Chicago reviews: Edzo's & David Burke's Primehouse

Two places from this past weekend's visit to Chicago merit reviews: Edzo's (burgers) and David Burke's Primehouse (steaks).

First, though, a quick recap of what we did...with precious few photos.

• Friday
  • Megabus departure from Music Hall at 8am - easy trip, front seats upstairs
  • Arrived in Chicago ~1:30pm, slightly but not significantly late
  • Walked ~15 min to Hotel Blake - got upgrade to corner room when I mentioned our anniversary, great view of Willis Tower
  • late lunch at Xoco (marvelous, as always)
  • walked around Millennium Park (under construction using geofoam, fascinating)
  • dinner at Sofi (pasta, helping The Girl stay meatless on Good Friday)

Sofi's dining room (not my pic) - we sat in the center there against the wall

 

 

The view from our hotel room at night

Our Year of Living Steakishly: July, Jeff Ruby's

We're on the home stretch now, and this past week we hit the titular Jeff Ruby's steakhouse across from the Aronoff in downtown Cincinnati. We even got lucky enough to see the man himself parking his convertible outside our window seat and coming in to grab a take-out dinner.

The interior of Jeff Ruby's (thanks to thadd) - our seat in out of frame against the far left windows
First off, the interior of Jeff Ruby's is gorgeous. The decor is art deco with classical statuary here and there breaking up the lines. On the east wall is a huge mural (you can see a bit in the background here) of movie stars, starlets, waiters, and diners in a highly stylized, period-appropriate design. The restaurant is awash in brilliant colors (a small glimpse can be seen here) and rich woodwork.

The wait staff attended us in black slacks and matching, signature embroidered shorter-cut waiters jackets, white shirts, and simple black ties, and they were - to a man - efficient, personable, and spectacular. When The Girl left her purse at the table at the end of our meal, one of the waitstaff (not our waiter, the guy who filled our water glasses, swept up the crumbs after the main course, and was downright hilarious) came running down the street with her purse. Heck, I probably would've given the service a perfect ten before that, but that's worth a bonus point.

Nice crusty rolls split, nicely salted rye
Our waiter went through a fairly extensive selection of specials - bison in two forms, a particular steak topping named the Collinsworth (asparagus, crab, some sauce) - and recommended a few items on the menu then headed off to let us make our decision. While we deliberated - wow, maybe the strip for me, huh? - our future street runner brought us a fashionable basket of bread options. All were tasty and fresh without being sticky. He also left us a butter pat of plain salted butter and a compound butter of wild mushrooms. The Girl liked the mushroom butter, but I found it a bit too earthy for my tastes.

When we put our menus down, our waiter popped right over to take our orders:

• The Girl
  - Freddie salad
  - New York Strip, medium rare
• ChemGuy
  - Tiffany salad with vinaigrette
  - New York Strip, medium rare
• To share
  - potatoes anna
  - green beans sauteed in garlic and shallots
  - Mac Daddy and Cheese with six cheeses

ChemGuy's salad - Tiffany with basil vinaigrette
The Tiffany salad was excellent with a strong basil flavor in the vinaigrette. The tomatoes are starting to approach high summer, so that's always a strong addition. In all, the flavors were well balanced and fresh with a nice mix of field greens and slightly bitter lettuces. I did, admittedly, pass the radishes along to The Girl's plate.

The Girl's salad - The Freddie
The Girl's Freddie salad was simple and well received. She got the Freddie at Carlo & Johnny's as well, but this time she forgot to ask for the dressing on the side. For her, that meant far too much dressing. Were I eating it, however, it would have been just about right. Her salad tasted just like a deconstructed BLT should taste - fresh, crisp, flavorful, and rich with bacon. Both salads were excellent and almost exactly the same as the offerings at Carlo & Johnny's.

ChemGuy's strip steak - spectacular in every aspect
When the main dishes arrived, our table required a fair bit of rearranging as we had more then enough food for the two of us and the room accorded us on our table for two. Our waiter helped us shift things around - insisting, kind of entertainingly, on where each dish had to go in order to fit all of our dishes - each of which came on an individual plate.

The steaks that arrived were, however, outstanding. They were perfectly red in the center and a rich brown-black on the top and bottom. The plates were marked with a bit of orange-red juice, partially blood and partially fat mixed with the spices that lightly topped each steak. This small bit of spicing took what was an excellent steak and shifted it up a bit to thoroughly outstanding. The Girl felt the spice mix had just a bit too much salt, but I didn't think so as the slight sharpness offset the richness of the meat marvelously. (The Girl, by the way, chose the NY Strip at the recommendation of our waiter who affirmed that the filet was the filet - we all know the cut (his words) - but the strip here is outstanding. He was right.)

To me, this was a perfect steak. To The Girl, it could have been a little more lightly salted.

The Girl's strip steak - slightly too salty for her tastes
Mac and cheese with like nine hundred cheeses
The side dishes, however, were a more mixed bag. The Mac Daddy & Cheese (I swear that's what the menu said.) was far too rich with its six combined cheeses, half of which appeared to be added at the end before the dish headed under the broiler. The crust atop the dish was excellent, but the combination of all the cheese was too rich by far.

Green beans sauteed
The green beans were outstanding with a bit of salt flavoring them well in addition to the slightly browned garlic and shallot slivers. These were similar - though not quite identical - to the green beans offered at Carlo & Johnny's.

Potatoes Anna - crisp crust, no seasoning
The potatoes Anna were recommended by Cincinnati Magazine, and they appeared perfectly golden, quartered by our waiter before he set them on our crowded table. We differed on our opinions of the dish. I enjoyed the crisp crust and well cooked interior but looked for more flavor - salt and pepper, even - from the interior in particular. The Girl appreciated the simplicity of the dish as a contrast to the rich, flavorful steak.

