Here is an approach to make fine dining more approachable by offering a $14 hotdog. I liked it. The sausage made in house was thick and snappy, like a Superdawg but drier. I liked how the condiments for the dog: mustard, relish, tomato, onion, real sport peppers, were totally separated from the balsamic ketchup for the fries. Chicago kosher. I liked how Gene, our silver fox server, split the sunchoke salad, chicken fried softshell crab and hotdog and we didn’t have to ask. Gene spaced the meal in such a way that I was able to recover between courses, creating a lovely Sunday dinner with Etta.
He impressed right off the bat moving us from the crowded front window dining room full of young families and crying children celebrating Mother’s Day to a table in the quieter and more stately interior dining room beside a roasting marble fireplace. I embarressed myself when I inquired why the header on the dessert menu read, “Sweets & Stinkies,” and he kindly informed me that it’s pastry and cheese. They offer a $26 31 year old cave aged pu-erh tea, a $14 hotdog, amazing service from Gene, and for dessert the cheesecake sundae. It’s grapefruit granita and poprocks over graham cracker crumbles, savory cheese, and huckleberries.
They are selling you a gold-plated dose of gout. Sweet bellyaches. Please come back to L.A. soon – we have new tasty treats, even. On Friday we had masala dosas and lentil donuts and samosas – a fried feast even you would reel from.