The latest in interactive engagement of the customer - build more flavor into your meal.  It looks a little like an an experiment rather than a dining experience.  But, as Faith Popcorn predicted, people will migrate to anything “custom.” LH

Geschmackslabor, German for Flavour Lab, is a new restaurant located in a former school in Bremerhaven. The ‘lab’ part of the name doesn’t refer to molecular gastronomy or food served in test tubes. Experimentation at the restaurant is all about letting customers add flavour to their meals.

Dishes are served ready-to-eat, but diners are encouraged to enhance them by adding one or more of twenty custom-made seasoning oils that Geschmackslabor has on offer. The seasonings are all based on very pure olive oil, which is infused with flavours ranging from Arabica coffee and rosemary to papaya and coconut. Geschmackslabor’s menu suggests which seasonings go well with which dishes, but the whole point is for customers to experiment and find their own delicious combinations. The restaurant supplies plenty of bread for trying out different oils before adding them to food, allowing customers to sample a full range of spicy, sour, salty, sweet and bitter. The oils are also sold separately at EUR 4.90-5.50 for 100 ml.

Adding olive oil to prepared food may not appeal to every consumer, but Geschmackslabor’s DIY approach to ‘finishing’ a dish definitely adds a new level of experience to eating out. It’s an adventurous, taste-focused alternative to the usual ketchups and hot sauces, and should appeal to those daring consumers that our sister-site trendwatching.com calls trysumers. If you’re in the restaurant biz, this is one to experiment with! http://www.geschmackslabor.com/

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Discover, Savor & Taste Some of the Finest Chocolatiers & Confectioners in North America.

The first annual Chicago Luxury Chocolate Salon will be held on September 7th from 11 am to 5 pm.

Anyone who is a chocolate lover will be happy to experience some of the finest in artisan, gourmet and premium chocolate.

Featured “chocolatiers” include Ghiradelli, Chocolate Company, The Chocolate Traveler, Diving Chocolate USA, Katherine Ann Confections, Coco Delice Fine Chocolates and many more.

I’ll be there on the tasting panel (would you say no to this opportunity?).  I am ready and willing to lend my palate!

For more information go to http://www.chicagochocolatesalon.com/

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Due to the state of the economy, I’ll be posting good discounts or deals to help those who want to obtain a value when they dine out.  In the month of September, Sweet Baby Ray’s helps familys with kids and anyone who enjoys ribs.  LH 

800 E. Higgins Rd.
Elk Grove Village, Ill.
(847) 437-9555
Kids Eat Free on Tuesday
On Tuesday nights at Sweet Baby Ray’s in Elk Grove, kids ages 12 and under receive a complimentary children’s meal with the purchase of one regularly priced adult entrée. This offer is available each Tuesday after 5 p.m. This deal sounds just as good as the Sweet Baby Ray’s Cherry Rum-a-Nades ($5), a very-adult drink special, made with muddled Maraschino cherries, Lemonade, Black Cherry rum and a splash of Sprite. The Cherry Rum-a-Nade is offered as a Tuesday drink special throughout the month of September.

Wednesday Night All You Can Eat Ribs
The Sweet Baby Ray’s team is so proud of their first prize Best Ribs win at Naperville 2008 Ribfest that they can’t help but share the good fortune with their customers. Every Wednesday, the All You Can Eat Baby Back Ribs ($16.99 per person) packs the fans in, and the Sweet Baby Ray’s Barbecue Restaurant Sangrias ($5) keep the customers thirsting for more.

Smoked Prime Rib Dinner Weekend Special
Every Friday and Saturday evening, Sweet Baby Ray’s Barbecue Restaurant features a Smoked Prime Rib Dinner, complete with favorite side dishes ($18.99 per person).

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The most remarkable thing about my mother is that for thirty years she served the family nothing but leftovers. The original meal has never been found. Calvin Trillin

I had some business near Portland a few weeks ago, so I got in touch with an old friend who lives in Vancouver.  We spent the weekend tooling around and I requested that we make the 2 hour trip to the Oregon coast.