With such a grotesque amount of food, neither of us felt the need to finish any of the dishes. So the waiters got to wrap up half of each of our steaks and a goodly portion of all the side dishes. We could easily have gotten away with a single steak and just two side dishes - something that we've found at nearly ever good steakhouse on our list and something that we'll likely be doing if we head back to any of the restaurants after finishing up the initial rankings.

Key lime pie - tart filling, sweet crust, great balance
With no appetizers to tempt us - seriously, what's with every appetizer being somehow fish- or crustacean-based? - we opted for a dessert instead. The Girl leaned, as always, toward the crème brûlée but gave me the final choice, so we got the key lime pie to split. The pie filling was rich and slightly too tart by itself, but the crust provided a brown sugar-cinnamon flavor and crunch that balanced the filling perfectly, particularly when the whipped cream was spread across the entire top. A great finish to an outstanding meal.

Do we have a new leader, folks? I think we just might.

• Salad/Dessert/Appetizer - 9 - Excellent salads, very good dessert.
• Steak - 9.5 - A solid 10 from ChemGuy, a 9 from The Girl averaged out.
• Side dishes - 7.5 - Total rankings get averaged here again (Mac 6&6, Beans 8.5&9, Potatoes 6&8)
• Atmosphere - 10 - Right there with our best yet and without the schmutz that C&J's had all over the place.
• Cost - 3 - Things were a bit pricey, but we over ate by at least one side dish.
• Service - 10 - Great stuff, very friendly and attentive.
• Bonus - +1 - They ran down the street after us.
• Total score - 50 (out of 60)

Wow...just wow...best...meal...yet.

Realistically, neither of us thought it was that far above Embers (5 points is a huge lead.), but we both agreed that this was our best meal yet.

Summarizing things so far...

• Jeff Ruby's - 50 (of 60)
• Embers - 45
• Carlo & Johnny's - 44.5
• Celestial - 44.5
• Mitchell's - 44.5
• The Palm - 41.5
• Oakwood Club - 40
• Jag's - 38.4
• Red - 38
• Pine Club - 37.5
• Boi na Braza - 35
• Guenther's - 30

Next up, Morton's...then The Precinct...then out of town for Ruth's Chris somewhere.

Our Year of Living Steakishly: June, The Palm

If we're wandering far afield - and Washington is far enough - then Our Year of Living Steakishly is going along for the ride.

It took us some decent research, but we came to the conclusion that The Palm was going to be our best bet to find the best steakhouse in the District of Columbia.

The Palm is a few blocks northwest of the Farragut North Metro stop on the red line, but it's not too bad a walk, two blocks over and two up. The interior walls are covered with cartoons and characatures: Hagar the Horrible from its original artist and sketches of patrons both famous and unknown (at least by us). We elected to sit in the front, glass-walled room, however, as the weather was nice and the sky clear as a bell as we sat down.

The Palm at we departed. Our table was the second from the right.
Our waitress was very friendly without being overly casual or officious. She offered us a description of the special - 4lb lobster for two, which we of course declined as we are Living Steakishly.

The Palm's assorted breadish options.
After each of us ordered a drink - since we were going via Metro, there was no need for either of us to designate - we made our dinner choices:

• The Girl's choices
  - half of a mozzarella, tomato, basil salad
  - half of a New York Strip, medium rare
  - string beans, sauteed in garlic
  - three-cheese potatoes
• ChemGuy's choices
  - half of a mozzarella, tomato, basil salad
  - the other half of the New York Strip, medium rare
  - split of the side dishes (both served for two, so we split everything)

While we waited for the red meat to come, we were delivered The Palm's bread assortment - two slices each of sourdough, dark rye (with raisins), and simple white bread. The raisin rye was a very nice, moist change from the usual sourdough and rye that we'd gotten at pretty much every steakhouse so far. All the breads were, in fact, quite fresh and tasty, offering a nice assortment for every taste.

Oddly, we found none of the appetizers to our liking, they being nothing but seafood, something we find that many steak houses seem to offer. So we took a pass and opted instead to save some room for a dessert.

Half of the tomato salad. The waiter had it split for us.
The waitress brought us our split salad - on two plates, that's solid service - which was still enough for the two of us. The mozzarella was fresh and creamy, the basil high quality and without a touch of licorice flavor, the tomatoes surprisingly fresh and not watery - not quite high summer tomato but close. The balsamic vinaigrette was nicely flavored, and the fresh cracked pepper on top was appreciated. The salad was certainly a good choice.

The Girl's steak half
Our New York Strip was sixteen ounces, meaning that even a half was still technically two servings a piece. The steak arrived split, as well, and the sides were in individual plates each, from which we served ourselves.

At this point in our Steakish year, we've become rather jaded in what we're looking for in a steak. My half was nicely red in the center; The Girl's was a bit less so being the thinner end of the steak and cooked through a bit more thoroughly. A bit of seasoning had been lightly applied to the steak but not much crust was developed on the steak, and the steak had an oddly tangy off flavor - nothing bad enough to send back but just off.

ChemGuy's steak half

The sides were the better part of the main meal. The potatoes showed up in a small ceramic dish with the cheese still bubbling and nicely browned. They were full of flavor and richness, thoroughly excellent. The string beans were lightly sauteed in olive oil with pieces of garlic throughout. The beans could have used a bit of salt, but we each fixed that fairly quickly.

The sides - string beans up top, three cheese potatoes down low
With no appetizer, we were happy to peruse the dessert menu, and in what I am sure is a shocking development, The Girl leaned us toward crème brûlée. As many restaurants do, The Palm offered up this dessert with three raspberries topping it. The top was pleasantly crusty and browned and fully absent of any burned spots. We were a bit surprised with the lemon flavor of the custard beneath the crust, but the flavor turned out to be a pleasant surprise instead of the assumed vanilla.

