Ian Froeb's STL 100 2016 by Go! Magazine

BONUS ISSUE • MARCH 13, 2016 •

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Use this checklist to keep track of which places you’ve visited. Restaurants marked with a star are part of the Top 25.

STL 100 Great Taste Experience nearly 40 of these restaurants for just $25 at our special tasting event, 6 p.m. March 31 at Neo. Tickets are on sale now.

Oysters Randolfi at Randolfi’s

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2015 was an excellent year for new restaurants in St. Louis. Of the year’s standout debuts, two have already cracked the Top 25 in this, the second annual edition of my STL 100. What’s more, last year’s best new restaurant has already landed in the Top 10, and the runner-up is just outside it. ❡ All told, the 2016 STL 100 features 27 restaurants that weren’t on the inaugural list. Most of these opened after the eligibility cutoff for last year’s edition, though there are a few already-established restaurants newly deserving of your attention. ❡ Meanwhile, only two restaurants from the 2015 STL 100 are now permanently closed. (Farewell, Stellina. Adieu, Franco.) And few of last year’s restaurants that I cut from the 2016 list showed me an obvious reason to do so. ❡ Which is to say, assembling this year’s STL 100 was a pain in my barbecue-cushioned butt. ❡ But after much eating, thinking, nursing of bourbon and a little more eating, here are the 100 restaurants that best represent St. Louis dining circa 2016 — the restaurants that are setting the standards, pushing us forward, introducing us to important new voices and reminding us about the voices we might have forgotten. ❡ This is the 2016 STL 100.

@ianfroeb

A few notes ☛ The STL 100 is divided into the Top 25 and the Rest of the Best. No great gap exists between the two sections. Determining what distinguishes No. 50 from No. 51 from No. 52, etc., would be infinitesimal hairsplitting. ☛ Though you’ll find several expensive restaurants clustered at the beginning of the Top 25, the STL 100 is, in general, an egalitarian exercise, with representatives from inexpensive everyday eats to once-a-year splurges. ☛ As with my weekly restaurant reviews, I make every effort not to announce my presence at a restaurant (e.g., reservations under false names). However, after writing about St. Louis dining for a decade now, I’m recognized by many chefs, especially those who run or have run multiple venues. ☛ Though I want the STL 100 to be as current as possible, I also can’t chase down every new restaurant right up to my final deadline. Restaurants that opened after Oct. 31, 2015, weren’t eligible for the 2016 STL 100.

OUR TEAM Gabe Hartwig editor, ghartwig@post-dispatch.com • Jody Mitori Post-Dispatch assistant managing editor for features, jmitori@ post-dispatch.com • Ian Froeb restaurant critic, ifroeb@post-dispatch.com • Frank Reust copy editor, freust@post-dispatch.com • Hillary Levin photo editor, hlevin@post-dispatch.com • Josh Renaud Web developer, jrenaud@post-dispatch.com • Donna Bischoff Post-Dispatch vice president of advertising, dbischoff@post-dispatch.com • Kyle Ingram director of new business, sponsorship and events, kingram@post-dispatch.com • CONTACT US Advertise 314-340-8500, stltoday.com/advertise • Subscribe 314-340-8888, stltoday.com/subscribe • Write to us Go! Magazine, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 900 N. Tucker Blvd., St. Louis, MO 63101 • COPYRIGHT 2016 Go! Magazine is published by the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and Lee Enterprises. No part of Go! Magazine may be reproduced without prior written consent. For permissions requests, reprints, back issues and more information, call 314-340-8000, or visit stltoday.com/contact. • ON THE COVER Photo illustration from Post-Dispatch photos

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■ 801 Chophouse ■ Acero H ■ Adam’s Smokehouse ■ Annie Gunn’s H ■ Asian Kitchen ■ Baileys’ Range ■ Bar Les Frères ■ Basso ■ Beast Craft BBQ Co. ■ Blood & Sand ■ Blues City Deli ■ Bogart’s Smokehouse H ■ Brasserie by Niche H ■ Bridge Tap House & Wine Bar ■ Byrd & Barrel ■ Chef Ma’s Chinese Gourmet Restaurant ■ Cielo Restaurant & Bar ■ Clementine’s Naughty & Nice Creamery ■ Cleveland-Heath H ■ Comet Coffee & Microbakery ■ The Crossing H ■ Death in the Afternoon ■ Diner’s Delight ■ Dressel’s Public House ■ Elaia H ■ Farmhaus H ■ Ferguson Burger Bar & More ■ Five Bistro H ■ Five Star Burgers ■ Fork & Stix H ■ Gallagher’s ■ Gioia’s Deli ■ Grapeseed ■ Guerrilla Street Food H ■ HandleBar ■ Hiro Asian Kitchen ■ Ices Plain & Fancy ■ J McArthur’s ■ Juniper H ■ Kaslik Mediterranean Cuisine ■ Katie’s Pizza & Pasta Osteria ■ Kitchen Kulture ■ The Kitchen Sink ■ La Patisserie Chouquette ■ La Tejana Taqueria ■ La Vallesana

■ The Libertine ■ Linh Mi Gia ■ Lona’s Lil Eats ■ Mai Lee H ■ Medina Mediterranean Grill ■ Meskerem Ethiopian Restaurant ■ Milagro Modern Mexican ■ Milque Toast Bar ■ Mission Taco Joint ■ Niche H ■ Olio ■ Pappy’s Smokehouse H ■ Pastaria H ■ Peacemaker Lobster & Crab Co. ■ Pho Long ■ Pi Pizzeria ■ Pint Size Bakery ■ A Pizza Story ■ Pizzeoli ■ Private Kitchen ■ Publico H ■ Quincy Street Bistro H ■ Randolfi’s Italian Kitchen H ■ Reeds American Table ■ Remy’s Kitchen & Wine Bar ■ Retreat Gastropub ■ Rice Thai Bistro ■ Salt + Smoke ■ Salume Beddu ■ Sauce on the Side ■ Schlafly Tap Room ■ The Shaved Duck ■ Sidney Street Cafe H ■ Signature India ■ Sister Cities Cajun and BBQ ■ Smoki O’s ■ Southern ■ Southwest Diner ■ Spare No Rib ■ Stone Soup Cottage H ■ Sugarfire Smoke House ■ Taco Circus ■ Tai Ke ■ Taqueria Durango ■ Taste H ■ The Tavern Kitchen & Bar ■ Three Flags Tavern H ■ Tony’s H ■ Tree House ■ Union Loafers Cafe and Bread Bakery ■ Urban Chestnut Brewery & Bierhall ■ Veritas H ■ Vincent Van Doughnut ■ The Vine Mediterranean Cafe and Market

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Visiting all 100?

velouté spiked with lemongrass, an elegant, border-blurring riff on chicken and dumplings. Playfulness abounded. Nashan winked at current St. Louis dining trends with his “ramen”: noodles made from grits, smoked beef brisket, an egg, fermented radishes and blistered turnips in a rich, spicy red-eye-gravy broth. The Tuna Fish Sandwich, tuna with Wonder Bread panna cotta, quail egg pickled in beet juice and tonnato sauce, nodded at childhood. The entire meal was a reminder that more than 11 years after taking over the Sidney Street kitchen, Nashan is still striving to push St. Louis dining forward. $$$$

A taco with Missouri caviar at Niche

LAST YEAR’S RANKING No. 7 • OPENED 1987 • MUST ORDER Menu changes frequently

Elaia

P H O T O S : R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( N I C H E , S I D N E Y S T R E E T C A F E ) ; L A U R I E S K R I VA N / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( E L A I A )

CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN, MEDITERRANEAN

One winter 2 evening, wanting to serve a classic hearty dish, Ben Poremba decided to put pot-aufeu on the menu of his flagship restaurant. Poremba being Poremba, of course, it wasn’t simply the beloved French stew of meat (beef cheek, in this case), vegetables and aromatics. In the broth, Poremba combined red wine and beet vinegar in equal measures, and the beet vinegar’s earthiness and tang both enriched and brightened the dish. It was hearty, as desired, but also brilliant. It was Elaia in a nutshell. Poremba’s inspired cooking, drawn from his background across the Mediterranean, have distinguished Elaia since it opened. Even after a year of significant turnover, including a new chef de cuisine (Tello Carreon, replacing Josh Charles,

$ Under $15 per person

 WHERE 2000 Sidney

now at Element) and wine director (Aaron Sherman, formerly of Girl & the Goat in Chicago and, briefly, Niche), it belongs at the summit of St. Louis dining. My most recent meal here featured stunner after stunner: Kibbeh Nayeh, a disc of smooth lamb tartare topped with a quenelle of raw carrot, both sharpened with harissa; swordfish ceviche in lime juice and aji chile, cooled with the sweetness of Japanese yam and honeydew melon; a show-stopping soup course in which Poremba poured a silken velouté of parsnip into an airy, luxurious sabayon of foie gras. $$$$

Street, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-771-5777, sidneystreetcafe. com • HOURS Dinner Tuesday-Saturday

Niche CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN

After five previous nominations, Gerard Craft finally won the James Beard Award for “Best Chef: Midwest” in 2015. His victory gilded what was already a special year for Niche, which was celebrating its 10th anniversary — a decade that saw it grow from a small Benton Park establishment into a juggernaut with five distinct restaurants and, soon, an expansion into the white-hot Nashville, Tenn., market. So is Craft’s flagship restaurant resting on its laurels? Hardly. My return to Niche after another year of dining at St. Louis restaurants both new and old cemented my belief not only that Niche is our best restaurant, but also that nowhere else is close to knocking it off this perch. With an ace team in place (executive chef Nate Hereford, pastry chef Sarah Osborn and general manager Christopher Kelling), Niche delivers an unrivaled experience. Not even a self-imposed stricture to use local products almost exclusively has dampened its brilliance. Consider the Missouricaviar taco, a playful, delicious three bites of paddlefish caviar with yogurt, habanero and chicharrones on a wheatberry tortilla, or the unexpectedly exciting rutabaga soup (rutabaga!) spiked with horseradish and cooled with a lovely elderberry granita. And I’m still thinking about Osborn’s beguiling Missouri miso crème caramel. A decade in, Niche is still finding new ways to delight and amaze. $$$$

LAST YEAR’S RANKING No. 1 • OPENED 2005 • MUST ORDER Menu changes frequently  WHERE 7734 Forsyth Boulevard, Clayton • MORE INFO 314-773-7755, nichestlouis.com • HOURS Dinner daily

LAST YEAR’S RANKING No. 2 • OPENED 2012 • MUST ORDER Menu changes frequently  WHERE 1634 Tower

Grove Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-932-1088, elaiastl.com • HOURS Dinner Wednesday-Saturday

Sidney Street Cafe CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN

Last year, I seemed to have caught Kevin Nashan’s landmark restaurant in what was, by its own lofty

$$ $15–$30

$$$ $30–$45

standards, a fallow period. My meal there was excellent, but not quite as exciting as what I experienced at the six restaurants I ranked ahead of it in the inaugural STL 100. When I returned to Sidney Street Cafe this year, I found inspired cooking. Nashan seems

$$$$ Over $45 per person

especially enamored of his kitchen’s wood-fired grill, and it imparted a smoky soulfulness to a piece of red snapper over a feisty nduja sauce and a squab breast, rare, with satsuma and braised endive. On the side was a crock with squab confit and drop biscuits in a classic

New to the STL 100

Sweetbread banh mi at Sidney Street Cafe

Farmhaus CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN

Farmhaus shows few signs of the game a chef of Kevin Willmann’s stature — a former Food & Wine magazine “Best New Chef” and a multiple semifinalist for the “Best Chef: Midwest” James Beard Award — usually must play. The space is modest, verging on quaint. I can’t remember the last time I received a press release from the restaurant. Every so often Willmann will close it to go fishing. So maybe Willmann’s profile isn’t as high as it could or should be. It’s refreshing to enjoy a meal of Farmhaus’ caliber without the attendant rigamarole — and there just might be a connection between Willmann’s love of fishing and the fact that Farmhaus, among other things, is one of the best spots for seafood in town. I’ve lost track of how many great seafood dishes I’ve eaten ☛

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A pecan-wood smoked scallop at Stone Soup Cottage

LAST YEAR’S RANKING No. 4 • OPENED 2010 • MUST ORDER Breakfast ($20)  WHERE 3257 Ivanhoe

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-647-3800, farmhausrestaurant.com • HOURS Lunch Monday, dinner Tuesday-Saturday

 WHERE 6679 Delmar

Boulevard, University City • MORE INFO 314-833-5780, publicostl.com • HOURS Dinner Tuesday-Sunday

ClevelandHeath Deep-fried Brussels sprouts at Cleveland-Heath convenient day. So plan ahead. Book a table even before you see the menu. McConnell’s classic continental cooking applied to the season’s bounty, much of it sourced from the farm where the restaurant is located, is as close to a culinary sure thing as you’ll find in the area. On top of that, of course, is the impeccable hospitality, which makes the long drive (for most of us) to Cottleville seem like nothing the moment you walk in the door. $$$$ LAST YEAR’S RANKING No. 3 • OPENED 2009 • MUST ORDER Menu changes monthly  WHERE 5809 Highway N,

Cottleville • MORE INFO 636244-2233, stonesoupcottage. com • HOURS Dinner Thursday-Saturday

Stone Soup Cottage CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN, FRENCH

The ritual is agonizing. I don’t make a reservation at Stone Soup Cottage because I can’t review Carl and Nancy McConnell’s restaurant every month. Then the McConnells send the email with the upcoming month’s menu, and I immediately search Stone Soup’s online reservation calendar because who can resist, say, a zucchini blossom stuffed with applewoodsmoked duck with a lavender béchamel (July) or braised beef short rib osso buco with a Périgueux sauce (September)? Not this restaurant critic. And maybe there will still be an open table for the month. More than likely there isn’t, or at least not on a

Broccoli rabe at Público

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New to the STL 100

Público CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN, MEXICAN, LATIN AMERICAN

I struggled to decide where Público should rank in this list. Yes, Mike Randolph’s selfstyled Latin-Americaninspired cantina was, by far, the best restaurant to open in St. Louis last year, and it was a semifinalist for best new restaurant nationwide at

$ Under $15 per person

this year’s James Beard Awards. But it’s not yet 1 year old as I write this, and the always restless Randolph is still tinkering with his approach, pushing Público in new directions. I hesitate to mention dishes that I love — the sweetbreads with pineapple and habanero, the hidago arepa, the pescado blanco taco — in case they vanish from the menu. But just now, as I wrote “pushing Público in new directions,” I remembered again just how important this restaurant is. It’s the capstone for one of St. Louis’ most talented chefs, who after opening the Good Pie in 2008 brimmed with ideas but couldn’t find the right vehicle for them. It marries his ambition, intellect and playfulness to hearth-fired soulfulness. Randolph’s cooking here is dynamic, borderless and personal, and it comes at a time when the St. Louis restaurant scene, while as strong overall as it’s ever been, has retreated to a position of safety — of comfort food and fastcasual, barbecue and fried chicken. Público isn’t safe. It is vital. It belongs right here. $$$ LAST YEAR’S RANKING New • OPENED 2015 • MUST ORDER Higado arepa ($10)

FIND FOOD WHEN YOU’RE ON THE GO Sort STL 100 restaurants by cuisine and price range, and find spots that are near you.

CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN

My only frustration with Cleveland-Heath is one I suspect most chefs would be happy to provoke. I’ve enjoyed so many terrific dishes at Jennifer Cleveland and Eric (Ed) Heath’s Edwardsville restaurant, dishes I’d call iconic — except that, by the time I return, the menu has moved on to the next great thing. (A short list of dishes I’d love to eat again one day: a more-than-credible take on pho; seared beef tongue over spaetzle with horseradish crème fraiche; foie gras with flapjacks, candied pecans and maple syrup.) Recent inventions I’m sure to be mourning soon include a take on the trendiest dish around, Nashville hot chicken. Heath uses pork belly instead — its fat-smooched flavor better stands up to the intense chile heat than chicken’s does — but the truly distinctive element is the cooling Wonder Bread puree that surrounds the pork. A few dishes are constants, though, and with good reason, including the pork porterhouse with a sunny-side-up egg and jalapeño-cheddar cornbread and the must-order side dish of deep-fried Brussels sprouts. $$$

LAST YEAR’S RANKING No. 5 • OPENED 2011 • MUST ORDER Pork porterhouse ($24)  WHERE 106 North

Main Street, Edwardsville • MORE INFO 618-307-4830, clevelandheath.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner MondaySaturday, brunch Saturday

At stltoday.com/stl100 or in our free app

$$ $15–$30

$$$ $30–$45

$$$$ Over $45 per person

P H O T O S : L A U R I E S K R I VA N / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( FA R M H A U S ) ; R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( S T O N E S O U P C O T TA G E , P Ú B L I C O ) ; J . B . F O R B E S / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( C L E V E L A N D - H E AT H )

Roasted Ozark Forest mushroom salad at Farmhaus

here. A winter dinner featured lovely Maine lobster with charred grapefruit, baby carrots, a celery-root puree and a carrot-tarragon beurre monte, part of a tasting menu that showcased Willmann’s understated elegance (red beet agnolotti with roasted fennel, goat cheese and black walnuts) and modernist playfulness (an upscale take on Chinese-takeout beef and broccoli). If Farmhaus is underrated, its tasting menu is more so — though understandably, since it competes for attention against such regularmenu standards as the roasted Ozark Forest mushroom salad and Willmann’s signature Breakfast. $$$–$$$$

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03.13.16 • ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH • GO! MAGAZINE

IAN FROEB’S STL 1OO

CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN

Before the craze for crudo on every upscale menu, there was tuna tartare, and before tuna tartare was on every upscale menu, it was actually something I looked forward to eating. So when I last dined at Jim Fiala’s the Crossing, as part of my four-course tasting menu (still an amazing value, whether you choose the $35 Classic or $50 Premium option), I ordered the tuna tartare. I figured if anyone could redeem the dish, it would be Fiala and his executive chef Brad Watts. I figured right. A little orange highlighted the tuna’s clean sweetness, while celery and fennel added bite. I followed this with a simple, soulful dish of housemade tagliolini

From left: Roasted beet salad at the Crossing; a filet mignon of swordfish at Tony’s; garganelli with braised beef at Pastaria with chanterelles and Parmesan. Even with two courses to go, I’d already returned to the heart of the Crossing, a restaurant both contemporary and timeless, elegant and rustic, a place where you can indulge in seared foie gras and finish your meal with an apple crumble paired with a nostalgiainducing oatmealcookie gelato. $$$$ LAST YEAR’S RANKING No. 6 • OPENED 1998 • MUST ORDER Tasting menu (four courses, $35 Classic or $50 Premium)

 WHERE 7823 Forsyth

Boulevard, Clayton • MORE INFO 314-721-7375, fialafood. com/the-crossing • HOURS Lunch Monday-Friday, dinner Monday-Saturday

Tony’s CLASSIC FINE DINING, ITALIAN

The chicken9 little reaction to January’s news that Mike Shannon’s Steaks and Seafood and Harry’s Restaurant and Bar were closing

was overblown — downtown dining isn’t dead or dying — but it did touch upon an important point. Some restaurants become such institutions that you can forget they are also still day-to-day operations. St. Louis has no greater culinary institution than Tony’s, and it remains the place to pamper yourself with the extraordinary hospitality of Vince Bommarito Sr. and his staff and, of course, to indulge in caviar, foie gras and other old-school

luxuries. That Tony’s doesn’t change its menu in the frequent, comprehensive way many of the other restaurants in the Top 25 do is beside the point. You wouldn’t want it to. Yes, for most of us this is very-special-occasion or generous-expenseaccount dining, but if you want to experience the Bommarito spirit without breaking the bank, visit the adjacent, much more casual Anthony’s Bar. $$$$

LAST YEAR’S RANKING No. 8 • OPENED 1946 (as Tony’s Spaghetti House) • MUST ORDER Beef tenderloin with foie gras ($48)  WHERE 410 Market Street,

St. Louis • MORE INFO 314231-7007, tonysstlouis.com • HOURS Dinner Tuesday-Sunday

Pastaria ITALIAN, PIZZA

Gerard Craft

1o will test his

appeal outside St. Louis this year when

he opens a location of Pastaria in Nashville, Tenn. Pastaria is the obvious choice for expansion into a booming market. Of Craft’s four restaurants — not counting the new Porano Pasta, itself derived from Pastaria’s menu — it has proven the most approachable to diners of all ages without sacrificing the James Beard Award winner’s commitment to quality. Under the stewardship of risingstar executive chef Ashley Shelton, Pastaria is a model of casual-

LAST YEAR’S RANKING No. 10 • OPENED 2012 • MUST ORDER Salume Beddu Nduja pizza ($14.75)  WHERE 7734 Forsyth

Boulevard, Clayton • MORE INFO 314-862-6603, pastariastl.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily, brunch Saturday and Sunday

Gallagher's 2015 Voted #1 BEST FRIED CHICKEN by St. Louis Post-Dispatch & RFT Readers

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New to the STL 100

$ Under $15 per person

$$ $15–$30

$$$ $30–$45

$$$$ Over $45 per person

P H O T O S : P O S T- D I S PAT C H F I L E ( T H E C R O S S I N G , T O N Y ’ S ) ; R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( PA S TA R I A )

The Crossing

dining excellence, efficiently turning out terrific food to a consistently crowded dining room. Choosing a favorite dish from the loaded lineup of pastas (canestri cacio e pepe, pistachio ravioli) and wood-fired pizzas (the spicy Roman, the lardo-kissed Brussels sprouts) is difficult, but lately I’ve been drawn to the Salume Beddu Nduja pizza, which features spicy sausage from St. Louis’ preeminent charcuterie as well as tomato, fior di latte, garlic, oregano and honey. $$

Randolfi’s Italian Kitchen ITALIAN

Randolfi’s Italian

11 Kitchen, runner-

P H O T O S : C H R I S T I A N K . L E E ( R A N D O L F I ’ S ) ; R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( V E R I TA S ) ; P O S T- D I S PAT C H F I L E ( F I V E B I S T R O )

up to owner Mike Randolph’s other 2015 debut, Público, as last year’s best new restaurant, remains a work in progress. Since I reviewed the restaurant last November, Randolph has tweaked the menu format into a more traditional Italian succession of antipasti, primi (pastas) and secondi (main courses), though with additional categories for large-format meat dishes and for Neapolitan pizzas that hearken back to the restaurant’s previous life as the Good Pie. Randolph’s goal, though, hasn’t changed: to infuse the spirit of old-school Italian dining with his

From left: White Bolognese pasta at Randolfi’s; beet and parsley tortellini with nameko mushrooms and pork shoulder at Veritas; charcuterie plate at Five Bistro modern vision. You can see this in my favorite dish here, pappardelle in a white Bolognese sauce (ground pork, pancetta, heavy cream and vermouth with a little turkey liver for its extra nudge of flavor) topped with a cured egg yolk. Randolfi’s also raises the bar for beverage programs at Italian restaurants in St. Louis, thanks to Jeffrey Moll’s excellent cocktails and a wide range of amari and vermouths. I’m already excited to return here for next year’s STL 100. $$$

LAST YEAR’S RANKING New • OPENED 2015 • MUST ORDER Pappardelle with white Bolognese ($13.50)  WHERE 6665 Delmar

Boulevard, University City • MORE INFO 314-899-9221, randolfis.com • HOURS Dinner Tuesday-Sunday

Veritas CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN

The blessing 12 and the curse of being a restaurant critic?

(Besides the expense account and the weight gain, that is?) You’re never done learning what’s out there, what’s new, and what you’ve missed or misjudged or forgotten about. Case in point: Veritas, David and Stephanie Stitt’s wine shop, gourmet market and restaurant in Ellisville, where their son, Mathis, is the executive chef as well as a co-owner. I’d eaten at Veritas before. I’d included it in last year’s inaugural STL 100. But not until my most recent dinner there,

from Mathis Stitt’s oftchanging “fine-dining menu” (available for dinner Thursday through Saturday) did I realize just how great Veritas is. Crisp-edged cornbread with bacon jam and foie-gras butter could hold its own with any of the newly trendy Southern dishes in town. And then there was the pan-roasted barramundi, served with a slab of pork belly, a sort of fritter made from creamed rice and a slew of vegetables (Brussels sprouts, turnips, carrots) in a citrus-

bacon broth. It was as beautifully plated and complexly flavored as anything I’d eaten all year. Veritas is now in the Top 25, where it should have already been. I suspect it might go higher still. $$–$$$ LAST YEAR’S RANKING Unranked • OPENED 2004 • MUST ORDER Menu changes frequently  WHERE 15860 Fountain

Plaza, Ellisville • MORE INFO 636-227-6800, veritasgateway. com • HOURS Lunch and dinner Tuesday-Saturday (“fine-dining menu” dinner Thursday-Saturday)

Five Bistro CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN

Five Bistro

13 will celebrate

its 10th anniversary this year, which speaks to Anthony Devoti’s talents as a chef and his vision for a tightly curated, oft-changing menu featuring impeccably sourced, generally local products. It’s the sort of place where you can see something as simple as braised chicken leg on

the menu and be excited to order it. But I feel like whenever I discuss Five, I write sentences like the two preceding this one. That braised chicken leg was excellent, but what really excited me during my most recent dinner at Five were the empanadas Devoti served as an appetizer. Filled with lamb confit, sweet potato and Kickapoo cheese, these stayed true to Devoti’s mission: sourced from local producers, elegantly plated and technically exact. The unexpected and downright fun combination of ingredients shows that within the established confines of Five, Devoti finds room to play. $$$–$$$$ LAST YEAR’S RANKING No. 11 • OPENED 2006 • MUST ORDER Menu changes frequently  WHERE 5100 Daggett

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-773-5553, fivebistro. com • HOURS Dinner TuesdaySaturday, lunch Saturday

Bringing ART, FOOD & ENTERTAINMENT together as one!

Our Famous hot Salami... never had it? ask for a sample the next time you are in! Pick your Sandwich, Bread, Cheese and Toppings

We Make Our SandWiCheS YOur WaY Gioia’s Deli, home of the famous Hot Salami sandwich, is located on “The Hill” at the corner of Macklind and Daggett. Locally owned and operated since 1918, Gioia’s Deli was built from brick and wood from the 1904 World’s Fair. Gioia’s Hot Salami sandwich is St. Louis’ sandwich. The Hot Salami or Salam de Testa is made fresh daily and is a combination of beef and pork. The same recipe and techniques have been used to make the Hot Salami for over 96 years. All product is sourced locally from DiGregorio’s Market, Fazio’s Bakery, Volpi Salumeria and Gelato Di Riso.

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314-610-0405 03.13.16 • ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH • GO! MAGAZINE

pickled celery. With the closure of Tom Schmidt’s Franco in February, Brasserie has become St. Louis’ best French restaurant. The crown looks good on it. $$$

Juniper CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN, SOUTHERN, FRIED CHICKEN

Juniper’s 2015

14 began with

The Belly of the Beast at Guerrilla Street Food

big news: John Perkins had hired Cassy Vires of recently closed Home Wine Kitchen as executive chef, and she would remake the menu of his Southern restaurant in her own fashion. This transformation was short-lived. Vires left in June, and Perkins took charge of the kitchen again, with Tim Zenner as his executive chef. So the year ended with Juniper back where it began three years ago — except when I dined there this winter, Perkins’ cooking struck me as even more focused and exciting than before, as if his stepping back from the kitchen had recharged him. His own voice came through more clearly in a playful “pop tart” filled with a thin layer of chicken-liver mousse and glazed with a preserved-lemon icing and a soulful riff on posole with country ham and the sophisticated sweetness of collard greens. Yes, Juniper is still a Southern restaurant — fried chicken, shrimp and grits, the stellar Pork and Beans — but now it feels like it’s on the precipice of something more. $$$ LAST YEAR’S RANKING No. 17 • OPENED 2013 • MUST ORDER Pork and Beans (pork belly and Sea Island red peas with a fried egg, collard greens and maple syrup, $19)  WHERE 360 North

Boyle Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-329-7696, junipereats.com • HOURS Dinner Monday-Saturday

LAST YEAR’S RANKING Unranked • OPENED 2009 • MUST ORDER Walleye quenelle ($24.95)  WHERE 4580 Laclede

Berkshire hog belly with bittersweet chocolate soy caramel glaze and mandarins at Annie Gunn’s tion, but the arrival last year of its small, fast-casual storefront in Tower Grove East felt monumental. Here, for any remaining doubters, is the proof that a truck can be the genesis of some of St. Louis’ most exciting and delicious fare — and that a restaurant shorn of the usual trappings can be destination dining. The Guerrilla storefront lets Joel Crespo and Brian Hardesty serve an expanded menu of their dazzling riffs on Filipino cuisine: the Iron Manok, fried chicken thighs with hoisin sauce and a umami-laden sauce of mango and bagoong (fermented shrimp paste); tocino ribs with banana ketchup and the pickled papaya slaw called atchara; and, of course, the signature Flying Pig, garlicky pulled pork and a one-hour egg over rice. As exciting as Guerrilla Street Food’s growth into a full-fledged restaurant is the prospect of what dishes Crespo and Hardesty will develop next in their new, permanent kitchen. $ LAST YEAR’S RANKING No. 19 • OPENED 2011 (food truck), 2015 (restaurant) • MUST ORDER Flying Pig ($8)  WHERE 3559 Arsenal Street,

St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-

FILIPINO, FOOD TRUCK

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Guerrilla Street 15 Food wasn’t the first St. Louis food truck to open a brick-and-mortar loca-

New to the STL 100

Brasserie by Niche FRENCH

Executive chef

16 Nick Blue has

energized Brasserie by Niche with his burger (a sort of haute Big Mac to which you can add a slab of foie gras) and the Cinq à Sept happy-hour menu, featuring bratwurst with a changing assortment of toppings. The heart of Brasserie is unchanged, though, and Blue has kept the hearty French fare — onion soup, steak frites, cassoulet — to the standards diners have come to expect from a Gerard Craft restaurant. My new favorite dish might be the walleye quenelle, two small footballs of delicately seasoned fish in a lobster sauce with oyster mushrooms and shrimp. The quenelles show an quiet elegance, as did another standout, a midwinter celery-root soup enlivened with

TASTE WHAT THESE CHEFS ARE COOKING

Guerrilla Street Food Ancient grain salad at Brasserie by Niche

529-1328, guerrillastreetfood. com • HOURS Lunch and dinner Monday-Saturday, closed Sunday

$ Under $15 per person

Tickets are on sale now for the STL 100 Great Taste, 6 p.m. March 31 at Neo. For just $25, you’ll be able to sample dishes from nearly 40 of the restaurants on this list.

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-454-0600, brasseriebyniche.com • HOURS Dinner daily, brunch Saturday-Sunday

Annie Gunn’s CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN, STEAKHOUSE

A photograph of

17 the veal sweet-

breads I ordered at a recent dinner at Annie Gunn’s wouldn’t have looked out of place in the pages of Bon Appétit. The sweetbreads — as crisp on the outside and creamy on the inside as any I’ve eaten — were spread across a swipe of cashew butter. Scattered artfully atop them was a tangle of cilantro, onion and pepper. It evoked, by design, the flavors of pad thai. My entree that evening also crossed culinary borders: redfish, a daily seafood special, chile-rubbed and then roasted. Yet the presentation was endearingly old-school, with the fish served over rice with a side of mixed vegetables. Lou Rook III has been the chef at Annie Gunn’s for nearly a quarter-century now, and his kitchen can still move effortlessly between contemporary styles and classic plates, between burgers and USDA Prime steaks topped with sauteed foie gras. $$$-$$$$ LAST YEAR’S RANKING No. 22 • OPENED 1936 (as the Smokehouse Market) • MUST ORDER Menu changes frequently  WHERE 16806 Chesterfield

Airport Road, Chesterfield • MORE INFO 636-5323314, smokehousemarket. com • HOURS Lunch and dinner Tuesday-Sunday

stltoday.com/ greattaste

$$ $15–$30

$$$ $30–$45

$$$$ Over $45 per person

P H O T O S : S I D H A S T I N G S ( J U N I P E R ) ; C H R I S T I A N K . L E E ( G U E R R I L L A S T R E E T F O O D ) ; J . B . F O R B E S / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( B R A S S E R I E ) ; M I C H A E L T H O M A S ( A N N I E G U N N ’ S ) ; C H R I S T I A N G O O D E N / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( L O B S T E R )

Chicken and waffles at Juniper

Find an interactive guide to the #stl100 at stltoday.com/stl100

03.13.16 • ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH • GO! MAGAZINE

Dalie’s Smokehouse.) And if I’m wrong and you actually didn’t need this reminder? Well, then I’ve sent you back to Pappy’s anyway. Enjoy. $–$$

Taste CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN, SMALL PLATES

A year after

LAST YEAR’S RANKING No. 23 • OPENED 2008 • MUST ORDER Ribs (half-slab $15.99, full slab $23.99)

18 Heather Stone

A pulled-pork sandwich platter at Pappy’s Smokehouse

the who-knows-howmany-eth time, just how revolutionary Jim Fiala’s restaurant was in 2007. Its contemporary, upscale approach to rustic Italian fare brought St. Louis’ Italian restaurants into the 21st century, paving the way for Gerard Craft’s Pastaria and Michael Randolph’s Randolfi’s Italian Kitchen, among others. And under executive chef Adam Karl Gnau and chef de cuisine Eric Gibbs, it continues to rank among St. Louis’ best Italian establishments. While I could easily build a legacy meal out of such classics as the egg raviolo and the porchetta, I find new favorites on every visit, like a light, smart appetizer of prosciutto di Parma draped over gnocco fritto (like hollow doughnut holes). Even that egg raviolo can still stagger me. Can the most sumptuous dish in St. Louis be made even more so? With a little black truffle, it can. $$$

LAST YEAR’S RANKING No. 18 • OPENED 2009 • MUST ORDER Porchetta ($12)

LAST YEAR’S RANKING No. 9 • OPENED 2007 • MUST ORDER Egg raviolo ($15)

 WHERE 4584 Laclede

 WHERE 7266 Manchester

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-361-1200, tastebarstl. com • HOURS Dinner daily

 WHERE 3106 Olive Street,

Road, Maplewood • MORE INFO 314-644-1790, fialafood. com/acero • HOURS Dinner Monday-Saturday

Acero ITALIAN

A bowl of khao soi at Fork & Stix

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Acero, a 19 keystone of Maplewood’s blossoming food scene, will turn 10 years old in 2017. So it might be difficult to remember, as I prepare to recommend its egg raviolo for

New to the STL 100

St. Louis • MORE INFO 314535-4340, pappysmokehouse. com • HOURS 11 a.m.-8 p.m. (or sold out) Monday-Saturday, 11 a.m.-4 p.m. (or sold out) Sunday

