Delicious

A guide to dining & drinking in our neighborhood

Tea Time

eDen brings high tea back D own to earth. Dining at the quaint abode on lovers lane feels somehow familiar, like stopping by a neighbor’s house for lunch. the door squeaks open to reveal just that. c hef Karen Khan’s eclectic taste and treasured possessions abound. the walls display her husband’s horseshoe-throwing trophies — he’s a state champion — along with their wedding photos, antiques and other knick-knacks. “to me, it’s comforting,” Khan says. “ i t’s very quiet, very inviting.” in addition to its regular menu items like hen with plum sauce, eden offers high tea with a reservation 24 hours in advance. high tea features three courses. the first is a savory tea with elegantly prepared sandwiches, including smoked salmon, cucumber, pimento cheese and egg salad with tomatoes. the second is a more robust tea paired with scones and homemade breads. the third is a sweeter tea accompanied by chocolate mousse, chocolate-dipped fruit and lemon bars. Khan is the only cook in the kitchen, and she makes everything from scratch. “ i t’s what i like to call ‘honest.’ ” the coziness of the tiny restaurant spurs conversation among strangers. And when the weather’s nice, Khan opens up the dog-friendly patio in back. eden is BYoB with a $5 cork fee. At the end of each meal, each guest receives a large strawberry dipped in fine Belgian chocolate. Yes, sometimes, it’s the little things.

—EMIly ToMAN

Ed En R EsT au R an T & Pas TR iEs

Lovers & eLsby 972.267.3336 eDen- Da LL as.com

Not far from Eden is Maudee’s, another cozy retreat offering 3-5 p.m. afternoon tea with about 20 different flavors on the menu. If you’re stopping by for lunch, try one of the daily specials.

Lovers & DougLas 214.526.9750 mauDees.com

Take a break from antiquing at this quaint café, tucked away inside the Forestwood Antique Mall, which offers an array of soups, salads and sandwiches. Forest & the toLLway 972.392.3911 ForestwooD.antiqueLanDusa.com

For a more lavish, upscale experience, this high-end home décor store near Inwood Village offers high tea 11 a.m.-3 p.m. Saturdays and “ladies lunch” on weekdays. Lovers & inwooD 214.352.7777 champagnesLuxe.com

The dog days of summer are fading, and while you’re warm and toasty now, you’ll soon be chilled to the bone— especially if your furnace goes belly-up mid-winter.

Call us now for a complete home heating inspection and tune-up. An inspection ensures your equipment is operating safely and not leaking dangerous carbon monoxide into your home. Preventative maintenance also saves money by maximizing efficiency and minimizing costly breakdowns.

Comfort, Safety, Savings—

now that’s something to wag your tail about.

Nine Walks Sauvignon Blanc New Zealand

Wine is complicated enough, what with all of the different kinds of wine and all of the different places in the world where wine is made. So what does the wine business do to make wine even more complicated? Invent wine terms, giving it language all its own.

This is troublesome for anyone who likes wine, experienced or not. Even today, after two-plus decades of doing this, I’ll read a wine description and have no idea what it means. So you can imagine the difficulty wine-speak gives beginners.

How to get around this problem? One way is to stop by the Wine Garden at the State Fair of Texas between Sept. 30 and Oct. 23, where The Two Wine Guys, John Bratcher and myself, will speak again this year. We’ll be at the wine stage Monday through Thursday at 1, 3 and 5 p.m., and will be happy to answer any questions.

The best way? Taste wine, and learn the differences:

Many California red wines, like Toad Hollow’s Erik The Red ($15) are fruity, which some wine drinkers often confuse with sweetness. Think of a sweet wine, like riesling, as iced tea with lemon and sugar. Think of fruity wine as the tea with just lemon. The latter is fruity (the taste of the lemon) but not sweet. Does the wine pair easily with food? If so, and if it doesn’t overwhelm the taste of the food, then it’s food friendly. Usually, but not always, food friendly wines have more simple, straightforward flavors, such as a New Zealand sauvignon blanc like Nine Walks ($10). Drink this with summer salads, roast chicken or boiled seafood, and the wine complements the food, which is about as friendly as you can get.

Wineries release a new vintage every year, which is the current vintage. But what happens when retailers haven’t been able to sell all of the previous year’s current vintage? It becomes the previous vintage, and retailers cut prices to get rid of those wines to make room for the current vintage. It’s not unlike what car dealers do — cut prices on last year’s models to make room for the new models. The Australian red blend Pillar Box Red 2008 used to be $12 or $13; you can find it these days, since it’s a previous vintage, for as little as $10.

—JEFF SIEGEL

JEFF SIEGEL’SWEEKLYWINE REVIEWS appear every Wednesday on prestonhollow.advocatemag.com