First (Well...Second) Visit: Gusto!

The school year was winding down and one day we just needed to go out for a tapas and wine wind-down after work. Since I get off at 3:30, and my friend, a teacher, gets off at 4, it's a good time of day to hit a restaurant that will most likely be crowded a little later. We chose Gusto! in Ballantyne.

Bruschetta Barcelona-kale pesto, goat cheese, garbanzos, and tomatoes

My friend is not a fan of goat cheese, but she's willing to give things a try. I didn't push her. She kind of pushed it herself. I love all things goat cheese and she was willing to try it again, thinking she may not have had good applications. This was an excellent appetizer, and she definitely came over to the goat side. 

Let me say here that the most memorable part of this experience at Gusto! was NOT the food. It was the service. Actually no...not the service...which was excellent. It was the server himself. He brought the food, suggested the wine, gave us good ideas on the apps. All that was good. BUT HE WAS ANNOYING. He was a pure salesman. And it was not about what we were ordering. It was about what we were NOT ordering. Namely, the pasta. 

Gusto! prides itself on their house-made pasta. Every noodle, every sheet, rolled out by hand. The dough made from the finest semolina flour. "Have you tried it?" he asked. "Yes, I have," I said. "But today we are here for light appetizers and drinks. Thank you." 

He was relentless. 

Seared tuna crusted with sesame seeds. I am just now realizing the menu says there is avocado. Maybe they were out that day? No matter, because this was absolutely ravishing. It was all I could do stop myself from pulling the entire plate of tuna to my side of the table!

This was my second visit. I visited Gusto! one Saturday morning with another friend and we had an early lunch. My companion that day had a pasta dish. I don't remember what I had. We tasted each other's. Yes, the house made pasta is good. So is Oggi's. And so, for that matter, is mine. 

Stuffed zucchini with roasted veggies and orange almond sauce

We ordered our apps all at the same time, but they came in a succession. Which was fine. He paced them rather well. We were not quite done with the first when the tuna arrived, and then the third arrived as we were savoring the tuna. I thought it was cool, how he did that. I thought, "This is nice. Sort of a progression." But the problem is that, each time he came back to the table he would try again to get us to order a pasta entree. More rhapsodizing about their pasta. 

I was getting more and more dismissive. My friend was backing me up, but not quite as vocal. When he said, "Have you had homemade pasta before?" I said, "Yes." She said, "She makes it." He said, "Oh, but the semolina flour..." I cut him off and told him "I KNOW". 

As we wound down our visit, my friend looked at me and said, "Would you come back here again?" And I honestly can say I don't know. The food was delicious. Fresh and light. The wine was good, the time of day was wonderful for a sit-down after work. 

Maybe I should drink a glass before I go. Then maybe the hard-sales waiter might not bother me so much. 

First Visit: Sabor Latin Street Grill

We need to go back to Sabor. This food was good, but I think I made a mistake with my choice. I should have just had tacos. Instead I ordered Dominican Nachos and, while it tasted good, it really turned out to not be what I wanted. 

Sabor Latin Street Grill in the Elizabeth neighborhood, is very close to the Grady Cole Center, where we see the Charlotte Roller Girls. We love to eat in Elizabeth or Plaza Midwood after the bout. It also turns out that Saturday night around 7 or so, parking around Sabor kind of opens up a bit, and there are no long lines at the counter. There was a steady stream of customers, but they were not slammed.

We liked how approachable the staff are. They were patient with the people in front of us, who asked several questions about the menu. Even the bus people were friendly and eager and to help us be comfortable. 

Bob had an empanada and a ground beef taco. The empanada was huge, so he felt like he had plenty to eat. 

I had the Dominican Nachos. The nachos were well seasoned and there was a LOT. It didn't help that the nachos were made on yucca fries, rather than chips. The fries were large wedges. There was a ton of wonderfully seasoned chicken layered next, and then all the toppings...cabbage, onions, salsa, cotija cheese and rosada sauce. It was all very flavorful. Just too much food. And I think the yucca wedges added a sorty of mealy texture that I didn't really love. I think if I made something like myself, I'd make yucca chips, crisply fried, and serve them on the side. 

I think we'll try it again.

