15 minute read
Editor’s Letter
from January 2023
What gives you hope? That’s a simple question, but a big question. It’s a topic that feels especially timely at the start of another new year.
It’s the question we posed to the five doctors profiled in this year’s feature, our annual list of the best doctors in Kansas City. When we picked these five doctors from among the six hundred and twenty you’ll find listed by specialty starting on page 50, we warned them this question was coming. And yet they tended to pause before answering, carefully considering their response before offering it. That’s understandable, I think. The last three years have conditioned us to be measured about our hopefulness and to contemplate potential snags in any statement that sounds overly optimistic. Doctors, I suspect, have learned to temper their expectations even more than most average people. But in each case they offered an answer. I won’t try to paraphrase them here, but there is a thread that runs throughout: faith in their fellow man. These doctors who’ve practiced through a once-a-century pandemic are left hopeful by what they see in their patients, colleagues, students and community. When I stop to think about it, that’s sort of a soft theme connecting dots in a diverse assortment of stories spread throughout this issue. This is an issue full of survivors with bold ideas and faith in the future. Also in the Top Doctors feature, you’ll learn about a groundbreaking new blood test that finally gets results like the ones Elizabeth Holmes infamously faked (page 61). Meanwhile, state invasive species experts think that the key to controlling a problem fish could come down to getting fishermen to catch and eat them (page 22). In Pendleton Heights, a barista with twenty-odd years of experience has started a novel class to teach you how to make cafe-quality drinks at home (page 28). A blacksmith who survived a nearfatal accident while doing his trade shares his hard-won knowledge and helps couples forge their own wedding rings (page 32). This month’s barbecue story is about the rise of Wyandot Barbeque II from the ashes and the rabid response the reborn pit was met with after a year off (page 107). So happy New Year, Kansas City. I hope 2023 finds you feeling rested and hopeful, if a bit wizened. And if it doesn’t, check out what five of the best doctors in the city have to say about the things that brighten their view. Or flip to page 66 for a profile of KC-based jazz singer Marilyn Maye, who is about to celebrate turning ninety-five with a big blowout in Midtown Manhattan. Few things are quite as inspiring Martin Cizmar to me as seeing a woman in her mid-nineties EDITOR IN CHIEF planning a massive birthday bash where she’s
MARTIN@KANSASCITYMAG.COM the headliner.
CONTRIBUTORS
Patrick Moore
WRITER This month’s issue features a news story about the surprisingly liberal rules for legal cannabis in Missouri by, ahem, subject matter expert Patrick Moore.
Isabella Ferrentino
INTERN Our Top Doctors package includes a story about a local effort to conduct the type of hyper-efficient blood tests that were promised by Elizabeth Holmes. It’s written by intern Isabella Ferrentino, a student at the University of Missouri–Columbia
Kevin Goodbar
ART DIRECTOR This is the first full issue designed by our new art director, Kevin Goodbar. Goodbar is a Jayhawk who previously served as art director of 5280 in Denver, Austin Monthly and D Magazine in Dallas.
NUMBERS FROM THIS ISSUE
3Ounces of recreational marijuana that can be legally possessed by Missourians— more than any other state in the country. PAGE 20 18 $1,226
Mercury is in retrograde through January 18, in case you have bad luck between now and then. We explain the increasingly common phrase. PAGE 34
Amount the average American spends on prescription drugs each year. PAGE 64
COOKING LESSONS
Our December issue featured the first full refresh of our list of the top forty restaurants in Kansas City since before the pandemic. The article racked up thousands of comments within a few days and set a new record for our site’s web traffic. Here is a small sampling of the comments, with extra space allotted to the small handful of people who loudly disagreed with our choices.
Fellow foodies, here’s your restaurant week guide! If it’s on this list and on the restaurant week list, make your reservations now. I’ve always wanted to check out The Antler Room and Fox and Pearl, but so many good places listed! —Tiffany Marie Beam
Cafe de Amis sucks. Pizza Tascio is not a top 40 restaurant in this city and I love pizza. (What a joke.) Lotus Hot Pot is good but not a top 40. Farina isn’t on this list but Extra Virgin is. Extra Virgin has gone downhill over the last few years. Acre is a top ten in my book. I sense some biased selections in this publication. —Brandon Dunn
Love seeing Cafe de Amis… an underrated spot! —Luke Menn
The Frog’s [Le Fou Frog] not on there and the 1900 at 38th place? Oh bullshit. That’s some hipster masturbation party, and the worst of those lists I’ve ever seen. Hacks hacks hacks. —Johnathan Long This was a great read for a newcomer to the city… I guess I’ll have to work my way through this list! —Daniel Barwick
We had Acre in Parkville last month and it was pretty fantastic. Fox & Pearl & Town Company are great. If you go to Town Company, go to Nighthawk for post-dinner drinks in the basement of Hotel KC. Michael Smith is a fantastic chef and both Extra Virgin and Farina are super too. —Bill Hurrelbrink
Been waiting for a list like this. I see a lot of familiar places I love on here. Excited to check some of these out. Great job putting this together! —Alecks Cruz
If you’re like me you had no clue that half of these restaurants exist. New list for gift cards this Christmas! —Douglas L. Freeman
MudBug Cajun PoBoy’s should be on that list, nevertheless a good list. —Gary Shelby
Thanks to Janus Films/The Criterion Collection for sending over a stunning high-resolution image for this month’s Beat opener so fast that it made our heads spin.
