I was somewhat surprised to see Miller Union – the restaurant I ate at on Monday in Atlanta – among the nominees for best chef: Southeast from the James Beard Foundation. The place didn’t bowl me over but, again, not sure I selected the right things. The only Iowa nominee was Archie’s Waeside, a steak joint in the out of the way northwest town of LeMars, of Blue Bunny ice cream fame. Who knew? http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/25/dining/the-2015-james-beard-award-nominees.html?smid=nytcore-ipad-share&smprod=nytcore-ipad
Category Archives: THE SOUTH
Centennial Park, Decatur, cakes & ale: Atlanta
Centennial Park
Camellias near MLKings’s birthplace
We didn’t have much free time today (a work day) but when we did, I grabbed it, in part because the weather was gorgeous. And the trees are starting to bud. – pear trees, red buds, camellias, plus daffodils. I took a quick walk to centennial park which I found too vast and spread out. But I followed the street car tracks back to my hotel stopping against at sweet auburn market which didn’t have much in the way of light breakfast options but I did buy an apple turnover at the savory pie place. For dinner tonight four of us piled into a black SUV and drove out to Decatur, which was full of gorgeous old stately homes on vast lots with, yes, flowering trees. The downtown was bustling with restaurants. We had a really good meal at cake & ale (once we found it. We discovered the newspaper article I had about it was from…2012 and the place had since moved. Fortunately not far.) anyway, very good food, fairly simple but with just very fresh ingredients, cleanly served and prepared, with nice flavors.
Filed under Atlanta
MLK Historic sites, sweet auburn market, modern tribe, miller union: exploring Atlanta
Ebenezer BaptistMust say that the last thing I expected to see as I walked along an inner city neighborhood en route to the MLK National Historic site was a story selling “Jewy goods.” Say what? But sure enough, the little shop called Modern Tribe was full of the most clever Judaica (Jewy goods) and with Passover fast approaching, I couldn’t resist the matzohs patterned toilet cover that says “Let My People Go” although I didn’t buy the book “how to raise a Jewish dog” (although I was tempted.)
sweet auburn marketIt was one of several discoveries in the neighborhood, including the Sweet Auburn Market, an old brick building full of fruit vendors and butchers and take out places from afro Caribbean to soul food to arepas. I had an excellent pulled pork sandwich on Texas toast with the best sautéed brussel sprouts, at the BBQ place there.
On to the MLK sites, where I lucked into a last minute ticket on the last tour of the day inside the early 20th century house where MLKing was born and spent his first 11 years. Only 15 people tour the place at a time and is been told the tix were gone for the day (spring break here) but managed to…
Modern tribe.com
MLK Birthplace, Auburn StreetGet a tix when I was inquiring about how to get a ticket tomorrow. We had a terrific tour guy who told all kinds of interesting stories about the young “ML” including that his best friend when he was three was the son of a white family that ran a local business… Until the boys were six and the white boy suddenly announced that they could no longer be friends, his father had decided. That was a formative experience, apparently. The tour guide was blind which made him all the more impressive.
Sitting inside the Ebenezer Baptist Church, with a tape of MLKing giving one of his stirring sermons also packed a punch. I took the new streetcar (still free) over to centennial park but couldn’t quite get a feel for the place. Tonight I had dinner with a nice friend of my aunts at Miller Union. The food didn’t blow me away but not sure I ordered the right thing. Cool place though, kind of industrial chic meets southern porch.
Filed under Atlanta
Bouldin Cafe, Lost luggage…Austin
Also had breakfast with an old friend who grew up in Austin at a friendly hippie dippie place, Bouldin Cafe, in an old house in First Avenue just west of south congress in a neighborhood full of small gentrified houses and new modern homes squished onto lots where other small houses presumably once stood. The neighborhood reminded me of East Nashville, full of interesting activity and creative types. It was a fun neighborhood (albeit a little hilly) to explore by bike. I was dying for something cold to drink when I came upon this funny guy in a giant lemon, really, who was selling “cups of happiness.” And so they were! Cute name for his business too “Austin City Lemons.”
