Servicing Niches

My mail suggests that restaurant customers care less about food than service - perceived bad service anyway. Some complaints seem more justified than others. Over the last three winters I was informed about four places that readers considered amiss at shoveling their sidewalks or parking lots. I found three of those walkways still covered with snow days later. None remain in business today. I also heard from someone who thought a busy restaurant had dishonored a friend’s contract to use their place, on a Saturday night, for a wedding reception. That restaurant’s partners told me that they only said that they “would work with” the wedding party and only before hearing that they wanted to bring their own food and that their previously quoted budget was for an entire wedding - not just the reception. Good service is in the eye of the behooved.

Two new Latino restaurants define service rather differently. On my first visit to El Centro Americano the door was locked during normal operating hours. I called to make sure they were still in business. Someone told me that he had only closed briefly to pick his daughter up at school and that he would be open the next day, unless he had to pick his daughter up again. I made sure I had plenty of time for my next visit. That was wise.

El Centro Americano had a delightful, immaculate look including new murals but I waited over an hour to be served. The owner, a personable young man named Jose Kino, provided a charming explanation. “I am so sorry for the delay. My chef today is my grandmother and I can’t tell her to rush just because we’re backed up. She’s my grandmother.”

Grandmother’s cooking was worth the wait. Plantains were stuffed with beef, Honduran cheese and mild salsa.

Pupusas were considerably less oily than most around town, stuffed with chicharones (pork skins), beans and cheeses, and served with freshly made curtido (cabbage, onion, carrot and chile slaw) and salsa roja (tomato, lime and chile).

Vigoron presented fried yucca root paired with fried chicharones, with meat attached, and another curtido.

The piece de resistance though was pollo con crema. Large pieces of tender chicken breast were covered with a rich sauce of peppers, tomatoes, Salvadoran cream, and chicken stock. That was plated with a salad, yellow rice with corn, and mashed black beans. A full bar kept people content while waiting for Jose’s grandmother.

Abelardo’s won me over.

When they first opened, I resented that prices on menus differed from cash register prices and that employees couldn’t refund the difference. They fixed that problem but for awhile I preferred frequenting local taquerias instead of this Nebraska chain. It’s hard though not to admire Abelardo Gonzalez. He started his first restaurant ten years ago when just 21 years old. In today’s economy, he’s managed to open three restaurants in Omaha, one each in Wichita and Spokane Valley, and now two in Des Moines. His restaurant on Ingersoll is open 24-7 and becomes quite busy, yet efficient late at night.

Abelardo’s food ranks with that of our better taquerias too.

Carnitas have been consistently both tender and crunchy. Egg dishes were cooked perfectly as ordered. Tongue and beef cheeks added creative variety and adobo had a New Mexican style tang.

Chiles rellenos were made with whole, stem-on Anaheim or poblano chiles. Chicken, shrimp and fish dishes were all bargain priced.

 Abelardo’s condiment bar - with three fresh salsas, pico de gallo, and pickled carrots with chilies - might be the best in town. Soft drinks, even Coke, were made with cane sugar while four kinds of horchata/fruit punch were also available.

Abelardo’s

2510 Ingersoll Ave., 243-3743

Also opening any day now at 300 Grand Ave. in West Des Moines

Open 24-7

El Centro Americano

2811 S.E. 14th St., 288-3799

Tues. - Sun. 11 a.m. - 8 p.m.

Side Dishes

Casey’s extended the hours at six metro stores to 24-7... Raccoon River Brewing Company introduced prix fixe menus with optional beer pairings.

Last week, on my way to a new sushi joint in West Des Moines, I drove by what used to be The Q. A new sign announced yet another new sushi outlet. That seemed symbolic. In Des Moines, sushi is the new barbecue, the only restaurant genre expanding as quickly here as Q did last decade. In the last two years, Hoshi, Sakari, Haiku all opened just in the Drake-Ingersoll neighborhood. Gateway Market and Hy-Vee started making fresh sushi in their stores. When the The Mandarin moved two years ago from Beaverdale to Clive, it changed its name to Mandarin Grill & Sushi Bar. Most Chinese buffets in the metro have also added sushi to their menu. So have several Thai and Vietnamese places. When Waterfront opened their second store, in Ankeny, they featured a much larger sushi bar and a considerably smaller fresh seafood market, than in their mother store.

With so many new options, I keep waiting for one of the new sushi joints to do something new or different enough to challenge long time favorites Miyabi 9 and the West Des Moines Waterfront. Even something as obvious as hiring a female itamae (sushi chef). According to Japanese legend, women can’t be sushi chefs because 1.) Their hands are too warm to handle raw fish or sushi rice. 2.) Their perfume and makeup interfere with the food. 3.) Hormonal fluctuations wreak havoc on delicate Japanese food.

Even modern Japan is relenting on those feudal rules - women were given the right to work past 10 p.m. nearly 20 year ago. But here, in the country most obsessed with political correctness, it’s still a man’s game. Accordingly, Sakura Sushi owner Lala Gao works the front of the house while her husband Lin Xing mans the knives. They project considerable professionalism between the “green tea mochi” colored walls of their handsome place in Normandy Plaza, an eclectic mini mall with a sports bar, an English pub, a full service aquaria, and a pizza carryout. On my first visit I ate everything in a bento box except for an imitation crab stick.

On my second visit, someone remembered that and substituted a tuna roll for a California roll (made here with crab sticks) in a sushi platter, without even being asked.

Another time, Lala asked why shrimp had not been eaten in a soba noodle dish. When told that they were overcooked, she beseeched our table to please request more shrimp in the future.

Lin has been an itamae since his teenage years, working all over this country. He possesses serious skill - presentations were considerably above average. Noodles were better than most other places too. Too much though seemed indistinguishable from a dozen other sushi places.

Even toro (blue fin belly) was unremarkable. There was no hamachi kama (yellowtail collars) either. In fact salmon terriyaki was the only grilled fish coming out of the kitchen.

Tempura shrimp were not tempura - but furai (coated in Panko), a common practice in a town where I seem to be the only person bothered by this deception. Vegetables on the same platter were actual tempura and delightfully included taro.