BEHIND THE SCENES
Sampling the new cocktail menu at Westport Cafe to identify the latest drink trends. You can see what we found on page 110.
SHOUT OUT
CONTACT US Kansas City
P.O. Box 26823 Overland Park, KS 66225-6823 (913) 469-6700 EMAIL: editor@kansascitymag.com
— Angela Sokolowski, an ecologist who specializes in invasive species for the Missouri Department of Natural Resources
A land rush along the new streetcar route could remake Midtown KC.
BACK IN OCTOBER, the KCMO city council voted unanimously to put four Midtown buildings under historic protection. It was a “novel approach” by city officials because the building’s owner said he wanted to demolish them. It was only the second time the city has made such a move. The first time was in the eighties when Union Station was being restored.
It’s the latest in a series of interesting power plays by public and private groups to shape development along the expanded KC Streetcar route. The high-stakes game will have major implications for the future of the central city.
Since the federal government granted $174 million to fully fund Kansas City’s public transportation project along Main Street in 2020, the city has seen a land rush of sorts as developers grab what they can, positioning themselves to take advantage of an anticipated economic boom along the route once it’s complete.
“There is great opportunity along the corridor to create something dynamic for the city,” says Vincent Gauthier, president of developer Authenticity and former director of the Port Authority of Kansas City.
Gauthier, who works as an urban development planning consultant, sees the streetcar as a way to showcase the unique neighborhoods lining the expanded route. Advocates view the streetcar as something much larger than just a way to move people from one part of the city to another—it’s also a way to revitalize Midtown.
Like other developers, Doug Price purchased the buildings on the corner of 31st and Main streets in the Union Hill neighborhood with the future in mind. Price was planning to demolish the structures, calling them unsalvageable, and presented potential plans for a high-rise apartment building with a front that mimics the historical structures. He’s said he doesn’t plan on producing specific plans until the streetcar route is complete in early 2025. (Price could not be reached for comment.)
Price’s plans upset neighbors who argued the historic buildings that front the busy Main Street thoroughfare serve as a “gateway” to the Union Hill Neighborhood. That’s when councilmembers Katheryn Shields and Eric Bunch, who represent the area, applied to designate the buildings, including the 1888 Victorian-era Jeserich Building, as historic, preventing Price from demolishing the structures for three years.
Gauthier, who was asked by the city to offer his opinion on the state of the buildings, does not think it would be difficult to renovate them. Removing the buildings would be “going against the absolute principle of why the streetcar line was put in,” Gauthier says.
The battle over Price’s now-historic buildings are just one of the bubbling projects along the future streetcar route. In the last several years, a slew of multi-million dollar developments have been proposed along the Main Street expansion route, and several are in the works.
KC-based VanTrust Real Estate is another developer planning to play the waiting game. The developer recently purchased a two-acre lot along Main and Linwood that houses the McGilley Funeral Home. The company has said it has no immediate plans for the property but thinks it’s in a “great location near two future streetcar stops” and plans to create specific plans when the route is finished.
Out-of-town real estate developers have been a bit more bullish. Chicago-based Mac properties is proposing to renovate the existing U.S. Bank building at Armour Boulevard and Main Street as an apartment building that spans an entire block. This project is estimated to have more than four hundred apartments and 45,000 square feet of retail space. The company also plans to renovate the historic New Yorker apartment building at 35th and Baltimore. Northpoint Development, which is based locally but operates across the country, is planning a large apartment building project at the former Trinity Lutheran Hospital. St. Louis-based Lux Living plans to keep the historic Katz Drug Store building at Westport Road and Main Street while adding almost two hundred units, each multifamily.
Exact Partners, the company that owns the Wonder Building in a rehabbed former bread bakery on Troost, has also embarked on several streetcar route projects.
“We think Main Street is going to be the vibrant corner of Kansas City, connecting universities, our Plaza, research hospitals, downtown sports and the riverfront,” says Caleb Buland, an architect and partner at Exact, which is working on both new infill and renovating historic buildings. “Main Street has not seen reinvestment in some decades, so we’re excited that the community is coming together and bringing vibrancy to midtown.”
The company completed the renovation of the historic Netherlands Hotel and turned the Monarch Storage buildings on Main into apartments in 2020. Exact is looking to redevelop the ABC storage building on Main to create apartments and also wants to create another boutique hotel in the former National Guard Armory on Main.
Buland says that the renovation of the Netherlands Hotel has been one of Exact’s favorite projects. “The views all across the city from its rooftop bar make developing along Main Street as easy as pointing over the railing and planning new projects,” he says. “On the preservation side, this building was slated for demolition after being vacant nearly two decades. Now it’s home to thirty-plus jobs and nearly two hundred residents.”
