire albums of songs someone else thought they ought to like. That internet service was so popular then it accounted for 80% of computer use in college dormitories. Business strategists predicted this new generation of consumers would change the way everything was marketed, from “push” (you buy what someone else decides you want) to “pull” (manufacturers build exactly what you order) models. Alas, business revolutions are rarely as quick as political revolutions. Rather than buying Napster technology to sell downloads, the music industry tried to preserve their old model by suing Napster out of existence. Anyone who knows what iTunes, Insound and Rhapsody are also knows that didn’t work.

Although Burger King began advertising “Have it your way” in 1975, the restaurant industry has maintained a push model mindset. Customers at big chains are still given novella sized menus that might include over 200 specific items. At Cheesecake Factory, one is supposed to choose from 13 burgers each of which includes 6 to 10 specific ingredients. Try asking for substitutions and you get the same attitude that provoked Jack Nicholson’s Bobby Dupree to go nuts on a waitress in “Five Easy Pieces.” Finally, one new downtown restaurant appears to support consumer driven choice more than its precedents. Big City Burgers and Greens is innovative in many ways. First, it shares its address and kitchen with a handsome, well placed catering company. Secondly, it’s making a green effort with 100% composting and an unusual number of local, organic and sustainable vendors on its books.

Big City has uncovered hidden assets. I’d been in the previous business many times without even noticing the marvelous windows to Fifth and Walnut – the best street level views downtown. Outdoor patio space is the largest downtown and indoor patio space has been realized via the business being named official caterer of the Capitol Center. Brad Hartman smartly decorated the café with lime green acoustic panels and Plexiglas accentuating white furniture and stainless steel. Lunch menus fold away to make the place look like a Caribbean bar room for evening functions.

The menu is Napsterian. If one orders a burger ($3.75), one chooses amongst 9 free additions and 17 extras that cost $.75 each. Among the former are roasted tomatoes. Extra choices include fried eggs, jardinière and fried prosciutto. Cheese choices include Feta, queso fresco and chevre. Fresh baked potato buns were grilled and buttered. Quarter pound patties were made from a brisket and shoulder mix at 80-20 (lean – trim) ratio. The results were consistently as good as burgers get, perfectly seared.

A tuna burger delivered ahi cooked rare and cooled, with sesame seeds, red and green chilies and jicama slaw in a ginger orange vinaigrette. Hot dogs were split and served with jardinière, pickles cucumber and celery salt.

Salads ($6.50) included choices amongst five kinds of fresh greens, 20 kinds of freshly made dressings, and 64 toppings; five toppings were included in the price of my salad, as were rolls and cheese. Eight other premium ingredients could be added ($3 – & $5) including seared tuna, Moroccan chicken, and sautéed shrimp or skirt steak.

Side dishes were also inventive. Well seasoned fries had been freshly cut with skins on, fried crisply and tossed with Asiago and truffle oil.

Cheesy potatoes included cubed potatoes covered with melted Swiss cheese, Italian herbs and fried prosciutto.  

Thin onion strings were golden fried in beer batter. Sweet, lightly spiced house sauce (remoulade) worked well with fries, strings and burgers.

Big City Burger & Greens

400 Locust St., 537-8433

Mon. – Fri. 11 a.m. – 2 p.m.

Side Dishes

East Village’s newest food shop All Spice offers more rare individual spices, particularly North African ones, and fewer premixed blends than other spice stores in town. All Spice also has numerous olive oils.

 

Full Court Press (FCP) is a partnership of friends that has invigorated the Court Avenue district with uniquely themed restaurants Hessen Haus, El Bait Shop, Royal Mile, High Life Lounge, Fong‘s Pizza, Red Monk, Sbrocco, and Mullet‘s. Des Moines travelers who have sought unique downtown dining adventures in similarly sized Midwest towns (Wichita, Peoria, Toledo, etc.) appreciate our city’s debt to FCP. Probably the most amazing thing about this group is that all their visions have been spot-on. Every restaurant they ever opened is still up and running. None has even required tweaking. So a recent announcement that Sbrocco was revamping its menu became news.

“It took me fifteen months to realize it but this is a wine bar. It’s not the place for $38 entrees,” chef Andrew Meek explained.