The shocking dessert choice of crème brûlée
As we finished our crème brûlée, The Palm's manager stopped by our table to ask how our meal had been and to inform us that - as it was our first visit to The Palm - the dessert would be on them. He chatted to us about our visit to Washington, and we told him about our trek around the steakhouses of the Cincinnati area and mentioned that we were headed to a couple of Jeff Ruby restaurants in the next few months.

He hadn't heard of Jeff Ruby but hoped and felt fairly confident that The Palm's steaks would hold up well against any that we tried. We didn't feel that theirs did, but we didn't tell him that.

So, where does the The Palm rank against the best of Cincinnati?

• Salad/Dessert - 8.5 - Good if imperfect tomato in the salad. Lemon was a nice touch with the dessert.
• Steak - 6 - Tangy and without a good crust, but the meat was rich and moist without a visible fat run.
• Side dishes - 9 - The string beans were lesser than those at Carlo & Johnny's - but not by much. The potatoes were outstanding.
• Atmosphere - 6 - Meh.
• Cost - 3 - With alcohol and splitting everything, we were at $113. $28 of that was booze, so we're down to $85, but if we'd each gotten a steak, we would have been up in the range of $120 or so with tax (which is a healthy 10% at restaurants in DC).
• Service - 9 - Things were a little slow coming out initially, but the waitress and manager were very friendly and helpful.
• Total score - 41.5 (out of 60)

The Palm wasn't better than what we've had in Cincinnati. It won't be our reason to get back to DC.

Summarizing things so far...

• Embers - 45 (of 60)
• Carlo & Johnny's - 44.5
• Celestial - 44.5
• Mitchell's - 44.5
• The Palm - 41.5
• Oakwood Club - 40
• Jag's - 38.4
• Red - 38
• Pine Club - 37.5
• Boi na Braza - 35
• Guenther's - 30

Comments on the rankings:

• The best steaks we've had so far have come from Ember's and Carlo & Johnny's.
• The best value has come from Mitchell's.
• We actually liked Boi na Braza more than their ranking suggests, but we wouldn't go there if we were looking for a steak.
• We would be hard pressed to choose between Carlo & Johnny's, Embers, and the Celestial for a good night out. Personally, I'd probably choose Embers. The Girl, however, might take Carlo & Johnny's.

The places left are Jeff Ruby's (July), Morton's (August), and the Precinct (September). Two from Ruby and the one that Cincinnati Magazine nicknamed The Expense Account.

Our Year of Living Steakishly: May, Boi Na Braza

With the Best Man and his The Girl, we headed to Fountain Square for a night of Steakish Living, our first in the series to benefit from the company of another couple.

If you've not been to a Brazilian steak house - and we hadn't before this journey - you should know that it's certainly a different dining style than that of any other steakhouse that we've hit on our travels. There is no menu, no choice of sides, no need to ask for the meat cooked a certain way.

Instead, the sides and salads and antipasto are on a four-sided salad bar, free for the grazing. One side had typical salad fixings, another warm sides (sauteed mushrooms, whipped potatoes, black beans, cauliflower with cheese, soup), the third and fourth antipasto choices (roasted red peppers, asparagus, salami, cheeses). We were welcome to take in as many and as much of these as we wanted - at the beginning of our meal or throughout.

ChemGuy's choice from the four-sided salad bar
All of the starters were very tasty, the mushrooms and black beans, in particular. With so many sides - salads, sides, appetizers - none of us were able to sample all of the choices, but we each agreed that they were all solid choices with very few of them rising to a level of excellence. In general, we treated the opening course largely as something to be sampled lightly but not to be indulged in with any real gusto.

The meat was the thing, and we needed to save room.

The Best Man's choices from the same four-sided salad bar. Note the red octagon at the top left of the photo. That'll be relevant later.
Once the salad choices were done, we moved on to the meat course...courses...the endless meat course.

When we were ready to bring on the carne, we flipped our card from red to green. Once the green was showing, the gauchos who were wandering the churrascaria (I swear, I'm not making up these terms) immediately began stopping by the table. They brought by seventeen (the host told us the number, I certainly wasn't counting) different meat options:

• bottom round
• bacon-wrapped filet
• bacon-wrapped chicken breast
• garlic beef
• prime rib
• lamb
• chicken legs
• and a bunch of others that started to blend together
• sausage

Seriously, the meat started to blend together pretty quickly. There was meat and meat and some meat.

After a while, we flipped back to the red to make the meat rain pause and took a few minutes to actually eat some of the carnage. With so many choices, The Girl and I began by simply accepting every meat offered to us, trying every style of meat. The Best Man, on the other hand, had been to Boi na Braza before and was a bit more selective, knowing which meats he enjoyed the most and which would simply be taking up much needed space on his plate.

Most of the meats came in smallish pieces, typically two or three ounces at a time, all served on large skewers and slid off onto our plates. I like my steak more closer to rare than medium, and the small sizes of the meat pieces seemed to keep this from happening. Instead, most of the meat - the beef, at least - more in a medium well level of doneness. Even the larger cuts, from which slices were cut and laid onto our plates, struggled to stay at even medium, and none of the meats had the rich crust that comes on an outstanding steak.

Admittedly, the endless supply of meat as well as the vast variety of available seared flesh was attractive, but Boi na Braza felt a bit like a higher quality CiCi's where the value was to be had in the quantity rather than the quality of the offerings.

The Best Man's plate of meat.
Somebody's meat plate.
Go Meat!After taking down probably a pound of meat a piece, we had the foolishness to try out the dessert menu by splitting apiece of their caramel cheesecake, a dessert too large by half, especially at the end of an evening of gluttony.

