13 minute read
EATS
FOOD
& DRINK
A variety of dishes at Pho Lang Thang
PHOTO: HAILEY BOLLINGER
Findlay Market Features Nationally Lauded Food and Drink
CityBeat dining critic Pama Mitchell explores Over-the-Rhine’s surprising variety
BY PAMA MITCHELL
Iremember when Newsweek named Findlay Market as one of the ten best markets in the whole world. at was in 2019, and Findlay was the only U.S. market to make the list. We knew the market was special, and it was terri c to see this acknowledgment. e market has blossomed so much in recent years that the surrounding neighborhood has boomed, too. Along with the development of new apartments, condos and commercial buildings, the area has experienced a remarkable expansion of dining options.
For starters, Findlay occupies the only area of Cincinnati with restaurants owned by Cincinnati’s two superstar chefs, Jean-Robert de Cavel and Jose Salazar. De Cavel’s French Crust and Salazar’s Goose & Elder both hit a sweet spot of being perfect for the Over-theRhine neighborhood and a draw for folks from the entire region. At a recent Sunday brunch at French Crust (1801 Elm St., frenchcrustcafe. com), we enjoyed a meal that featured one scrumptious dish after another. We had six in our party, and every item laid on our table was completely satisfying – and that was without any of us ordering the best-in-the-city quiche. De Cavel’s private collection of framed posters and other decorations express his personality and create a spot-on Parisian bistro ambiance. Chef de cuisine Carla Heiert creates omelets, soups, salads and casseroles that complement the glorious croissants and sweets of pastry chef Jean-Philippe Solnom.
I adore the quiche Lorraine and don’t usually resist it. But at this recent brunch, I discovered the “Le Creuset” casseroles. My salmon casserole with tomato, corn kernels, shiitake mushrooms and a creamy lemon sauce was wonderful, as was my friend’s steak casserole with potatoes, carrots, peas and a demi-glace (each $16). e lemon sauce on the salmon dish couldn’t have been more delightful.
At the opposite end of the market sits Goose & Elder (1800 Race St., gooseandelder.com). While French Crust opened almost 10 years ago, G & E has only been around since 2019. It was one of my favorite spots for carryout during the rst year of COVID-19. With front and back rooms and several outdoor seating possibilities, the restaurant felt spacious enough to patronize last year when we started going back to in-house dining.
Serving from late morning until 9 p.m. or 10 p.m. every day except Tuesday, Goose & Elder excels at a variety of o erings. I can never get enough of the duck leg con t with grits and baconbraised greens ($19). Lighter, wonderful options include a veggie burger based on falafel ($11.75) and avocado toast perked up with jalapeno and sliced radishes ($12.25). You can’t go wrong with the burger and fries, either ($8.50 for a single patty; $12.50 for a double). e back room with a bar and well-spaced tables is a welcome place to linger, while the front dining room is livelier.
Pho Lang ang (1828 Race St., pholangthang.com) completes a triumvirate of truly outstanding restaurants adjacent to Findlay Market. If fragrant, savory and vegetable-forward Vietnamese cooking rings your bells, this establishment down the block from Goose & Elder has you covered. e restaurant quickly outgrew its original location inside the market several years ago, moving into a roomier spot across Race Street in 2019. Two COVID years later,
Meals at Goose & Elder
PHOTO: HAILEY BOLLINGER
the eatery still dishes out impossibly fresh salads, salad rolls, banh mi sandwiches and noodle bowls. Come dinner time, a couple of especially creative o erings might pop up. e expanded location includes an adjacent carry-out storefront, a much larger kitchen and a full bar.
Cheese fans—which probably includes just about everyone— shouldn’t miss e Rhined near the French Crust side of the market. Although you can nd a lot of excellent cheese among the vendors in Findlay Market proper, e Rhined (1737 Elm St., therhined.com) has unique charms. You can relax at the little shop’s counter or in a back courtyard to sample cheese ights with or without a glass or two of wine. e shop sells those goodies and more to enjoy at home, too and specializes in regional cheeses, often made in small batches.