Indeed, people flock to Sbrocco for its 200 inexpensive bottles of wine and 40 wines by the glass, large (six ounce) pours in Riedel stemware. So Meek created nine new “social plates” ($2 – $13) plus six “smears,” (dips) served with toasted rosemary bread to complement wines. He also retained nine social plates from previous menus. Many prices were reduced, up to 37.5%, and price reductions outnumbered increases by a 5-1 ratio.

The best of the old plates was a blue prawn dish served on spoon bread with a saffron nage. New Bedford scallops on cauliflower puree with caramelized Maui onions, watercress, and apple cider syrup was a close second.

A sun dried tomato soup, offered in three sizes ($2 – $6), was gorgeous but unremarkable but truffled parsnip soup mixed smooth and woodsy flavor brilliantly.

The least successful of the new dishes emulated chicken & waffles ($7). Chicken breast strips were southern fried and tucked into ice cream cones with shredded lettuce and a dab of Sriracha mayo. Lettuce could have used dressing and the cone didn’t work as a waffle surrogate. Smothered chicken and dumplings ($6) was much better in its rich gravy.

Deviled eggs ($5) with truffle oil and shitake shavings absorbed superb flavor from wild fennel marinade plus an acid kick from wine vinegar. Escalloped oysters ($8) with cornbread crumbs, garlic and cream employed huge oysters that are better used as fryers.

 Lobster pot pie (($13), with large chunks of cold water claw meat, was topped with a sensational puff pastry. A kitchen that can make this most difficult pastry should make an original waffle cone.

One night, duck wings ($6) were correctly described as “confit on the bone” with a celery and blue cheese salad.

Another night they were crisp and chewy. Thai style walleye pike ($5) was fried crunchy and served with a sweet apple slaw. Marinated mushrooms ($5) picked up flavors from oregano, fennel and garlic.

Meek’s new piece de resistance is a Niman Ranch pork belly ($8) of multiple textures perfectly paired with a slaw sautéed in bacon fat, and served on apple syrup.

The most original smears ($4 – $6) included a braunschweiger made with some speck (juniper cured pork butt) plus a Pella bologna mixed with roasted garlic.

Tapanade was made with chevre.

White bean hummus had been spiced with Sriracha. Whipped Feta was blended with cucumber and mint. Duck pâté was mixed with cornichons.

Meek retained seven popular large dishes from his repertoire and also added four large “comfort” plates ($17-$23): lamb shank; mushroom ravioli; osso bucco; and ratatouille with pasta. House salads featured good fresh greens, mostly blue cheeses, Nueske’s bacon, and bocarones (white anchovies). Ten cheeses were served with candied almonds and peppered apricots. Dessert prices ($5-$8) were reduced considerably.

Bottom line – Lower prices and new small plates should be a hit at downtown’s best wine bar.

Side Dishes

Meek said that Sbrocco plans to convert its retail wine store into an exclusive wine cellar and that tail-to-snout events will be held there next year… The old Zen space in the Hotel Kirkwood is being remodeled for a new undetermined restaurant.

Sbrocco
208 Court Ave., 282-3663
Mon. – Sat. 11a.m. – 2 p.m. and 5 p.m. – 10 p.m.

El Chisme moved into a Valley Junction building that most recently hosted Café Su after being doctors’ offices in previous decades. Jesus Ojeda’s café thus closes two circles, first by restoring Mexican cuisine to Valley Junction, the original base of Mexican immigration to Des Moines. Secondly, because Ojeda is a most ingenuous chef, his kitchen discipline derives, like medicine, from science as well as art. A little background.

Ojeda began in the restaurant business by designing and building a pushcart that maintained temperatures so efficiently that health inspectors used it as their model when they rewrote pushcart codes. After serving in the US Marine Corps, he graduated from culinary academy and worked on Don Yamaguchi’s line at Le Francais, a legendary French restaurant near Chicago. He saved money, bought a mobile taqueria and moved to Des Moines. He built a customer base here catering events like ArtFest and Latino festivals while working at Centro. Then he opened a Mexican-Italian hybrid restaurant in a strip mall on Merle Hay Road. There he built his Mexican menu around scratch, home made tortillas. His double tortilla tacos, burritos, quesadillas and enchiladas all use fresh homemade tortillas.

