Sunday, September 18, 2011

Manito Tap House

The hopes have been high around these parts, lately. These parts being "the mid South Hill" (surely we can come up with a cooler neighborhood moniker than that). I'm not even talking about the Trader Joe's that will be opening, at long long last, later this month. I'm talking about the Manito Tap House, which has moved into the old and frightening Pear Tree Inn space, underneath what used to be Gottschalks and will soon be Ross Dress for Less. The early buzz seemed so promising: calling itself a gastro pub; fifty beers on tap; everything made on premises; a commitment to local ingredients and environmentally conscious materials and practices. Best of all, the location is within easy walking distance. Oh please, please let it be good!

The Tap House hasn't been open for long, and is still something of a work in progress. A few menu items are  unavailable, and the outdoor seating area is a pile of construction materials and caution tape. The new sound baffles have been ordered, but sound still bounces almost painfully off the concrete ceiling. So, take what follows with a grain of salt. It is all subject to change.

First, I'll start with things I like. The interior is comfortable, chic, and does not feel like the decor was inspired by HGTV. The lighting is a tad on the dim side, but I like both the wit of the "chandeliers" and the energy savings: they are LEDs suspended in beer bottles. The menu is highly promising, filled with tasty sounding entrees that I would like to try. And, the beer list is long and impressive, although I will echo Luke Baumgartner, there isn't that one really special beer on it. The service is friendly and knowledgeable, if lacking in polish and, at least tonight, definitely tailing off in attentiveness towards the end of the meal.

But, the real make-or-break for me is, of course, the food. The good news: the lamb burger is excellent. The yam chips are a nice twist on the ubiquitous (if yummy) sweet potato fries. The fried mozzarella was tasty, if confusingly mislabeled "bruschetta." The hot crab and asparagus dip was pleasantly crabby, although the accompanying bread was barely toasted and lacked any presence at all. Think Safeway baguette. And the pork tacos are a big success, succulent and moist without being wet or mushy, with a complex blend of flavors and a pleasant kick of spice.

Now for the bad. Their signature burger is dry. I ordered mine medium, and it came out without a hint of pink or juice. The promised Oregonzola cheese was barely present, and I'm pretty sure the promised caramelized onions were not there at all. But the real cardinal sin was the pork chop. I'm not sure how any chef would let that plate leave his kitchen. I've seen tastier, prettier food on a season opener of Hell's Kitchen. The chop was thin and cooked to shoe leather, topped with apple sauce that I'm sure was house made but could easily have come from a child's lunch box. The risotto was worse than mush. It was pasty mush. There was a large bowl of overcooked vegetables swimming in some unidentifiable liquid. The soup was just bizarre. It was like each component had been cooked separately, piled into a soup bowl, and then covered in a fairly unappealing broth. The result was not inedible, but it failed to be soup in some existential way.

There is also a very strange thing about the Tap House: the beers are small. Like stonehenge from Spinal Tap smallThey arrive in pint-glass shaped glasses, but they aren't pints. I think they are twelve ounces. This wouldn't be so bad if they weren't also really expensive. $4.50 for a not-pint of PBR, are you kidding me? Some of their beers are $8.50 a glass, so the very least I would expect is that the glass would be adult-sized. The thing that really bothers me is that nowhere on the menu does it acknowledge that what you are ordering is not a pint. This fact, tied with the rest of their relatively aggressive pricing, makes an evening at the Tap House cost more than it feels like it is worth. That is never a good feeling with which to leave a restaurant.

The Manito Tap House is not a disaster. At worst, it will be a comfortable neighborhood hangout, a place to get a beer and a nosh. At best, it could be what it seems so earnestly desire to be: a progressive, sustainable, local hot spot. But, for my money -- of which they seem to have more than they should at the moment -- it isn't there yet. I'm sure I'll be back. It's too close, both literally and metaphorically, not to keep trying. But I'm sticking to the lamb burger and the tacos until something convinces me to foray back out into the wilds that are the rest of their menu.