To the rankings, steakish readers:

• Appetizers/Dessert - 8 - The dessert seemed mass produced. The full salad bar made for a lot of options, many of which were very tasty.
• Steak - 6 - The massive amount of meat and huge variety makes up for some of the middling quality, but not all of it.
• Side dishes - 7 - see description of salad bar.
• Atmosphere - 7 - Nothing special - nice decor but nothing special.
• Cost - 4 - At $47 per person plus $8 for the dessert, it's slightly above the middle of the road cost.
• Service - 8 - The lack of a traditional waiter made things tough to evaluate. The meat servers seemed to come from nowhere when the card was flipped to green. Drinks were never allowed to be low.
• Minus 5 - It's not a steakhouse - period - end of story.
• Total score - 35 (out of 60)

It's not a steakhouse.

I don't know if I'd mentioned that yet or not.

No big, single steak on my plate. No medium rare. No menu.

It's a buffet, a high quality buffet but a buffet none the less.

On to steakhouses in Washington, D.C for June.

Our Year of Living Steakishly: March, The Celestial

Things are getting tight at Our Year of Living Steakishly. We're down to the final half dozen steakhouses, and half a point separates our three highest rated restaurants so far: Embers (45), Carlo & Johnny's (44.5), and Mitchell's (44.5). The best value so far is Mitchell's, and the best overall steak was at Ember's.

That last statement was put to a bit of a test this month as we headed to The Celestial, where our waiter - in touring us through the menu - mentioned that many people say that their steak is the best in town, better than any of the Jeff Ruby restaurants, for example.

Well, if you're going to throw down that kind of a gauntlet, we're going to pick it up and see just what your steaks are made of. And they'd better be made of meat, because otherwise we're going to be really annoyed...and surprised.

Other than Guenther's - and the less said about that place ever again, the better - the Celestial has easily the least elegant entryway of any of our steak restaurant places so far. Its location is high atop Mount Adams, but the entry side presents a view of the condominium building of which the Celestial is the majority of the first floor. We passed by a recumbent security guard enjoying the second day of the NCAA tourney and headed down a hallway of mirrors (tempting me to scream bloody mary thrice) opening onto a smallish host area with the bar - the Incline - to the right.

The location at the bottom of what looks like a simple, inelegant apartment building - badly misplaced among the rest of the homes in Mt Adams - certainly doesn't inspire confidence. Admittedly, from the host area, we headed down a short hallway to the main dining room, a two-level affair with little decoration save for floor to ceiling windows allowing an excellent look out upon the river and the eastern side of downtown including the backside of the P&G pyramids. The view (seen in rotation on their website) is outstanding and the clear drawing power of the location.

Our table was against the windows - all of the two-person tables are. The tables for four were on a level a foot or so above us, allowing all diners an uninterrupted vantage point. The restaurant's layout is remarkably similar to Prima Vista's on the opposite side of downtown, though The Celestial goes for a much more natural feel with wooden paneling on the lone non-window wall and an older style of table and chair.

We were greeted by our waiter David, who offered us drinks and a menu that certainly introduced the restaurant as something not to be trifled with - he referred to it as a tome, and that was appropriate. The depth of the menu wasn't necessarily stunning, but the physical mass of it did leave a distinct impression. He took a moment to get us drinks and returned to offer up the day's specials as well as a few recommendations depending on where our tastes seemed to be heading.

It's rare that I'll note anything about the waiter, but this one deserves a mention. David was entertaining all evening long without ever nudging anywhere near officious. He was knowledgeable about the menu and sang the praises of the food, all of which turned out to be absolutely spot on. At the end of the meal, he asked us to come again and to ask for him by name. When we return to The Celestial - if we return - I certainly will ask for him by name. It was kind of a neat touch.

Simple presentation of bread in dimming sunset light with cute flowers of butter
The bread was presented on a simple, gold-rimmed plate with an accompanying square plate with four flowers of butter. The bread was similar to a chabatta bread but a bit sweeter and a little less crusty. It had a nice chew, and the unsalted butter balanced it nicely.

The delectable tomato and Mozzarella tower with smears of balsamic reduction
None of the appetizers tempted us, so we headed a little further down the menu to take in a starter - the tomato and mozzarella tower split presented on two plates for us at the offering of our waiter. The starter was outstanding. Two layers each of tomato and cheese found their way onto our plates, topped with light greens resembling clover in appearance but providing a nice, clean background against which the bit of balsamic reduction on the plate. The reduction took on a syrupy consistency so that even the small bit held tightly to the tomato as we smeared across it. Through the magic of concentration, the typical tangy of balsamic morphed into a sweetness almost reminiscent of blackberries. This was one of the best salad/starters that we've had in our tours.

The rest of our individual orders:

• The Girl
  - Gorgonzola and pear salad
  - Filet Mignon, 8oz, medium rare plus
  - Sour cream, horseradish whipped potatoes
• ChemGuy
  - hearts of Romain salad
  - Kansas City strip, medium rare
  - lobster potatoes
• Shared
  - spicy green beans (side)
  - Crème brûlée (dessert)

ChemGuy's hearts of Romain salad
The croutons atop my hearts of Romain salad had been rubbed with garlic and toasted - sadly taking it a bit beyond just crunchy to hard. That, however, was the only off note on my salad as the hearts of Romain were whole leaves of tender Romain lettuce - my choice at home or in a restaurant - topped with a Caesar vinaigrette and Romano cheese. My salad was excellent and simple, and The Girl's was also excellent but far more involved. She went with the Gorgonzola and pear salad, coming out to her with a nicely sliced pear resting partially atop a salad of mixed greens, dried cherries, candied walnuts, and Gorgonzola cheese crumbles. The slightly bitter greens and cherries were balanced marvelously with the sweet pear and walnuts, and all the ingredients were nicely tied together with a vinaigrette coating the greens. The Girl reported that the salad was easily the best she had enjoyed on our tour.