While making taco deliveries, Ojeda kept hearing people say “If you only delivered pizza as good as your tacos.” So, he tinkered with his tortilla machinery until he figured out how to make pizza pies. And because he loves working with dough, he expanded into home made pasta – not just cavatelli and ravioli either. Even El Chisme’s traditional pasta seca (lasagna, spaghetti, angel hair) are scratch made.

El Chisme is smartly remodeled. It still looks enough like Café Su that no fan will feel displaced. It looks just different enough to show that attention has been paid – a wall was altered and art work changed. Fresh flowers sat on tables and dinnerware was festive and hefty. Service had Marine Corps discipline – servers walked through the dining room but ran down a hallway to the kitchen.

Chips, made with unique tortillas imported from Chicago, were freshly fried and served with homemade salsa, guacamole or cheese.

Calamari, served with an excellent green salsa included whole baby squids. Hot wings and garlic bread were more traditional.

Pizza were better than ever. Thin crust pies are as fine an example of good New York style pizza in town. Crust was thin and crisp yet malleable enough to be folded in half. A close inspection revealed sear marks that resembled the pattern of a dry wall rasp, not a traditional pizza stone. Whatever Ojeda is using, he has ingenuously designed something that allows enough aeration of his crusts to keep them supple yet crisp.

 Like everything at El Chisme, excellent Mexican ingredients (asada, baked chicken, cow’s head, chicharron, roast pork, tripe and tongue) and Italian ingredients (steak, shrimp, chicken, bacon, sausage) could be mixed or subbed.

The full dinner menu was less ethnic than that served on Merle Hay Road. Multiple applications of chicharron were gone (except by special request) as were carnitas. Four kinds of fajitas, chicken enchiladas, and rib eye steak constituted the new entrée menu, all priced under $24.

Pasta are being phased on to the menu as Ojeda tinkers with new machinery. I tried angel hair thoroughly mixed with an orange colored marinara that was more Mexican than Italian. A house sauce that mixed marinara with cream had deeper flavors. Desserts featured freshly whipped cream and fresh fruits. A short wine list ranged $22 – $45, with many served by the glass.

El Chisme

225 Fifth St., West Des Moines, 255-5756

Tues. – Thurs. 5 p.m. – 10 p.m., Fri. – Sat. 4:30 p.m. – 11 p.m., Sun. brunch 10:30 a.m. – 3:30 p.m., dinner 5 p.m. – 10 p.m.

Side Dishes

Hy-Vee ranked #41 on Forbes list of the largest private companies in the USA, just behind Menard’s and ahead of Levi Strauss, Hallmark Cards, and Petco.

Prodigies and Tangents at the Knapp Center

For Des Moines, last weekend’s big game was played in the promotional borderlands between TV commercials, where the local stations relentlessly touted their weather men. The first big blizzard of winter was coming and all Storm Teams were on 24 hour alert.

Unduly frightened, I drove to Miller Hardware to update my winter pantry with snow blower oil and weather stripping. On the way I listened to “Keith & Andy” on sports talk radio KXNO (http://www.kxno.com/main.html). They wandered from the talking points (NFL, Hawkeye, Cyclone, Cam Newton) that usually dominate that medium in this market to consider whether Sylvester Stallone deserved induction into the Boxing Hall of Fame. These sports casters drifted deeply into a tangential wilderness where only skilled comedians can hold an audience. One person after another entered and later exited the hardware store as I continued listening in the parking lot, unable to pull away. I was laughing so hard that one passerby knocked on my window to ask if I was OK.

At its best (Jim Rome‘s annual Smack-off), sports talk radio is as funny as any comedy. Those are rare incidences though, almost all of which involve voices that wander in tangential wilderness. Keith & Andy often hang their hats there. They are the sports radio equivalence of “Seinfeld,” which was famously advertised as “a TV show about nothing.“ Keith & Andy can talk for two segments about caroms, or tourist wardrobes, or Christmas trees and still keep their audience. Their Stallone routine worked so well that I determined to apply a new tangential point of view to my own sports observations.