Sunday, September 11, 2011

Tomatoes and Maionese


Wow. Really? I haven't written since I left Portland? I guess I have been focusing on things not food based this summer. That's not a bad thing, but it does make me wonder if Portland really did manage to sate something deep and heretofore hungry within me. Surely I haven't really had enough charcuterie to last a lifetime?

No. I absolutely have not.

It's not that I have no thoughts on food in Spokane this summer. It's just that none of them seemed big enough to fill an entire blog post. For example, I have thoughts about the infamous "Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives with Guy Fieri" episode filmed in Spokane this summer. I think that Picabu is a perfectly pleasant restaurant, but that their fire pasta is a strange dish, muddy in its flavors and intentions, and not worthy of television fame. I think that there is some food worth talking about at The Elk, but that their reuben is not any of it. I prefer both The Viking and Hills' contribution to the genre far more, and nothing, nothing reuben-like can compare to Kenny and Zuke's in Portland, largely because their pastrami is such a wonderful, fatty, salty, smokey revelation. Were I to tackle The Elk, which I will, I think I would focus on their blackened chicken quesadilla. I really must figure out how they make that onion dipping sauce, which I want to lick out of the bowl when I run out of quesadilla. Waddell's is a pleasant surprise, even though I am as a general rule turned off by restaurants whose marketing strategy is based on excess: excess food, excess ingredients, excess calories. The "Lamb-strosity"? Pastrami on a burger? Also, I have no idea what "tasty bits" are, nor why they are on my hamburger. I'll take the slightly more refined burger at Luna any day, but Waddell's is good when something more casual is called for.

I learned that I need never eat at Winger Bros in the valley again, even if it is conveniently located near a kayaking take-out. I learned that Spokane has a little baby food truck pod in downtown, now that Mamma G's has joined the taco truck. I also learned that I don't want grilled cheese on a day over 85 degrees, no matter how gourmet it is. I learned that peaches can live on a savory pizza without being an abomination (thanks, Perry Street!), but that I will still order their prosciutto any day. I'm a sucker for arugula on pizza, or anywhere else.

But the last few weeks haven't really been about learning or thoughts for me. They have been about tomatoes (at least food-wise. There's been a lot going on that has not been food related). I thought the cold spring and late summer would kill any chances that we would get a good harvest, but I was wrong. My plants produced a ton of fruit, and the late heat has given them a chance to ripen. There is nothing better than a real, garden grown, vine-ripened tomato. I won't repeat the endless recipes on-line talking about how to turn them into soup, pasta sauce, etc. As soon as you cook them, they are lessened (although I do occasionally toss them with pasta. There is some residual heat involved. But that is the absolute limit.) I recommend eating them with a little salt. Maybe some basil and mozzarella, but only if you can find bufala or barrata. Otherwise, it isn't worth it.

Or, you could make your own mayonnaise. Like ricotta, home-made mayonnaise bears almost no relationship to its store-bought brethen. It manages to be both lighter and richer at the same time. It never morphs into unsavory goo when overused. Best of all, it has a wonderful, heady, subtle flavor. It is also remarkably easy to make with a food processor. I actually use an Italian recipe instead of a traditional French one; the main difference is that my recipe uses a whole egg instead of the standard egg yolks. It lightens the final product just a bit, and I prefer the consistency. Here's how you do it:

Crack one egg into the bowl of a small food processor (or the small bowl of a large one). Add a tsp of dijon mustard, 1/8 tsp salt, and a pinch of cayenne. Turn the machine on while you mix 1/2 cup canola oil (or any other neutral tasting vegetable oil) and 1/4 cup really good quality olive oil. This is a place to bust out the Columela, or any other fruity, slightly bitter olive oil. While the machine is still running, start dribbling in the oil. All the recipes say "drops," but a thin stream works fine. Start really thin, and then, after you hit the halfway mark, you can add it faster. Enjoy the heady aroma. I swear, I've nearly passed out from how good it smells a couple of times (then again, I really like my olive oil). At the end, add a tbls of lemon juice, and then stop the machine and taste for salt. You'll know when it is right.

Eat with tomatoes. Or on bread. Or off a spoon.