Taste in the Central West End

$ Under $15 per person

Pappy’s Smokehouse BARBECUE

Pappy’s Smoke2o house is even better than you remember. This might seem like an odd statement. After all, we’re talking about Pappy’s Smokehouse, where Mike Emerson, John Matthews and Skip Steele kicked off the apparently endless Great St. Louis Barbecue Boom eight years ago, a spot that has become as synonymous with St. Louis dining as Crown Candy Kitchen, Imo’s Pizza or Ted Drewes Frozen Custard. But that’s my point. With the wealth of great barbecue now available in the area and the food-tourist and gameday diners who crowd Pappy’s, it’s all too easy to say: “Pappy’s will be there tomorrow. I’ll go back another time.” I say that all the time, and then I finally do go back and taste those perfect pork ribs kissed with pepper and herbs or the burnt ends both blackened and luscious. Pappy’s set the standard. Pappy’s sets the standard. (A standard that extends to its 2015 spinoff in Valley Park,

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$$ $15–$30

$$$ $30–$45

Fork & Stix THAI

The menu at

21 Fork & Stix

isn’t long, but it seems inexhaustible. Three years and change after Phatcharin Wanna and her family opened this tiny Thai restaurant in the east Delmar Loop, I’m circling back to dishes that I haven’t eaten since my earliest visits, like mu ping, skewers of grilled pork with a breezy coconutmilk and palm-sugar sweetness edged with pepper and garlic. How could I have forgotten about the mu ping? But what was I supposed to drop from my usual rotation? Fork & Stix’s best dishes, from the Wanna’s native northern Thailand, turn diners into obsessives: the rustic, verdant pork sausages called sai oua, with sides of sticky rice and the hot sauce naam prik nuum; the tamarind-soured hung lay curry with pork loin and belly; and, of course, its signature curry-noodle soup, khao soi. I’ve lost count of how many bowls of khao soi I’ve slurped down, but I still haven’t unpacked how its interplay of chile, warm spices and coconut milk leads to an endless, umami-rich finish. $ LAST YEAR’S RANKING No. 12 • OPENED 2012 • MUST ORDER Khao soi ($9)  WHERE 549 Rosedale

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-863-5572, forknstix. com • HOURS Lunch and dinner Tuesday-Sunday

$$$$ Over $45 per person

P H O T O S : R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( A C E R O , TA S T E ) ; K AT H E R I N E B I S H ( PA P P Y ’ S S M O K E H O U S E ) ; I A N F R O E B / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( F O R K & S T I X )

Egg raviolo at Acero

succeeded the acclaimed Matthew Daughaday as Taste’s executive chef, Gerard Craft’s spot for small plates and cocktails feels familiar but still retains the ability to surprise. On my most recent visit, Busch beer, of all things, added zip to a straightforward dish of shrimp in a buttery sauce. A salad of radishes and kimchee was a pungent yet oddly refreshing punch of funk and salt. What the menu called porchetta turned out to be Stone’s smart rewrite of Daughaday’s signature scrapple. The pork’s crisp skin contrasted the richness of both the meat itself and the sunny-side-egg draped over it, all of it sparked by a feisty Calabrian-chile sauce. The cocktail program overseen by Kyle Mathis is as inventive as ever: A drink called “Peach Don’t Kill My Vibe” drew me in with its lightly sweet fruit and then plunged me into smoky, tannic depths. Taste is St. Louis’ best example of a place equally appealing for a snack and a drink or a restaurant to build your entire evening around. $$

9568 Manchester Rd St. Louis, MO 63119

(314) 942-6555 Open 7 Days a week for lunch and dinner Happy Hour 3-5pm, 7 days a week Brunch Saturday and Sunday 10am-2pm

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03.13.16 • ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH • GO! MAGAZINE

than 200 dishes, almost all of which, picked at random, I’d recommend, which is why, three decades later, diners continue to flock here. $–$$

Quincy Street Bistro CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN, PUB FARE, SOUTHERN

LAST YEAR’S RANKING No. 21 • OPENED 1984 • MUST ORDER Bun bo hue ($8.95)

Rick Lewis put

22 Quincy Street

Crispy crepes with shrimp and pork at Mai Lee Cauliflower broccoli gratin at Three Flags Tavern

Bistro on the culinary map, so the news that he was leaving the restaurant to open Southern with the Pappy’s Smokehouse team worried fans of Mike and Sue Enright’s corner tavern. Our concerns, though understandable, were unfounded. Southern is a smash hit, and at Quincy Street Bistro, first under chef Chris Tirone and since November with Chris Ladley helming the kitchen, the engine Lewis built continues to hum. Or, as Ladley himself told me, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” That means applying a chef’s sure hand and the contemporary concern for quality, often locally sourced ingredients to comfort-food classics local (toasted ravioli filled with smoked hog’shead meat), Southern (chicken-fried steak) and universal (meatloaf). The selection of burgers and sandwiches is especially strong, chief among them the Southsider, griddled bologna, cheddar fondue and a sunny-side-up egg. I’m no longer concerned for Quincy Street Bistro — just anxious to see where Ladley takes it next. $$ LAST YEAR’S RANKING No. 14 • OPENED 2011 • MUST ORDER The Southsider ($10)  WHERE 6931 Gravois

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-353-1588, quincystreetbistro.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner Monday-Saturday

Bogart’s Smokehouse BARBECUE

Daniel Vaughn, 23 the barbecue editor for Texas Monthly magazine — yes,

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New to the STL 100

 WHERE 8396 Musick

Memorial Drive, Brentwood • MORE INFO 314-645-2835, maileestl.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner Tuesday-Sunday

Three Flags Tavern CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN, FRIED CHICKEN

Country fried steak at Quincy Street Bistro barbecue is that that big deal in Texas — who over the past few years has become one of the country’s leading barbecue authorities, has declared 2016 the year of pastrami. Well, ask Bogart’s Smokehouse fans, what took you so long? Pastrami has been one of pitmaster Skip Steele’s specialties since Bogart’s opened five years ago, and for me, at least, it has surpassed the justly celebrated apricot-glazed ribs as the must-order at this Soulard blockbuster. (To be precise, my go-to order here is a two-meat platter with pastrami and burnt ends. Unless I want the ribs.) At Dalie’s Smokehouse, the offshoot of Pappy’s Smokehouse and Bogart’s that Steele and Mike Emerson opened last year (and which, for the sake of the STL 100, I’m considering part of both Pappy’s and Bogart’s entries), you can order a sandwich with beef pastrami, as at Bogart’s, and pork pastrami. The year of pastrami, indeed. $–$$ LAST YEAR’S RANKING No. 20 • OPENED 2011 • MUST ORDER Pastrami (sandwich $11.99, plate $15.99)  WHERE 1627 South

Ninth Street, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-621-3107, bogartssmokehouse.com • HOURS 10:30 a.m.-4 p.m. (or until sold out) Monday-Saturday

$ Under $15 per person

Mai Lee VIETNAMESE

This year will

24 see the open-

ing of Nudo, the long-awaited ramen restaurant from Qui Tran, the son of Mai Lee founder Lee Tran and, increasingly over recent years, the public face of her 30-year-old Vietnamese restaurant. Anticipation for Nudo is understandably high. Ramen is as trendy as can be in St. Louis right now, Mai Lee is beloved and Qui Tran’s ramen researchand-development has included studying with Japanese ramen master Shigetoshi Nakamura. But you don’t need to care about ramen to be excited for Nudo. More than once in interviews over the years, Tran has told me his favorite station to work in Mai Lee’s kitchen is soup, and no Vietnamese restaurant in town — maybe no other restaurant, period — displays a mastery of as many different styles of soup as Mai Lee, from the familiar, anise-accented pho to fiery bun bo hue to lesser-known egg noodles, clear noodles and rice porridges. Those soups, of course, are just one small part of Mai Lee’s epic range of more

$$ $15–$30

$$$ $30–$45

It’s difficult to

25 convey exactly

what makes Three Flags Tavern so special. Even naming it the best new restaurant of 2014, as I did, doesn’t quite capture it. The menu looks familiar, though the quality of Three Flags’ versions of such ubiquitous dishes as fried chicken, shrimp and grits, lobster rolls both hot and cold and, of course, a burger, sets it apart. The space, decked out in dark wood and warm colors, overseen by a large historical map of the United States, is a significant part of the charm. More so is the spell of hospitality cast by chef John O’Brien, his wife, Cathy, and their staff. (Though the staff is now without talented chef de cuisine Scott Davis, who left in February.) In my original review, I said Three Flags was close to the perfect neighborhood restaurant. I believe this more now. The O’Briens make Three Flags feel like home, no matter where you’ve come from. $$–$$$ LAST YEAR’S RANKING Unranked • OPENED 2014 • MUST ORDER Lobster beignets ($12.75)  WHERE 4940 Southwest

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-669-9222, threeflagstavern.com • HOURS Lunch WednesdayFriday, dinner Monday and Wednesday-Sunday, brunch Saturday-Sunday

$$$$ Over $45 per person

P H O T O S : R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( B O G A R T ’ S ) ; P O S T- D I S PAT C H F I L E ( M A I L E E , Q U I N C Y S T R E E T B I S T R O ) ; D AV I D C A R S O N / P O S T- D I S PAT C H F I L E ( T H R E E F L A G S TAV E R N )

Ribs at Bogart’s Smokehouse

The American burger, topped with a fried mac-andcheese patty, bacon, cheddar sauce and Sriracha mayo at Baileys’ Range

P H O T O S : R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( B A I L E Y S ’ R A N G E , 8 0 1 C H O P H O U S E , A S I A N K I T C H E N ) ; D AV I D C A R S O N / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( A D A M ’ S S M O K E H O U S E ) ; P O S T- D I S PAT C H F I L E ( B A R L E S F R È R E S )

STEAKHOUSE

OPENED 2013 • MUST ORDER 16-ounce rib-eye ($52)  WHERE 137 Carondelet

Plaza, Clayton • MORE INFO 314-875-9900, 801restaurantgroup.com • HOURS Dinner daily

 WHERE 920 Olive Street,

St. Louis • MORE INFO 314241-8121, baileysrange.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily

FRENCH

801 Chophouse Adam’s Smokehouse The gold standard for BARBECUE

You know by now that two of the defining features of the St. Louis barbecue boom are long lines to order and crowded dining rooms. That’s especially true at Adam’s Smokehouse, which Pappy’s Smokehouse veterans Mike Ireland and Frank Vinciguerra opened in 2013. Even a modest queue reaches the front door of this small Clifton Heights restaurant, and if you’re dining alone or with one other person, an employee will kindly ask you to share your table with another diner or two. The cozy arrangements are worth it, though, for Adam’s signature dish, the smoked salami. With nothing more than a dab of the tart-hot cranberry-cayenne barbecue sauce, the salami (pork with some beef) makes for one of the best sandwiches

OPENED 2011 • MUST ORDER Basic burger with cheese ($8.50) and small fries ($2)

Bar Les Frères

AN ALPHABET ICAL LISTING

modern-steakhouse dining in St. Louis, 801 Chophouse now boasts a sibling seafood restaurant, 801 Fish. Of course, 801 Chophouse itself has offered numerous seafood dishes since it opened in late 2013, but the choice then and now is steak: beautifully marbled, properly prepared ribeyes, strips and filets. Excellence is expensive, of course: The Sunday $33 three-course prixfixe dinner is the only way I know to enjoy an 801 Chophouse steak for less than $40. But if you’re on a budget, stop by during happy hour (4-6 p.m.), when individual lamb chops are $9 each. $$$$

smack of rosemary cream cheese. $–$$

in town — nothing but the essentials and itself essential. $–$$ OPENED 2013 • MUST ORDER Smoked-salami sandwich (regular $9.50, large $10.50)  WHERE 2819 Watson Road,

St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-8759890, adamssmokehouse.com • HOURS 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Tuesday, 11 a.m.-6 p.m. WednesdayThursday, 11 a.m.-7 p.m. FridaySaturday, 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Sunday

Asian Kitchen KOREAN

St. Louis isn’t exactly a hotbed of Korean cuisine, and what is probably the area’s best-known

Korean restaurant, Seoul Taco, actually serves a mashup of Korean-Mexican fare. Fortunately, among our few traditional Korean options is Asian Kitchen in University City. This small and unassuming restaurant offers a wide range of experiences, from an inexpensive lunch of bibimbap or — for a heartier, spicier change of pace — kimchee bokeumbap (fried rice with kimchee, beef and egg) to hot-pot or Korean-barbecue dinners for two. And whether you order simply or elaborately, the spread of banchan that the kitchen sends

FIND FOOD WHEN YOU’RE ON THE GO

out as side dishes is impressive in its variety, quality and number. $–$$

Sort STL 100 restaurants by cuisine and price range, and find spots that are near you.

OPENED 2009 • MUST ORDER Kimchee bokeumbap (lunch $8.95, dinner $9.95)

At stltoday.com/stl100 or in our free app

 WHERE 8423 Olive

Boulevard, University City • MORE INFO 314989-9377, asiankitchenstl. com • HOURS Lunch and dinner Tuesday-Sunday

Baileys’ Range BURGERS

On my most recent visit to Baileys’ Range, I took a deep breath and ordered something other than the basic

patty, medium-rare. This is a credit to Dave Bailey’s downtown burger restaurant. In a town full of just-OK burgers, the basic burger here is a reliable standout, blush-red in the center, with the copper tang of good grass-fed beef. But I needed to make sure that the myriad other

burgers at Baileys’ Range also deliver, and now I can add the Dave’s Chop House burger to my rotation. Smoked gouda, bacon jam and steak sauce blanket an agedsirloin patty (more conventionally “beefy” than the regular patty), but the revelation here is the just-right herbal

Calling Bar Les Frères a romantic restaurant, maybe St. Louis’ most romantic restaurant, isn’t wrong. The glow of amber light and the fizz of French 75s suffuse lifelong partners and Tinder matches alike. Dining alone at the bar recently, though, staring at all the deer antlers on the wall, I wondered whether this is too reductive a description. More than anything else, Bar Les Frères is an exuberant restaurant. Owner Zoë Robinson and chef Ny Vongsaly revel in the glories of classic French cuisine but deliver them with a modern touch, lighter and winking. An evening spent in the company of the peerless lobster bisque and cassoulet with duck confit, crisp-edged slices of pork belly and Toulouse sausage? I’m in love. $$$ OPENED 2012 • MUST ORDER Lobster bisque ($10)  WHERE 7637 Wydown

Boulevard, Clayton • MORE INFO 314-725-8880, barlesfreres.net • HOURS Dinner Monday-Saturday

From left: Colorado lamb chops with mint jelly at 801 Chophouse; a slab of ribs with pit beans and pasta salad at Adam’s Smokehouse; Asian Kitchen in University City; blini and caviar at Bar Les Frères

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03.13.16 • ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH • GO! MAGAZINE

From left: A Hero pizza in the kitchen at Basso; Big Cut Pork Steak with kielbasa, pan-roasted kale and tortillas at Beast Craft BBQ Co.; Mangalitsa pork collar with grilled frisee, chayote squash, chestnuts and Peppadews at Blood & Sand

Basso ITALIAN, PIZZA, PUB FARE

Basso wasn’t supposed to be the star of the restaurants at the renovated Cheshire hotel. That should have been the upscale Restaurant at the Cheshire — a fine establishment and a member of last year’s STL 100, but one that never generated the same energy that Basso does. Basso’s menu features many appealing small plates (my favorite: the very of-the-moment roasted carrots with sultanas, pistachios and harissa yogurt), but the menu’s heart is its selection of pastas and wood-fired pizzas. Among the pastas, the standout since Basso opened has been the mafalda, ribbon noodles with a beef-pork ragu,

pecorino romano and breadcrumbs. Meanwhile, the Cheshire hotel’s management has reinvented the Restaurant at the Cheshire as Boundary, with a casual menu clearly meant to replicate Basso’s appeal. $$ OPENED 2012 • MUST ORDER Mafalda ($14)  WHERE 7036 Clayton

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-932-7820, bassostl.com • HOURS Dinner daily, lunch Sunday

Beast Craft BBQ Co. BARBECUE

Have you grown spoiled by the wealth of barbecue that has appeared in St. Louis over the past eight years? Do you miss the “Wow!” moment you experienced from your first bites of the ribs at Pappy’s Smokehouse and the fatty brisket at Salt + Smoke? Head to Beast Craft

BBQ Co. in Belleville, where pitmaster David Sandusky’s pork steak — a softball-size hunk of shoulder, blackened, smoky and tender — knocked this jaded restaurant critic on his butt. The whole enterprise is impressive, from standards (ribs, chicken, brisket) to daily specials (burnt ends and snoots among them) to sides (kale with garlic, Brussels sprouts with pork belly). Every platter comes with two freshly made flour tortillas, perfect for sopping up

the cherry-chipotle barbecue sauce. $–$$ OPENED 2014 • MUST ORDER Pork steak (with two sides, $15)  WHERE 20 South Belt

West, Belleville • MORE INFO 618-257-9000, beastcraftbbq. com • HOURS 11 a.m.-9 p.m. (or sold out) SundayThursday, 11 a.m.-10 p.m. (or sold out) Friday-Saturday

Blood & Sand CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN

This will be a pivotal year for Blood & Sand, as founders Adam Frager and TJ Vytlacil have put the private restaurant and bar up for sale. (The duo are focusing on the restaurant-point-ofsale software they have developed.) The new owner will inherit a stellar beverage program, a staff that makes

gracious hospitality seem effortless and a menu from chef David Rosenfeld that is as inventive as any in town. A recent visit featured two dishes as delicious as they were mind-bending: parsnip soup with absinthe and black trumpet mushrooms followed by an Italian-Thai mashup of pistachio-crusted duck with papaya and arancini stuffed with larb. Yes, Blood & Sand is hidden behind a members-only scrim, and as I did last year, I’ve excluded it from

the STL 100’s Top 25 for that reason. But if the new owner allows Blood & Sand to continue building on its strengths, that exclusion will be more difficult to justify. $$$$ OPENED 2011 • MUST ORDER Menu changes frequently  WHERE 1500 St.