With the exception of a single championship season the last four decades, Drake men’s basketball has been tangential to local sports talk. All women’s sports are tangential at best. Yet Drake fans, of both men’s and women’s programs, are as loyal as any. Bulldog sports resemble a short lived cable TV drama that critics (and somewhere south of 1.2 million viewers per week) adore but poor Nielsen ratings doom.

“Terriers” was that show this autumn and it had just been canceled leaving a void in my life. Could the Bulldogs become my new “Terriers?” I set out on a blizzard weekend watching Drake basketball in the Knapp Center.

Actually I’d been thinking about going to Drake games for a while. An enlightened observer had told me that the women had the “best pair of freshmen since Lisa Bluder’s day” (a decade ago) and that the men had “the best freshman player in memory.“ I like prodigies. They give a fan a chance to watch special children growing up.

Both Drake teams headed into rarely scheduled afternoon games in desperate straits. The women had been humiliated by both Iowa State and St. Mary’s. The only two BCS (major major conference) teams that the men had played had more than doubled the score against them. The men had also been wandering the continent for a month and needed a homecoming victory to maintain hope for a decent season.

Both teams played teams that were, on paper, superior to them. Fans sensed their urgency. The women’s game attracted 1600 of them with a blizzard warning in place. The only students attending though were those in Drake’s marvelous pep band.

Officials appeared to be as wary of the weather as the student body. They determined not to exhale into their whistles in order to speed up the game and preserve their lungs for their race against the storm. At halftime, one of the photographers in the media room assembled a montage of “no-calls” that amused him. Drake freshman star Angela Christianson was the primary victim of the officiating oblivion. One photo showed her being kicked hard in the chest, a red card in soccer but a no call during a blizzard warning. Another showed her being held with two hands as a ball escaped her reach out of bounds.

Drake’s opponent, Tennessee Tech, was better equipped for blizzard warning rules. The Cookeville team’s roster included the Cook twins who looked exactly as I have always pictured the Colfax twins who terrorized author Doug Bauer (http://www.uiowapress.org/books/2008-fall/bauer.htm) in his memoirs about dating a girl’s basketball player in high school. The Cook twins had SHOULDERS. Drake players‘ shoulders were all lower case. Tech’s Brittany Darling, who also had SHOULDERS, muscled the entire Drake team off the ball to rebound the winning basket in the final second of the game. That was the only time Tech led in the last 30 minutes of the game. Darling and the Cook twins scored 36 of Tech’s 56 points. Doug Bauer would have run to his therapist had he seen the game.

Christianson and fellow freshman prodigy Morgan Reid did not thrive in the rough house but both showed shooting touches, grace and court vision that testified to lofty potential. I asked Paul Morrison if he thought they were as good as I had been told. He is Drake’s legendary historian and has seen every game for seven decades. He agreed they were the best freshmen pair since Bluder days.

I had more trouble confirming my second tangential urgency. To my naked eye, Tech coach Sytia Messer had tied Cheryl Burnett’s infamous Knapp Center record for coaching in the highest high heels. No one on the Tech bench could confirm how many inches Messer’s heels measured though. They didn’t even take my question seriously even after celebrating their victory. I asked long time women’s basketball writer Dan Johnson about this. He reminded me that former Drake coach Lisa Stone not only coached in very high heels but also earned bonus points for jumping up and down without ever breaking one.

The next day, Drake’s men played a good Boise State team. Their month on the road wore on non basketball aspects of this production. The singer of the national anthem messed up the words, twice. Students attended the men’s game in good number but did not appear to be in good taunting form yet. A time-out promotion was rather bogus. One lucky row of fans won “free Buffalo Wild Wings.” When they read their prize certificates and learned that they had to purchase a dozen wings and only on certain nights of the week, before receiving a free half dozen, the entire lucky row became littered with the “prizes.”

The blizzard warning had expired by tip-off time. Over 3400 folks showed up to watch and the referees were not rushed. One however lost patience with a Boise player who took too long tucking in the laces of his pants and demonstrably ordered off the floor. Boise started quickly as Drake changed defenses trying to match up against a team whose five starters looked like each other, right down to hair cuts and tattoos. Highly touted freshman Raymonte Rice got in foul trouble and Drake had trouble getting the ball up court in his absence. After a pair of long haired Boise subs entered the game, Drake settled down.