Sakura staff spoke Fukienese. That excited me. One of the eight great cuisines of China, Fujian is deservedly famous for its seafood. Fujian oyster cakes and “Fotiaoqiang” (literally “Buddha jumps over the wall,” similar to bouillabaisse) are legendary dishes as far away as Shanghai, Manilla and even Toronto. I asked Lala about them.

“We will make “Buddha jumps over the wall” for holidays. We had oyster pancakes (for a staff meal) yesterday. Maybe we will make it for a special someday. You think customers would like it?” she asked.

I know a few who would. If you know anyone else, please encourage her.

Sakura

1960 Grand Ave., 225-9999.

Mon. - Thurs. 11 a.m. - 10 p.m.; Fri. - Sat. 11 a.m. - 10:30 p.m., Sun. noon - 9 p.m.

Side Dishes

Lemongrass is moving into the old Tandoor space on Eighth Street in West Des Moines… Jethro’s Jambalaya announced a December 1 opening…

Some restaurant genres have expanded rapidly in the metro without adding much quality or variety. For instance, dozens of barbecues followed Kin Folks and Flying Mango to Central Iowa but none put out the all-wood, slow love products of those pioneers. Similarly a dozen sushi joints followed Miyabi 9 to town without bringing any discernable new level of quality to the community table. Two new restaurants in familiar downtown Des Moines haunts have hopefully reversed this trend.

City Bakery took over the space formerly known as Bagni di Lucca. Steve Logsdon, who also owns Lucca, sold the place to his brother Joe, Joe’s wife Christina and Nico Pecheron, their long time right hand man at La Mie. The new owners tweaked the pizza recipes and began featuring a limited version of La Mie’s menu, with about five sandwiches a day, all served on focaccia, and some seven salads. Specialty beers, an excellent selection of inexpensive wines and European soft drinks were also featured. City Bakery’s state of the art Pavailler ovens will allow Pecheron and Joe Logsdon to expand their French baking operations too.

Last week, I found vegetable & Mozzarella, tuna & avocado, turkey & Swiss, and hot ham sandwiches. Salads included Roquefort-beet, apple-avocado, Caesar, albacore tuna, fresh salmon and fruit.

Pizza choices included tomato basil, meatball mushroom, sausage pepperoni, spinach ricotta, artichoke olive, and four cheeses. The sandwiches, all priced $5 or $6 dollars, were generous bargains compared to similar fare downtown.

So were salads, all $6 or $7, and pizza which was sold by the $4 slice, a rather rare thing in Des Moines, or priced $7.50 and $14.50 for small and large pies respectively. An extra two dollars provided a side salad. I learned during Cityview’s Ultimate Pizza Challenge that pizza taste differs wildly from one tongue to another but I’m pretty sure anyone who likes thin, crisp crusts and fresh ingredients will be hard pressed to find another pie they like more than these. In the near future, City Bakery will also open for breakfast and serve more La Mie type fare, i.e. pastries, desserts, croissants, etc. that can take your breath away.

Bagni di Lucca’s former baker Cameron Keller moved across the river and opened Keller’s Bakery, Deli, Café in space that was formerly home to Funky Pickle. Before that it was the spot where George Formaro got started in the restaurant business, selling sandwiches with his South Union breads. Appropriately, Keller bakes exquisite artisan slicing breads (five grain wheat, pain au cereal, Bordelais, roasted garlic and sometimes Irish rye, potato and oatmeal pecan cranberry) as well as epis and baguettes. He also makes divine stocks for soups - I tried excellent French onion, clam chowder, and red pepper crab bisques, each just $2 when added to a sandwich order. He also serveed breakfast sandwiches, burritos, cinnamon sugar toast, Irish breakfasts (eggs, sausage, bacon & beans) and salads.

His trump cards though were two neglected deli legends.

Homemade meatloaf (beef & pork) was served with caramelized onions on toasted garlic bread. Better yet, Keller brines his own corned beef briskets, including deckles. No other corned beef in town compares for tenderness and flavor.

He offers corned beef sandwiches in regular and “Gotham” sizes, the latter daring a comparison to Carnegie and Katz delis in New York. (Think about Meg Ryan’s famous orgasm in “When Harry Met Sally.”) Cheese cakes, mousse cakes, lemon cake, brownies and ice cream sandwiches were also served.

Bottom line - both these new places have something quite special going for them.

Keller’s Deli Bakery Café

625 Grand Ave.,, 280-5112, www.kellerbreads.com

Mon. - Fri. 6 a.m. - 2 p.m.

City Bakery Café

407 E 5th St., 243-0044

Mon. - Sat. 11 a.m. - 2 p.m.

Side Dishes

Lucca extended its lunch hour until 4 p.m. and its chef Fidel Macias began teaching Saturday morning cooking classes… Lori Olsen-Hopkins opened Le Gourmet, a specialty foods store on University in Clive.

Beef searing on an open grill emits a primal scent. San Francisco chef and humorist Shirley Fong-Torres credits it for our place in the evolutionary food pyramid.

“What do you think encouraged our ancient ancestors to straighten their spines, walk on two legs, fashion weapons and invent fire? They didn’t do all that for an amuse bouch of fiddlehead fern foam. They did it so they could eat seared ribeyes while taunting their enemies with its aroma.”

Steak was the food of the rich and powerful for several millennia but today most Americans can afford to indulge in this protein of kings. Late twentieth century feeder and packer technology initiated by Iowa Beef Packers made it possible to produce beef more affordably than at any time or place in history. In fact, it became such a bargain that a large part of the cow was lost. Americans ate burger and steaks and not much else.

Today, beef cuts that disappeared half a century ago are back. At Azalea Chef Sean Wilson serves roasted marrow delightfully paired with his homemade syrah onion jam and toast points. He also features a should steak, tenderized and matched with fingerling potatoes and blue cheese creamed spinach. George Formaro grills skirt and hanger steaks at Django on his steak frites menu. He also braises chuck for his beef bourguignon . At Centro, he serves flank steak sandwiches and salads. He braises entire heads of beef to make tacos, for personal use and for staff meals.

