Local Restaurants Support Veterans with Free Entrees

I’m completely just pasting in a press release here, but it’s got all the information you need. Why reinvent the wheel?

Relish Restaurant Group announced today that for the second year in a row four of their area restaurants will hold a Veterans Appreciation Week giving all veterans a free entrée. The Bistro, Chalk Food +Wine, Local 127 and Lavomatic Café will salute area troops with a free meal in celebration for Veterans Day. The event will last from November 8^th through November 14^th during regular business hours.

“Our service members deserve more than one day in recognition of their service and sacrifice to our country, this is why we are giving back for an entire week,” said Summer Crenshaw, Director of Marketing for Relish Restaurant Group. “Last year we were able to serve several hundred area veterans, donating nearly $10,000 in meals. We expect this year to be even bigger and we are excited to serve our veterans.”

This year the restaurants will also offer patrons the opportunity to give back to veterans, through a special patriotic-themed cocktail menu with proceeds benefiting Disabled American Veterans (DAV). “We’re very impressed with Relish Restaurant Group’s generous recognition of veterans,” said Marc Burgess, Executive Director of DAV’s National Headquarters in Cold Spring, Ky. “In addition to providing a great meal, they’re going a step further and giving their patrons an opportunity to support our veterans service programs.”

To participate in appreciation week, veterans just need to show proof of military service and make a reservation at one of four restaurants. The veteran will choose on entrée from a special menu.

Proof of military service includes:
• U.S. Uniform Services Identification Card
• U.S. Uniform Services Retired Identification Card
• DD214
• LES
• Citation or Commendation
• Photograph in uniform
• Veterans Organization Card

Participating restaurants:

Local 127
127 W. 4th St
Cincinnati OH 45202
513-721-1345
www.mylocal127.com

The Bistro
413 Vine St
Cincinnati OH 45202
513-621-1465
www.bistrocincinnati.com

Lavomatic Cafe
1211 Vine St
Cincinnati OH 45202
513-621-1999
www.lavomaticcafe.com

Chalk Food and Wine
318 Greenup St
Covington, KY 41011
859-643-1234
www.Chalkfoodwine.com

Fork, Cork & Style Louisville

If you feel like heading out of town on Sunday, I’ve got a great event for you. Fork, Cork, & Style is happening at Churchill Downs in Louisville this Sunday, September 12.

Churchill Downs Entertainment Group is hosting Fork, Cork & Style this Sunday from 1-9 pm at the racetrack. The festival is bringing in celebrity chefs and party specialists, and Bringing to life its theme of “Fork, Cork & Style” the festival will present signature foods from around the country, celebrity chef cooking demonstrations, a wine tasting featuring 150 elite brands and innovative ways to dress up your next tailgating party.

There will be cooking demonstrations by Emeril Lagasse, “Top Chef” finalists (Brian Malarkey, Eli Kirshtein, & Betty Fraser) and local Louisville chefs.  There is a grand wine tasting with over 150 brands (via Southern Wine & Spirits) from 2-5 pm and 6-9 pm. Restaurants from Louisville and across the nation will also be serving tasty bites. According to the web site, notable restaurants participating include:

Chicago area’s Albano’s Pizzeria, #8 on Travel Channel’s “101 Tastiest Places to Chow Down” for their football-sized pizza puff ; Buffalo’s Anchor Bar, home of the original Buffalo Chicken Wings and #17 on the “101 Best Places to Chow Down” list; Memphis hot spot Central BBQ, rated #1 BBQ joint in Tennessee, which will prepare delicious ribs and pulled pork; West Virginia’s Hillbilly Hot Dogs, which placed #15 on the Travel Channel’s “101 Best Places to Chow Down” list and is best known for their 15-inch Home Wrecker hot dog topped with a pile of tasty condiments; Chicago’s world Famous Billy Goat Tavern and Grill, which brings their highly publicized cheeseburger adored by the cast of Saturday Night Live who performed the sketch “Cheezborger, Cheezborger”; Tony Luke’s in South Philly, home of the ultimate cheesesteak featured on Travel Channel’s “Man v. Food”.

So there you go. Come for the wine and food and enjoy some live music while you’re there. Between Beer Fest on Friday, a wedding on Saturday, and this event on Sunday … well, this weekend is most definitely the Last Bash of Summer for Kevin & myself. We’re staying the night in Louisville, an option I highly recommend.