Cleverly and aptly named, Mighty Good: Meat n’ ree (1819 Elm St., mightygoodotr.com) serves Southernstyle comfort food at reasonable prices. e place also does good by sta ng its kitchen with students from the Findlay Culinary Training Program in which students are ready for employment in area kitchens after 12 weeks of preparing dishes such as garlic chicken, Mississippi pot roast and blackened red sh, along with all kinds of sides and scrumptious desserts. Mighty Good patrons pick a meat and add three sides from a list of almost a dozen, all for $11; three pieces of fried chicken with two sides will cost you $15. I’ve had lunch there twice and enjoyed both meals, especially the fried chicken, braised greens, mashed sweet potatoes and cornbread. Pie slices, cobblers and banana pudding (each $4) come o pretty much like grandma used to make. ere’s booze, too, including a few bottled beers ($3-$5), ve wines by the glass ($8) and several cocktails such as bourbon and other whiskey drinks ($8-10).
For those who prefer to focus on libations, the neighborhood has several enticing watering holes. Just a couple of blocks from the market is La Ofrenda (30 Findlay St., laofrendatequila.com), which specializes in margaritas and other tequila or mezcal cocktails, plus a wide selection of tequilas and other spirits. A friend tells me that when La Ofrenda has Latin dance nights, the place is packed.
A bit farther from the market, in two separate directions, are OTR Stillhouse and Somerset. e former (2017 Branch St., otrstillhouse.com) is a combination distillery, brewery, bar and performance venue with oodles of space both indoors and out. ere’s a menu of light bites, meaty grilled skewers, a burger with fries and a couple of noodle bowls.
Somerset (139 E. McMicken Ave., somersetotr.com) received a shout-out from Harper’s Bazaar in April as one of a handful of OTR establishments it recommends for out-of-towners (Pho Lang ang also earned a nod). e restaurant is a bit of a walk from the market, but it may be worth the e ort to see what made a national magazine pay attention. e place has beautiful ambiance, with a feel that’s both spacious and intimate. It’s also crazy-popular, but you can reserve space in advance via the website. Plan ahead, though: you’re not likely to nab a table lastminute. Reservations aren’t necessary, but without them you may have to hang out in a line for a while. ere are plenty of places to eat or drink within a short walk of Findlay Market, but these are some of my favorites. Next time you’re in the neighborhood, save room for a snack or meal in this historic part of Cincinnati.
For more information about Findlay Market, visit ndlaymarket.org.
Selections at Mighty Good: Meat n’ Three
PHOTO: CATIE VIOX
EATS
BY MAGGY MCDONEL
Heather Donaldson and her husband Reggie went vegan in 2019 to lower their carbon footprint, but like many people, they really didn’t want to give up cheese and charcuterie.
Donaldson says in an email to CityBeat that she “wasn’t thrilled with the commercial vegan options available,” so she set out to learn how to make her own plant-based meats and cheeses.
Charcuterie is a French term describing a type of cooking that focuses on processed meat products, namely items like bacon, cured ham, sausages and pâtés. In recent years, charcuterie also has been used to describe extravagant boards fi lled with meats, cheeses and other fi nger foods in the United States. Donaldson’s venture Mad Cheese creates vegan versions of these items as well as made-to-purchase boards fi lled with imaginative ingredients.
Like so many others, Donaldson and her husband moved back home to Cincinnati in 2020, leaving Los Angeles once the COVID-19 pandemic shut down both of their jobs in the fi lm industry. Donaldson had worked as a food stylist, designing and creating food eaten by actors on camera, while Reggie did lighting and camera work for shows like Shameless. With her job on hold, Heather suddenly had the time she needed to further develop and perfect the vegan meat and cheese recipes that she already had been toying with.
About six months into COVID-19 lockdown, the couple fl ew to their hometown of Cincinnati, where they had both attended The School for Creative and Performing Arts, to visit Reggie’s parents; that fall, they bought a home in Madisonville.
While the house was being renovated, Donaldson continued to make her cheeses. She soon began sharing them with friends, who in turn gave them to other people, “Within a few months, strangers were contacting me and asking to buy cheese,” she says.
Feeling uncomfortable selling food products to strangers without proper licensing, Donaldson tells CityBeat that she decided to go for it and start a business. In March of 2021, she offi cially launched Mad Cheese.