Late in the game, with the outcome in jeopardy, Rice took an inbounds outlet and raced all the way to the hoop where he dramatically dunked over a taller player. KCCI’s Scot Reister got that money shot (http://www.kcci.com/video/26112208/detail.html) which became KCCI‘s “Play of the Week.” The Register’s Justin Hayworth did too, and his paper ran it with three upper case headlines – “THE SITUATION… THE DECISION… THE OUTCOME…”

Rice delighted the house but Morrison wasn’t ready to proclaim him the best anything yet.

“He’s good and he’s really exciting,” was as far as he’d go.

Drake radio commentator Dolph Pulliam, who has watched most Drake games since the 1970’s was also cautious.

“He’s the best since Josh Young,” he said, going back just five years.

To my less experienced mind’s eye, Rice is better than Young at this stage of his career. He’s certainly more exciting. Maybe winning makes Drake observers more cautious than losing does.

Temperatures that hovered in single digits allowed me to test an important observation gleaned from shows about nothing: “Second hand smoke is better preserved on clothing when temperatures are below freezing.”

By the time the smoke scent dissipated from his jacket, the guy sitting behind me had to go back outdoors and smoke again. He only needed to do that three times in over two hours.

But that’s where he was when Rice dunked.

Six architectural firms and one chef developed gingerbread houses for auction during the Salisbury House’s ”The Home for the Holidays” celebration.

Invision and Carefree Patisserie teamed up to gingerize Principal Park complete with replica lighting fixtures, seating, skyboxes, scoreboard and even outdoor sculpture grounds.

RDG built a house on a hat box foundation that incorporated the original logo of Armand Cosmetics, the source of wealth for Salisbury House founder Carl Weeks.

BN (Brenda Nelson) built her house in the sdie of a hill with Christmas decorations.

SVPA Architects delivered a conceptual house.

OPN Architect used a prominent painting in the mansion’s breakfast room to build this stork house.

And Design Alliance built the most traditional gingerbread house of the exhibition.

For more information on the holiday season at Salisbury House – http://www.salisburyhouse.org/events_holly_ivy.html

The Ingersoll Theater’s sign is an historical landmark. For five years after the dinner theater closed in 2004, its marquee remained blank. Then last autumn, it announced that “Copa Cavana” was the coming attraction. When that club and restaurant finally opened last month, that marquee was having surgery on one side and draped with a vinyl drop cloth on the other. Because modern semiotics declares nineteen possible relationships between signs and the things they signify, I won‘t jump to any conclusion about omens. Too much is at stake. A last vestige of both the big band era and the golden age cinema in Des Moines, this theater is much loved. Its new owners seem to be keen to its potential. I’ve been told at different times that the theater would host: salsa, meringue, jazz, hip hop, and children’s movies. I was even told that Julian Serrano will be flown in for special events. That got my attention until it was clarified that this Julian Serrano is a Miami VJ, not the world famous chef.

Remodeling Copa Cavana was a major endeavor. Some infrastructure had been sabotaged and new codes presented expensive challenges. Still Ankur Amin, Katintha Mwanza, Faisal Samara and Belefia Parks stuck it out and created a theatrical re-do with touches of romance that can transport visitors to another time and place, one that looks much like Miami of previous decades. Linen covered tables, set with glass bowls of sea shells, form three plateaus that retain a movie house slope descending to a dance floor and stage. A kitchen has been built between the building’s real wall and a faux wall. A bar occupies the back of the house. The balcony level is a VIP lounge with its own dance floor and bar, plus a special menu that includes rare, even exclusive rums from South and Central America. Dance music seemed as diverse as the roots of the owners, who collectively come from Nicaragua, India, Zambia and Chicago. The theater could really use some acoustical panels during live music presentations though.

Chef Alejandro Alvarado’s menu was pan-Caribbean. Water was flavored with cucumber.

Plantain fans had a choice of vertically sliced tostones or horizontally sliced mariquitas. The former were served hot, the latter cold. Chip fans could choose between cheese dip or mango salsa.