Charles Street, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-241-7263, bloodandsandstl.com • HOURS Dinner Monday-Saturday

A traditional Lebanese Restaurant where we take pride in our authentic flavors. Our menu is created from family recipes served for generations. Whether it’s freshly baked pita bread or the daily selection of sweets, every dish from our kitchen carries the love of a home cooked meal. Several new sandwich options have been added to our menu.

3171 South Grand • St. Louis • 314.776.0991 • thevinestl.com

The Vine Café and Market

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New to the STL 100

$ Under $15 per person

$$ $15–$30

$$$ $30–$45

$$$$ Over $45 per person

PHOTOS: ROBERTO RODRIGUEZ (BASSO, BLOOD & SAND); JERRY NAUNHEIM JR. (BEAST CRAFT BBQ CO.)

TasTe The TradiTion

From left: The dining room at Blues City Deli; a charcuterie board with Volpi prosciutto, smoky Danish blue cheese, smoked duck and housemade focaccia bread at Bridge Tap House & Wine Bar; the Mother Clucker sandwich at Byrd & Barrel

Blues City Deli DELI, SANDWICHES

inevitable lunch-hour line out the door. Even after a decade, I keep finding another reason to love the place. $–$$ OPENED 2004 • MUST ORDER Prez Reuben ($7.50 small, $11 large)  WHERE 2438 McNair

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-773-8825, bluescitydeli. com • HOURS 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Monday-Saturday (open until 7:45 p.m. Thursday)

Bridge Tap House & Wine Bar CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN, SMALL PLATES

Bridge Tap House & Wine Bar might be the most unheralded member of Dave Bailey’s ever-expanding restaurant empire. I’ve liked the place since it opened in 2010 but didn’t even think to consider it for the inaugural STL 100 last

year. A recent visit served as a corrective. Bridge is a whip-smart concept that would be welcome anywhere, but it’s especially vital downtown, where nonlunch options outside of Washington Avenue and Ballpark Village are so few. Here you can pair a drink from the excellent selection of wine, spirits and especially craft beer (more than 50 usually on tap, with many available to-go in growlers) with fun snacks like spiced popcorn and nuts, charcuterie

and a well-curated selection of cheeses, sandwiches and more ambitious fare. If you’re not burned out on tacos, try Bridge’s take, which folds roasted duck, kimchee slaw and jalapeño crema into a freshly pressed tortilla. $$ OPENED 2010 • MUST ORDER Smoked paprika and sea salt popcorn ($3)  WHERE 1004 Locust Street,

St. Louis • MORE INFO 314241-8141, thebridgestl.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily

Byrd & Barrel CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN, FRIED CHICKEN

Yes, Byrd & Barrel is another new friedchicken restaurant. Yes, the chicken lives up to the hype. Buttermilk-brined and pressure-fried, it’s crunchy and juicy, peppery and brownsugar sweet. What makes Byrd & Barrel fascinating, though, is that within its tiny space

(crammed bar, only three indoor tables) chef Bob Brazell is operating two different restaurants. One is fast food done better, drivethru included: meaty fried-chicken nuggets, or Nugz, with a wide range of dipping sauces. The other restaurant features creative, ambitious fare. Dishes nod both to St. Louis (a fried-chicken sandwich with Provel and Red Hot Riplets) and Brazell’s background in upscale dining (game hen over white-cheddar grits). Both versions of

Byrd & Barrel belong on this list. $–$$ OPENED 2015 • MUST ORDER Buttermilk fried chicken, halfbird ($12) or Nugz ($4 and up)  WHERE 3422 South

Jefferson Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-875-9998, byrdandbarrel.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily

P H O T O S : R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( B L U E S C I T Y D E L I , B R I D G E TA P H O U S E & W I N E B A R ) ; M I C H A E L T H O M A S ( B Y R D & B A R R E L )

For many years, I was a 7th Street Italian man. Call it a character flaw. I want a sandwich? I default to Italian meats. Lately, though, my goto has been the Prez Reuben, a glorious mess on grilled rye bread. Vince Valenza uses pastrami, not corned beef, but keeps the sauerkraut, which I suppose makes it half-Reuben, halfRachel. Wherever this arrangement of pastrami, sauerkraut, Swiss cheese and Thousand Island dressing ends up on your own sandwich taxonomy, it delivers an ideal balance of salt and fat, tang and funk. The Prez Reuben is as much a testament to Blues City Deli’s enduring popularity as the

Find an interactive guide to the #stl100 at stltoday.com/stl100

03.13.16 • ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH • GO! MAGAZINE

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GO! MAGAZINE • ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH • 03.13.16

The old Taco Bell in Overland that has housed several taquerias is now Chef Ma’s Chinese Gourmet Restaurant, another of the slew of noteworthy new Chinese restaurants in St. Louis (see also: Private Kitchen, Lona’s Lil Eats, Tai Ke). Chef Ying Jing Ma serves two menus: one of typical Americanized fare, the other of traditional Chinese dishes. You’re here for the second. The signature dish is Hainan chicken rice, chicken served at room temperature or thereabouts, the skin slippery instead of crisp. The texture might take some getting used to, but soon you’ll be picking each piece apart and dipping it in the ginger-laden sauce on the side. If you want a more approachable entry point, consider the peppery beef short ribs or the squid fried with garlic and chiles, maybe the best calamari in town. $–$$ OPENED 2015 • MUST ORDER Hainan chicken rice ($8.95)  WHERE 2336 Woodson

Road, Overland • MORE INFO 314-395-8797 • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily

Cielo Restaurant & Bar ITALIAN

What to make of Cielo Restaurant & Bar? With its gorgeous, sweeping view of the Mississippi and the downtown skyline, the restaurant at the Four Seasons St. Louis feels like it should be at the top of this list. And there are moments

New to the STL 100

OPENED 2008 • MUST ORDER Farinata ($13)  WHERE 999 North Second

Street, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-881-2105, cielostlouis.com • HOURS Lunch Monday-Friday, dinner daily, breakfast MondayFriday, brunch Saturday-Sunday

Clementine’s Naughty & Nice Creamery BAKERY & DESSERT

If I ranked the STL 100 by deliciousness per square foot, the miniscule Lafayette Square ice-cream parlor Clementine’s Naughty & Nice Creamery might be No. 1. Tamara Keefe fashions sophisticated, nuanced flavors that still appeal to the summertime kid inside each of us — or the actual kid alongside us, begging for one more scoop. Strawberry ice cream laced with balsamic and a hint of white pepper tastes as vividly and lingeringly of the fruit itself as a handful of the freshest berries. Adults might gravitate toward the booze-spiked Naughty

$ Under $15 per person

From top: Fried squid at Chef Ma’s Chinese Gourmet Restaurant; a roasted rack of lamb at Cielo; pistachio, vegan coconut chocolate fudge, and strawberry with balsamic and white pepper ice cream on a waffle cone at Clementine’s; lemonpoppyseed scones at Comet Coffee & Microbakery flavors, like chocolate with cabernet sauvignon or an ice cream blended with 17, Perennial Artisan Ales’ imperial mint-chocolate stout. $ OPENED 2015 • MUST ORDER Strawberry ice cream with balsamic and white pepper (two scoops for $4.50)  WHERE 1637 South

18th Street, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-858-6100, clementinescreamery.com • HOURS 11 a.m.-10 p.m. Monday-Thursday, 11 a.m.11 p.m. Friday-Sunday

$$ $15–$30

$$$ $30–$45

Comet Coffee & Microbakery BAKERY & DESSERT

Every once in a while, Comet Coffee & Microbakery sells out of its lemon-poppyseed scones before I get there, or maybe co-owner and pastry chef Stephanie Fischer decided not to bake them that day, and for a moment I sink ☛

$$$$ Over $45 per person

P H O T O S : I A N F R O E B / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( C H E F M A’ S C H I N E S E G O U R M E T R E S TA U R A N T ) ; R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( C I E L O , C L E M E N T I N E ’ S , C O M E T C O F F E E & M I C R O B A K E R Y )

Altair Travel & Cruises

Chef Ma’s Chinese Gourmet Restaurant

when the Italian fare from executive chef Gian Nicola Colucci dazzles — often in unexpected ways. Farinata, an appetizer, is humble and luxurious at once: a chickpea pancake (it reminded me of a Mexican huarache) topped with smoked chicken and oyster mushrooms and sauced with a truffle aioli. But then comes the pan-roasted branzino, a shockingly flabby fish in a puddle of lemon emulsion and a scattershot bed of herbed fregola and fried Japanese eggplant. And at $32, this was the least expensive entree the night I ordered it. Cielo belongs on this list, but cut off as it is from downtown, and out of most diners’ price range, very good won’t be good enough much longer. $$$$

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Beast Craft BBQ Bogart’s Smokehouse Brasserie Byrd & Barrel Cielo Clementine’s Naughty and Nice Ice Creamery Cleveland-Heath Comet Coffee Farmhaus Five Bistro Fork & Stix Guerilla Street Food HandleBar Ices Plain & Fancy Kitchen Kulture Lona’s Lil Eats Mai Lee Niche Pappy’s Smokehouse Pastaria Peacemaker Lobster & Crab Co. Pho Long Restaurant

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Private Kitchen Público Quincy Street Bistro Randolfi’s Italian Kitchen Retreat Gastropub Salt + Smoke Sidney Street Café Southern Sugarfire Smokehouse Taco Circus Taste The Kitchen Sink The Libertine The Schlafly Tap Room The Shaved Duck The Tavern Kitchen & Bar Three Flags Tavern

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03.13.16 • ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH • GO! MAGAZINE

OPENED 2012 • MUST ORDER “You’ve gotta try this lemonpoppyseed scone!” ($3)  WHERE 5708 Oakland

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-932-7770, cometcoffeestl. com • HOURS 7 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Friday, 8 a.m.-4 p.m. Saturday, 8 a.m.-2 p.m. Sunday

Dressel’s Public House CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN, PUB FARE

From left: Death in the Afternoon at Citygarden downtown; Diner’s Delight in the Gate District; Dressel’s Public House in the Central West End

Death in the Afternoon CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN

Adam Frager and TJ Vytlacil are selling their other restaurant, the members-only Blood & Sand, but plan to retain ownership of Death in the Afternoon. That’s excellent news for the downtown-lunch crowd, not to mention those of us who love a good pastrami sandwich.

Since opening two years ago, Death in the Afternoon has found a successful formula for the glass-box restaurant in the Citygarden sculpture park: a focus on lunch and weekend brunch with higher-end (or at least not cheap) contemporary fare with global influences. You can nosh on falafel, slurp chicken or turnipmiso ramen, or reckon with a version of the Minneapolis classic, the Jucy Lucy, a burger stuffed with cheese. I’m a pastrami guy. It’s cut

thicker than usual here, stacked high between halves of a pretzel bun and dressed with mustard, mayonnaise and sauerkraut. $$ OPENED 2014 • MUST ORDER Hot pastrami sandwich ($13)  WHERE 808 Chestnut

Street, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-621-3236, deathintheafternoonstl.com • HOURS Lunch Monday-Friday, brunch Saturday-Sunday

Diner’s Delight SOUL FOOD

Tuesday means oxtails at Diner’s Delight, so Tuesday is when you’re likely to find me there, fishing tender, sweet morsels of meat out of those great fists of fat and bone and swiping the meat through the luscious gravy. Not an oxtail fan? There’s also fried chicken on Tuesday; in

fact, there’s fried chicken every day, crisp and juicy and wonderfully free of any modern-day gimmicks, and there’s probably the creamy mac and cheese and, if you’re lucky, there are mixed greens cooked down into a verdant tangle. And be sure to get the signature pancake-shaped cornbread. (It’s perfect for sopping up the oxtail gravy.) As with the barbecue boom, the current rage in St. Louis (and elsewhere) for Southern cuisine threatens to obscure what’s come

before. There’s no better soul food in St. Louis than what Jo Houston has been serving for 47 years now at her Gate District restaurant. You need to eat here. Preferably on Tuesday. Preferably the oxtail. $–$$ OPENED 1969 • MUST ORDER Oxtail plate ($13.50)  WHERE 1504 South

Compton Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-776-9570, dinersdelightstl.com • HOURS 11 a.m.-7 p.m. MondayThursday, 11 a.m.-8 p.m. Friday, noon-6 p.m. Sunday

Many years ago, before Benjamin Dressel took over his parents’ Central West End institution, I thought Dressel’s Public House served one of the best burgers in St. Louis, defined mainly by what it wasn’t: complicated or overcooked. These days, with Dressel and chef Derek Roe having planted Dressel’s firmly in the modern chef-driven, ingredientminded moment, I still believe its burger to be among the best. It’s not the same burger, though. The beef is sourced from Ridgley Farms in High Hill, Mo., and it’s topped with aged cheddar and onion jam. Yet it’s still defined by what it isn’t: complicated or ☛

brunch | dinner | happy hour | private events

OISHI SUSHI AND STEAKHOUSE prasinostcharles.com 1520 s. 5th street, st. charles, mo | 636 277 0202 20

GO! MAGAZINE • ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH • 03.13.16

100 PUBLIC WORKS DR. • CHESTERFIELD MO • 636-530-1198 oishistl . com /oishisushisteakhouse @oishistl New to the STL 100

$ Under $15 per person

$$ $15–$30

$$$ $30–$45

$$$$ Over $45 per person

P H O T O S : S I D H A S T I N G S ( D E AT H I N T H E A F T E R N O O N ) ; I A N F R O E B / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( D I N E R ’ S D E L I G H T ) ; R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( D R E S S E L’ S P U B L I C H O U S E )

into a deep melancholy. The lemon-poppyseed scones are my favorite baked good in the universe, the sort of thing that makes me want to grab strangers by the collar and shout, “You’ve gotta try this scone!,” which I doubt anyone anywhere has ever shouted. Anyway, the melancholy lifts, and instead I order the buttery-beyondbuttery croissant or the breakfast-in-a-bite Rebel Within or the cranberry scone, which you’ve also gotta try. If I’m lucky, there’s a seasonal special, like the too-briefly available pawpaw pie. $–$$

overcooked. It’s the perfect example of how Dressel’s has managed to stay current without sacrificing what made it beloved in the first place. $$ From left: Ferguson Burger Bar & More in Ferguson; Dad’s Green Chile Cheeseburger at Five Star Burgers; fried chicken at Gallagher’s

OPENED 1980 • MUST ORDER Burger ($13)  WHERE 419 North

P H O T O S : I A N F R O E B / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( F E R G U S O N B U R G E R B A R & M O R E ) ; H U Y M A C H / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( F I V E S TA R B U R G E R S ) ; N O R M A K L I N G S I C K / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( G A L L A G H E R ’ S )

Euclid Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-361-1060, dresselspublichouse. com • HOURS Lunch Monday-Saturday, dinner daily, brunch Sunday

Ferguson Burger Bar & More BAR & GRILL, BURGERS, BREAKFAST

The national and international media have moved on. Ferguson Burger Bar & More, at the West Florissant Avenue flashpoint of 2014’s unrest, remains. And its signa-

ture Garbage Burger is still mandatory eating for fans of griddled burgers, its flavor of beef and char sounding clear and true through the assembly of cheese, mayonnaise and the oozing yolk of a fried egg. Crisp bacon and onion add crunch, and somehow the toasted bun contains the whole edifice. Add seasoned crinkle-cut fries and a soda for a few more bucks. If you’re in a pinch, a single plain burger will set you back only $3. $ OPENED 2014 (current ownership) • MUST ORDER

Garbage Burger (single $6.50, double $7.50)  WHERE 9120 West

Florissant Avenue, Ferguson • MORE INFO 314-3880424, fergusonburgerbar. com • HOURS Open for breakfast, lunch and dinner Monday-Saturday

Five Star Burgers BURGERS

St. Louis is understandably excited that superstar restaurateur

Danny Meyer will finally open a Shake Shack in his hometown next year. While no local burger restaurant is likely to match the global reach of Shake Shack, the news of its imminent arrival led me to wonder who might turn their operation into, say, a regional force. I didn’t need to ponder it long. Steve Gontram’s Five Star Burgers is a success at two locations, with a third slated to open in Creve Coeur this spring, and the restaurant is already a spinoff of the Five Star Burgers that

Gontram’s father, Bob, runs in New Mexico. More importantly, Five Star Burgers serves amazing burgers: pasture-raised, grainfinished beef that the kitchen always cooks to your requested temperature. Add top-notch fries, onion rings and fried cheese curds as well as appealing nonbeef burger offerings, and the recipe for future growth is apparent. No pressure, guys. $–$$ OPENED 2012 • MUST ORDER Dad’s Green Chile Cheeseburger ($9.75)

 WHERE 8125 Maryland

Avenue, Clayton • MORE INFO 314-720-4350, 5starburgersstl.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily  WHERE 312 South