Tickets are $29 for all music performances, cooking demos and one portion of food from the restaurant of your choice. For $64, you can get all of the above plus access to the Grand Wine Tasting inside Millionaires Row 4. For $200, you can do all of the above and meet Emeril while you’re at it.

Can’t make it to Louisville? Drive three more hours and you can attend the next Fork, Cork, & Style, held in Chicago on Oct 2.

Full Disclosure: While I was interested in this event anyway, Kevin & I were given free tickets to attend the event, although I have no idea if we have access to the Grand Tasting.

Tink’s Reborn as La Poste

I love it when people I adore get it in their heads to open a new wine shop or restaurant. My friends Bryant Phillips and his wife Kelly Lough, along with Chef Dave Taylor, and previous wine rep/wine store owner and occasional wine blogger Jens Rosencrantz are sharing ownership of what used to be Tink’s in Clifton. It’s been renamed as La Poste, as the location used to be a post office.

You’ll recognize Bryant’s name from some of our more recent Wine Shop Wednesday posts, as both he and Chef Dave have been out at the Wise Owl Wine Bar in West Chester.

I got a call from Bryant this afternoon and here’s what I know so far. La Poste is looking to be a little of everything good, it sounds like. That includes having a “massive and all-encompassing wine list” that includes plenty of by the glass selections as well as by the bottle.

It sounds like primarily American cuisine. Bryant got excited as he described how they want to have a bit of the ambience of the a champagne lunch at the Waldorf in the ’60s, but don’t worry – they’re going to have primarily bistro fare and maybe a tasting menu so that Chef Dave can show off his stuff.

Tink’s is in a lovely location in Clifton on Telford and Ludlow. It’s a neighborhood restaurant and the owners want to cultivate that neighborhood feeling, hoping they have regulars. Happily, Bryant also told me he’d save a regular seat at the bar for me.

La Poste is set to open in Fall 2010.

Better Off Bottled?

CNN Money reported today that restaurant wine lists are huge rip-offs. I think we all knew this. But just in case you weren’t clear on the facts:

Restaurants mark up cheaper bottles by an average of three times the retail price, while the prices of higher end wines are typically doubled, says Ronn Wiegand, a master sommelier who runs the industry newsletter RestaurantWine.

Last week, I got to eat at the wonderful (and amazingly expensive) new restaurant Sage in Las Vegas’s new Aria / City Center complex. My friend and I picked a $44 bottle of Argentinian Malbec off of the wine list, and proceeded to enjoy two bottles, but I was aware that the bottle probably retailed for around $15. We made a decision to “not think about it.”  That said, we both felt we got off lucky with the $44. Mixed into the French listings was a bottle of Domaine de la Romanee-Conti La Tâche, which was listed at over $9000. Per bottle. Ouch!

The CNN article continues, with tips about wine by the glass:

Think that’s rough? Prices for wine sold by the glass are tripled or even quadrupled, Wiegand says, since restaurants have to account for the chance that they won’t sell the whole bottle before it spoils.

I hate ordering wine by the glass, but occasionally, that’s all I want and I bite the bullet. If I’m with a group though, or if Kevin and I actually want the same glass, I’ll tend towards a bottle. Back when Tonic was Twist, I would always order a bottle of the Gruet Sparkling Wine from New Mexico as opposed to just a glass. The difference between an ~$14 glass and a $40 bottle seemed negligible when people were sharing. I recently noticed that Tonic still offers the Gruet on their list, so if I can ever tear myself away from cocktails, I might resort to the full bottle again.

Many restaurant wine lists have a sweet spot – that spot where you can find several bottles of wine in a similar price range that is actually affordable and not so far off from the retail price to give you a heart attack. At Sage, we found that spot in the Argentinian section. At the Wine Cellar at Las Vegas’s Rio, that spot was located in the Spanish wine section. So if you have to shop by price, look for the sweet spot.

Cheers to 1WineDude‘s Joe Roberts
for tweeting this tip!
Dollar sign used under Creative
Commons from OldMaison

Review: Tonic on 4th

I really didn’t want to like Tonic on 4th. In fact, I loved Twist so much, and was so mad that it was gone, that I was determined to never go to Tonic. Period. Then I met Josh Durr, the cocktail consultant for Tonic. His skill with a cocktail shaker swayed me, and later the same week I popped into Tonic. I sort of feel like I haven’t left since.