Chicken wings were not fried but baked thoroughly in a sweet marinade. Cuban quesadillas presented flour tortillas stuffed with cheese, tomatoes, ham, onions and a choice of meats, or shrimp. Stuffed potato skins were filled with pork, cheese and onions.

Sandwiches were hearty.

A “mini burger” delivered half a pound of ground beef, two strips of bacon, cheese, tomato, onions and pickle on a large grilled Cuban bun.

A “media noche” brought roast pork, ham, cheese and pickles on fried Texas toast. All $8 – 9 sandwiches came with a choice of sides: A Caesar salad brought fresh Romaine, generous amounts of fresh shaved Parmesan cheese, home made croutons, and a dressing with subtle anchovy flavor; Cuban black beans and rice resembled dirty rice with two distinct textures.

Soups were the best items I tasted. A green chili soup had marvelous chicken flavor with crumpled fried tortilla strips on top.

Lechon asado, presented “marinated roast pork in Cuban spices. Like all the roast pork in the other dishes, it was overcooked. Coconut flan and bread pudding in rum sauce kept Caribbean themes dancing through dessert.

Bottom Line: Like the movies of old, Copa Cavana provides a romantic escape.

Copa Cavana

3711 Ingersoll Ave., 277-8000

Mon. – Sat. 11 a.m. – 2 p.m. and 5 p.m. – 10 p.m. Lounge open till 2 a.m.

Side Dishes

Bagni di Lucca’s first wine and pizza tasting was such a hit that the plan now is to make regular Thursday occasions… Amateur cook Eileen Gannon (La Crème) defeated a dozen pros to win Sweet Equality’s top prize with a trio of home made ice creams.

The Ingersoll Theater’s sign is an historical landmark. For five years after the dinner theater closed in 2004, its marquee remained blank. Then last autumn, it announced that “Copa Cavana” was the coming attraction. When that club and restaurant finally opened last month, that marquee was having surgery on one side and draped with a vinyl drop cloth on the other. Because modern semiotics declares nineteen possible relationships between signs and the things they signify, I won‘t jump to any conclusion about omens. Too much is at stake. A last vestige of both the big band era and the golden age cinema in Des Moines, this theater is much loved. Its new owners seem to be keen to its potential. I’ve been told at different times that the theater would host: salsa, meringue, jazz, hip hop, and children’s movies. I was even told that Julian Serrano will be flown in for special events. That got my attention until it was clarified that this Julian Serrano is a Miami VJ, not the world famous chef.

Remodeling Copa Cavana was a major endeavor. Some infrastructure had been sabotaged and new codes presented expensive challenges. Still Ankur Amin, Katintha Mwanza, Faisal Samara and Belefia Parks stuck it out and created a theatrical re-do with touches of romance that can transport visitors to another time and place, one that looks much like Miami of previous decades. Linen covered tables, set with glass bowls of sea shells, form three plateaus that retain a movie house slope descending to a dance floor and stage. A kitchen has been built between the building’s real wall and a faux wall. A bar occupies the back of the house. The balcony level is a VIP lounge with its own dance floor and bar, plus a special menu that includes rare, even exclusive rums from South and Central America. Dance music seemed as diverse as the roots of the owners, who collectively come from Nicaragua, India, Zambia and Chicago. The theater could really use some acoustical panels during live music presentations though.

Chef Alejandro Alvarado’s menu was pan-Caribbean. Water was flavored with cucumber.

Plantain fans had a choice of vertically sliced tostones or horizontally sliced mariquitas. The former were served hot, the latter cold. Chip fans could choose between cheese dip or mango salsa.

Chicken wings were not fried but baked thoroughly in a sweet marinade. Cuban quesadillas presented flour tortillas stuffed with cheese, tomatoes, ham, onions and a choice of meats, or shrimp. Stuffed potato skins were filled with pork, cheese and onions.

Sandwiches were hearty.

A “mini burger” delivered half a pound of ground beef, two strips of bacon, cheese, tomato, onions and pickle on a large grilled Cuban bun.