The Girl's Gorgonzola and pear salad
Kansas City strip and lobster potatoes
David brought our entrees, mine on two separate plates (see just above), The Girl's on one larger plate, and our green beans set between us. The smell was amazing as was the crust on each steak. These were steaks clearly cooked at the high temperatures that Red was missing. These were crusts to make mouths water, and they certainly did that to mine. The bone in mine was a bit off-putting, and I would likely choose the New York strip rather than the Kansas City cut when we go back to the Celestial. There was also a strip of fat on the side opposite the bone, but everything between the two was outstanding. The center was a perfect red, the outside a masterful brown-black. This was a perfectly prepared steak.

The Girl's initial thoughts were that her choice of medium rare plus was a bit too far as the center redness was a faded pink in her first few bites, but the center's glory began to reveal itself after a few more bites. Her steak's crust was also perfect and the meat significantly smoother than mine. The initial reservations were cleared up, and The Girl and I both agreed that David's comment that the steaks at The Celestial were the equal of any in town - at least any that we've tried so far. I give Embers a half point on The Celestial's steaks, but that comes from the slight over cooking on one end of The Girl's filet and imperfect edges of my strip.

My biggest issue - and one worthy of a full point deduction on my rankings - was the low quality of the steak knives at The Celestial. A steak of this quality, a steak that is to be the finest cut available shouldn't be hacked and grabbed with a serrated knife worthy of the Outback. This level of restaurant should be providing straight-bladed knives honed to razor sharpness. Cheap, serrated blades simply are not acceptable at this level.


Spicy green beans - half of which were consumed
Our sides were of a mixed level. The Girl reported that her whipped potatoes were outstanding, tangy with horseradish but leveled with the sour cream within. The horseradish put them entirely beyond my tastes, but she's a horseysauce kinda Girl. so she thought they were outstanding. My lobster potatoes were very tasty with a slight taste of the shared base with their lobster bisque. My potatoes had been cooked in the thick, flavorful sauce and had a subtle flavor that was very much enjoyable. The green beans were - at first bite - wonderfully flavorful, having been sauteed and then coated in a sauce of soy and hot pepper. The sauce was reduced and thickened to coat the green beans. After a few bites, however, the soy reduction became far too salty for either of our tastes. The flavor was good in very small doses, but between the two of us, we couldn't finish the green beans.

Shockingly, crème brûlée with a strawberry garnish
The crème brûlée was nicely firm and flavored, but the crust on top was easily more blonde than the golden brown that results from thorough caramelizing. Not the finest dessert we've had on our tour, but a solid entry with a very simple accompaniment of a sliced strawberry centered atop. Plus, it wasn't in a stupidly shaped bowl.

To the numbers, intrepid readers:

• Appetizers/Dessert - 8.25 - The crème brûlée topping wasn't as dark as it should be - still more blond than burnt (7), the mozarella/tomato tower was fairly well perfect (9.5)
• Steak - 8.5 - Outstanding...excellent crust, good flavor, mine perfectly cooked with a little more fat than I would have appreciated (8)...The Girl's a little more done than she would've liked but otherwise spectacular (9).
• Side dishes - 7.3 - both potatoes get an 8, and the green beans a 6.
• Atmosphere - 9 - Obviously, great view, well laid out dining room, good atmosphere.
• Cost - 3 - Our bill was $114 - minus $6.50 for a reasonably-priced Manhattan plus a solid tip because of the next section.
• Service - 9.5 - We agreed that this was our favorite waiter - they lose a half point because my glass got low on water a couple of times.
• Minus 1 - horrible steak knives, serrated and not effective in cutting the steak. Very bad.
• Total score - 44.55 (out of 60)

Our Year of Living Steakishly: February, Red

We're halfway through the list at this point, now visiting our fifth steak establishment out of the twelve on the list (one of which has already closed). We've also added in two more restaurants (Mitchell's and the Oakwood Club) to bring us to seven of - in theory - thirteen fine steak meals.

At this point we're starting to know just what we're looking for, and The Girl and I are beginning to rank things and consider our point scale from the moment we walk into the restaurant. The decor's a point here, the crust on the steak's not as deep as that at Carlo's - point deduction. We're not quite pros - especially since nobody's paying us to eat their steaks, but we're certainly skilled amateurs, confident in our tastes and our rankings.

So we challenged ourselves with Red on Hyde Park square. In rereading the Red review after our meal, I found that Red is categorized as The Hideaway, and much of the review is taken up by praise for the various menu options other than the steaks. The steaks are mentioned in passing, but the duck breast gets as many lines for its non-traditional sides of lo mein noodles, mango relish, and housin butter.

The Girl and I would have none of that, however.

We went to Red - without Calen and her hubby who had to back out on our Steakish night at the last moment due to a sick eldest child - for the meat, the flesh, the cow, the steak, and it was the meat that we ordered. No toppings for the steaks though the menu listed a half dozen options. We're all about the carne.

Our opening foray into Red was greeted with the unpleasant smells of a raw bar gone wrong. In heading to the dining rooms, you have to pass through their bar area, directly across from their raw bar with huge shrimp, crab legs, and oysters - some of which was giving off a rather pungent aroma on our evening at Red. It wasn't an auspicious opening salvo from the restaurant.

We were shown to our table, tucked against the wall and tight to the other tables in a dining room that was significantly smaller than any that we had yet checked out in our Steakish visits. The lighting was nicely dim but not pitch black, and the decor was a mixture of contemporary and slightly older with rich brown paint, upholstered walls, red-themed artwork, and curtains hiding a folding wall to separate the rear-most dining room from the main dining room.