Kirkwood Road, Kirkwood • MORE INFO 314-394-2250, 5starburgersstl.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily

Gallagher’s BAR & GRILL, FRIED CHICKEN, PUB FARE

Gallagher’s has become destination dining for fried-chicken aficionados on both sides of the

Authentic Mexican Cuisine

Mississippi, and last year Post-Dispatch readers voted it the winner of Go! Magazine’s Fried Chicken Frenzy, a tournament of 64 restaurants. Believe the hype. Crisp, juicy and flavorful, Gallagher’s chicken is worth what is, for most of us, a long drive. On Sundays, you can eat all of the chicken and family-style sides you want, but if that’s too much — or too much of a scene — it’s available as a two-, three- or four-piece plate the rest of the week. As great as the fried chicken is, don’t overlook the rest

of Gallagher’s menu. Its comfort fare, like sandwiches made with housemade salami and bologna, shows the same attention to detail the Gallagher family displayed in their magnificent restoration of this 1870s building. $–$$ OPENED 2005 • MUST ORDER Fried chicken ($7.95 and up)  WHERE 114 West Mill Street,

Waterloo • MORE INFO 618939-9933, gallagherswaterloo. com • HOURS Lunch and dinner Tuesday-Sunday (closes at 7 p.m. on Sunday)

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Find an interactive guide to the #stl100 at stltoday.com/stl100

03.13.16 • ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH • GO! MAGAZINE

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Gioia’s Deli DELI, FOOD TRUCK, ITALIAN, SANDWICHES

Gioia’s Deli, 98 years young, continues to refresh itself. Two years ago, owner Alex Donley launched a food truck to bring Gioia’s famous hotsalami sandwiches to the St. Louis streets. Now that experience has led directly to plans to open a location at 903 Pine Street downtown this spring. “We realized that we are an institution, but it’s not about the location,” Donley said when he announced the downtown Gioia’s. “It’s about the food. It’s about the customer service — the Gioia’s experience.” And while I’d never want to see an important part of St. Louis culinary history become just another brand, at a time when diners have so many options — so many good options — it’s necessary for a restaurant as important historically as Gioia’s to keep reaching out to new diners. $

OPENED 2010 • MUST ORDER Vegetable or pork pelmini ($7 small, $10 large)  WHERE 4127 Manchester

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-652-2212, handlebarstl. com • HOURS Lunch and dinner Tuesday-Sunday

Hiro Asian Kitchen FILIPINO, FRIED CHICKEN, PAN-ASIAN

OPENED 1918 • MUST ORDER Hot salami sandwich ($8.25)  WHERE 1934 Macklind

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-776-9410, gioiasdeli.com • HOURS 9 a.m.-4 p.m. MondayFriday, 9 a.m.-3 p.m. Saturday

From top: Tortellini salad with a hot salami sandwich at Gioia’s Deli; pulled turkey leg nachos at Grapeseed; the Baltic banh mi at HandleBar; Hiro Ramen with pork belly and baby bok choy at Hiro

Grapeseed CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN

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GO! MAGAZINE • ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH • 03.13.16

I’ve grown to appreciate Grapeseed even more during its second year. Nothing significant has changed, but now that the natural newrestaurant sparkle has faded, you can clearly see what a smart, sustainable project chefowner Ben Anderson has built. Grapeseed is, first of all, a great neighborhood spot in Southampton’s booming Macklind Business District, a place to grab a drink and a bite (the signature turkey-leg nachos) or something more substantial (a

New to the STL 100

steak or thick-cut pork chop). But Anderson’s thoughtful, unshowy cooking should draw diners from all over. I’ve returned especially for Anderson’s pastas: braised beef short rib with parsnip, carrot and onion over tagliatelle was a warming winter dish enlivened by sour cream and dill. $$–$$$ OPENED 2014 • MUST ORDER Turkey-leg nachos ($11)  WHERE 5400 Nottingham

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-925-8525, grapeseedstl.com • HOURS Dinner Tuesday-Sunday

$ Under $15 per person

HandleBar RUSSIAN

HandleBar has been slinging food and drinks in the Grove since 2010, but in 2015, owner Tatyana Telnikova freshened up the menu of Russian fare (with assistance from chef Chris DiMercurio, who worked there briefly), and if you haven’t been in a while — or ever — you should stop by for a bowl of the pelmini, pork or vegetable dumplings in a buttery,

$$ $15–$30

$$$ $30–$45

Hiro Asian Kitchen’s fascinating evolution continues. In addition to his regular pan-Asian fare, Bernie Lee now also offers a platform to two other chefs: Malou Nievera, who on Saturday serves a Filipino brunch, and Leon Augustus Braxton Jr., who on Sunday serves the fried chicken that won him a devoted following at the short-lived Grove restaurant Miss Leon’s Fried Chicken. Lee’s own cooking is an appealing collection of dishes from Chinese, Malaysian, Taiwanese and other cuisines. The spicy shrimp laksa ramen is my favorite dish, though a recent visit, my first, to the Sunday brunch won me over with da ji pai, a whopping Taiwanese chicken-fried steak served with a sunny-side-up egg and a sweet-corn coulis. $$ OPENED 2013 • MUST ORDER Spicy laksa ramen (lunch $12, dinner $17)  WHERE 1405 Washington

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-241-4476, hiroasiankitchen. com • HOURS Lunch TuesdaySaturday, dinner TuesdaySunday, brunch Sunday

$$$$ Over $45 per person

P H O T O S : C H R I S L E E / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( G I O I A’ S D E L I , G R A P E S E E D ) ; R O B E R T C O H E N / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( H A N D L E B A R ) ; C H R I S T I A N G O O D E N / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( H I R O A S I A N K I T C H E N )

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complex vegetable broth accented with dill and, if you want heat, sambal. Other Russian fare includes both classic dishes (the crepelike blinchiki, pierogi) as well as fun mashups (a banh mi with smoked whitefish as the pâté, a flatbread with salmon, crème fraiche and caviar). $

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GO! MAGAZINE • ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH • 03.13.16

Ices Plain & Fancy BAKERY & DESSERT

Ices Plain & Fancy is a science lesson the entire family can enjoy: ice cream flash-churned in front of you with liquid nitrogen, served in flavors classic (vanilla, chocolate, cherry cordial), more contemporary (my favorite, the salted dulce de leche custard) and adults-only (the dark-and-stormyaping Dark & Fancy; the Frozen Dude, a tribute to white Russians and the “Big Lebowski”). Firsttime visitors will be won over by the ice cream’s incredibly smooth texture, while regulars know to look for chef Max Crask’s changing selection of Fancy Ices. My 2016 will be spent in a highly scientific, comprehensive study to determine which of St. Louis’ great new(ish) parlors, here or Clementine’s Naughty & Nice Creamery, serves the smoothest ice cream. $ OPENED 2014 • MUST ORDER Salted Dulce de Leche Custard (regular $5.43, large $6.72)  WHERE 2256 South

39th Street, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-601-3604, icesplainandfancy.com • HOURS 2-10 p.m. Sunday, Wednesday and Thursday, 2-11 p.m. Friday-Saturday

J McArthur’s CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN

Ben McArthur’s Lindenwood Park establishment was one of 2015’s best new restaurants and a strong contender for the Top 25 of this year’s list. It will compete for a spot in the Top 25 next year, too, as McArthur continues to build on what he’s already accomplished here. J McArthur’s seamlessly integrates the strengths of progressive American cuisine — a focus on quality, often locally sourced ingredients; modernist

New to the STL 100

technique; painterly platings — with many of the details that contemporary restaurants have forsaken. Diners enjoy some space between tables here, and they can talk to each other without shouting. The best dishes are equally seamless: scallops, beautifully browned in a cast-iron skillet, served when I ordered them atop a butternut-squash bisque with bacon, Brussels sprouts and cubes of butternut squash cooked in a sous-vide bath. $$$ OPENED 2015 • MUST ORDER Cast-iron skillet scallops ($24)  WHERE 3500 Watson

Road, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-353-9463, jmcarthurs. com • HOURS Dinner TuesdaySaturday, brunch Sunday

Kaslik Mediterranean Cuisine MEDITERRANEAN, MIDDLE EASTERN

I first became a fan of Wasem Hamed’s Lebanese cooking in 2012, when he was the chef of Layla in the Grove. I was particularly taken with his mezze, both familiar (hummus, falafel) and not (makdous, a delicious dish of pickled baby eggplants stuffed with spicy walnuts, garlic and olive oil). Hamed left Layla the following year to open Kaslik Mediterranean in a cupboard of a North Lindbergh storefront in Florissant; in 2015, he relocated his restaurant to a larger space just down the street in Hazelwood. After giving him time to acclimate to the new Kaslik, I found Hamed’s cooking more appealing than ever. The mezze alone remain worth a visit, and the grilled meats deliver deeply savory flavors, with lingering hints of garlic, lemon and sumac. $–$$ OPENED 2013 • MUST ORDER Makdous ($3.99)  WHERE 7847 North

Lindbergh Boulevard,

$ Under $15 per person

From top: Mint chip ice cream at Ices Plain & Fancy; duck confit salad at J McArthur’s; beef shawarma with basmati rice at Kaslik Mediterranean Cuisine; fried artichokes at Katie’s Pizza & Pasta Osteria Hazelwood • MORE INFO 314-972-8282, kaslikmediterraneancuisine. com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily

Katie’s Pizza & Pasta Osteria ITALIAN, PIZZA

Katie’s Pizza & Pasta Osteria served one of the best pasta dishes I ate last year, an early-

$$ $15–$30

$$$ $30–$45

winter offering of thick, pleasantly chewy bigoli with bone-marrow butter, rapini, pecorino and lemon. This was hearty but also bright, luscious but also sharp. I loved it, and I might have added Katie Collier’s 3-year-old Rock Hill restaurant to the STL 100 for it alone. But I’d already stopped by earlier in 2015 to try a pizza special with Seoul Taco’s beef bulgogi and kimchee and found — besides a fun mashup of two very different restaurants — that the ☛

$$$$ Over $45 per person

P H O T O S : R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( I C E S P L A I N & FA N C Y, K A S L I K M E D I T E R R A N E A N C U I S I N E ) ; H U Y M A C H / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( J M C A R T H U R ’ S ) ; C H R I S T I A N G O O D E N / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( K AT I E ’ S P I Z Z A & PA S TA O S T E R I A )

D u c he sn e Hig h S c hool

P H O T O S : I A N F R O E B / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( K I T C H E N K U LT U R E ) ; G A B E H A R T W I G / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( T H E K I T C H E N S I N K ) ; R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( L A T E J A N A TA Q U E R I A ) ; J O D Y M I T O R I / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( L A PAT I S S E R I E C H O U Q U E T T E )

pizza crust here had improved since my original review, with a more complex flavor and a lighter, crisper texture. Collier then tweaked the recipe again, and the crust is even better. The bigoli dish I fell for has changed, but I’ll be back to see where Collier goes from here. $$ OPENED 2013 • MUST ORDER Cured meats pizza ($19)  WHERE 9568

Manchester Road, Rock Hill • MORE INFO 314-942-6555, katiespizzaandpasta.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily

Kitchen Kulture CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN

Now that Guerrilla Street Food has opened a brickand-mortar location, Christine Meyer and Michael Miller’s Kitchen Kulture is St. Louis’ best restaurant that isn’t technically a restaurant. Sometimes from a mobile cart, sometimes from a borrowed kitchen, Meyer and Miller serve a frequently changing, border-crossing menu. One week might be curry and saag paneer, another tacos. As often as possible, the emphasis is on local produce. Fittingly, you’ll most regularly find Kitchen Kulture at the Tower Grove Farmers’ Market, both the weekly outdoor in-season market and the monthly indoor winter market, and from spring through fall for the past couple of years, Meyer and Miller have served lunch on Thursdays at Sump Coffee. $–$$ OPENED 2012 • MUST ORDER Menu changes frequently  WHERE Pop-up restaurant

• MORE INFO 314-2773881, kitchenkulture.co

The Kitchen Sink CAJUN/CREOLE, BAR & GRILL, BURGERS, BREAKFAST

Late last year, Anthony Ellerson Jr. opened a second Kitchen Sink in

a sprawling space at the corner of North Sixth and Lucas streets downtown — this, only three years after the original restaurant debuted without fanfare in a modest storefront by the Forest Park MetroLink station. (That location moved a year later to much bigger digs nearby.) The speed of the Kitchen Sink’s growth might be remarkable, but its success isn’t. Ellerson Jr. serves crowd-pleasing fare that also conveys a distinct voice. At a time when shrimp and grits appears on every other menu, his version — the restaurant’s namesake dish: shrimp and andouille on cheeselarded grits, the whole shebang smothered in a tasso-crab gravy — still manages to be unique, and his more-is-better approach to traditional Cajun and Creole fare as well as burgers, sandwiches and breakfast is never too much. $–$$

its caramelized crust and soft interior. While it might have been a coincidence that La Patisserie Chouquette displayed these two pastries next to each other, I thought it was a fitting showcase of the range of Faure’s immense talents. Naturally, I bought one of each. $ OPENED 2013 • MUST ORDER The Darkness ($4)  WHERE 1626 Tower Grove

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-932-7935, simonefaure.com • HOURS 9 a.m.-2 p.m. TuesdayFriday, 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday

La Tejana Taqueria MEXICAN

If you could concentrate the flavor of goat into one dish, it might be the goat soup at La Tejana Taqueria, a shimmering golden broth packed with falling-to-shreds meat. Even after I think I’m full, I usually find myself soaking up the broth with tortillas or even, ☛

“Northern Thai Cuisine”

OPENED 2012 • MUST ORDER The Kitchen Sink ($13)  WHERE 255 Union

Boulevard, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-454-1551, letseat. at/thekitchensink • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily  WHERE 626 North Sixth

Street, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-241-5454, letseat.at/ thekitchensink • HOURS Lunch and dinner Monday-Saturday

La Patisserie Chouquette BAKERY & DESSERT

On a recent visit to La Patisserie Chouquette, I looked first at the Darkness, Simone Faure’s chocolate croissant because, I mean, just look at it: it’s a chocolate croissant, flaky layer imbued with cacao-rich chocolate after flaky layer imbued with cacaorich chocolate. Out of the corner of my eye, though, I spotted an array of canalés, a pastry spiritually opposite to the Darkness, a modest fluted thimble that offers a subtle gradation of sweetness between

549 Rosedale Ave., St. Louis, MO 63112

314-863-5572

From top: Tuna tataki by Kitchen Kulture; chicken and waffles at the Kitchen Sink; the Darkness from La Patisserie Chouquette; La Tejana Taqueria in Bridgeton

Find an interactive guide to the #stl100 at stltoday.com/stl100

Hours: Mon. closed; Tu-Th 11am-3pm/5pm-9pm; Fri. 11am-3pm/5pm-10pm; Sat. 12pm-3pm/5pm-10pm; Sun. 12pm-3pm/5pm-9pm

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in a pinch, tortilla chips. Such depth of flavor is what distinguishes La Tejana as one St. Louis’ best spots for traditional Mexican fare. Antonio and Brenda Garcia’s restaurant, which shares its space with a grocery and liquor store (the Garcias also operate a butcher shop in the same Bridgeton strip mall), serves the standard array of taqueria fare, with excellent lengua, cabeza, al pastor and other tacos. Larger dishes (fajitas, enchiladas) are also available, though the play here is to wait for the weekendonly carnitas. $ OPENED 2008 • MUST ORDER Goat soup (small $5.99, large $8.99)  WHERE 3157 North

Lindbergh Boulevard, Bridgeton • MORE INFO 314-291-8500, latejanataqueria.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily

From left: Al pastor and chicken tacos at La Vallesana; seared foie gras poutine at the Libertine; butter-garlic chicken wings at Linh Mi Gia

La Vallesana MEXICAN

When I started planning the inaugural STL 100 in 2014, I assumed La Vallesana would be on it. Since 2003, Hilario Vargas’ taqueria had been the highlight of Cherokee Street’s strong roster of traditional Mexican restaurants. But my research visits felt off. Not terrible; just flat. Had the restaurant’s ambitious expansion

— literally rebuilt from scratch into a much bigger space, with a menu that now included such non-Mexican fare as gyros — diminished it? I made it a point to come back to La Vallesana for this year’s list and found it back to its form, with excellent tacos and tortas, especially my longtime favorite here, the tacos al pastor (pork with pineapple). And La Vallesana’s ice cream and paletas (Mexican popsicles) are St. Louis treasures. $

OPENED 2003 • MUST ORDER Taco al pastor ($1.99)  WHERE 2801 Cherokee

Street, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-776-4223, facebook. com/lavallesana • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily

The Libertine CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN, ITALIAN, MEDITERRANEAN

One of the biggest dining stories of 2015 was Josh Galliano’s departure as the Libertine’s executive chef. (Galliano, who had

won much acclaim for his work here and at An American Place and Monarch, now works for Companion bakery.) To replace him, owners Audra and Nick Luedde brought over Matt Bessler from Schlafly Bottleworks, and Bessler has given the menu a decidedly Italian slant with an emphasis on big flavors. The Crispy Pork Belly Carbonara combines its namesake pasta dish with the equally rich cacio e pepe. As you might have noticed, there are also

slabs of pork belly. How to set apart roasted bone marrow? Top it with short-rib meat, but also, crucially, a medjool-date jam for a tang that accents that one-two punch of beef and marrow. Bessler’s generous, occasionally over-thetop cooking certainly fits a restaurant called the Libertine. $$$–$$$$ OPENED 2013 • MUST ORDER Short ribs and roasted bone marrow ($16)  WHERE 7927 Forsyth