My friend Rebecca had discovered a quaint little eatery right on the way to the shore that’s become her favorite: 42^nd Street Café in Seaview, Washington. 

Chef/owner Cheri Walker has an eclectic background - she’s played in several symphonies, is honored for her culinary skills, and for relaxation she rides her horse London Fog.

Cheri has created just the kind of café Calvin Trillin would love. 

Everywhere we ate in the Oregon/Washington area stuffed me with “really good” seafood.  When I reached 42^nd Street, I let Rebecca slide down the famous oysters, and eyed choices from the Roadhouse menu like “eight hour pot roast, mashed potatoes and brown gravy (served with a salad, baked bread, marionberry conserve and corn relish.  A featured entrée: New Orleans style Muffaletta Penne Pasta.  How bad can that be?

Care for some of those seafood tidbits: fried razor clams breaded with flour, buttermilk and crushed saltine crackers served with parsley caper mayo on the side!

For dessert, try French Cream infused with lavender and topped with raspberries tossed in rose water, and cinnamon!

I could not help describing all of those dishes - please leave your computer now and go there!

I loved the tomato soup with blue cheese (recipe shared below).  I absolutely will make this.  Don’t you love when a recipe has surprise ingredients that you would never think of that bring up a subtle flavor?  For me, in this dish, it was the brandy and brown sugar.  None of that was overt, but truly present is the quietest of ways.

If you are ever anywhere near Seaview, set the GPS for the 42^nd St Café.

360.642.2323
42nd Street Café
4201 Pacific Way • Seaview, WA 98644

http://www.42ndstreetcafe.com/

Cream of Tomato and Blue Cheese Soup
Makes 8 cups

• 2 tbsp tomato paste
• 1 ea 29-oz can tomato sauce
• 1 tbsp dill weed
• 1/2 c brandy
• 1/4 c brown sugar or anise syrup
• 2 tsp chicken base with 2 c water <OR> 2 c chicken stock
• 2 c heavy cream
• 1 c blue cheese crumbles
• 1/4 tsp white pepper

1. Combine all of the ingredients except the blue cheese and white pepper and bring up to a boil. Turn to a simmer and cook for 15 minutes to cook off the alcohol in the brandy.
2. Add the blue cheese crumbles and stir until dissolved. Add the white pepper to taste and serve with hazelnut croutons.

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The other day I stumbled upon Dave’s post below (www.czmarketing.com) about which is more important - good food or good service.  I pondered and came to my own succinct conclusion.  GREAT FOOD IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN GREAT SERVICE. Bad service is very annoying, and can even cause anger.  Anger is the certain emotion if the food NEVER comes (in that one case, service would be more important).  I could withstand fairly lousy service (although I really do covet service).  But to withstand lousy food, well I’ll just say no to that! LH

 ”The owner is Greek, the restaurant is Italian. And it serves the best Chicago-style stuffed pizza in the Chicago area.

That’s saying something, given that there’s a pizza joint on the four corners of every major intersection. This restaurant is not a franchise. Not a carry-out-only place. And while it serves other Italian food - I don’t know that for sure, since I’ve eaten only the pizza.

To beat the rush weekend evenings, we order in. That is, my wife or I call about 40 minutes ahead and place our order. We arrive with our three kids, two of which head to a playroom with video games and other toys.

We put our name in with the host, who most often is the grumpy, squatty gray-haired owner-grandma. She barely looks up when you walk up to the podium that she peers over to take your name. We remind her that we’ve already ordered. I don’t think she smiles. She plays no favorites.

The service is slow, the waiters and waitresses are never around when you want another drink. You wait for your check. You wait for the box to take home the leftover pizza. It’s the place to go if you want to test your patience.

In short the restaurant violates pretty much every marketing principle of the last quarter century.