Donaldson says that at fi rst, she hadn’t even planned on creating a website, but within fi ve days of marketing her new business on social media, she had more than 100 orders.
For a while, Donaldson and her husband operated Mad Cheese out of the kitchen of Walnut Hills’ New Thought Unity Center. The duo recently received a LEAP (Leveraging Education Assistance
Heather Donaldson’s Camembert is completely vegan.
PHOTO: PROVIDED BY HEATHER DONALDSON
Mad Cheese’s Gouda Vibes is an aged smoked gouda.
PHOTO: PROVIDED BY HEATHER DONALDSON
Program) grant from Main Street Ventures, though, with funding that allowed them to hire a part-time employee and move into a new fully-equipped kitchen at 5909 Bramble Ave. in Madisonville.
Donaldson says that to perfect each product and bring them as close as possible to the dairy and meat tastes and textures that they are imitating, she will test “over 100 different versions of a recipe before I feel like it is close enough.”
The recipes vary greatly for each product that Mad Cheese produces. Donaldson says that the cheese bases vary from nuts to seeds to pea protein. The general process involves combining the ingredients, cooking them and then chilling them in molds. “Fresh” cheeses can be made within one week and are packaged as soon as they are set. Some cheeses like Brie, blue and blue-gouda are aged using vegan cheese cultures shipped from France. Donaldson says the process for aging these cheeses are controlled and can take up to eight weeks.
While Donaldson is open about her cheese processes, she keeps her “meat” making a little more secretive, as she has developed a fairly unique style of vegan meat that also is gluten-free. She says that the process is similar to the one she uses to craft the cheese. To make the meats both vegan and gluten-free, she uses pea protein, which Donaldson says differs from the typical vegan meat that is created using wheat gluten. This process creates a meat-like product loved by many — even non-vegans enjoy it, she says.
Donaldson notes that she has heard from several meat and cheese eaters that they prefer her Greener Pastures ($13 per six-ounce wheel) over traditional goat cheese. She says that Greener Pastures is an herbed chevre and is Mad Cheese’s most popular creation.
Donaldson says her current favorite of Mad Cheese’s offerings is the company’s version of Brie, La Ferme Rustique ($15 per four-ounce wheel). She is also a fan of Mad Cheese’s take on ricotta, called Euphoricotta ($14 for a 16-ounce container).
“It’s nut-free and super versatile — eat it solo on baguette toasts, swirl some into pasta, make lasagna, add it to soups to make them creamy,” Donaldson says of the Euphoricotta.
As for her husband, Donaldson says that Reggie loved their aged smoked gouda, GoudaVibes ($15 per 6.5-ounce wheel) as well as their walnut paté ($11 per four-ounce glass jar).
New products are always being developed in Donaldson’s kitchen. Recently, Mad Cheese released Fet-ahhh ($13), created with soy from Cincinnati-based soy sauce fermenter CinSoy Foods. In the works now is the soon-to-be-released Mad Parma, a vegan hard parmesan that can be shaved and grated.
Vegan charcuterie enthusiasts can also pick up pre-made charcuterie boards from Mad Cheese. Each Mad Cheese Board ($95) is made-to-order, Donaldson says, the company can even customize the colors, add a theme and deliver it straight to your door. Mad Cheese also occasionally offers seasonal boards, which feature limited-edition items and decor.
As of press time, Mad Cheese is sold out of every product in its online store, but its products can be found all over Cincinnati. Cork N Crust in Bellevue uses Mad Cheese’s vegan cheeses on its pizzas and sells the vegan cheese and charcuterie boards as well. The company’s mozzarella also is used in the vegan poutine that’s now offered at La Petite Frite in Oakley Kitchen Food Hall.
Additional Mad Cheese products are available at Rooted Juicery + Kitchen’s various locations, grocer Morsel & Nosh in Cumminsville, the marketplace at Oakley Kitchen and Food Hall, Spoon: Kitchen & Market in Covington and Madison’s at Findlay Market in Over-the-Rhine.
Donaldson and Mad Cheese will be at Cincy VegFest in Burnet Woods on June 4.
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