“I really do a lot of braised barbacoa beef with chuck and brisket, even oxtail to put on tacos. There are not a lot of parts out there to work with. I like pushing the marrow out of bones to use on grilled hanger or skirt. The cuts that are not the prime cuts by far taste beefier then the rest, with the exception of the prime rib. If you know how to cook them, you can make really great dishes for not a lot of money,“ Formaro said.

Steak Des Moines

Tajima-ushi breed of Wagyu cattle raised according to strict traditions in Hyogo Prefecture of Japan. In America, “Kobe-style“ refers to beef from any breed with at least 50% Wagyu blood.

Ankeny has been Iowa’s “city of the future” for quite awhile. Flush with huge fortunes from Dichlorophenoxyacetic acid and Glyphosate, the town’s developers led the state in new housing permits seven years in a row during the last decade. If not for the 2008 housing market collapse, Ankeny’s Prairie Trail neighborhood would have probably created a brand new Grinnell-sized community by now, adjacent Des Moines Area Community College‘s (DMACC) Ankeny campus. Despite that college, with its 16,000 students and renowned culinary institute, Ankeny’s restaurant scene has been dominated by national chain restaurants. Chip’s, Ranallo’s and The Waterfront are good independent restaurants but in Ankeny the big buzz has surrounded places like Olive Garden. That chain’s Ankeny outlet store did such great business that the corporation has decided to copy its design in all its new stores while remodeling half of its old stores in its image.

Some recent discoveries in Ankeny suggest the town might have a culinary future beyond serving as a test market for corporate makeovers. One of our alert Twitter followers, a self described “zealous eater,” turned us on to an Ankeny original called Topped Doughnuts. She said it’s turning out products so good that her home town “Chicago needs to step up its doughnut game.” That got our attention. Zealous eater has demonstrated excellent taste and we rank Chicago in America’s top three food cities.

Topped Doughnuts, which recently celebrated their first anniversary, professes to make doughnuts that are “sophisticated” and “indulgent.” I tried plain glazed twist with cinnamon, Holland cream, regular glazed, cake glazed, double chocolate, and Samoa (coconut, chocolate, caramel and vanilla just as in the Girl Scout cookies) doughnuts.

Every doughnut was remarkably light, flaky and fresh tasting. I wanted to sample blueberry cream, red velvet cake, and maple bacon bar too but they were always sold out before I arrived.

Pouting about that I visited Tasteful Dinners, a café that combines farm house antiques, quilting art with Biblical messages, Eagle Scout paraphernalia, and wildly mismatched colors dominated by so much purple and gold I thought I had stumbled into an LSU football game. Christian rock played relentlessly. This café employs culinary college students and professes to make everything from scratch and many things from old family recipes. Iced tea was served in large carafes Amana style.

Execution was as inconsistent as the interior design.

Pies were stunningly good, with flaky lard crusts that literally melted in my mouth. Fillings mixed exotic with local fruits, fresh berries, classic pecan recipes, etc.

All were served with freshly whipped cream and could easily win ribbons at state fairs. A pot roast that had braised all day helped create a nearly perfect hot beef sandwich.

Mashed potatoes and meat loaf were also delightful but gravies were very heavy with thickeners. “Crispy baked chicken” was so unevenly coated that not even puffed rice could crisp it.

At DMACC’s Iowa Culinary Institute, the student staffed Bistro has begun regular dinner hours. Menu service and buffets alternate from one week to the next. I visited during a $10 Mardi Gras buffet that included beverages and desserts. I’ve paid three times as much for lesser buffet fare.

Gumbo, shrimp Creole and jambalaya all included fresh, high end seafood. Both dirty rice and plain rice were offered. So were three excellent salads: fresh fennel with Parmigiano-Reggiano, a three cabbage slaw, and mushrooms with lentils in hot bacon dressing.

I tried a red velvet cake from the dessert cart that smartly used a passion fruit Marscapone.

Bottom line - I’ll return to Ankeny, probably the next time my sweet tooth whines.

Side Dishes

Splash’s award winning wine cellar is starting Wine Club 2012. Contact Jason Vogelgesang, 244-5686... Splash’s oyster bar will soon introduce a charcuterie bar.

Bistro

Building 7, DMACC Ankeny campus, 964-6369

Tues. - Fri. 11:15 a.m. - 1 p.m., Tues. - Wed 5 p.m. - 7 p.m.

Topped Doughnuts

129 Ankeny Blvd., Ankeny, 650-2046

Wed. - Fri. 6 a.m. - 2 p.m., Sat. 6:30 a.m. - 2 p.m.

Tasteful Dinners

121 SE Shurfine Dr., Ankeny, 965-3324

Mon. - Fri. 11 a.m. - 2 p.m. & 4 p.m. - 8 p.m., Sat 11 a.m. - 2 p.m.

Flying Mango platter

Through most of the 20^th century, barbecue was a specialty of the American South, distinguished regionally by the local woods: hickory in the Carolinas and the mountain states, burr oak in east Texas, mesquite in west Texas, and fruit woods in Georgia and Missouri. Things changed utterly with the new millennium. Southern barbecue lost its authenticity after Yankee environmentalists moved south and enacted wood burning bans on once proud barbecue towns like Raleigh and Atlanta. In 1998, I asked the Chamber of Commerce President in Lockhart, Texas why almost all the best barbecues in his state were found in small towns.

“Very simple son. Big cities have too many encumbrances to good barbecue,” he replied.

“Could you define what you mean by encumbrances?” I asked.

“They come in two main forms - health codes and safety codes. Even here in our town some fresh-out-of-college bureaucrat proposed installing sprinklers over the pits. He didn‘t last long,” he laughed.

Kin Folks

Wood burning bans inspired a technological revolution that led to the invention of modern smokers that simulate pure wood with gas and wood chips. It turned out that those were just as easy to sell in the north as the south. The shift away from pure wood burning barbecue also inspired a boom for Q nostalgia.