Yet, I suspect that the owners fit the profile of the rich folks in the best-selling book, The Millionaire Next Door. The restaurant mints gold, the pizza is gold.

So I wonder what there is to take away from their success, and the only thing I can think of is this: Great pizza trumps great service. That is, if your product is really, really good, then your service can be average.

That doesn’t sound right to me, but I’m stumped.  Thoughts?”

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Chaniga Vorasarun from www.forbes.com wrote this post about celebrity chefs.  For me, it defies logic that many of these chefs are making “so little” in the context of “all things celebrity.” I really want to know how one accounts for their incomes.  With all of the books, products, restaurants that they own…how can Mario only bring in $3 million? LH

 Mario

10.  Anthony Bourdain with $1.5 million

9.    Bobbly Flay with $1.5 million

8.    Tom Colicchio with $2 million

7.     Mario Batali with $3 million

6.     Paula Dean with $4.5 million

5.     Alain Ducasse with $5 million

4.     Nobuyuki Matsuhisa with $5 Million

3.     Gordon Ramsey with $7.5 million

2.     Wolfgang Puck with $16 million

1.     Rachael Ray with $18 million

  Rachael

Here’s the article

Say what you will about Rachael Ray, but the jaunty chef-next-door knows how to build a brand.

She began winning audiences with catch phrases like “EVOO” (for extra-virgin olive oil) on her first Food Network show, 30 Minute Meals, in 2001. Today, she has four Food Network programs, including Tasty Travels and $40 a Day. Her nationally syndicated, Oprah-backed talk show, Rachael Ray, is averaging 2.6 million viewers this season, and her Every Day With Rachael Ray magazine has 1.5 million readers. She endorses Dunkin’ Donuts too–all to the tune of $18 million a year.

More established chefs also know how to play her game. Wolfgang Puck pulls in $16 million a year. The Austrian-born patriarch of celebrity chefdom got his start with the ritzy Los Angeles restaurant Spago in 1982. That hot spot, once frequented by Orson Welles and Sidney Poitier, now counts Brad Pitt and Jamie Foxx among its regulars. Today Puck owns 15 other fine-dining brands, including Chinois, Cut and the Source, and he also sells sandwiches to weary airport travelers at Wolfgang Puck Express. He’s got Wolfgang Puck Bistros in suburbia and sells soups in the grocery aisle and cutlery on the Home Shopping Network.

In Depth: Top-Earning Celebrity Chefs

Others of their sort include Paula Deen ($4.5 million), Alain Ducasse ($5 million) and Mario Batali ($3 million).

Ducasse’s empire includes 22 restaurants from Tokyo to Paris. The French chef’s first New York spot shuttered in 2006 after critics said the food was too fussy; he opened two humbler joints there this year.

Deen, the queen of Southern cuisine, serves up butter-drenched casseroles and motherly charm on two Food Network shows. Her loyal audience laps it up, and her cookbooks, memoir and magazine are all bestsellers.

And Batali, a culinary school dropout, is now a master of Italian cuisine who owns 13 restaurants in New York, Los Angeles and Las Vegas. Reservations at his New York spots Babbo and Del Posto are especially hard to get.

Small-Screen Standouts
Branded television shows play a big role in the success of many of the chefs on our list.

Anthony Bourdain’s Travel Channel show, No Reservations, where he explores delights like roasted warthog rectum, has become the network’s top hit. The Food Network’s female fans swoon over Bobby Flay’s Southwestern cooking. He hosts Throwdown!, Boy Meets Grill and The Next Food Network Star. And Tom Colicchio is a judge on Bravo’s Top Chef cooking competition.

But none can beat Ray’s network gig. Her 2.6 million viewers undoubtedly think it’s Yum-O.

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Erba did not get the web site done…

Erba on North Lincoln will be closing in September.  This rustic Italian Eatery was a nice compliment to the offerings in Lincoln Square.

The owners plan to open a new restaurant in the spact featuring American cuisine. We will let you know “what’s next.”  Certainly the economy has really affected many restaurants.  