First Visit: Brazwell's Pub-Ballantyne (Veggie Burger Quest)

This is a clear winner in my quest for the ultimate veggie burger. Not THE winner...there will be many winners...such as Emma's of Salisbury, Bang Bang Burger, and The Cafe @ Williams Hardware. Today I was pleased to find a fantastic, house made black bean burger just a short distance (albeit long drive, with Ballantyne traffic) from my house.

I heard about Brazwell's Pub last week, when a former student stopped in at school to pick up a transcript. He said he's one of the chef's at this pub in Ballantyne. His story is like many great chefs: he started as a dishwasher and his boss found he had talent in the kitchen. This was not news to his Foods teacher at school. 

This loosely formed(which, to me, proves it's house made, and not full of fillers and commercial additives, like this place), well-seasoned black bean mixture overflows a wonderful bun that has been lightly toasted to a pleasing crunch. It's topped with melted pepperjack cheese, sour cream, slices of avocado, a pretty decent tomato slice, lettuce and red onion. Even the red onion won me over. Often people serve too much red onion on their salads and sandwiches, causing them to overwhelm (and maybe mask?) flavor, dry your mouth out, and cause you to burp onion for the rest of the day. This one had two slices of onion. I still took off one, but I wasn't shoveling ring after ring to the side of my plate. 

And the FRIES! They were well-salted and had a couple other seasonings on them. They were slightly wilted, but forgivable. These are the fries that come with the sandwich and I can't imagine wanting to pay more to take them off and sub for something else. 

As a side note: that beer is Old Mecklenburg Brewery's Hornet's Nest. It's the brew in season right now, and it's very delicious.

Back to the food: both my lunch companions had the black and blue burger and loved it. The Friday special was fish & Chips and I'll probably have to go back for that. They are often my bar food of choice.

First Visit: JJ's Red Hots

This review might surprise you for two reasons. Actually, maybe three:

1. What am I doing at a hot dog joint?

2. Why would I say "meh" about a place that is a Charlotte favorite?

3. Why am I saying I'll try it again?

 

Ok. I went to the hot dog joint because I live with two people who will eat meat, no matter where it came from. Do they discriminate between "humanely-raised" meat and other? No. Do they love ground meat with seasonings and anything else that might get swept up from the floor? Yes. But also, I'd heard so much about JJ's and how great it is, and that they have a veggie dog that even non-vegetarians would eat. So why not?

On to the "meh" part:

First of all, I pretty much think the joint is inappropriately named. I really should be "JJ's Hot Dog Fixin' Joint." Because, based upon my veggie dog and the guys' meat dogs, I'd have to say the hot dog is really just a filler. They have several choices on their menu for how you want your dog decorated, and it's clear that it's pretty much all about that. In the case of our dogs, it's all about mustard. Ballpark mustard, actually. We all ordered the first item on the menu, the JJ's "No. 1 Red Hot." To me, it makes sense to order that item because it seems that's where this whole venture of theirs probably started. They use Sahlen's Hot Dogs, which I've never heard of before. 

When I visited the Sahlen's website, I found that this company has been around since 1869, and they boast about their "signature smokehouse flavor."  What we got was mustard. Mustard and mustard and mustard. The guys were not impressed with the smoky flavor of their hot dogs (they didn't detect any), and I'm still not sure what the veggie dog actually tasted like. 

Now, I am a lover a mustard. Don't get me wrong. In fact, I've been known to snarf down 2 or 3 Hormel Wrangler or Nathan's hot dogs with nothing but ballpark mustard on them. But those dogs are fatty and have a robust flavor and texture and snappy skin that can hold up to a nice, thick line of mustard. These dogs couldn't cut it. They are meant for a finer hand, I think. 

I'll try it again. I'm not sure when and I'm not sure what I'll have. I don't know if I'll throw out my questions about the sources of the meat and just eat a meat dog or sausage, or if I'll try the veggie dog again but with different fixin's. I will try it again because hundreds (maybe thousands) of people can't be wrong. I'm willing to guess that we just chose the wrong dogs. 

Oh. And we like the hot dog with the roasting fork. Cute.