Boulevard, Clayton •

MORE INFO 314-862-2999, libertinestl.com • HOURS Dinner Tuesday-Sunday

Linh Mi Gia VIETNAMESE

Maybe I’ve mentioned the butter-garlic chicken wings, or canh ga chien, at Linh Mi Gia? OK, I’ve mentioned them many times: in my original review of this restaurant, in its entry for last year’s STL 100, in my review of chef

Nelson Padilla’s previous restaurant. They really are my favorite chicken wings anywhere: crisp, juicy and, as you’d expect, buttery and garlicky. Linh Mi Gia is not a single-dish restaurant, though, and I feel like I’m doing Padilla a disservice by focusing on those wings. So you must also try his soups — classic pho, of course, but also fiery bun bo hue and the pork broth with egg noodles and barbecue pork — and his version of shaking beef. You can always order the wings in addition to something else. They are just an appetizer, after all. $ OPENED 2014 • MUST ORDER Canh ga chien (buttergarlic chicken wings, $8)  WHERE 3723 Gravois

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-772-7742 • HOURS Lunch and dinner Tuesday-Sunday

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New to the STL 100

$ Under $15 per person

$$ $15–$30

$$$ $30–$45

$$$$ Over $45 per person

Lona’s Lil Eats From left: Steak and mushroom dumplings at Lona’s Lil Eats; a falafel sandwich at Medina Mediterranean Grill; a selection of dishes at Meskerem Ethiopian Restaurant

P H O T O S : R O B E R T C O H E N / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( L O N A’ S L I L E AT S ) ; D AV I D C A R S O N / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( M E D I N A M E D I T E R R A N E A N G R I L L ) ; K AT H E R I N E B I S H ( M E S K E R E M )

CHINESE

Lona’s Lil Eats began life as a stall at the Soulard Farmers Market, but the brickand-mortar version of Lona Luo and Pierce Powers’ operation has proven so popular that the duo decided last year to close the stall. The market should commemorate its spot with a plaque. Lona’s has quickly become an indispensable part of the St. Louis dining scene, with the convenience and affordability of a fastcasual restaurant, the friendly vibe of a neighborhood watering hole and, above all else, Luo’s inimitable cooking, drawn from her native village in China’s far south. I especially love Luo’s turkey: grilled, then

braised, it’s so flavorful you’ll double-check the menu to make sure you did order turkey. Pair it with the invigorating lemongrass pesto or the smoky-sweet Lona-Q sauce inside the restaurant’s signature rice-paper wrap to understand what makes Lona’s Lil Eats unique and essential. $ OPENED 2014 • MUST ORDER Turkey rice-paper wrap ($9.25)  WHERE 2199 California

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-925-8938, lonaslileats. com • HOURS Lunch and dinner Tuesday-Saturday

Medina Mediterranean Grill MIDDLE EASTERN, SANDWICHES

What will the restaurant of the future look like? I don’t mean the sciencefiction future of labgrown meat and soylent green, but the near future of the country’s increasingly diverse population. Ibrahim Ead’s fast-casual Medina Mediterranean

Grill provides one possible direction. Ead spent most of his childhood in St. Louis but also lived for a time in the West Bank, and his menu mashes up Palestinian cuisine with the global influences he experienced growing up in the United States. So the Summer in Dubai sandwich accents chicken shawarma with pepper jack cheese and a chipotle sauce. Traditional dishes — beef shawarma, especially — hold their own against the area’s best Middle Eastern

restaurants. If this is the future, it’s a delicious, exciting one. $ OPENED 2015 • MUST ORDER Original Palestine beef shawarma sandwich ($6.50)  WHERE 1327 Washington

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-241-1356, medinagrill.com • HOURS 11 a.m.-8 p.m. MondayThursday, 11 a.m.-9 p.m. FridaySaturday, 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Sunday

Meskerem Ethiopian Restaurant ETHIOPIAN

In January, Meskerem Ethiopian Restaurant owners Henok Gerbi and Atsede Wondem opened Moya Grill in the Delmar Loop, serving a fast-casual version of Ethiopian fare. This is a smart move. (On paper, at least; as I write this, Moya hasn’t

been open long enough for a fair review.) Few restaurants are immune from the rising popularity of fast-casual dining. While fast-casual Ethiopian might seem counter-intuitive — the food is traditionally served on large pieces of the sour flatbread called injera and eaten by hand — the cuisine does offer advantages, especially when it follows the recipes at Meskerem. For nearly a decade now, this South Grand restaurant has served brilliantly seasoned dishes with

broad appeal, whether you want a hearty beef dish (the berbere-spiced tibs wat) or lighter but still flavorful vegetarian fare (the cumin-kissed miser wat). $–$$ OPENED 2007 • MUST ORDER Tibs wat ($10.95)  WHERE 3210 South

Grand Boulevard, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-772-4442, meskeremstl.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily

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Milagro Modern Mexican

From left: Carne asada at Milagro Modern Mexican; gravlax and cucumber at Milque Toast Bar; crab taquitos at Mission Taco Joint

I’m disappointed there aren’t more restaurants like Milagro Modern Mexican. I don’t mean more locations of Milagro itself. Brothers Adam and Jason Tilford are busy enough operating Milagro, Tortillaria Mexican Kitchen and two Mission Taco Joints (with another two, one here and one in Kansas City, Mo., slated to open later this year). But when Milagro first opened six years ago, I hoped it would be the beginning of, if not an explosion, then at least a impressive conflagration of interest in traditional Mexican cuisine — or cuisines, rather, because as the Tilfords themselves would be the

first to tell you, Mexico is home to a wealth of regional variations. I’m still waiting for that conflagration. (Mike Randolph’s Público is great, but more broadly Latin American.) In the meantime, Milagro still moves confidently from tacos and burritos to cochinita pibil, lamb barbacoa and queso fundido with huitlacoche, the fungus also known as corn smut. $$ OPENED 2010 • MUST ORDER Queso fundido ($8.95)

 WHERE 20 Allen Avenue,

Suite 130, Webster Groves • MORE INFO 314-962-4300, milagromodernmexican.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily

Milque Toast Bar BREAKFAST, CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN

A milquetoast is a timid soul, which Milque Toast Bar, though tiny, is not. The trio of Colleen Clawson, Amanda Geimer and Rachel Moeller toast

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bread from some of St. Louis’ best bakeries, and top the slices with such smart combinations as apple, apple butter and white cheddar, or gravlax with horseradish cream, capers, red onion and cucumber. Weekends see the menu expand with the smørrebrød platter of special toasts. Keep an eye out for the Jezebel, cream cheese with gingerorange marmalade and a sprinkling of scallions. The menu also includes flavored milks and a daily crock-pot

special (named for the George and Martha children’s books, a winsome touch, as is often the case here). Dessert is milk toast, or milquetoast, light and sweet but not timid, either. $ OPENED 2015 • MUST ORDER Apple cheddar melt ($4.95)  WHERE 2212 South

Jefferson Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-833-0085, milquetoastbar.org • HOURS 8 a.m.-5 p.m. Monday-Friday, 10 a.m.-4 p.m. SaturdaySunday (closed Wednesday)

Mission Taco Joint MEXICAN

Only three years after the original Mission Taco Joint debuted in the Delmar Loop, brothers Adam and Jason Tilford have opened a second location in Soulard, launched a food truck, and announced plans to expand to the Central West End this spring and to Kansas City,

Mo., early next year. Mission’s success is no fluke. The Tilfords keep one eye on that nebulous idea of authenticity (a woodfired grill, tortillas made with nixtamalized corn), the other on fun (a collaboration last year with Mai Lee’s Qui Tran on a believably pho-flavored taco). The Mexican-via-California fare is impressive throughout: tacos (chile-roasted duck, beef-brisket birria), burritos (Three Little Piggies) and tortas (the chile-sauce-

drenched ahogada). As impressive, the newer Soulard location is as consistently excellent as the Loop original. $–$$ OPENED 2013 • MUST ORDER Beef-brisket birria taco ($3.25)  WHERE 6235 Delmar

Boulevard, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-932-5430, missiontacojoint.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily  WHERE 908 Lafayette

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-858-8226, missiontacojoint.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily

Tienda Carniceria

Taqueria Licoreria

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At La Tejana, you will experience friendly smiles in a warm atmosphere, excellent service and top-quality items in all of our family-owned shops. 3157 N Lindbergh Blvd, Bridgeton, Missouri 63043 (314) 291-8500 www.latejanataqueria.com

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Carniceria

New to the STL 100

$ Under $15 per person

$$ $15–$30

$$$ $30–$45

$$$$ Over $45 per person

P H O T O S : H U Y M A C H / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( M I L A G R O M O D E R N M E X I C A N ) ; R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( M I L Q U E T O A S T B A R ) ; P O S T- D I S PAT C H F I L E ( M I S S I O N TA C O J O I N T )

MEXICAN

Olio CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN, MEDITERRANEAN

P H O T O S : S I D H A S T I N G S ( O L I O ) ; C H R I S T I A N G O O D E N / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( P E A C E M A K E R L O B S T E R & C R A B C O . ) ; R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( P H O L O N G )

You easily could have overlooked Ben Poremba’s Olio in last year’s inaugural STL 100. Elaia, Poremba’s adjacent flagship restaurant, dazzled its way to No. 2 on the Top 25 — it lands there again in 2016 — while Old Standard Fried Chicken was then the shiny new thing. Olio just did what it had always done, what it does now: serve affordable, flavorful food that pairs well with the excellent selection of cocktails and wines. (There’s beer, too, though the range isn’t broad.) As at Elaia, here Poremba draws mainly on his

From left: The dining room at Olio in the Botanical Heights neighborhood; Broadwater oysters at Peacemaker Lobster & Crab Co.; Pho Long in University City influences from around the Mediterranean and adds little touches to distinguish familiar dishes: smoked paprika, almond and pine nuts in the “King of Kings” hummus; wheatberries to provide textural contrast in the baba ghanoush. Its small, but impressive sandwich menu — Coca-Colaglazed beef brisket; a variation on the speck and preserved lemon

sandwich at Salume Beddu (where Poremba was once a partner) — means you shouldn’t overlook Olio as a lunch destination. $$ OPENED 2013 • MUST ORDER “King of Kings” ($8)  WHERE 1634 Tower

Grove Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-932-1088, oliostl.com • HOURS Lunch Monday-Saturday, dinner daily, brunch Sunday

Peacemaker Lobster & Crab Co. SEAFOOD

You probably already know about Peacemaker Lobster & Crab Co. Kevin Nashan’s long-awaited second restaurant was one of the most hyped and

most acclaimed debuts of 2014. (I ranked it the No. 2 new restaurant of that year, a whisker behind Three Flags Tavern.) Without question, this is the place to go in St. Louis for lobster rolls, crab boils, and oysters raw or fried. But a recent meal here reminded me that hidden among all this seafood splendor is one of the best meat sandwiches in town. The beef brisket in the smoked brisket po’boy

rivals what you’ll find at our better barbecue joints, and it doesn’t need any more accent than its dressing of lettuce, tomato, pickle and horseradish aioli. $$–$$$ OPENED 2014 • MUST ORDER Lobster roll (market price)  WHERE 1831 Sidney Street,

St. Louis • MORE INFO 314772-8858, peacemakerstl. com • HOURS Lunch MondayFriday, dinner daily (opens at 1:30 p.m. Sunday)

Pho Long VIETNAMESE

A decade after Pho Long opened, it remains my favorite spot for the traditional Vietnamese beef-noodle soup, both beefier and more complexly aromatic than any other in town. (Which does actually mean something: There

are more than a few good bowls of pho in St. Louis.) A decade after Pho Long opened, however, few restaurants have followed its model of focusing on one or a few dishes within a larger tradition, a model that I thought would be Pho Long’s legacy. It still can be. Pho Long’s continued success — show up in the middle of the lunch rush and expect to wait — shows the wisdom of trusting St. Louis diners to be curious enough to learn about a specific dish and how to appreciate its range of quality and possibilities. $ OPENED 2006 • MUST ORDER Pho ($7.95-$11.95)  WHERE 8629 Olive

Boulevard, University City • MORE INFO 314-997-1218, facebook.com/pholongstl • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily (closed Tuesday)

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Pi Pizzeria PIZZA

I want to take a moment to remember Gringo, the Mexican restaurant Pi Pizzeria founders Chris Sommers and Frank Uible opened in 2013. I didn’t like Gringo when I reviewed it that year, but when I returned in 2015, I found a dramatically improved restaurant. Cary McDowell, the corporate executive chef for both Pi and Gringo, had located the soul inside the concept, and I was strongly considering including Gringo on this list when it closed in February. The changes that Sommers and McDowell undertook testified to their commitment to a quality dining experience — a commitment you can still witness at Pi, which

From left: A slice of pizza at Pi Pizzeria; oatmeal cream pies at Pint Size Bakery; the Thriller, with Spanish chorizo, tomato sauce and mozzarella, at A Pizza Story delivers consistently excellent pizza (deepdish and thin-crust) and hospitality across five distinct locations. Eight years after the hubbub of its opening and presidential endorsement, it remains an essential restaurant. $$ OPENED 2008 • MUST ORDER South Side Classico (small $18.95, large $22.95)  WHERE 6144 Delmar

Boulevard, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-727-6633, pi-pizza.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily

“the best buzz your food

 WHERE 610 Washington

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-588-7600, pi-pizza.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily  WHERE 400 North Euclid

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-367-4300, pi-pizza.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily  WHERE 10935 Manchester

Road, Kirkwood • MORE INFO 314-966-8080, pi-pizza.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily  WHERE 14870 Clayton

Road, Chesterfield • MORE INFO 636-527-5070, pi-pizza. com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily; carryout only

Pint Size Bakery BAKERY & DESSERT

Pint Size Bakery will relocate this spring to 3133 Watson Road, and while the move isn’t far — not quite a mile — it’s significant, as the new home of Christy Augustin’s bakery will be double the size of the original. “We’ve only needed to do this for 2½ years,” Augustin told me when she announced

the news last year. “I’ve always wanted to make everything by hand in small batches, (but) we’ve been doing it in a really hard and painful way. We have to order supplies much more often than other people. We have to make batches over and over again because we can’t store anything anywhere.” We fans of Pint Size will also benefit from the more efficient production of our beloved oatmeal cream pies, breakfast cookies and sweet and savory scones — and

maybe (fingers crossed) improved odds of scoring one of Augustin’s coveted salted-caramel croissants, a Saturdayonly special. Plus, the new Pint Size will feature indoor seating. Like you need an excuse to hang around and order just one more treat. $ OPENED 2012 • MUST ORDER Oatmeal cream pie ($1.95)  WHERE 3825 Watson Road,

St. Louis • MORE INFO 314645-7142, pintsizebakery.com • HOURS 7 a.m.-3 p.m. TuesdayFriday, 8 a.m.-3 p.m. Saturday

A Pizza Story PIZZA

In an industry that can be unkind even to seasoned, successful restaurateurs, the story behind a Pizza Story is an unlikely one. Three men with established careers in medicine and academia — Muhammad Alhawagri, a biologist at the Washington University School of Medicine; Sherif Nasser, an assistant professor of market-

ing at the university’s Olin Business School; and Nael Saad, an assistant professor of radiology — decided to open a restaurant serving Neapolitan pizza. And after only two years, it ranks among St. Louis’ best pizzerias. Alhawagri, the pizzaiolo, has developed a fine crust, light but not without substance or flavor, dotted with char from the wood-burning oven. The toppings veer from the usual, like the pepperoni-but-not Thriller, with Spanish chorizo atop the bed of mozzarella and tomato sauce, or the Fantasy, a pairing of burrata and prosciutto di Parma that would be too rich were it not for the smart counterpoint of arugula. $$ OPENED 2014 • MUST ORDER The Thriller ($15)  WHERE 7278 Manchester

Road, Maplewood • MORE INFO 314-899-0011, apizzastory. com • HOURS Lunch and dinner Tuesday-Sunday

V E R I T A S

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George & Martha

New to the STL 100

$ Under $15 per person

$$ $15–$30

$$$ $30–$45

$$$$ Over $45 per person

P H O T O S : K AT H E R I N E B I S H ( P I P I Z Z E R I A ) ; R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( P I N T S I Z E B A K E R Y, A P I Z Z A S T O R Y )

ever have”

Pizzeoli From left: A New York pizza at Pizzeoli; special beef with black pepper, soy sauce and sugar at Private Kitchen; the butcher steak at Reeds American Table

P H O T O S : C H R I S T I A N G O O D E N / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( P I Z Z E O L I ) ; J . B . F O R B E S / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( P R I VAT E K I T C H E N ) ; C R I S T I N A M . F L E T E S / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( R E E D S A M E R I C A N TA B L E )

PIZZA, VEGETARIAN

An eventful first year for Scott Sandler’s Neapolitan pizzeria concluded with a renovation by SPACE Architecture + Design that more than doubled the Soulard restaurant’s seating capacity and gave it a handsome new look. And Sandler continues to refine his already excellent pizzas. The Bianca — the standout offering, with a béchamel base, rosemary and garlic — now features housemade mozzarella blended with Parmesan. Sandler has also begun offering a limited supply of sourdough bread baked in the wood-fired hearth. All of this has made for

a restaurant I visit not simply for a great meal, but to be inspired by Sandler’s continuous pursuit of better baking and commitment to Neapolitan pizza and vegetarian cuisine. $ OPENED 2014 • MUST ORDER The Bianca pizza ($12.95)  WHERE 1928 South 12th