Our waiter greeted us and went through their special, a fish dish that held no attraction for us. The Girl ordered her customary Manhattan - presented straight up in a martini glass but swapped into a small rocks glass when The Girl asked for the change. Perhaps it was a bit off that the waiter didn't initially ask her preference, but he solved the problem quickly and easily enough that no demerits were earned here.

Our orders for tonight:

• The Girl
  - house salad with vinagrette
  - filet, medium-medium rare
  - baked potato
  - asparagus with Hollandaise sauce on the side
• ChemGuy
  - Caesar salad
  - strip steak, medium-rare
  - whipped garlic potatoes

We also placed an order for an appetizer of french fries with truffle oil, Parmesan, and rosemary and chatted a bit, enjoying a nice night out after a rough week for me, in particular.

Wire basket, parchment paper, a fine presentation for excellently tasty fries
View of the fries from the top - note the rosemary visible
The fries impressed. They were brilliantly cooked, crisp and light with a great flavor and crunch. The truffle oil was present mostly in the smell though it did lend a hint of sweetness to every bite. The rosemary's flavor was also present if not overly strong, lending a nice earthy note to the fries. Sadly, this was the highlight of the meal.

We think the logo was made of paprika - not much taste to it, just artsy.
The bread came next, presented in standard napkin-wrapped-bowl with Red-logoed butter pat on a plate. The bread was fresh and nicely flavorful - not uniquely so but a pleasant enough way to pass a few minutes as we waited for the main courses to appear.

The Girl's salad - weird potato crisps up top
ChemGuy's Caesar salad - notice the huge hunk of Parmesan cheese
First, however, came the salads. The Girl was pleased with her salad as it had a nice variety of peppery field greens. The dressing was tasty as well, but the addition of the potato crisps up top - freshly made, I'm sure, but a little chewier than I would have hoped for them to be when I tasted one - were a bit odd. My salad, then, was a standard Caesar. The option was given for my salad to include anchovies (something some folks say is flat wrong) - I passed on the fish. The dressing for the Caesar salad coated the lettuce nicely, not being nearly as thickly applied as some salads I've had. Neither salad, however, was anything remotely approaching spectacular.

Seriously, who needs that many plates? Put some things together...let the foods touch, folks.
The Girl's 8-oz filet
The main dishes showed up with every item on its own plate, something that would likely have been a problematic situation is we had been a full four people at our table. The girl's steak, potato, and asparagus took up four plates as the Hollandaise somehow merited its own dish. Mine was a more reasonable two plates, but with the bread plates still on the table, space quickly became a premium.

The steaks were good. The waiter advertised them as Prime - something he said allowed only two percent of all beef to qualify for and that we'd heard at other steak places by now - and he had warned The Girl when she ordered her steak medium-rare, that this would mean a cool, red center - a bit too rare for her tastes. She wisely shifted her order to closer to medium, a wise move on her part.

I stuck with medium-rare and found a steak that I would deem closer to rare than to medium. The waiter had warned us, however, so I have no complaints there. Their scale leans rare, however, so be forewarned if you visit Red anytime soon.

ChemGuy's rare strip steakThe steaks served to us lacked any of the rich, dark crust that we both feel makes for an excellent steakhouse steak. These were steaks that were supposedly cooked at 800 degrees (according to our waiter) which seems far below the thousands of degrees advertised by the staff at Mitchell's and Carlo & Johnny's, and the temperature difference showed. The meat was well cooked, lightly seasoned, and well chosen. But it lacked the depth of flavor, the contrasts of mouthfeel that a steak with a rich crust can present.

These were steaks that would have pleased us half a year ago but that left us wanting far more from the meat than Red could offer. We each left half the steak for lunch the next day, as the photos show.

The side dishes also qualified as very well prepared but not excellent enough to merit special attention on our ranking scales at this point in our tours. The baked potato was well made and fluffy but didn't have the crispy skin that marks an excellent spud. The asparagus were perfectly cooked - according to The Girl, I steer clear of the spears - but simply steamed, leaving no extra flavor to be imparted to the vegetables. We couldn't comment on the Hollandaise, as neither she nor I partook of more than a taste. We're not down with the Dutch sauce.

The garlic-streaked whipped potatoes
My whipped potatoes were the highlight of the sides, richly streaked with roasted garlic and packed with flavorful bites. This rich streaking did have a drawback, however, as it meant that some of the bites of whipped potatoes were lacking in flavor while others were very strongly flavored. I would have been happier with a tan plate of potatoes with garlic throughout each bite. I'm also more of a mashed potato kind of guy. Gimme a lump here or there, please.

The Girl's leftovers
Remains of ChemGuy's strip steak
For dessert, The Girl had noticed another table's thin trough of dessert with berries atop the cream, so we asked the waiter what that had been. He pointed us toward the - unsurprisingly - crème brûlée, and we split one for the two of us. The presentation was overly stylish - berries resting atop a foolishly thin trough of creme brule. The trough was thin enough that getting spoons into it a challenge. The flavors were good, the crust nicely scorched but not burned. The berries were a nice addition. Dessert was very good.

Little trough of crème brûlée atop big plate of...of...
To the numbers, intrepid readers:

• Appetizers/Dessert - 9 - The crème brûlée was very good, the fries outstanding
• Steak - 6 - They're certainly better than Guenther's, but that's about it so far - maybe better than my steak at the Oakwood Club.
• Side dishes - 7 - solid, unspectacular side dishes.
• Atmosphere - 5 - There's a one-point deduction because the smell of the raw bar was strong through the first part of our meal even though we were forty feet from it. The contemporary decoration is well appreciated, but the crowded nature of the seating was a drawback.
• Cost - 3 - Our bill was $112 - minus $11 for a ridiculously-priced Manhattan plus $20 for the tip.
• Service - 8 - He came around with a crumb scraper before dessert.
• Total score - 38 (out of 60)

Barely behind Embers, about where I would have guessed. I was assuming it would come in slightly lower - maybe a point or two, but you have to trust the numbers.

