62 Main - Review

For our big, fancy, dinner celebrating our anniversary, we went to 62 Main, in the heart of downtown Colleyville (or what is supposed to be downtown.) It's just down the street from City Hall and the library in a shopping area similar to Soutlake's Town Center.

The restaurant is small, seating only 62 people (ha). Layout is very cozy and has clean lines. We had reservations and throughout most of our time there every table was occupied.

The menu is fairly short, about 4 choices each in the starters, salads, and entrees sections. For starters, I had the jumbo lump crab cake with a tangy tartar sauce. It was so tender and almost entirely crab, with barely enough other stuff to hold it together. Just the way I like it. Hubby had a wood-grilled shrimp with a smoky roasted red pepper sauce. It was really good. They have a wood-burning oven and let you know what the "wood of the day" is on their board. That day it was a Texas oak.

My entree was a pork belly with some kind of pureed turnip mixture. I didn't look at the menu closely enough to remember what it was. It was good - what little I got. One whole section of my pork was all fat. On top was a prune and morel sauce. I loved the prunes and the sweetness of the sauce, but forgot it had morels. Ugh, I hate mushrooms. I bit right into a morel thinking it was a prune and gagged. Hubby had the fish of the day which was halibut. It came with a tiny little polenta bite and some sort of sauce. He wasn't overly enthusiastic about it. He especially didn't like the ramps that came with it that were long and stringy and hard to eat.

There were selections on the menu which included polenta, gnocchi, and a warm chocolate cake - all things I had made recently. It was pretty funny. To steer away from that, our choices were either creme brulee or the cobble of the day. We chose the rhubarb and raspberry cobbler, mainly because I'd never had rhubarb before. It was pretty good, helped mainly by the ice cream on top. I was kind of disappointed I couldn't pick out the rhubarb. It became a reddish sweet mush with no discernible fruits.

The service was excellent. The only wine we had was one glass of sauvignon blanc, which I don't normally drink, but I thought it was nice with the crab. By the time the entree came around I wasn't feeling like another glass of wine. I'm not sure we'd go back. I would, but hubby thought it was too expensive for what was there. Especiall since I can (and did) make half the menu recently!

Vacation, Had to Get Away

This past weekend we took a little trip outside the Metroplex to celebrate our impending 1-year anniversary of bondage, er I mean marriage. We drove out to Granbury, which is only about an hour away, and spent one night. It turned out to be a culinary adventure as well as a good time away.

We stayed at the Inn on Lake Granbury in a room with a beautiful view of the lake. The room was huge and cozy with a 4-poster bed. It also satisfied our technological wishes, with a VCR/DVD player and Wi-Fi access. Breakfast was tasty, if a bit on the splurge side. Tasty snacks and wine were out in the afternoon for some post-sunbathing by the pool noshing. We were pooped from having been out in the rather warm countryside touring some fine wineries.

First stop was Bluff Dale Vineyards, just outside of Granbury. They had quite a selection of both reds and whites. Grapes are grown in west Texas in the higher elevations near Lubbock. We tasted all but the Merlot (which had been exhausted the previous weekend), even the port and cream sherry. We surprised ourselves and bought a bottle of the Chardonnay - mainly because it didn't taste like normal Chardonnay. We couldn't help but buy some of the port (not their production) which we predicted would be quite tasty over ice cream.

On down the road a bit towards Granbury, we stopped in at the Barking Rocks Winery. What a charming place and what a great guy running it! Tiberia, the vintner, works the whole operation. We loved Cellar, his friendly dog as well. We tried all the reds and whites, and even his newest venture, the Viognier grape. He so kindly let us have some of the new vintage unfiltered and raw. Then he led us into the fermentation room and had some of his Sangiovese that has yet to be bottled. It was fabulous. Here we purchased his Casena - a Bordeaux blend of Cabernet Franc and Cabernet Sauvignon and a very easygoing entry-level 2002 Cab. We had the Casena with Easter dinner the next day. Tasty! Tiberia occasionally hosts dinner and wine pairing events. They sound just awesome. He is the one who gave us the tip on our dinner that night.

We toured the downtown square a bit - but only found anything interesting in a foodie shop - go figure. (drunken spatula shopping!) We then retired to our lovely air-conditioned room at the Inn and had some of the afternoon libations. Well I stuck to water and hubby had the Dr Pepper, vintage 2005. But the cheese and crackers and hummus were mighty tasty.