At the Austin airport, I passed a good live band playing on a stage in front of an open air bar that was packed with travelers. Couldn’t get a seat. shades of south by southwest. I foolishly volunteered to check my luggage at the gate (since the plane was so full) and as a result went home from the Des Moines airport without my bag. Thanks American Airlines (it did arrive today).
Filed under Texas
Night out on the town in Austin…c-boys on South Congress
When I was last in Austin, about five years ago, my friend (and Austin social director) Pat took us to The Continental Club which was swinging on Saturday afternoon, full of lively two-steppers dancing to some band or other. This time we went to the sister (brother?) of the Continental Club, C-Boys, a little further south on South Congress. An old grey bearded guy Paul Oscher, who “played with Muddy” (as in Muddy Waters) was on the small stage with about four other musicians, playing a mean blues guitar and a small collection of dancers, including one particularly eccentric heavy set guy doing what looked like early Martha Graham improvisational modern dance. (he and his partner were later seen at a table by the bar molding globs of what appeared to be play dough around their spent beer bottles. No danger of Austin losing its weirdness, it seems.
On the weirdness front, the strangest sight during my bike ride along the river/lake today was a man who as I approached him was indeed completely naked. Except for what could most accurately be described as a penis pouch. Reminded me of Fire Island in the 1970s, when my little sister, then in grade school wrote this short letter home: We went to fire Island. I saw a naked man. love Jill.
The bike ride, by the way, was a great way to see the city and easy pedaling on my borrowed 3 speed from the way nice Hotel San Jose (which for some unknown reason did not charge me for the bike, as advertised; this on top of upgrading me to a suite priced over twice what I was charged.) I was sorely tempted to swim in Barton Springs, a huge spring water fed natural pool that appeared to be carved out of the river/lake and was open on a muggy day of on and off rain. I also stopped at the Whole Foods, the first ever, and it was indeed impressive. I particularly enjoyed riding along some ramps that are built into the south bank of the river/lake, past egrets and ducks and geese and an amazing collection of turtles crowded onto a log in the water.
Thank you Hotel San Jose — Austin, Texas
In the “it pays to ask category” I give you this short tale. After one night in a room overlooking busy South Congress street and the immortal Continental Club across the street (which I would rather visit than sleep, or try to sleep, across the street from) I politely inquired if there was a quieter room available tonight. and here I am in a beautiful quiet suite at the rear of this super stylish rehabbed motor court, upgraded to boot with no additional cost. Thank you!! After a long work day here, this is a very nice place to land. Only problem is I may not want to leave. And I have plans with an old friend tonight.
I haven’t had much time to explore but did enjoy a BBQ pork sandwich at Jo’s Good Food, next door and dinner with some work colleagues at Vespaio, a welcoming Italian restaurant also on South Congrss. Also fun to browse in a few of the vintage shops and boutiques and cowboy boots stores here, although most seem pretty pricey. look forward to exploring a bit more tomorrow before my flight home.
Filed under Texas, Uncategorized
NYLO NYC a real find
I knew the NYLO hotel on NYC’s Upper West Side passed muster when I got a thumbs up email from my brother, who also decided to stay there and had arrived at his room before we did. The hotel turned out to be a real find, especially for $120 a night ($151 with tax). The room was small, as expected, but well appointed, huge bed, comfortable linens, edgy but not too edgy furniture, art, light fixtures, clean and streamlined bathroom. Not too noisy at night even though we ended up with a room overlooking Broadway when I had asked for a presumably quieter interior room (my brother’s room got no traffic noise). I found out NYLO stands for New York Loft and the Texas-based hotel chain has outposts in Texas, Warwick (near Providence) (RI) and soon Nyack (NY). Good to know!
Remarkably, the restaurant my uncle had chosen for dinner turned out to be connected to the hotel. It’s called Serefina and it had good affordable Italian food (I had good bolognese, pizza etc). Monday morning we went for coffee and pastries to Irving Farm, a little basement cafe on 79th just south of Broadway (there are several other Manhattan locations). After a quick visit to Zabars for bagels to take home to Iowa (I still miss H&H bagels) we walked across the park to meet my aunt at PJ Bernstein, a good deli on third ave near 71st street (that’s their cheese/meat plate above).