Summarizing things so far...

• Embers - 45 (of 60)
• Carlo & Johnny's - 44.5
• Mitchell's - 44.5
• Oakwood Club - 40
• Red - 38>
• Pine Club - 37.5
• Guenther's - 30

The numerical rankings fall right about where we expected things to fall.

Next month we're off to either The Celestial, Jeff Ruby's, Jag's, or Morton's. We know Boi Na Braza is April, and The Pricinct wraps up the tour whenever that happens to be. Should be sometime around August.

If you want to catch up...

• January - Carlo & Johnny's
• December - Embers
• November - Guenther's
• September - Mitchell's
• September - Oakwood Club
• August - Pine Club

How did we miss October, folks? Man, hadn't noticed that 'til just now.

Our Year of Living Steakishly: January, Carlo & Johnny's

As January comes to a wintery close in the Cincinnati area, The Girl and I were halfway through out second winter break (thanks to four consecutive snow days). We decided to celebrate with a bit of Steakish Living by visiting the first of our trio of Jeff Ruby establishments: Carlo & Johnny's.

We had initially tried getting a reservation at Jimmy D's but were rebuffed and eventually found out that it had closed in early fall, apparently a victim of the renowned Cincinnati magazine top steakhouses curse. Because of this, we are currently taking suggestions for a replacement twelfth steakhouse in the Cincinnati area.

Carlo & Johnny's is technically in Montgomery, just south of the Kroger where we were supposed to have students collecting over the weekend. It is set back from the road in an old house that has been converted into a series of very distinct dining rooms. Ours - no photos of the room itself, sadly - had darkly quilted walls on which were hung large, golden-framed portraits that wouldn't have looked at all out of place in my maternal gradmother's home. There was a gilded lion's head with a spray of flowers, a mermaid statue appearing to support the ceiling, a painting of a French general with a bulldog's head, rather dim lighting, and an upholstered, four-sided settee around the aforementioned mermaid. The Girl sat on the settee.

In getting to our dining room, we passed a raw bar with oysters, crab legs, and numerous sushi-quality cuts of fish as well as a more inviting, socially active bar with live music. We heard acceptable covers of David Grey, the Beatles, Jim Croce, Jimmy Buffet and more through the doors throughout the evening.

I got the feeling that Carlo & Johnny's is many restaurants for many people. It is a bar with scantily-clad, pixiesh bar maid for those in search of a search of an adult night out. It is an old-school steakhouse for the older couple seated behind me - he in sport coat over read turtleneck, she taking off her faux fur coat to sit down. It is an elegant place for younger professionals to take a nice night out. And it is a place where the high-end regular customers keep their own wine cellars by the door as you walk in, cellars that contained everything from Miller Lite to Dom Perignon, $500 bottles of port to bottles of Mad Dog 20/20 with business cards taped on the front.

All of these, however, are presented in the finest restaurant fashion. Our waiter had a custom embroidered Carlo & Johnny's jacket over a simple white shirt and black tie. The lower wait staff - bus boys, water fillers - wore similar vests over a black on black shirt and tie combination. The manager visited every table, inquiring as to the meal, patiently decanting bottles of red wine before pouring the glasses for each patron at the table beside ours.

The menu is extensive - sushi had its own menu - and dominated by the sixteen different cuts of steak that our waiter claimed is the most extensive selection in Cincinnati. They had changed one thing, replacing the bone-in filet with what they referred to as a shorterhouse and that our waiter explained was their cutesy way of saying a porterhouse cut off of which they had trimmed the large fat at the bottom.

All steaks are served a la cart, and sides are sized to be shared between two or three diners. Initially we thought this meant the meal would be significantly more expensive than those at the other restaurants we had visited, but this didn't turn out to be the case, and neither of us felt the meal overpriced.

After a few minutes looking over the menu and being entertained by salads such as the Peter Frampton (Mixed Lettuces, Asparagus, Maytag Bleu with Pistachio Vinaigrette) and the Crab Calloway (Lump Crab, Rock Shrimp, Hearts of Palm with Dijon Vinaigrette), The Girl and I placed our orders:

• Appetizer
  - oddly, none - nothing stuck our fancy in this section
• The Girl
  $33 barrel-cut filet mignon, medium rare
  Freddie salad
  
• ChemGuy
  $40 Prime NY Strip, medium rare
  steakhouse tomato salad
• Sides to share
  saute of fresh green beans
  potato pancetta augratin
• Dessert (again, to share)
  crème brûlée

Our waiter, Mark, took our orders, complimenting a few of our choices, and returned in moments with bread and butter. The bread was sourdough and salted rye, the butter a composite pat of mushroom/truffle butter and plain butter with a simple JR-logo'ed paper round on top.

This should be turned 90 degrees clockwise, sorry...bread in the basket, butter pat on the plate
The aforementioned JR-emblazoned butter pat
The bread was tasty enough to eat on its own, but the truffle/mushroom butter moved it into excellence. Neither of us put away more than a single piece, however, as we knew that more important things were yet to come.

ChemGuy's steakhouse tomato salad - mozzarella, tomatoes, basil, lettuce, a balsamic reduction, and a bit of vinaigrette
The Girl's Freddie salad - lettuce, bacon, tomatoes, buttermilk ranch on the side
Both of our salads were excellent. The Girl's salad was simple with lettuce and tomatoes topped by wonderfully flavorful bacon. The bacon - crumbled large - had a gorgeous smokey flavor, the sort of real smoked flavor to which bac-o-s can only aspire. She commented that the bacon would make a wonderful BLT, and I would agree from the basis of my one taste.