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 Photo courtesy of Steve Johnson

Geno Bahena (formerly of Frontera Grill, Chilpancingo and Ixcapuzalco) has opened Real Tenochtitlan in Logan Square. Geno is known for high end “authentic” dishes and specializes in Mole sauces.   He offers all seven of the classic moles from the Oaxaca region of Mexico.

Currently the restaurant is BYOB; they are working on the liquor license.

Chef Bahena is conducting cooking classes throughout each month - information is posted on their website.

Real Tenochtitlan

2451 N. Milwaukee Ave

773-277-1050

www.realtenochtitlan.com

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A few weeks ago, I was asked to attend a tasting of gluten free baking products at Deerfield’s Bakery in Schaumburg.

The personal story behind this is that I have a wheat allergy (although not severe), so I’ve been working on watching my intake.  Of course, as a carb lover, it’s not so easy!

Deerfield’s resident baker - Lisa Albertson, has created an incredible line of products - including 16 types of gluten free cookies, coffeecakes, brownies, cheesecake and mini chocolate cupcakes. Honestly, upon tasting these treats, you would have no idea that you were eating gluten free baked goods.

I also sampled some “sourdough” like rolls served with hummus that had great texture. It is difficult to keep any moisture in a gluten free product. Traditional gluten free products are extremely “leaden” and dense in texture, and often taste flat.

Several people attended who have celiac disease, a life long autoimmune intestinal disorder which is highly toxic.  Those with celiac disease cannot eat wheat products in any form.  For more insight into celiac disease, contact the Celiac Disease Foundation at http://www.celiac.org/.

We toured the “gluten free” bakery - kept entirely separate from the other bakery in order to ensue no traditional wheat based products contaminate the area.  There were a few children on the tour who have celiac’s disease.  To see how amazingly happy these girls were to feast on such flavorful baked goods - was very special.  Along the way I met Carol Praxmarer of Palatine.  She has two daughters with Celiacs disease. “Deerfield’s is a very unique bakery featuring high quality baked goods, which are very difficult to find. They are unsurpassed in the market.”

Deerfield’s Bakery has three locations that sell gluten free products: Schaumburg, Deerfield and Buffalo Grove.

For more info, feel free to visit their website: http://www.deerfieldsglutenfree.com/ or their blog: http://gluten-freebaker.blogspot.com/.

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  Dirty Dancing…different from Dirty Dining…

This is not what you may think it is!  The Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) has compiled this list. The CSPI ranking considers how often city inspectors found five major health hazards and five less critical concerns in 30 high-end, medium-range, and fast-food eateries in each city.  Chicago is in pretty good shape here.

• Austin, Texas: 58 violations in 30 restaurants  
• Boston: 63 violations in 30 restaurants
• Milwaukee, 27 violations in 20 restaurants
• Colorado Springs, Colo.: 46 violations in 30 restaurants
• Kansas City, Mo.: 41 violations in 30 restaurants
• Pittsburgh: 40 violations in 30 restaurants
• Denver: 35 violations in 30 restaurants
• Las Vegas: 30 violations in 25 restaurants
• Washington, D.C.: 27 violations in 25 restaurants
• New York: 32 violations in 30 restaurants
• Atlanta: 19 violations in 20 restaurants
• Portland: 25 violations in 27 restaurants
• Baltimore: 14 violations in 14 restaurants
• Minneapolis, Minn.: 31 violations in 29 restaurants
• Chicago: 22 violations in 30 restaurants
• St. Louis: 17 violations in 27 restaurants
• Seattle: 16 violations in 30 restaurants
• Philadelphia: 16 violations in 23 restaurants
• San Francisco: 15 violations in 30 restaurants
• Tucson, Ariz.: 14 violations in 29 restaurants

For more insight, readers can go to: http://www.healthyandfitmagazine.com/2008/08/cities-ranked-by-dirty-restaurants/

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