Later that night we drove back out to Bluff Dale for dinner at a place called "Let's Eat". As you can see from the picture, it was a small...ahem, quaint...place. The vehicle out front was the standard mode of transportation.



We had been so worried about how we looked that we changed clothes, only to find that we were grossly overdressed. I wish Tiberia had let us know a little more about what to expect. This has absolutely NOTHING to do with the chef, Curren Dodds, or the fabulous meal we had there. It was a very short menu but I quickly gleaned that you could get lots of grub that wasn't on the menu if you asked and Curren had it. They ran out of 2 specials while we there, that's how popular the place is, even if it seats 35 people as a high estimate. Hubby had the New York Strip on corn hash and I had the grilled pork chops with savory bread pudding and green beans in a bourbon sauce. They were both great, and about 1/3 less than you'd pay at any place in the Metroplex. The Strip was huge! I started my meal with some butternut squash soup that was good, but too salty. The savory bread pudding was great but hard to figure out what was in it as it disintegrated under the chops and into the sauce. The bourbon sauce was perfect with the chops, with apple juice as the perfect sweetness. I thought hubby's hash had too much rosemary but he enjoyed all of it. I couldn't even finish my entree so we decided not to have the apple pie a la mode that was dessert that night.

We went home fat and happy, only to eat MORE on Easter Sunday.

Let's Eat
Bluff Dale, Texas
254-728-3635

Date Night

A couple weeks ago I took a cooking class at the local Market Street grocery. It was entitled "Date Night Food". Now I *thought* it was all about how to make tasty romantic dishes you would serve to your loved ones on, well, Date Night. It quickly appeared that it was actually a Date Night with you and your loved one to go out and cook. I took it with some friends of mine, a couple, so I consoled myself with knowing people in the class. Nevermind that the receptionist called to let me know I wasn't the only "dateless" one in the class that night...

I usually take hands-on classes because most of the demonstration classes drone on into a list of a recipe and the steps to assemble it. I can do that on my own! But this was a hands-on, and it caught my eye because one of the dishes was gnocchi, and I LOVE gnocchi, but have never made it myself. The rest of the dishes that evening were roasted asparagus, quinoa pilaf, roast duck breast, and a souffle for dessert. Wasn't too thrilled with the duck breast, but I sure as hadn't ever made that myself so what the hey?

I picked an assembly station for a dish that was foreign to me - the quinoa pilaf. Step one involved rendering a lot of bacon in a hot pan. Step two was adding butter. So as people came over to inquire about my process I got to say "well it was fat...then we added some more fat..." It really did look like a LOT of fat for that dish, but it came out really nicely. It made a heck of a lot of pilaf so per serving there was probably not a lot of fat content. Still, if I made it at home I'd pour most of the fat off after rendering, or skip the bacon altogether, or go for turkey bacon. There were onions, and chicken broth, and spices and what not, and the quinoa gets almost translucent when done.

Everybody got a turn at making the gnocchi. The chef/instructor had already riced the potatoes, but unfortunately, they were still warm. The gnocchi were very soft and soaked up a lot of flour and were hard to handle. Would have been much better if they had been able to cool. Still, they cooked up very nicely, quite light. The sauce was really good, mainly because it had a lot of cream. But it didn't make you feel heavy at all. Most of that I'm sure was due to the small portion we got, but hey, I'm not saying eat creamy pasta sauces every day. I'll definitely try this recipe out, but I need to get a ricer or food mill first. You can't mash up the potatoes or they'll be too gummy. You need something to break them up and keep it light.

Roasted asparagus...well I make that at home all the time. I don't really remember the salad either. I actually ate a lot of my duck breast. The fat rendered nicely and it didn't taste at all gamey.

I don't remember much about the souffle either, except that it was tasty and gone in a flash. The strawberry sauce was really good, basically just strawberries cooked down with some sugar and strained.

I don't know that I'll take another class there. There were too many dishes to prepare in such a short time and too many people for my taste. There was a lot of standing around. I much prefer the Sur la Table classes I've taken with fewer students. Specifically, knife skills and the pasta class were TREMENDOUS. I've made so much fresh pasta since then.

Chocolate Class

You may have noticed a name over there - a link - named David Lebovitz. He has an awesome Paris-based blog about all things food. He's also a chef and cookbook author, namely, of a book entitled The Great Book of Chocolate. I am so fortunate to have found out he's teaching chocolate classes at Central Market. The description sounds absolutely scrumptious. I'll be there, notebook in hand, apron on, and appetite whetted...