GRASS IS GREENER
The Show Me State now has the nation’s most liberal cannabis laws—here are six somewhat surprising stats about Missouri marijuana. 2/2023
Recreational marijuana will be available in Missouri starting sometime in “early February.” That’s just three months after legalization. When Colorado and Washington state legalized it a decade ago, it took them nearly two years to get recreational dispensaries up and running.
168
The number of midsized joints a Missourian can legally possess. That’s based on a typical jazz cigarette weighing in at about a half gram and Missourians being able to possess three ounces. The Missouri law is the nation’s most relaxed: Missourians can possess three times as much pot as conservative California, Colorado or Oregon (one ounce each).
6
(BUT REALLY 13)
A six percent tax on the retail price of marijuana is put toward legal fees for expungements of people convicted of nonviolent marijuana offenses. The remaining tax revenue will go toward substance abuse treatment programs, veterans’ health care and the public defender system.
Local governments can add on an additional three percent tax, and state sales taxes will also be charged, making the tax package more than thirteen percent. This is still among the lowest rates in the country— half what’s charged in less progressive places like Illinois, Vermont and Oregon.
6
(BUT REALLY 18)
Missourians are allowed to have six mature, flowering pot plants if they buy a $100 home cultivation license card. The specifics get complicated, but they can have eighteen plants in total.
78
Percent of KCMO voters that supported the legalization measure— more than apparently conservative St. Louis City (seventy-three percent) or any individual county. Jackson County also approved, by sixty-eight to thirty-two percent. The only part of the KC metro area to not approve was Lafayette County, homeland of Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo.
21
Missouri becomes lucky number twenty-one. The state technically legalized cannabis on December 8, 2022, eighty-nine years and three days after the 21st Amendment repealed alcohol prohibition in 1933.
OUR TASTE BUDS savor the flavor of pan-fried tilapia, blackened salmon, marinated catfish filets or a buttery sauteed halibut. Now, a new fish is flopping its way onto the menu.
Asian carp are sometimes called “silent invaders” of the fishery world. The massive fish are known for enthusiastically leaping from the rivers. Unlike the common carp, they’re plankton feeders, with cleaner, sweeter flesh than their bottom-feeding cousins.
Now, they’re being rebranded by state game departments to have a more palatable name: copi. The name is short for “copious,” a word that means “abundant in supply”—the perfect description of this highly populated species of fish.
“Asian carp” is a collective name for the various species of carp, including the bighead, black, grass and silver carp, which were imported in the 1970’s to control algae blooms primarily in wastewater treatment plants. Soon, the leaping fish escaped from the treatment plants into local waterways and were labeled an invasive species as they rapidly overpopulated their surroundings.
“They outcompete native fishes,” says Angela Sokolowski, an ecologist who specializes in invasive species for the Missouri Department of Natural Resources. “This has had a negative impact on anglers and the local industries that bring in anglers. It is also believed they can decrease water quality, which can negatively affect native mussels.”
They’re also dangerous in their own way: “Silver carp are notorious for jumping out of the water, which can injure boaters and others recreating on the water.”
Following their silent invasion of the Missouri and Mississippi rivers, copi have been seen jumping overzealously from the surface of the water that is agitated by boats. Many rivergoers share the same story of leisurely boating down the river COPI-OUS CARP
when, out of nowhere, they are violently struck in the face by these sizable fish. Safe to say these individuals may be the most eager to see Asian carp on the menu.
Common carp are generally shunned by American fishermen, though they are popular in other parts of the world. The species we call Asian carp are very different fish, prompting the rebranding effort to hopefully encourage the public to catch and eat them. The state departments found that the public had a misconception about the copi, believing that these bottom-dwelling water foragers are “dirty” and “uneatable”—but it is quite the contrary.
Those who have had the opportunity to have a bite—whether broiled, baked, fried, blackened or sauteed—tend to agree that copi are worthy of appearing on restaurant menus. “the time I had it, it was deepfried and I thought it had a much nicer flavor than a deep-fried sucker,” says Sokolowski. “It was delicious. It wasn’t fishy. It was very mild. It was on par for me with fried catfish for pleasantness.”
Attendees of the Missouri State Fair also approved when served bighead and silver carp, Sokolowski says.
Rob Connoley, a chef at Bulrush St. Louis, which serves an Ozark-inspired menu, has developed a go-to method for cooking copi. “The few times I have worked with it, we’ve smoked it,” Connoley says. “I treated it like New York’s popular smoked white fish.”
Copi was officially rebranded in early 2021 and got a push last year. It may seem silly, but copi is not the first fish to be made more appetizing by a new name.
“What we buy in the store now as orange roughy used to be called slimehead,” says Sokolowski. “They renamed Patagonia toothfish to Chilean sea bass. If people like eating orange roughy or copi, they increase the demand, and that incentivizes the market. The hope with copi is to increase the demand to make it profitable for commercial fisherman to target.”