That manifested itself most notably in the burgeoning popularity of competitive barbecue, which adheres to the old, pure ways. Through most of the last decade, the barbecue cook off at World Pork Expo in Des Moines was one of the most popular events on the competitive cycle. That brought the best southern smokers to Central Iowa where they competed with local guys who quickly learned that they could smoke with the very best. Last year, Shad Kirton of Des Moines won the largest prize in barbecue history, on The Learning Channel’s BBQ Pitmaster. This year, Darren Warth of Des Moines was the first man in America to qualify for Sam’s Club’s National BBQ Finals, a $400,000 national competition.

Jethro's brisket

Iowa towns soon learned that these competitions were tourist attractions. Mason City Globe Gazette publisher and “Up In Smoke” festival director Howard Query explained how his town initiated their barbecue event.

“We wanted a premiere event to draw people here. I could see that competitive barbecue was an up and coming sport,” he said.

Kin Folk's brined butt

To understand barbecue as a “sport,” compare it to professional golf. Both have four major events: the Jack Daniels Invitational (The Masters); the Sam’s Club National Tour finals, formerly The American Royal (US Open ); Memphis in May (British Open); and the Houston Livestock & Rodeo BBQ (the PGA). Numerous others across the country allow competitors to qualify and prepare for the big four. Most Iowa events are geared for Sam’s Club and use its “Kansas City rules.” This year, eighteen barbecue competitions are listed on the Iowa BBQ Society web site. All will be drawing long distance competitors, tourists and manufacturers of barbecuing hardware, firewood, charcoal, meat and meat treatments.

By the middle of the last decade, Q had also become a restaurant craze in Central Iowa. Five new barbecues opened in 2005 - just in Ankeny. As local smokers learned they could compete with anyone, local smokehouses added to Iowa’s renown. Des Moines’ Q renaissance began when Mike Wedeking lost a job.

“That was fifteen years ago. I had been smoking meat since I was a student at Hoover High School in the 1970’s and a lot of people thought I was really good at it. They encouraged me to give it a try professionally. I bought some equipment and pitched a job to AG Expo, which was in Ankeny that year. That was my first gig - to cook 3 meals a day for three days for 6000 people,” he explained,

Jethro's platter

In February 2003, Wedeking opened the Flying Mango café. It quickly became a life style statement to its fans, including a number of famous musicians (Lipbone Redding, Jonah Smith, Carrie Rodriguez, etc.) who play there out of love for the place though their reputations command much larger venues.

“ I have a standing joke with Carrie. I tell her she’s too big for The Mango and she says ‘I’ll never be too big for The Mango,” Wedeking explained.

Flying Mango is still a pure barbecue. All smoking is done solely with fruit woods, mostly young woods.

“We do Q for Q sake. I like young unseasoned fruit woods - pear, apple and cherry - because I like it to smolder. That creates more smoke and more smoke means more moisture in the meat,” Wedeking explained.

Flying Mango is also known for smoking exotics like catfish cakes, goose, duck, bison, lamb chops and elk. It’s more than smokehouse too, with four fish on the menu and a chef, Nick Illingworth, who moved from Bistro Montage, a French café of renown. Even the pies at The Mango are old school, with lard crusts and fresh fruit fillings.

Brined loin from Smokey D's

Other local barbecues found their own niches. Jethro’s and Jethro & Jake’s are run by Dom Iannarelli, one of Des Moines’ top haute cuisine chefs at Splash. His smokehouse treats are accompanied with many side dishes one might also find at that far more expensive place. Mac & cheese is made with shell pasta and aged white cheddar. Onion rings are buttermilk washed. Chicken wings are smoked AND fried. Gumbo uses a sassafras chicken stock with smoked chicken and sausage. Cole slaw comes in hot German and cold Midwestern versions. Even nachos have a unique option with waffle fries substituting for chips and a choice of smoked meats for toppings. Chips come hot from the fryer.

Uncle Wendell’s evolved from a bakery and features home baked goodies as well as pure wood smokehouse basics. Owner chef Wendell Garretson is a refugee from Cajun cuisine and resourcefully uses his smoked bones to make amazing stocks for soups, jambalayas and gumbos. His jambalaya often also employs authentic Cajun meats, like smoked cheeks. His brisket is always fresh sliced, never refrigerated for reheating.

Woody’s Smoke Shack always features free home made corn bread and jambalaya. Daily specials are more unique: creamed smoked chicken on biscuits on Mondays; smoked pork chops on a stick on Tuesdays; and smoked salmon on Fridays. The Thursday-only collard greens are top notch.

Smokey D’s, owned by Warth and Kirton, also ventures beyond smokehouse culture with a full time pastry chef, old fashioned diner fare like pork tenderloins and hot beef sandwiches, plus tea house fare like chicken salad with grapes.

Claxon’s serves burnt ends in half pound wedges, with ciabatta, plus deep fried pickles and fried hominy. Smoked prime rib and rarely smoked lean meats like pork loin and turkey breast share the menu with standards. Their fresh banana pies feature soda cracker crusts. Patton’s dresses its all hickory Q up in a chic café ambiance. What other barbecue might serve an amuse bouche “soul roll” of southern foods wrapped like a dumpling and fried? Cornbread dressing, cobblers, beans & rice, sweet potato fries, and strawberry cake have as many fans as their smokehouse meats. Cactus Bob’s includes home made kettle chips among its side dishes and built its reputation with prickly pickles and smoked jerky. Whole smoked turkeys, bone-in hams, and whole smoked prime ribs added to it.

When Pigs Fly is the place to go for sweet potato pie made with pecans, and peach cobbler made without crust. Their chocolate banana bread pudding and sugar rolls have followings. Findlay’s Smokehouse & Barbecue offers fresh barbecue meats in a butcher shop, plus deli sandwiches and pork tenderloins. Uncle Mike's BBQ & Soul Cuisine mixes its Q with southern favorites like catfish, fried chicken wings, hot links in natural casings, collards, and Hoppin' John - a mixture of corn, rice and beans. Boss Hawg’s is new to town but already has created a considerable bike and vintage car drive-in scene.