My salad was more complex with mozzarella and basil laid atop large tomatoes that were in excellent condition for winter tomatoes. In the peak of summer tomato season, I would imagine this salad to be mouthwatering enough to comprise a meal unto itself. The field greens behind the tomatoes were drizzled with a balsamic reduction that made me think I've been eating the wrong thing out of bottle labeled balsamic vinegar for years. It had a marvelous sweetness balancing the perfect tart notes. Wonderful.
ChemGuy's prime strip steak, ~16oz
The Girl's barrel cut filet, ~14oz
Mark took our salads and refilled our glasses - The Girl declined a second Manhattan, and we had a few minutes to chat and watch our fellow diners before the main course and raison d'etre was delivered. The steaks were presented with a minimum of flair, a well-cooked piece of meat in the center of a white plate with just a few sprigs of - at The Girl's guess - pea shoots.

The steaks smelled marvelous, but at first The Girl was afraid that hers was over cooked. She had ordered medium rare, but her first slice in suggested a solid medium - gray all the way through. She began to turn up her nose but sliced through the center of the steak and found the correct colors there. The photos don't show the redness well as the light in our dining room was very low, but be assured that the center of her steak was a nice red. Her steak was buttery smooth and nicely crusted. She managed to bring half of it home for a great dinner while I was at Rock 4A Cause the next night.

My strip steak was right from the first bite, wonderfully red in the center and darkly brown/black on the outside. We both tasted the other's steak and affirmed that we are, indeed, different tastes. The strip has a beefer flavor and stronger chew that I appreciate, and the filet is smoother and richer, both of which she enjoys.

ChemGuy's steak after the carnage
The Girl's steak - she took half home
We discussed the steaks while we ate, trying to find a way to compare these to those of Embers and our other steakhouses. We both agreed that these were a narrow margin below those of Embers, last month's Steakish Living destination. The lines here are fine, but we agreed that the crust on the Embers's steaks were more flavorful, a little richer. The crust on the Carlo & Johnny steaks were a bit thinner, blacker, and more crumbly. I don't want to say that they had an almost ashy mouth feel - too black, thin, sandish - because that would sell them short, but it's a little way onto that spectrum.

Neither of these complaints - The Girl's steak's overdone outer edge or the imperfect crust - is meant to say that the steaks this time were anything short of excellent. Instead, it's a way of splitting the hairs that are starting to show up in this competition. Where the Embers steaks were near perfect, the Carlo & Johnny steaks were merely excellent...the difference between the 9 that I gave Embers and the 8 that I'll give Carlo & Johnny's.

Potato / Pancetta Au Gratin
Saute of Green Beans
Where the steaks at Carlo & Johnny's were less than perfect, the side dishes were nothing short of absolute perfection. The au gratin potatoes with pancetta pieces within had a gorgeous, broiled crust under which creamy slices of potatoes were on the verge of melting together. It is the rare side dish onto which I won't throw at least a little pepper - preferably freshly ground - but this one needed for nothing. The flavors were outstanding, the texture marvelous, the dish spectacular.

And the green beans were better.

They were sauteed in olive oil with chopped garlic and chives on them, and they were wonderful. The beans themselves were barely cooked, retaining the crisp freshness of a blanching but softened just enough by the sauteing, and the flavors while simple were gorgeous. The Girl and I both agreed that we could make a meal out of the green beans themselves.

The side dishes will be earning our first perfect score thus far in the rankings.

crème brûlée in its apparently native habitat with a mint sprig and raspberries
Dessert tempted us both, and we went for the crème brûlée which was served in an attractively flared, almost trapezoidal dish and with soup spoons for each us.

The crème brûlée at Embers was too runny by half, but this one had an excellent consistency, custardy and rich. The crust atop was dark and bordering slightly on burnt in the center, but the contrast with the rich crème beneath stood up well. We would have appreciated more appropriate dessert spoons - smaller, more pointed - because the larger round soup spoons that we were given, particularly because of the corners in the dish, but that isn't a reflection upon the chef's creation.

The meal - with a single Manhattan for The Girl - came in at $120 plus tip, so I'll be ranking it at $114, the bill without anything from the bar. As I wrote earlier, we expected much worse on the pecuniary spectrum.

So, let's turn to the numbers and see if Embers has been displaced:

• Appetizers/Dessert - 8 - The crème brûlée was very good.
• Steak - 8 - Excellent steaks but not the best in town.
• Side dishes - 10 - Simply put, perfection. With the salads included here - there's no pure salad category - I'll drop them by half a point because the salads weren't perfection, just excellence.
• Atmosphere - 7 - The Girl would've given the place a nine, but she's into more "interesting" decors. I like a slightly more contemporary touch and didn't enjoy sitting with the freakish artwork.
• Cost - 4 - A few dollars cheaper than Embers but not by much. And The Parents deserve major thanks for funding this visit with a Christmas gift of $100 gift card to any of the Jeff Ruby establishments.
• Service - 8 - Mark was friendly but not overly so. The Ted Green scale scored highly as my water glass was never empty or even a third so. Our waiter was noticeably absent for a fair portion of the meal, but there were enough other wait staff around that had we needed anything, we certainly could have gotten it.
• Total score - 44.5 (out of 60)

Barely behind Embers, about where I would have guessed. I was assuming it would come in slightly lower - maybe a point or two.

Summarizing things so far...

• Embers - 45 (of 60)
• Carlo & Johnny's - 44.5
• Mitchell's - 44.5
• Oakwood Club - 40
• Pine Club - 37.5
• Guenther's - 30

The numerical rankings fall right about where we expected things to fall.

My overall feeling - supported by The Girl in discussions after the meal - is that I prefer Embers as a restaurant, and the perfect meal might be the Embers steaks with the Carlo & Johnny's side dishes. Perfection has not yet been achieved.

We steakishly live on...