A “media noche” brought roast pork, ham, cheese and pickles on fried Texas toast. All $8 – 9 sandwiches came with a choice of sides: A Caesar salad brought fresh Romaine, generous amounts of fresh shaved Parmesan cheese, home made croutons, and a dressing with subtle anchovy flavor; Cuban black beans and rice resembled dirty rice with two distinct textures.

Soups were the best items I tasted. A green chili soup had marvelous chicken flavor with crumpled fried tortilla strips on top.

Lechon asado, presented “marinated roast pork in Cuban spices. Like all the roast pork in the other dishes, it was overcooked. Coconut flan and bread pudding in rum sauce kept Caribbean themes dancing through dessert.

Bottom Line: Like the movies of old, Copa Cavana provides a romantic escape.

Copa Cavana

3711 Ingersoll Ave., 277-8000

Mon. – Sat. 11 a.m. – 2 p.m. and 5 p.m. – 10 p.m. Lounge open till 2 a.m.

Side Dishes

Bagni di Lucca’s first wine and pizza tasting was such a hit that the plan now is to make regular Thursday occasions… Amateur cook Eileen Gannon (La Crème) defeated a dozen pros to win Sweet Equality’s top prize with a trio of home made ice creams.

At 3 p.m. on a weekday, Smokey D’s parking lot was half full, mostly with pickup trucks sporting bumper stickers: “I’ll keep my guns and you can keep your change.” An eight foot tall trophy greeted folks inside the front door. Tin, old wood (salvaged from the previous tenant’s dance floor), and 14 high definition televisions decorated three large rooms. Joey Martin Feek sang “Cheater, cheater, where’d you meet her, that no good white trash whore?” It was time to eat my words.

Shad Kirton and Darren Warth opened Absolute Flavors/Smokey D’s in 2007 in a small shack a block away from their new 265 seat home store. Because Kirton was offering tea room fare like croissants and portabello-Boursin wraps, I called that place “Iowa’s first metrosexual barbecue.” Joey Martin Feek’s fans don’t do anything metrosexual, so the new place is named Smokey D’s BBQ. It’s also become a town defining restaurant, the kind that inspires truck drivers to blog and farmers to drive a hundred miles for dinner.

In 2007 I also wrote that Warth was the top Iowan on the professional barbecue circuit. This year, he was the American Royale’s (the U.S. Open of Q) grand master of chicken, completing a personal grand slam of all categories – chicken, ribs, pork and brisket. This summer Kirton won the biggest prize in BBQ history, the $100,000 TLC Barbecue Pitmaster. Trophies and ribbons now cover the walls and even clog up a long hallway.

However, lots of barbecue champions open restaurants that fail. In competition, smokers cook only for a panel of judges and can usually serve their product when it’s perfect. Start-up restaurants rarely know when their customers are going to show up. Barbecue restaurants, including some of the most famous in America, resort to a process of smoking, refrigerating and “re-thermaling.” That’s not going to happen to these guys. Smokey D’s avoided that trap by growing smart. They built a client base in their shack mostly by catering. Then they opened a sky walk venue and later another downtown store while growing their reputation on the competition circuit. As luck had it, Kirton’s nationally televised Pitmaster final nearly coincided with the opening on their large, new home store.

From Day One, crowds have been large and consistent enough to keep three 1000 pound Old Hickory smokers working at capacity around the clock. More importantly, that heavy traffic means smoked meats don’t need to be reheated. Brisket can still be preordered custom sliced. Otherwise it is trimmed of fat before being cut.

Smokey D’s burnt ends are cut from the fattier tip. Smoked sausage, pulled chicken, and pulled pork are dependably well ringed. Half chickens are served on Thursdays only. Sweet, tomato-based sauces come from Russ & Franks, a local company.

Pork would be better served with a vinegar based sauce. Side dishes (creamy slaw, beans, potato salad, mac & cheese, cucumber slaw, and pasta salad) are what one expects at a good Q.

 

Chickens are smoked on the bone on Thursdays only. Daily specials (hot beef, roast pork, chicken fried steak, smoked burger), “chef selections,” and baked desserts are more like what one expects in his dreams. Chicken noodle soup was the best anywhere, made with heavy stock from whole baked birds, with home made noodles. Pork tenderloins were wide and thick.