Smoked meat loaf at The Q

Local Q has also been gathering prestige from afar. Before the death of owner Ike Seymour, Big Daddy’s made it onto both Peter Jennings’ World News Tonight and The Early Show with Bryant Gumbel. Woody’s Smoke Shack was named a top national barbecue by Good Morning America. Jethro’s and Cactus Bob’s were both featured on national TV shows about extreme eating.

Other local barbecue products added to our renown. Speed Herrig, founder of Cookie’s Barbecue Sauce of Wall Lake, was one of the original six inductees into the National Barbecue Hall of Fame. Seven Oaks, a Lineville, Iowa company owned by “retired” sisters Marta and Margaret West, has been rated the best lump charcoal in America, by respected BBQ website nakedwhiz.com. Russ & Franks BBQ Sauce of West Des Moines is also catching on in stores and restaurants. Both Smokey D’s and Uncle Wendell’s feature it.

Today, Des Moines is as big a barbecue town as any place. While Southern barbecue was diminished by regulations and technology, Central Iowa smokehouses have gained national repute, and maintained purist orthodoxy to a large degree. Jethro & Jake’s and Smokey D’s both have easy access and high visibility on major interstate highways. Their parking lots fill up daily with long distance drivers, many of whom learned of them from national TV. Our other joints have their own personal followings.

Today in Des Moines, where there’s smoke, there’s a choir, singing its praises.

Des Moines’ image makers scrapped the motto “The Surprising Place” years ago. As far our restaurant scene goes though, American Restaurant Association Chairman elect Roz Mallet thinks it’s still applicable. She used the words “wow, it’s so surprising” while discussing her impressions of our town, which she visited last week for the first time. Mallet said she never expected to find so many good French restaurants in this part of Midwest, let alone to find a pair of Alsatian restaurants. Yes, Alsatian restaurants are now plural in Central Iowa.

In September, David Baruthio and Sara Hill of Baru 66, one of the top 20 new restaurants in the United States (James Beard Awards) last year, partnered with Deborah and Paul Secord and with Lynn and Sarah Pritchard to open Tartine in the former Shane's Rib Shack space in Clive. There are similarities with Baru 66. Both cafés represent Strasbourg native Baruthio’s visions of his homeland cuisine. Baru 66 pastry chef Jess Dunn is baking breakfast pastries at Tartine too. Former Food Dude “Rising Star of the Year” Scot Stroud (Dos Rios, Alba, Django) has been recruited as Baruthio’s head chef at Tartine and will eventually run both kitchens. Hill and artist Jamie Navarro crafted the ambiance of both places.

Differences are more obvious, as Baruthio puts it “Even Alsatian chefs don’t eat exclusively at Michelin star restaurants. Tartine is more like the food I ate growing up.” Indeed, a blackboard even provides a recipe of the day from Baruthio’s grandmother. Tartine is a casual place serving breakfast and luncheon fare seven days a week. With sky blue ceilings and a painting of a surrealistic pear hovering over an Alsatian field of plenty, it appears decidedly brighter and more whimsical than Baru. Chairs are remarkably comfortable and booths are super sized. Tableware is from Crate & Barrel rather than from Riedel or Hill’s studio as at Baru. Tartine is a semi self service operation. Its prices are also casual - $13 topped everything on the menu over my four visits. Wines and Iowa beers were bargains too.

Some things were quite fabulous.

Frites (French fries) were triple fried for a crisp finish and tender crumb.

A dish of grilled salmon with almonds, dried fruits and tabbouleh delivered perfectly rare salmon. Caesar salad dressing was spot on with lemon and anchovies shining through without dominating.

Soups were consistently excellent and seasonally appropriate - a thick squash soup stood out.

A ham and Brie tartine (open faced sandwich) was grilled with a butter rich enough to deceive my palate into thinking there might be a sweet marmalade added. There wasn’t. Placing Brie under a grill is one of the trickiest propositions in a kitchen, it can easily melt into a flavorless goo. Stroud knew the trick for preventing that.

A croque monsieur (with Gouda, ham and béchamel) served with a choice of salad, frites or soup for $8 was a top deal.  

Add a dollar for a croque madame (with two added fried eggs).

Crepes were perfectly delicate and accompanied by fresh fruit, freshly whipped cream and rich chocolate. Panini were served on sliced breads, not the thick baguettes or focaccia so frequently used in town. Waffles, pancakes, omelets, quiches, scrambled eggs and eggs Benedict were also simply splendid.

Dunn’s pastries included croissants, éclairs, turnovers, macarons, to-die-for croquembouches, and tarts that were stuffed with seasonal fruit fillings and creams.

Risottos changed daily but tended to be undercooked. Large burgers were served two ways, with prosciutto, Swiss cheese and truffle mayonnaise as well as with chevre, arugula and caramelized onions. Like everything else, they were cooked to order.

Side Dishes

Des Moines authors published hot works this summer. Wini Moranville’s “Bonne Femme Cookbook” casually details the craft of everyday French cooking while Joyce Locke’s “Foodie Fight Rematch” provides a second helping of her popular trivia game for serious food lovers.

Tartine, 12695 University Ave., Clive, 327-7427, Mon. - Sat. 7 a.m. - 8 p.m.
Sun. 9 a.m. - 2 p.m.

El Chisme carnitas pizza

Pizza is a flat out contradiction, a “fast food” that takes hours to prepare, a “pie” we eat as a main course, and a relatively “new” food, at least in Iowa, that’s as old as civilization. Four thousand years ago Babylonians, Israelites and Egyptians were all cooking flat unleavened bread in mud ovens. Greeks, Romans and Egyptians were topping it with olive oil and native spices before the birth of Christ.

A popular Italian fable claims that Roman soldiers in the Middle East tasted matzo and decided it lacked “focus,” the Latin word for hearth. So they threw it in a fire along with oil, herbs and cheese to birth the first “pizze.” It took 1500 dark years before Italians improved upon that, after tomatoes had found their way from Mexico to Naples, in the 15^th century.

The modern pizza era began in 1830 with the opening of the world's first pizzeria - Naple’s “Port'Alba,” where the oven was lined with lava from Mount Vesuvius. In 1889, pizza man Don Raffaele Esposito created a pie for Queen Margherita of recently unified Italy.