First Visit: Bang Bang Burgers

This, my friends, is how you do a black bean burger:

This is a quinoa black bean burger, from Bang Bang Burger. This sandwich respects the black bean burger and those who choose to eat them. This creation has a crisp crust, flavorful mixture, and is topped with delicious condiments. There were crunchy pickles, a chipotle ranch dressing, and some mo' jack cheese on a wonderfully toasted bun. The accompanying fries were crisp and generous. 

Mensa Boy had a Bang Bang Burger, which was a standard burger with lettuce, tomatoes and onion and their special Bangburger sauce. Burgers come in single patty or double patty sizes. He had the single and felt it was plenty. I've seen a couple people comment online that it's expensive, but I don't think so. For $10 you get a meal that is high quality. thoughtful, and filling.

I don't know what is in their Bangburger sauce. Their website doesn't go into that. We thought it tasted a bit like a zipped-up Thousand Island sauce. I dipped my fries into Bob's. The restaurant is a counter-ordering place, but they bring your food to the table. The offer a nice selection of craft beers, many of them local. We were there on a Saturday night around 7 and it was steady busy but not crowded. It's located in the cool Elizabeth neighborhood. I could see it being a neighborhood place. There were no TVs up playing sports, I think. I don't remember, so that tells you it's not an obvious attraction if there are any. 

The restaurant is about 5 minutes from the Grady Cole Center. With the close proximity to the Charlotte Roller Girls, and the wonderful food, I'm sure we'll be back. 

First Visit: Hobo's

 Hobo's is a tavern in downtown Fort Mill. It's been open for a while now, but I kept getting information from friends about slow service and uneven food quality. I hadn't heard anything for a while now, so when a group of friends from school wanted to go out after work, I was ready.

I'm always looking for a good bean burger, and they have a house made one on their menu. It's an impressive-looking sandwich on great bread. There is a slice of avocado and tomato on top, as well as some bean sprouts. To be honest, I'm not sure why people feel they must put avocado on a black bean burger. It really doesn't add anything most of the time. If you have a great-tasting patty, it's going to pop with flavor and really nothing you put on top is going to be necessary, unless you add some crisp lettuce for crunch. 

That said, this was not a great-tasting patty. Actually, this patty didn't have much flavor at all. It wasn't terrible, but it really had so much potential for being great. It just was kind of..."there." And it was huge. It seemed almost as if they had some black beans and glued them together with more smashed beans and then shaped a huge patty with the mixture. I'd estimate that the patty was over 1.5 cups in size. I brought half of it home. If they had put a little thought into the patty, such as maybe some garlic, some cilantro...really any kind of aromatic...and then cut the size down by at least a third, maybe a half...they could have had something really good there. Also, a good black bean patty should have a little crispness to it. This did not. Will I have it again? No. But it won't kill anyone. 

The fries were another thing, too. I didn't capture many of them in this shot, but the few that you can see tell the story. They were a bit greasy, not terribly hot, and I think I had the bottom of the batch. I had a lot of little ends and shards in mine. One of the other people at my table had house-made chips and they looked fantastic. I'd definitely go for that next time. I might also try their grown-up grilled cheese next time. The only other vegetarian sandwich option is a portabello mushroom burger. Those have been done to death in the vegetarian world, and most of the time not done well. I have little reason to believe Hobo's would do them any better. I often eat fish when I go to taverns, and a friend of mine says their grouper bites are good, so I might try that or their fish sandwich. 

So yes, I'll probably go back. But it will be because our group would like to go out again and it's a convenient location. I doubt I'd take my guys there or invite friends to go. 

Two Restaurants to Try

I'm excited about two restaurants I want to try.

The first is Fern Flavors from the Garden, which is a VEGETARIAN restaurant that has opened in Charlotte! FINALLY! Their website is not built yet, but they do have a Facebook page and they have good status updates on there. Helen Schwab of the Charlotte Observer reviewed them recently here and here. They've only been open a short time. I'm not sure when we'll try them, but I know we will.

The other restaurant is Erin's Restaurant in Rock Hill. They are not vegetarian per se, but they will cater to you if you tell them you are vegetarian or vegan. However, since I have been adding the occasional fish to my meal, I have a feeling I'll feel compelled to try the Shrimp & Grits they are mentioning on their Facebook page this weekend.

So I'm excited. But we're not going to rush out this weekend. Too much other stuff going on right now. I'll take some pics and write something after I've visited.