Street, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-449-1111, pizzeoli. com • HOURS Lunch and dinner Tuesday-Saturday

Private Kitchen CHINESE

One of several regional Chinese restaurants to have opened in recent years, the Shanghaifocused Private Kitchen further distinguishes itself by its size — and I don’t simply mean its modest dining room. Lawrence

Chen cooks; his wife, Emily, tends to the front of the house. That’s it — that’s the staff. There are some consequences to this setup. Reservations are a must, even for lunch. When you call to make a reservation, you should already know what you want to order. (The menu is available on Private Kitchen’s Facebook page.) What do you want to order? Start with the soup dumplings, for sure, and ginger-spiked Shanghai-style braised

shrimp and, for a big finish, the sweet-and-sour spare ribs. It takes a little more work than usual on your part to dine here, but the Chens’ small miracle of a restaurant repays the effort tenfold. $$–$$$ OPENED 2015 • MUST ORDER Xiao long bao (Shanghai soup dumplings, $6.50)  WHERE 8106 Olive

Boulevard, University City • MORE INFO 314-989-0283, facebook.com/privatekitchenstl • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily (reservations only)

Reeds American Table CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN

Matthew Daughaday won many fans, myself among them, for his work as executive chef at Gerard Craft’s Taste, and the best dishes at his first restaurant, Reeds

American Table, continue his knack for playful, soulful and technically precise cooking. This is especially true among the selection of small plates: braised beef cheek gilded with foiegras cream; beer-braised pork ribs accented with five-spice powder and an orange-soy-hoisin glaze; cornbread fried in bacon fat, a welcome carryover from Taste. The main courses tend toward upscale takes on classic

comfort food (chicken pot pie, meatloaf, a pork chop). Don’t overlook the burger, a patty of ground dry-aged rib-eye and a bit of brisket elevated to the upper rank of the St. Louis burger elite by a tallow aioli. $$$ OPENED 2015 • MUST ORDER Braised beef cheek ($13)  WHERE 7322 Manchester

Road, Maplewood • MORE INFO 314-899-9821, reedsamericantable. com • HOURS Dinner daily, closed Tuesday

FIND THE BEST RESTAURANTS NEAR YOU, OR SEARCH BY PRICE RANGE OR CUISINE ☛ stltoday.com/stl100

� Find an interactive guide to the #stl100 at stltoday.com/stl100

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Remy’s Kitchen & Wine Bar

From left: Remy’s Kitchen & Wine Bar in Clayton; the Farmhouse Burger at Retreat Gastropub; crab rangoon at Rice Thai Bistro

CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN, MEDITERRANEAN, SMALL PLATES

a single grilled lamb sausage atop warm farro tossed with radicchio, onion, celery root and grape tomatoes. The kitchen swings nimbly from fun snacks like perfectly crisp polenta fries with a harissa dipping sauce to more formal entrees, including my go-to order, the bronzed mahi-mahi over green lentils. $$ OPENED 1995 • MUST ORDER Bronzed mahi mahi (lunch $11.95, dinner $19.50)  WHERE 222 South Bemiston

Avenue, Clayton • MORE INFO 314-726-5757, remyskitchen.com • HOURS Lunch Monday-Friday, dinner Monday-Saturday

Retreat Gastropub CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN

Owner Travis Howard and chef Michael Friedman haven’t broken new ground at this Central West End newcomer. A

glance at its menu might prompt jaded diners to roll their eyes. Mac and cheese? Flatbreads? A griddled burger, with (of course) a sunny-side-up egg on it? But Retreat Gastropub matters because it invests these familiar dishes with energy and care, turning out a better griddled burger (with egg), a better bistro steak (a teres major cut served with a verdant chimichurri), better small plates, flatbreads and cocktails (especially

the smoky, spicy mezcal- and tequila-based Oaxaca Flocka Flame). It’s a restaurant that will make you happy — and that should keep many other St. Louis restaurants on their toes. $$ OPENED 2015 • MUST ORDER Farmhouse burger ($14)  WHERE 6 North Sarah

Street, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-261-4497, retreatgastropub. com • HOURS Dinner daily, lunch Monday-Friday, brunch Saturday-Sunday, closed Tuesday

Rice Thai Bistro THAI

You might notice it with the green curry, beautifully balanced between coconut-milk sweetness and chile heat, with the just-right bursts of basil, galangal and makrut lime. Or maybe you’ll fix upon the salt-and-pepper

in town, but the married team of Bryan and Nina Prapaisilpa attack the familiar dishes with such exuberance and attention to detail that you can’t help but fall in love with the cuisine all over again. $

shrimp, tender and sweet beneath their sharp-elbowed accents of scallion and jalapeño. Or, hey, maybe you’ll order crab rangoon and smile at the presentation — cigar-like tubes of fried rice paper instead of the usual wontons — and then realize that it makes for a better dish, with a proper crunchto-cream-cheese ratio in each bite. The menu at tiny Rice Thai Bistro doesn’t differ from most other Thai restaurants

OPENED 2014 • MUST ORDER Green curry ($8 lunch, $10.95 dinner)  WHERE 14536 Manchester

Road, Winchester • MORE INFO 636-220-1777, ricethaibistro.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily

FIND THE BEST RESTAURANTS NEAR YOU, OR SEARCH BY PRICE RANGE OR CUISINE ☛ stltoday.com/stl100

A basement gastro pub with an Italian accent and playful attitude offering an intimate dining experience and a feast for the senses. Small plate menu, Italian-centric wine and unique cocktails.

basso-stl.com

314-932-7820 7036 Clayton Ave. St. Louis, MO 63117 32

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New to the STL 100

$ Under $15 per person

$$ $15–$30

$$$ $30–$45

$$$$ Over $45 per person

P H O T O S : R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( R E M Y ’ S K I T C H E N & W I N E B A R ) ; C R I S T I N A M . F L E T E S / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( R E T R E AT G A S T R O P U B ) ; R O B E R T C O H E N / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( R I C E T H A I B I S T R O )

The emphasis at Remy’s Kitchen & Wine Bar on small plates and Mediterranean fare — Middle Eastern and even some North African as well as southern European — has allowed Tim Mallet’s restaurant to stay vibrant for more than 20 years. These days, when every other hit cookbook is one of Ottolenghi’s, or seems to be, the food from executive chef Dominic Weiss (who recently succeeded longtime chef Lisa Slay) appears ahead of its time. On a recent stop here, I loved a straightforward, brightly flavored dish that set

Salt + Smoke

From left: Brisket with sweet pepper potato salad, coleslaw and a popover at Salt + Smoke; Calabrese salami in the curing room at Salume Beddu; a Puttanesca calzone at Sauce on the Side

BARBECUE

Smoking beef brisket is a bedeviling exercise: slow even by barbecue standards, subject to the whims of the smoker, the weather, the individual brisket itself. Aaron Franklin, the current king of the brisket at Franklin Barbecue in Austin, Texas, released a cookbook last year that is essentially one long recipe for brisket. It’s tough, in other words. As is, all too often, the meat. So we should be grateful for Salt + Smoke, where pitmaster Haley Riley turns out consistently excellent brisket, beautifully blackened, as tender as butter with rendered fat, its flavor rich with the smoke of post oak and

accented with nothing more than salt and pepper. You can order from the rest of the menu with confidence, of course, but the brisket is what will transport you — and bring you back again and again. $–$$ OPENED 2014 • MUST ORDER Beef brisket plate ($15, includes two sides)  WHERE 6525 Delmar

Boulevard, University City • MORE INFO 314-727-0200, saltandsmokestl.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily

Salume Beddu ITALIAN

Looking for a reason to be amazed anew by Marc Sanfilippo’s salumeria and lunch restaurant? Try the hot dog. No, seriously, Sanfilippo makes the mundane old frankfurter taste new again. It’s your first time here? Sure, you can order a hot dog, too. But the best introduction to Salume

Beddu is to dive into the house-cured meats with the prosciutto sandwich with Gruyère and pickled onions. (I’m also partial to the speck sandwich, also topped with Gruyère as well as preserved lemon.) Or you could begin with Salume Beddu’s salsiccia: the Beast accents the feisty, smoky fiama sausage with grain mustard and peperonata. The Saturday menu includes specials like the pork ribs rubbed with ras al hanout (my dish of

the year in 2011, when Salume Beddu opened) and the Tedesco, a habanero sausage smartly accented with sweet caramelized onions, crisp celery greens and housemade sauerkraut. $ OPENED 2011 • MUST ORDER Prosciutto sandwich ($10)  WHERE 3467 Hampton

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-353-3100, salumebeddu. com • HOURS 11 a.m.-3 p.m. Tuesday-Friday, 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Saturday (retail counter open until 6 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday)

Sauce on the Side ITALIAN

Sauce on the Side moved to bigger digs downtown last year, and this spring it will open in the Grove, bridging the gap between its original and Clayton restaurants. In other words, St. Louis’ appetite for Sauce on the Side’s calzones continues

to grow. That shouldn’t be a surprise. Founders Brendon Maciariello, Ryan Mangialardo and Daniel Porzel identified a niche in the market and filled it with a quality fast-casual product. Dishes like the Fatty B, the Costanza and the Meat Me in St. Louis follow the calzone-asinverted-pizza template but the menu pushes beyond this with the mushroom-loaded Magic Carpet Ride, the spicy egg-chicken-bacon Which

Came First ...? and the elegant Figgy Piggy. If Sauce on the Side stops at only three locations, I’ll be shocked. $ OPENED 2012 • MUST ORDER Fatty B ($10)  WHERE 411 North Eighth

Street, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-241-5667, eatcalzones. com • HOURS Lunch and dinner Monday-Saturday  WHERE 7810 Forsyth

Boulevard, Clayton • MORE INFO 314-833-5426, eatcalzones. com • HOURS Lunch and dinner Monday-Saturday

P H O T O S : C H R I S T I A N G O O D E N / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( S A LT + S M O K E ) ; R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( S A L U M E B E D D U , S A U C E O N T H E S I D E )

SAMPLE NEARLY 40 OF THE RESTAURANTS IN THIS GUIDE AT THE STL 100 GREAT TASTE ☛ stltoday.com/greattaste

Find an interactive guide to the #stl100 at stltoday.com/stl100

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and even medicinal notes for an effect that is as revelatory as it is delicious. Signature India’s menu also includes idli and other breakfast dishes as well as snacks available only during the late afternoon or on the weekend — reasons to return here repeatedly. I know I’ll be back. $–$$

Schlafly Tap Room PUB FARE

Elsewhere in this year’s STL 100, I write that brewpub fare has been liberated of its “fish-andchips straitjacket.” This is true in part because the new crop of craft breweries have branched out in food offerings just as they have done in the styles of beer they are brewing. It’s also true because the Schlafly Tap Room, St. Louis’ original brewpub, has refined its classic pub fare to the point where you need to do something different to stand out. Chef Andy White has nailed British (fish and chips, naturally), Belgian (moules frites) and most exactly

From left: Sticky toffee pudding at the Schlafly Tap Room; smothered fries at the Shaved Duck; chicken biryani at Signature India American (burgers and a murderer’s row of sandwiches: shaved prime rib, barbecued tri-tip and fried bologna-and-egg among them) pub grub. And while Urban Chestnut now claims the German pub-fare crown, the Tap Room still has its pretzels with cheese sauce. $$ OPENED 1991 • MUST ORDER Bag of pretzels ($7.50)  WHERE 2100 Locust Street,

St. Louis • MORE INFO 314241-2337, schlafly.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily

The Shaved Duck BARBECUE, PUB FARE

Who am I to argue with Guy Fieri? Seriously, as easy as it is to make fun of the Frosted One, Fieri has featured some fine

St. Louis restaurants on Food Network’s “Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives,” including three in this year’s STL 100: Dressel’s Public House, Guerrilla Street Food and the Shaved Duck. Ally Nisbet’s the Shaved Duck feels closest in spirit to Fieri’s aesthetic, with chef Kat Wallace leading a joyful romp through barbecue and other classic comfort food — a romp focused on deliciousness rather than

authenticity. So, yeah, you can order a pulledpork sandwich here, or you can get it — with bacon, cheese, barbecue sauce and beans — over a baked potato. The smoked tri-tip? Straightup or on a sandwich with bacon-Swiss sauce. It’s a party. I’ll meet you there as soon as my stylist is finished bleaching my tips. $$ OPENED 2008 • MUST ORDER The B.O.S.S. Sandwich ($13.99)

 WHERE 2900 Virginia

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-776-1407, theshavedduck. com • HOURS Lunch and dinner Monday-Saturday

Signature India INDIAN

Signature India doesn’t follow the template for Indian restaurants

in St. Louis. There’s no lunch buffet, and while chicken tikka masala, vegetable korma and a few other familiar dishes are on the menu, its true focus is on the cuisine of owner Sateesh Kodebattula’s native Andhra Pradesh and elsewhere in India’s south. In standout dishes like the gongura goat curry and ulavacharu goat biryani, the fierce heat of chiles works in concert with sour, tangy

OPENED 2014 • MUST ORDER Gongura goat curry ($14.99)  WHERE 14031 Manchester

Road, west St. Louis County • MORE INFO 636-220-1700, signatureindiastl.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily  WHERE 1617 Bryan Road,

O’Fallon, Mo. • MORE INFO 636385-6888, signatureindiastl. com • HOURS Lunch and dinner Tuesday-Sunday

Supplying The Best Restaurants in St. Louis...

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New to the STL 100

$ Under $15 per person

$$ $15–$30

$$$ $30–$45

$$$$ Over $45 per person

P H O T O S : R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( S C H L A F LY TA P R O O M ) ; P O S T- D I S PAT C H F I L E ( T H E S H AV E D D U C K ) ; S I D H A S T I N G S ( S I G N AT U R E I N D I A )

SAMPLE NEARLY 40 OF THE RESTAURANTS IN THIS GUIDE AT THE STL 100 GREAT TASTE ☛ stltoday.com/greattaste

Sister Cities Cajun and BBQ

From left: Seafood gumbo at Sister Cities Cajun and BBQ; barbecue at Smoki O’s; a four-piece wing hot-chicken plate at Southern

BARBECUE, CAJUN/CREOLE

P H O T O S : R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( S I S T E R C I T I E S C A J U N A N D B B Q , S M O K I O ’ S ) ; R O B E R T C O H E N / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( S O U T H E R N )

When an errant car clipped Sister Cities Cajun and BBQ’s building one day early this year, forcing it to close temporarily — and maybe indefinitely — fans of Pamela Melton and Travis Parfait’s Dutchtown restaurant waited and fretted. How long would we have to live without the seafood-heavy gumbo, either straight-up or slathered over fallingapart chicken thighs? That smoked-pork po’boy with fried onion straws. Those shrimp tacos with remoulade. (Seriously, Sister Cities made us long for Cajun shrimp tacos. It had to be magic.) And above all else, there were the smoked chicken wings, blackened with spice

and deeply smoky. Sister Cities wasn’t a typical Cajun or barbecue restaurant. It was unique and irreplaceable. Still is. The car damage wasn’t as bad as it looked. Sister Cities reopened in a matter of days. Thanks, fate, for the reminder to get back here soon. $ OPENED 2013 • MUST ORDER Smoked chicken wings ($8)  WHERE 4144 South

Grand Boulevard, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-8759653 • HOURS Lunch and dinner Tuesday-Sunday

Smoki O’s BARBECUE

Barbecue lovers might debate whether rib meat should fall off the bone. (It shouldn’t, but that hasn’t stopped the debate.) But they’ll probably all agree that barbecue should never crunch — until, that is, they eat snoots. A classic St. Louis dish, and one that the area’s current barbecue boom has mostly, lamentably ignored, snoots are like thick-cut potato chips,

except made from pork snouts. At Smoki O’s, my favorite spot for snoots, Otis and Earline Walker serve crunchy, smoky snout in a sweet-tangy sauce. For the full St. Louisbarbecue experience, order a combo meal of snoots and tips, the flavorful, cartilagespined bits left behind when spare ribs are cut St. Louis-style. $ OPENED 1997 • MUST ORDER Snoot dinner (medium $9.50, large $10.75)  WHERE 1545 North

Broadway, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-621-8180,

smokiosbbq.com • HOURS Lunch Tuesday-Saturday, dinner Thursday-Saturday (open until 6 p.m. Tuesday-Wednesday)

Southern FRIED CHICKEN, SANDWICHES, SOUTHERN

Kentucky Fried Chicken is now offering Nashville hot chicken — or, if you prefer, “Nashville hot chicken” — a sure sign that the craze for the fiery fried bird has passed its sell-by date. Fortunately, while the hot chicken at Rick

Lewis’ Southern can be excruciatingly hot, it isn’t a gimmick. This is great fried chicken, crisp but not overly battered, juicy and flavorful even if you opt for the mild — exactly what you’d expect from a James Beard Award semifinalist chef. The rest of the menu shows Lewis’ knack for finely tuned versions of crowdpleasing Southern dishes: a fried-bologna sandwich, perfect fried green tomatoes, a BLT with those tomatoes and thick house-cured bacon. $

OPENED 2015 • MUST ORDER Three-piece fried chicken meal (with two sides, dark meat $12, white meat $12.50)  WHERE 3108 Olive Street,

St. Louis • MORE INFO 314531-4668, stlsouthern.com • HOURS 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Sunday and Wednesday-Thursday, 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Friday-Saturday, closed Monday-Tuesday