He used only tomato, basil and mozzarella to replicate the colors of the new Italian flag. That Margherita pie has remained the world’s basic template for pizza ever since.

Gennaro Lombardi opened America’s first pizzeria, Lombardi's Napoletana, in New York City in 1905 but the dish didn’t catch on beyond Italian neighborhoods in America until after World War II. During that war Naples became a major base of operations for American armed forces. Then G.I.’s brought a pizza craving home.

Most Italians who settled on the south side of Des Moines immigrated from the south of Italy, from Calabria and Sicily. That part of Italy, Il Mezzodi, is rich in olive trees and wheat and is sunny enough to grow tomatoes, everything needed for pizza. By the mid 1950’s, sons of Calabria dominated the Des Moines restaurant scene. One of them introduced this old “Mezzodi” dish to Iowans.

The Calabrese Lacona family opened Union Station restaurant downtown in 1946. One year later, Noah Lacona opened Noah’s Ark on Ingersoll using his mother Teresa‘s recipes. He personally designed a gas oven that simulated the wood-burning ovens of southern Italy and a pie making machine that duplicated Neapolitan crusts.

Noah's pizza

By 1947 Noah was serving the first pizza in Iowa. Within a few years pizzerias were opening all over Des Moines.

Ironically, Iowa’s taste for pizza was anachronistic. Iowans discovered this most popular use of wheat after the state quit producing it. Once a leading producer of that grain, Iowa had transitioned to become the leading corn state in America. Though still surrounded by the leading wheat states, only West Virginia harvests less wheat than Iowa. Iowa Historical Society fellows Lowell Soike and John Zeller explained how this happened.

“The railroad crossed Iowa by 1869, opening up Chicago markets to corn and corn fed cattle. Iowa land became far too valuable to waste planting wheat,” said Zeller.

“Plus, the development of hard wheat, which grew better in colder, less arid climates became popular after of the invention of roller milling systems at about the same time,” added Soike.

Pizza Controversy

Anachronism goes well on pizza which has, after all, been appropriated from older cultures for over two millennia. Controversy goes well with it too. For most of the time since Des Moines became a pizza town, people have argued about which places make the best pies. Only a consensus can settle such food arguments, so Cityview followed up last year’s “Ultimate Sandwich” tournament with an “Ultimate Pizza” challenge this year. Last year, over 4000 people voted for their favorite sandwich. We quickly discovered that far more people carry strong opinions about pizza. Half again that many voted just during the first three rounds this year.

We started with 42 diverse places nominated by some food professionals. We then turned the controversy over to our readers. Many restaurants on the original list are old school Calabrese. Four of them - Gusto, Noah’s, Bambino’s and Mama Lacona’s - are owned by descendents of Teresa Lacona. La Pizza House might well be the second oldest pizzeria in Iowa. Pagliai’s opened their first pizzeria in 1957 and had been serving pies in taverns for a few years before that. Bordenaro’s, Orlondo’s, Chuck’s, Centro, Christopher’s, Sam & Gabe’s, Scornovacco’s, Paesano’s, Baratta’s, and Polito’s all trace their roots to the southside or Mezzodi traditions. Bagni di Lucca, Leaning Tower of Pizza, and Pagliai’s have Tuscan connections. Others with long histories are associated with a specific style of pie - Felix & Oscar’s, Paradise, The Tavern.

Some fuse Italian traditions with other cuisines. El Chisme features their superb Mexican meats, Fong’s offers Chinese- American verve, and Simon’s employs smokehouse meats. Others hail from fine dining establishments like Trostel’s Dish, Kirkwood Lounge, Court Avenue Brewing Company, Chef’s Kitchen, Marino’s, and Cosi Cucina, which re-introduced wood fired pizza to Central Iowa.

Flour makes Sicilian deep dish pies

Others are primarily known for their pizza - Big Tomato, Flour, Coach’s, Beaverdale, Angelo’s and Adriatica. Some are rather new - New York City, Fia’s, Rock Power. Three of them, Boston’s, Sam & Louie‘s and Red Rossa - are chain franchises from out of state.

Pagliai's pizza used more cheese than any other

Pagliai’s dominated the first round of voting which produced some upsets. Chuck’s, Flour, Cosi Cucina, Sam & Gabe’s, Paradise, El Chisme and Bagni di Lucca, all favorites of one critic or another, went down. So did The Tavern and Scornavacco’s both of which have long been among the most popular independently made Iowa pies in sales. Dish, Kirkwood, Christopher’s, Sam & Gabe’s, Simon’s and Court Avenue Brewing Company all missed the second round, probably showing that voters like their pizza made by stores that specialize in pizza. Long time favorites Mama Lacona’s, Big Tomato, Bambino’s, Noah’s, Felix & Oscar’s, Bordenaro’s, Orlondo’s on Park, and La Pizza House made it to the sweet sixtenn along with relative newcomers Fong’s, Coach’s, Centro, NYC and Sam & Louie’s.

Tradition did even better in the next round with Angelo's and Gusto leading the voting for the elite eight by capturing nearly half of all votes. Pagliai's, Bambino’s and Noah's also advanced with relative newcomers Fong's, Sam & Louie's and NYC. The voting tightened in the third round although Angelo’s and Gusto led again. Pagliai’s and Bambino’s rounded out the final four.

The Final Four

Gusto and Bambino’s are three and two generations removed from Teresa Lacona respectively. Gusto is owned by Josh Holderness, Joe McConville and Tony Lemmo who is a great grandson of Teresa Lacona on the Noah‘s Ark side of the family. His mother Lou Ann is a cousin of Bambino’s owner Vanessa Lacona Devine who comes from the Mama Lacona‘s side of that family tree. Bambino’s pies resemble Mama Lacona’s far more than Gusto’s resemble Noah’s though. And, with over 70 non-pizza items on its menu, Bambino’s is also more of a full service Italian restaurant too.