Our flight home from Newark went well despite a few stressful moments when we inadvertently left the subway station at 34th street and had to figure out where Penn Station was – above ground – and drag our suitcases through throngs of people at 5 p.m. At the airport, we somehow ended up again in the TSA pre-screened category but it didn’t make much difference this time around. We still had to stand in the same long line and take out our stuff and even take off our shoes (hrrummphhh). A guy in line ahead of me said that TSA pre-screened only really produces perks at Newark if you’re passing through Terminal C (we were in Terminal A). Whatever…I was just happy we made it to Newark with ample time to catch our flight – and it left on time and we got home on time! Love that direct flight!
Filed under air security, DINING, New York City, Rhode Island, Texas
When next in Vermont: Snapdragon Inn in Windsor
I think I’ve found a soulmate for The Sylvia Beach Hotel on the Oregon Coast (Nye Beach in Newport), famed for it’s bookish aura (the rooms are named after authors – most recently added are rooms honoring Amy Tan, Ken Kesey and Jules Verne), the place is full of books, no television, radio, wi-fi!). It’s the Snapdragon Inn in Windsor Vermont (photo above), in the central/southern part of the state, which apparently offers a “New York Times Best Seller” package that enables guests to choose a book from the NYT best-seller list and it will be waiting for them when they check into a room. Geddit? Book a room. Book a book. The inn is apparently the former home of a famous book editor (Maxwell Perkins) so that was part of the inspiration. No official word on whether you get to keep the book but guessing yes…
Dining at The Pharmacy in Nashville
On our last night in Nashville, we ate at The Pharmacy in – you guessed it – East Nashville. Its menu is limited primarily to burgers, brats, fries – and the ones we tried were very good (a cheese burger with three types of cheese, prepared medium rare, with a sweetish-potato batter perhaps bun; a brat loaded with not-too-tangy sauerkraut on a bun that didn’t hold the loaded brat well but was tasty; well-cooked sweet potato and regular fries – especially good when we requested a hot batch to replace the lukewarm batch originally served to us.) The place had a fun neighborhood vibe – waiters wearing plaid flannel shirts, lots of wood and stamped tin, indie music in the atmosphere.
We didn’t have the energy to go return to the Five Spot (see photo) nearby for dance night – which didn’t start until 10:30 or, we gather, really get going until midnight. But I was tempted. Who are these people partying into the wee hours of Sunday and Monday night? Musicians perhaps. My husband noted that there was live music in the food courts at Nashville airport when he got there midday yesterday (none that I saw/heard at 9 a.m., alas) and he’s never seen so many people walking through an airport with guitar cases. cool!
Tennessee hill and horse country, Arnold’s Country Kitchen, belle Meade plantation
I explored the horse country south of Nashville which was pretty and rolling, with long stretches of land fenced off with a big house, sometimes a lovely colonial brick plantation in the distance. Franklin is an old town about 20 minutes outside Nashville. Pretty buildings but felt very much like a bedroom community. Reminded me a bit of Alexandria va. It was also too cold to walk,around. In Columbia I went west and picked up a portion of the famous Natchez trail scenic parkway which was scenic but off season so not as scenic…. It was odd to be on this pristine two lane highway with no other cars. Felt like I was on some sort of test track.
I got off at highway 46 which turned out to be the most scenic of the roads I went on, winding through horse farm country and a few incorporated towns (I have now been to Sawdust, Tennessee! And there even was a possum hollow there. But not much more.) I passed through a pretty village with lots of antique shops and galleries ( and a historic plaque referring to Thomas Hart Benton. Not sure if it’s the famous Kansas city artist.) I think it is called leipert’s fork village.
The highlight of the day was a superb lunch at the famous Arnold’s Country Kitchen in Nashville, It’s a humble looking red cinder block building but inside it was full of people at 1:30 pm and I went thru the cafeteria line and got fried chicken with three sides ( great mashed potatoes) and a flattened grilled version of a corn muffin. This is the classic “meat and three” found around town.
I squeezed in a tour of the belle Meade plantation which was very different than the Laura plantation I Louisiana. It was a horse plantation and a brick colonial with limestone fronting and columns, not creole like Laura. Had a very long drive back to hotel in cold rain. Nashville traffic can be a drag.
Filed under Nashville
TakeBetsywithyou 