Apple dumplings were cored, sliced and reassembled in apple shape with a cinnamon dough ball replacing the core and an outer pastry baked golden to be served with hot apple syrup. Pies are coming soon.

Bottom Line – Along with Jethro & Jake‘s, Smokey D’s should do for interstate travelers through Des Moines what Dreamland did in Birmingham, Alabama – make this a barbecue destination.

Smokey D’s

5055 NW 2^nd Ave., 243-2747 (also with two downtown outlets)

Mon. – Sat. 11 a.m.. – 9 p.m., Sun. 10:30 a.m. – 7 p.m.

Zip codes are often type cast in the food business. For instance, it’s generally assumed that chains do best in brand new suburbs while independent restaurants thrive in older neighborhoods. The logic behind that is that people in new suburbs have hefty mortgages and busy “soccer mom lives,” so they want fast, cheap food. Older neighborhoods include far more people who have paid off their mortgages, sent their kids through college, and now have discretionary income for fine, slow dining in unique restaurants. A couple years ago, restaurateur Paul Rottenberg said that the Des Moines area needed to defy such type casting. He suggested that greater Des Moines might be better off if no new independent restaurants were allowed downtown and no new chains in the 50266. Since then, his theory gained momentum when Jimmy John’s successfully invaded the downtown.

It’s good to see rebels bucking the shibboleth that certain things won’t fly in some zip codes. Marsicos la Fogata (“eternal flame seafood“) is such a place. Its neighborhood around Hubble and East Grand is the epicenter of taco truck county. Prevailing wisdom dictates that it’s no place to sell $30 seafood lunches. La Fogata also smirks at the notion that restaurants need themes by making no effort to look like an upscale seafood place. You won’t find any nautical ropes, ocean murals, nor stuffed trophy fish there. Physically, it’s pretty much unchanged from its previous incarnations, most recently as Palenque. La Fogata features Mexican folk furniture painted gaily in multiple shades of lime, yellow and orange. Several different paintings pay homage to cockfighting. In one, game cocks are being serenaded by mariachis. Another large portrait depicts trail hands sitting around a campfire roasting something that looks far more like a coyote than a fish.

Televisions play at high volume. Had I not endured a long wait for my meal one day, I might never have realized how deeply Lady Gaga has influenced Mexican versions of MTV. Service is unconventional too. One day a young waitress administered a language translation test before allowing me to read a menu. When I passed her test, I found that that several dishes exceeded the $30 bench mark and that only burgers, tacos and tostadas were priced under $11. Chef Willy said he comes from Guerrero and while in Chicago he learned to cook in the style of Nayarit. Both those states are on Mexico’s west coast so he’s committed to fresh seafood – there’s even a shrimp hamburger on his menu.

Instead of the usual chips and salsa, I was offered a complimentary service of seafood ceviche and green chile with whole tostadas and Saltines. I tried two dishes I had not seen before in Des Moines. Chicarron de pescado delivered four filets of mojarra (tilapia) rolled in a breading made of pork skins.

The result was marvelously crisp fish, served with a full iceberg salad, rice and French fries for $13. It came unconventionally with a choice of tortillas or white bread.

An aguachiles dish presented raw, splayed shrimp in a bath of lime juice and red or green chilies, served with fresh tostadas. Two caldos (seafood soups) disappointed though. Both had bland stocks of mostly tomato without any crustacean flavor, or even any herbs added.

Shrimp in one were much smaller than what one expects at the $13 – $17 price points. Still, I’ll return for other intriguing specials: a pineapple ($26) stuffed with cream and multiple sea foods; and a pulpo a la Durango, which was described as an entire, large octopus served tableside with hot chile preparation unique to Durango. Chef also said that beginning soon, a lower priced menu will be introduced for lunch.

Mariscos la Fogata

1832 E. Hubbell Ave. 262-2599

Tues. – Sun. 10 a.m. – 9 p.m.

Mexican Scorecard

Margaritas moved into the old Los Compadres… Hawaiian Grill took over the former Maragritas… Players Sports Bar opened in Mexico Viejo‘s old site… El Chisme moved into the former Café Su.