Josh trained all the bartenders (Benjamin, Maggie, Erin, and Mike), and every one of them has that vintage, craft cocktail thing down to the art that it is. Even better, they’ll explain anything to you, from how and why they make their own bitters, tinctures, and ice to the history of the cocktail on which you’re sipping.

Photo by Bob 5chw4r7z

For me, the test of any bar is the Manhattan. If you read my post earlier this week, you know that Josh made me a flawless Manhattan. I expect nothing less from the folks at Tonic, and they deliver. My request of “stirred and up” might as well be laughed at – how else would they serve it? And I love that.

The cocktail menu is large and eclectic, and the menu is divided up into several sections: Classical (e.g., Moscow Mule, Aviation), Classic Punches (e.g., Bourbon Milk Punch), Neo Classical Originals (e.g., The Liberal Liberal and the absinthe-included Lumberjack Frappe), and New Punches (e.g., Teachers Punch). The menu not only lists what is in each drink, but provides you with a history of each cocktail.

Photo by Bob 5chw4r7z

My first night there, Benjamin made me a Bluegrass Flip. It was a drink I’d never heard of, but really enjoyed. Honestly, I’m not overly sure what was in it besides some liquor mixed with a Bourbon Barrel Stout and some egg; maybe some bourbon? Trust me, it’s a lot better than it sounds, and it lives on their Specials menu.

My friends all have a range of favorites. One girlfriend swears by the Liberal Liberal, which is a slight twist on a Manhattan. The recipe calls for Wild Turkey 101, sweet vermouth, Amaro, and the house-made orange bitters. I know that a couple of the bartenders actually prefer the drink with different bourbon. I tried it with the Wild Turkey, but it wasn’t up my alley. I suspect I might enjoy it more with Four Roses. Another girlfriend is very attached to the classic Moscow Mule, which is simply Smirnoff Lime Juice and Goslings Ginger Beer. Finally, a friend of mine will always order an Old Old-Fashioned. I had to ask – what’s a New Old-Fashioned? Apparently newer Old Fashioneds have some fruit muddled in the bottom, but the older style focuses more on the bourbon.

Photo by Bob 5chw4r7z

Twice now I’ve ordered snacks. Tonic shares a kitchen with Local 127, but don’t expect to order off the Local 127 menu. Tonic offers light bites, but they’re quite tasty. Thus far I’ve tried a rather yummy plate of Stuffed Baked Potato Skins (so cute and tiny!), Ohio Kennebec Fries with Cheddar Sauce, and an order of Sliders. I’ve seen the Grass Fed Fox Hollow Burger with Cheese. It’s huge and according to a friend of mine, quite tasty. Because they share the kitchen with Local 127, Tonic adheres to the same policy of local foods from local growers and markets.

Oh the wine list? I haven’t paid much attention. Because Tonic is so focused on craft cocktails, I don’t expect them to have the world’s largest wine list. However, since they are a part of Local 127, I do expect what they offer to be top-notch. I was happy to see they still offer the Gruet sparkling wine from New Mexico, which is the bottle I always ordered at Twist ($8 a glass at Tonic). They also offer a nice Montfort Chenin Blanc ($5) and a rather eclectic red selection including Chile and South Africa. It’s a short list, all by the glass. I should probably ask for a wine list next time I visit, just to see what all of the options are on the off chance I order a bottle.

As for beer, they have a nice selection of bottles, including Lindemann’s Framboise and Bells Seasonal. Their tap includes Unibroue’s Maudite, La Chouffe, Delirium, several ciders, and the Left Hand Polestar Pilsner, among many others.

The prices at Tonic aren’t cheap. On a good night, it’s easy for two people to run up a bill of around $100. At the same time, you’re not drinking well drinks either. I’ve been to Tonic three times now, although I want to go more. Of course, I’m in Las Vegas now, trying to find a decent Manhattan in Sin City. But I’m actually home the entire month of February. Do you know what that means? It means you can find me at Tonic.

My review:

My thanks to Bob 5chw4r7z for use of the photos!