Bambino pies were the best example of New York style

After opening in Ames, Pagliai’s restaurants moved into numerous Midwestern college towns building life long allegiances at that impressionable phase of life. Pagliai’s Pizza in Johnston, the only one in the metro, is a rare exception to that college zip code demographic. It was by far the busiest of the final flour during my our recent visits despite the fact we visited on a traditionally slow Monday night and we visited the other places on Thursdays and Fridays, usually big nights in the business. Pagliai’s featured the most open kitchens too. Every phase of their scratch pizza making operation could be viewed through windows. Their pies employed more mozzarella than the other final three and Pagliai’s literature touted their mozzarella, which is custom made by an Italian cheese family in Wisconsin. They also claimed a similar relation to their tomato supplier in California.

Angelo’s was the coziest operation among the final four with just four table tops in their West Des Moines store. They were also the least influenced by local allegiances or political correctness. Cincinnati Reds collector items were proudly displayed and an “Illinois Nazi” pizza was still featured, years after that name caused an editorial protest in the local Jewish press.

Angelo’s also made the only true “tavern style” pizza among the final four, meaning that a loaded crust was crispy enough to remain parallel to the table when gripped on its edge. That crust was also more peppered and blistered than other Final Four pies.

Gusto vs. Pagliai’s

Voters then reduced the field to a face off between Pagliai’s and Gusto. That’s about as close to old school vs. new school as any final two could have been. It’s also a city vs. suburb rivalry and a Tuscany vs. Calabria battle.

John and Katrina Pagliai left Lucca, Italy in 1914 and settled in the coal mining town of Zookspur, Iowa. That is a ghost town today but a century ago Zookspur’s numerous Central Italians immigrants supported five bakeries. The senior Pagliai’s came to America with family recipes committed to memory. Their son Sam started selling “tomato tarts” in 1953 in Ames taverns. By 1957, word of mouth about those doughy treats led to his first restaurant - The Pizza House, which he opened with his brother Armond.

Today, the Iowa-based, family-owned Pagliai's Pizza restaurants go through 12,000 pounds of cheese, 9000 pounds of flour, and 1000 gallons of tomato sauce each month keeping customers happy. Specials such as $2 glasses of wine, $5.50 spaghetti dinners, and $10 two topping pizza help make this one of the busiest restaurants in the metro. Pies are thin crusted but not crispy enough to be called tavern style. Nor are they malleable enough to be called New York style. Double crusted pies were offered as an option. Cheese was promoted as “100 percent Mozzarella.” Tomato sauce was quite fresh with visible chunks of tomato and obvious use of garlic and oregano. The restaurant has never changed John & Katrina’s pizza sauce recipe. Other toppings were quite generous.

Despite Tony Lemmo’s link to Teresa and Noah Lacona, Gusto’s pizza are hardly traditional.

Options include lifestyle and health choices such as vegan Mozzarella and gluten free crusts. Their cheese is hardly 100 percent Mozzarella. Asiago, chevre, Provolone, ricotta, pepper-ricotta, cream cheese, Romano, Colby, blue cheese and even Tallegio (a legendary smear ripened cheese) are all used on pies. Lemmo has sworn he will never serve a “de Burgo” dish at his upscale Café di Scala but Gusto serves “de Burgo” pies that use shrimp and mozzarella with the iconic steak sauce of Des Moines. Another pie includes pears, prosciutto, dried figs and blue cheese with fresh greens. Another mixed roast chicken with a Thai style peanut sauce, cilantro, carrots, and bean sprouts. A “Harry Caray” special honored that Italian-American baseball announcer with Niman Ranch brats and brown mustard sauce. Another special featured rillettes, arugula and truffle oil with Tallegio.

Even the drink selection was more cutting edge than traditional with Peace Tree, Madhouse and Millstream beers plus both Italian and Iowa crafted sodas offered. House wines included Moscato and Malbec along side Chardonnay and Cab.

So there you have your final two. Together, they represent the flat out contradiction that is pizza itself. One is old, one is new. One does it strictly by their ancestors’ recipe book and the other improvises. Yet, it’s no problem for Iowans to love them both because they both take many slow steps to turn out a superior product. 

In the end, there can only be one winner. Gusto came from behind in the final 12 hours to win.  

  
Gusto

1905 Ingersoll Ave., Suite 106, 24-GUSTO, www.gustopizzaco.com

Mon. - Thurs. 11 a.m. - 10 p.m., Fri. - Sat. 11 a.m. - 11 p.m., Sun. 4 p.m. - 9 p.m.

With 2000 stores, Applebee’s is by far the Midwest’s largest casual dining chain. They have at least five restaurants in each of Omaha, Wichita and Tulsa plus at least ten in the metro areas of those towns. They have only two in Des Moines and only four in our entire metro. How does Des Moines’ restaurant scene escape the usual conformity of Middle America?

Those of us who like to eat well owe a lot to a surprising number of visionary locals - the gang of friends known as Full Court Press, Dom Iannarelli & Bruce Gerleman, Harry & Pam Bookey, Steve Logsdon and Kirk Blunck, Scot Carlson, Mike & Carter Hutchison, and George Formaro & Paul Rottenberg. Collectively those folks built twenty five unique new restaurants here in the last two decades while preserving historic buildings that might otherwise have been torn down to build an Applebee’s franchise. In addition, Des Moines was blessed by the visions of immigrant chefs who settled here from the American South, Asia, Africa, Europe and Latin America. The latest visionary who is improving our dining habits is not a restaurant owner though. He’s a pig farmer.

Carl Blake is a refugee from the silicon rat race. A former computer engineer, he left Apple Inc to get his hands dirty. He wanted to bring back pork like he recalled from his youth. “I remembered brats that squirted when you bit into them and pork chops that were juicy. I couldn’t find pork that did that any more,” he recalled. So Carl investigated the bloodlines of pig history and discovered a cross breed that was the rage of Stuttgart 100 years ago. Those Swabian Hall pigs were half Chinese Meishan, the world’s fattiest pig, and half Russian Wild Boar (RWB). Carl heard that Iowa State University had given up its research on the only Meishan herd in America, so he bought their entire stock. RWB’s were harder to find and far more difficult to maintain. “I had to build two man traps in each RWB pen. Those pigs are so mean they will tackle you, hold you down and beat you half to death,” he explained.

Bottom line though is that by crossing a Russian with a Chinese you get a German, but only in Iowa. The Swabian Hall lineage became extinct in Germany.

Carl fought back. The resulting Iowa Swabian Hall pigs he raises at his Rustik Rooster Farms have become a taste sensation. “You can take the back fat off our pigs and turn it into whipped cream,” Carl bragged. One won last year’s Cochon 555 competition in San Francisco where chefs preferred them to Mangalitsas, which are the current darlings of the charcuterie world. Top charcuterie makers Perbacco of San Francisco and La Quercia of Iowa now buy Iowa Swabian Hall pigs. Other chefs loved their shoulders and loins, which taste like a cross between pork and goose. Chicago restaurant legend Charlie Trotter now buys Rustik Rooster’s suckling pigs. Two time Cochon 555 winner Matt Steigerwald uses whole Iowa Swabian Halls at his Lincoln Café in Mount Vernon. Stephanie Izard, this year’s winner on Food Channel’s “Top Chef,” prefers full grown whole hogs at her Girl and Her Goat restaurant in Chicago. She featured one at a James Beard House fundraiser this year.

Earlier this month, Blake brought a whole Iowa Swabian Hall hog to Carlisle’s Butcher Crick Farm for their second annual restaurant appreciation event.

Chefs Hal Jasa (Zingaro) and Sean Wilson (Kirkwood Lounge, Cuatro) made them into tasso,

stuffed trotters, bacon, and

half a dozen other pig treats. This weekend, Blake returned with a pig and caja de chino, the boxes that whole hogs are cooked in in Puerto Rico, Cuba and the Dominican Republic. It took just four hours. Blake can ship entire iced pigs and caja de chinos now, so that a pork lover has everything he needs for a perfect pig out.

Side Dishes

One hundred white clad diners attended the first Flash Dine event in Iowa at Pappajohn Sculpture Park this month. Some drove as far as Mason City… Peace Tree Brewery of Knoxville introduced their Kölsch style beer. It’s an amber lager without their usual bitterness and is a legend in Cologne.

Comedian chef Shirley Fong-Torres joked that “Fusion cuisine is whatever people find in the refrigerator when stoned. Cold pizza with pickled ginger and mayonaisse, far out. Peanut butter fried rice, awesome.” As a cuisine, fusion deserves such levity. First of all, it’s hardly innovative. Twenty five hundred years before the Travel Channel began sending gluttons around the world to “discover” new foods, Herodotus was chronicling the miracles of the spice route. (Among other things he wrote that cinnamon was harvested by breaking up the nests of giant birds in Arabia.)

At the decadent peak of the Roman Empire, Suetonius wrote about a dish that required pike liver, peacock brains, flamingo tongues, and lamprey roe. All those ingredients had to be imported from afar, as did the wheat that fed the rabble that kept the Roman Empire going. Without fusion there would be no tomatoes in Italian sauces, no noodles in Chinese stir fries, and no sugar in French desserts. If Iowa diets were restricted to indigenous Iowa foods, we would live solely on rye grasses, wild garlic, yarrow, pecans, sunflower seeds, prairie sage, wild leeks, dandelion greens, mint, riverbank grapes, gooseberries, blackberries, raspberries and some other fruits so bitter no one would think of eating them without sugar today.

Nevertheless, fusion cuisine is trendy now, particularly in late night haunts where human brains open for experimentation. Des Moines’ latest such place is Cuatro, a taqueria with a full bar and popular Asian options.

For instance, my order of “chimales” delivered fresh masa (cornmeal) stuffed with kung pao chicken. (Korean BBQ short ribs were not available on three different occasions.) That order had been steamed and also appeared to have been grilled to achieve a crunchy texture on the outside. That was innovative, turning each tamale into a finger food. Mine were covered with red pepper aioli, sour cream, onions and Srichacha. If you prefer to apply such condiments personally, ask for them on the side here. My to-go order of chimales was not wrapped in foil as it would be at most Mexican joints. It lost some moisture in transit too.

I had better luck with straight Mexican orders - tacos, burritos and tortas, the latter on freshly baked bread. Tongue was expertly cooked once but was unavailable on several subsequent visits. Pastor was particularly tender and flavorful.

Shrimp ceviche tasted of fresh squeezed lime juice but the seafood and price/quantity ratio left me dreaming about the ceviche at Mi Patria Ecuador. A $7.50 ramekin was accompanied by a large basket of corn chips.

A noodle bowl, ordered “hot,” was served without a single detectible trace of chili, though chilies were described on the menu. All its heat derived from bottled Srichacha. “Vietnamese style pork” seemed identical to the Mexican pastor I‘d tried. A good lemon sauce accompanied rice sticks but noodles were scarce compared to what is served in Asian cafés around town.

A rice bowl brought a similarly small quantity of Japanese style rice with pickled radishes, carrots, bean sprouts, fresh lime and Mexican salsa. Excellent freshly cooked shrimp subbed for Korean BBQ short ribs.

Kim Chee fries, quite popular with several young friends, come from the same school of thought that invented French fries with gravy, poutine, and other busy dishes that become more popular after midnight. This dish mixed sour (vinegar) and salty with umami (overcooked tilapia as BBQ ribs were unavaialbe), spicy (chilies), and sweet (orange sauce) flavors but all were lost in an excess of Srichacha and red pepper aioli. Crisp things soon became soggy.

Cuatro

400 Walnut St., 288-9637

Mon. - Thurs. 11 a.m.. - 2 a.m., Fri. - Sat. 11 a.m. - 3 a.m.

Side Dishes

Hell’s Angels California Club stopped at Smokey D’s for lunch last Sunday attracting as many cameras to the parking lot as Harleys… Ground cherries are making a comeback in Central Iowa. Ubiquitous before WWII, the little fruits, described as “a tomato crossed with a melon,” have shown up lately on menus at Mojo’s on 86^th and Trostel’s Dish.