Southwest Diner SOUTHWESTERN, DINER, BREAKFAST

How popular is

Southwest Diner? Jonathan Jones and Anna Sidel parked a bus outside their Ellendale restaurant and converted it into a waiting lounge for overflow crowds on the weekends. And unless St. Louis is home to many, many more homesick expats from the state of New Mexico than I’m aware of, those diners are drawn here, as I am, for Southwest Diner’s unique combination of classic diner charm and chile-spiked New Mexican cuisine. Lately I’ve strayed from my usual order of the ☛

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enchiladas or a greenchile burger to become a breakfast — or breakfastfor-lunch — visitor, building tacos with the red-chile-spiced pork adovada with scrambled eggs, potatoes and tortillas. And I’d happily wait on that bus for nothing more than a bowl of the hearty, spicy, soul-nourishing posole. $

OPENED 2012 • MUST ORDER Brisket plate (6 ounces $12.99, 8 ounces $14.99)  WHERE 9200 Olive

Boulevard, Olivette • MORE INFO 314-997-2301, sugarfiresmokehouse.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner (or until sold out) daily Industrial Drive, St. Charles • MORE INFO 636-724-7601, sugarfiresmokehouse.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner (or until sold out) daily

OPENED 2012 • MUST ORDER Posole (cup $4, bowl $6)

 WHERE 9955 Winghaven

 WHERE 6803 Southwest

Boulevard, O’Fallon, Mo. • MORE INFO 636-265-1234, sugarfiresmokehouse.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner (or until sold out) daily

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-2607244, southwestdinerstl. com • HOURS Breakfast and lunch daily

 WHERE 932 Meramec

Station Road, Valley Park • MORE INFO 636-825-1400, sugarfiresmokehouse.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner (or until sold out) daily

Spare No Rib BARBECUE, BREAKFAST, MEXICAN

• Catering • Prix Fixe Monday • Tapas Tuesday • Saturday Brunch • Beautiful Patio 5815 Hampton Ave. 314-328-2300 Monday - Saturday: 9am-9pm ediblesandessentials.com

Dine-in, carry out and delivery. Opening Hours:

Tues. - Fri. 11:30a - 2:30p & 5p - 9:30p Sat. 12p - 9:30p Sun 12p - 9p 14536 Manchester Rd., Winchester MO 63011

636-220-1777

RiceThaiBistro.com ediblesandessentials ediblesandesstl

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Spare No Rib was already one of my favorite new restaurants of the past few years, an unlikely but brilliant combination of barbecue and Mexican cuisine. And if you’ve never experienced the joys of Spare No Rib’s pulled-pork sandwich, beef-cheek tacos and chorizo-queso dip, you must begin there. Last year, however, Spare No Rib added yet another reason to return: a weekend-only brunch service called Egg. Here you’ll find breakfast tacos, of course, cornbread benedicts with smoked pork belly, the Tunisian baked-egg dish chakchouka and more. Egg is as appealing as Spare No Rib’s regular service, and it gives you an excuse to dine here daily. (For more on Egg, visit breakfastcame first.com. Spare No Rib’s menu will also be available beginning in spring for lunch at Bar Italia, 13 Maryland Plaza.) $–$$ OPENED 2014 • MUST ORDER Chorizo-queso dip ($7)  WHERE 2200 Gravois

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-202-8244, sparenorib.com • HOURS Lunch Monday-Friday, dinner Monday-Saturday, brunch Saturday-Sunday

New to the STL 100

 WHERE 512 West Front

Street, Washington, Mo. • MORE INFO 636-432-5550, sugarfiresmokehouse.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner (or until sold out) daily

Taco Circus TEX-MEX, MEXICAN

From top: Cherry Bomb pancakes at Southwest Diner; the SNR plate, with two ribs, two tacos and a side dish, at Spare No Rib; a brisket sandwich at Sugarfire Smoke House; a chicken burrito at Taco Circus

Sugarfire Smoke House BARBECUE

Last year, I placed Sugarfire Smoke House at No. 13 in the STL 100’s Top 25, making it the highestranked barbecue joint on the list. And eating beef brisket at the original Olivette location, I imagined it returning to that spot or somewhere close to it. Luscious with ren-

$ Under $15 per person

dered fat, black-barked, it was exactly what I’d fallen in love with when Sugarfire first opened. But I’d also recently eaten at the St. Charles location, where the brisket was tough, and the pulled pork, though tender, lacked punch. With five locations in the metro area, and a sixth slated to open downtown, Sugarfire’s success is unquestioned, and the original spot merits a place on this list, but I can no longer recommend it unequivocally. $–$$

$$ $15–$30

$$$ $30–$45

Tex-Mex cuisine has enjoyed a renaissance, or at least a reputation-repair job, in recent years, thanks to advocates like the great Houston restaurant critic, cookbook author and restaurateur Robb Walsh. In St. Louis, Austin, Texas, natives Christian Ethridge and Mikey Carrasco are on a mission to reveal the glories of breakfast tacos, fajita meat and Frito pie. And the chorizo-egg tacos and the beef-fajita meat (in a taco or burrito) are revelations. But what’s most impressive about this tiny Bevo Mill spot is that Ethridge and Carrasco are managing to source quality, locally raised meats while keeping their prices low. It’s a Tex-Mex and a fast-food revolution. $ OPENED 2015 • MUST ORDER Beef-fajita taco ($3.24)  WHERE 4258 Schiller

Place, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-320-8884, tacocircus. com • HOURS Breakfast, lunch and dinner daily

$$$$ Over $45 per person

P H O T O S : C R I S T I N A M . F L E T E S / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( S O U T H W E S T D I N E R ) ; R O B E R T C O H E N / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( S PA R E N O R I B ) ; J . B . F O R B E S / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( S U G A R F I R E S M O K E H O U S E ) ; R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( TA C O C I R C U S )

 WHERE 3150 Elm Point

Tai Ke

P H O T O S : D AV I D C A R S O N / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( TA I K E ) ; R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( TA Q U E R I A D U R A N G O , TAV E R N K I T C H E N & B A R ) ; P O S T- D I S PAT C H F I L E ( T R E E H O U S E )

CHINESE, TAIWANESE

Tai Ke is the first exclusively Taiwanese restaurant in St. Louis, but it’s no mere curiosity. Owners Calvin Koong and Brian Hsia, both of whom have cooked in Americanized Chinese restaurants in town, present a focused overview of their native cuisine, and while dishes range from soups to wok-fried meats to traditional street snacks, everything I tried was appealing. The braisedbeef noodle soup is as rich and purely beefy as any stock I’ve sipped; the clear clam soup is light and briny-sweet, with a sparkling undercurrent of ginger. Those street snacks are especially compelling, whether your taste runs to the stickyrice hot dog (a plump little sausage in a stickyrice bun) or sticky-rice cubes with basil and pork blood. My favorite dish so far is the signature threecup chicken, sizzling in a sauce of soy sauce, sesame oil and rice wine inside a clay pot. $–$$ OPENED 2015 • MUST ORDER Signature threecup chicken ($9.95)  WHERE 8604 Olive

Boulevard, University City • MORE INFO 314-801-8894 • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily

Taqueria Durango MEXICAN

Taqueria Durango’s tacos stand out not only for their quality but also their variety. This is the only restaurant in town where I’ve regularly found such cuts as suadero (navel beef plate) and buche (pork stomach, though the same term also sometimes applies to pork esophagus). And of course there is the range of traditional taco fillings: carne asada, chorizo, pork al pastor, lengua, tripe. I’ve concentrated on tacos during my

recent visits here at the expense of my favorite dish, the torta ahogada: a pork sandwich smothered in red-chile sauce. Eat it with a knife and fork — or wear a bib. $ OPENED 2003 • MUST ORDER Torta ahogada ($6.99)  WHERE 10238 Page Avenue,

Overland • MORE INFO 314-429-1113, facebook.com/ taqueriadurangosaintlouis • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily

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CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN

If one dish can capture the spirit of the Tavern Kitchen & Bar, it’s the duck poutine, which tops the traditional fries and cheese curds with duck gravy, duck confit and duck cracklings. It’s too much duck. It’s just plain too much. It’s also terrific. The fries are crisp, the curds are caught in that magic moment between chewy and molten, and each of the duck elements conveys its own variation on the fowl’s flavor and a distinct texture. “More (done well) is more” is the guiding principle here: the cheese-larded tater tot casserole; the bacon fried rice, itself substantial enough to be a meal, that’s merely the side dish for the oversized char-siu pork steak. Speaking of “more is more”: the original Tavern in Valley Park now has a sibling in the Central West End. $$$ OPENED 2009 • MUST ORDER Duck poutine ($15)  WHERE 2961 Dougherty

Ferry Road, Valley Park • MORE INFO 636-825-0600, tavernstl. com • HOURS Dinner daily  WHERE 392 North Euclid

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-696-8400, tavernstl. com • HOURS Dinner MondaySaturday, brunch Sunday

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STL10 From top: Braised beef noodle soup at Tai Ke; a torta ahogada at Taqueria Durango; the surf-and-turf trio (mahi-mahi, pork tenderloin and ahi tuna) at the Tavern Kitchen & Bar; street tacos at Tree House House, Bay Tran’s vegetarian restaurant in Tower Grove South. I no longer care how closely the faux meats here resemble beef, pork or chicken. Oh, sure, I might still be able to convince a first-time diner here that the “chorizo” in the street tacos and the chorizo tamale in a blackbean mole is the real thing. The fried “chicken” in the BBQ Chikn Katsu sandwich or the “breakfast sausage” patties in the breakfast sandwich? Nope. It doesn’t matter. The BBQ Chikn Katsu

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sandwich doses its crisp vegetarian cutlet with the tangy, sweet, umami notes of tonkatsu sauce and a little heat from a greencurry aioli. The “breakfast sausage” patties hit the right spice notes to contrast the runny yolk of a fried egg. $–$$

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OPENED 2013 • MUST ORDER Chorizo tamale ($11)  WHERE 3177 South

Grand Boulevard, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-696-2100, treehousestl.com • HOURS Lunch Tuesday-Friday, dinner Tuesday-Sunday, brunch Saturday-Sunday

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2013. Last year, he opened a brick-and-mortar location in Clayton, and it has joined the short list of St. Louis restaurants where on any given day there’s a real possibility that the restaurant will have sold out if you don’t get there as early as possible. For a food often associated with Homer Simpson’s Pavlovian drool, the doughnuts here are strikingly elegant. A glazed doughnut I sampled back in June, with the flavors of lemon and Cointreau, showed a lighter, smarter touch than the desserts at many upscale restaurants. $

Union Loafers Cafe and Bread Bakery CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN, BAKERY & DESSERT, SANDWICHES

How can you work and loaf at the same time? Costello’s famous question might not seem so comical after a visit to this new bakery and cafe in Botanical Heights. Ted Wilson’s breads are so ethereal that they might have arrived fully formed from a higher plane of existence. In fact, Wilson and business partner Sean Netzer took several years to plan and then build out Union Loafers. The result is a great bread bakery and one of St. Louis’ most compelling lunch destinations. Brian Lagerstrom, formerly of Niche, oversees a brief menu of sandwiches — roasted pork; turkey and Swiss; a marvelous Reuben-esque creation with smoked beets — and 2016 promises an evening menu centered on pizza. $

OPENED 2013 (truck), 2015 (restaurant) • MUST ORDER Vanilla glazed doughnut ($2)  WHERE 40 North

Central Avenue, Clayton • MORE INFO 314-899-9500, vincentvandoughnut. com • HOURS 6 a.m.-sold out Tuesday-Friday, 7 a.m.-sold out Saturday

The Vine Mediterranean Cafe and Market

OPENED 2015 • MUST ORDER Smoked-beet sandwich ($10)

LEBANESE, MEDITERRANEAN, MIDDLE EASTERN

 WHERE 1629 Tower Grove

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-833-6111, unionloafers. com • HOURS Lunch 11 a.m.-3 p.m. (retail bakery till 6 p.m.) Tuesday-Sunday, closed Monday

Urban Chestnut Brewery & Bierhall CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN, GERMAN, PUB FARE

In the clamor of Urban Chestnut’s massive Grove brewery and beer hall, as you drink a Zwickel and snack on the terrific pork rinds and best-in-town pommes frites, you can lose sight of how remarkable this place is. The menu has liberated brewpub fare from its fishand-chips straitjacket. Yes, there are pretzels, but there are also oysters and a kale salad; there are dumplings, toasts and other dishes that change as the season’s latest pro-

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From top: Kale-and-garbanzo soup, Little Gem Salad, dill potato salad and a ham-and-cheddar sandwich on rye at Union Loafers; deviled eggs at Urban Chestnut; doughnuts at Vincent Van Doughnut; the dining room at the Vine duce comes to market. The German fare is hearty without verging into cliché: schnitzel and porkknuckle sandwiches and the open-faced Strammer Max (Google it) sandwich with ham, Gruyère and a fried egg. Everything is under $15, and portion sizes guarantee leftovers or a treat for Fido. $ OPENED 2014 • MUST ORDER Pommes frites ($6 small, $8 large)  WHERE 4465 Manchester

Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-222-0143, urbanchestnut.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily

$ Under $15 per person

Vincent Van Doughnut BAKERY & DESSERT, FOOD TRUCKS

You don’t need me to tell you about St. Louis’ proud history of independent doughnut shops. It isn’t history, either. Last year, I included two of them in the inaugural STL 100. Who will carry this legacy into the future? Increasingly, I think the answer is Vincent Van Doughnut, which Vincent Brian Marsden launched as a truck in

$$ $15–$30

$$$ $30–$45

At the Vine, now in its seventh year of operation along South Grand’s bustling commercial heart, the pita bread still arrives at your table warm and fragrant from the oven. Its texture and flavor are light, but definitely there, adding another dimension to your scoop of hummus, baba ghanoush or lebnah. This fresh pita is a small thing, easily forgotten as soon as you’re chowing down on crisp, piquant falafel or sumac-dusted shawarma, but such details have helped to keep the Vine vital. St. Louis seems to agree: Once opened as half-restaurant, half-market, the market is now restricted to a single corner to expand dining capacity. $–$$ OPENED 2009 • MUST ORDER Beef shawarma (sandwich $5.49, entree $12.99)  WHERE 3171 South Grand

Boulevard, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-776-0991, thevinestl.com • HOURS Lunch and dinner daily

$$$$ Over $45 per person

P H O T O S : J . B . F O R B E S / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( U N I O N L O A F E R S ) ; H U Y M A C H / P O S T- D I S PAT C H ( U R B A N C H E S T N U T B R E W E R Y & B I E R H A L L ) ; R O B E R T O R O D R I G U E Z ( V I N C E N T VA N D O U G H N U T, T H E V I N E )

jazz at the bistro

1059 S Big Bend Blvd St Louis, MO 63117 (Richmond Heights)

Restaurant index by cuisine Bakery & dessert Clementine’s Naughty & Nice Creamery 18 Comet Coffee & Microbakery 18 Ices Plain & Fancy 24 La Patisserie Chouquette 25 Pint Size Bakery 30 Union Loafers Cafe and Bread Bakery 38 Vincent Van Doughnut 38

Barbecue Adam’s Smokehouse 15 Beast Craft BBQ Co. 16 Bogart’s Smokehouse 14 Pappy’s Smokehouse 12 Salt + Smoke 33 The Shaved Duck 34 Sister Cities Cajun and BBQ 35 Smoki O’s 35 Spare No Rib 36 Sugarfire Smoke House 36

Bar & grill Ferguson Burger Bar & More 21 Gallagher’s 21 The Kitchen Sink 25

Contemporary American Annie Gunn’s 10 Blood & Sand 16 Bridge Tap House & Wine Bar 17 Byrd & Barrel 17 Cleveland-Heath 6 The Crossing 8 Death in the Afternoon 20 Dressel’s Public House 20 Elaia 5 Farmhaus 5 Five Bistro 9 Grapeseed 22 J McArthur’s 24 Juniper 10 Kitchen Kulture 25 The Libertine 26 Milque Toast Bar 28 Niche 5 Olio 29 Publico 6 Quincy Street Bistro 14 Reeds American Table 31 Remy’s Kitchen & Wine Bar 32 Retreat Gastropub 32 Sidney Street Cafe 5 Stone Soup Cottage 6 Taste 12 The Tavern Kitchen & Bar 37 Three Flags Tavern 14 Tree House 37 Union Loafers Cafe and Bread Bakery 38 Urban Chestnut Brewery & Bierhall 38 Veritas 9

Hiro Asian Kitchen 22 Juniper 10 Southern 35 Three Flags Tavern 14

German Urban Chestnut Brewery & Bierhall 38

Indian Signature India 34

Italian Acero 12 Basso 16 Cielo Restaurant & Bar 18 Gioia’s Deli 22 Katie’s Pizza & Pasta Osteria 24 The Libertine 26 Pastaria 8 Randolfi’s Italian Kitchen 9 Salume Beddu 33 Sauce on the Side 33 Taste 12 Tony’s 8

Korean

Katie’s Pizza & Pasta Osteria 24 Pastaria 8 Pi Pizzeria 30 A Pizza Story 30 Pizzeoli 31

Pub fare Basso 16 Dressel’s Public House 20 Gallagher’s 21 Quincy Street Bistro 14 Schlafly Tap Room 34 The Shaved Duck 34 Urban Chestnut Brewery & Bierhall 38

Blues City Deli 17 Gioia’s Deli 22 Medina Mediterranean Grill 27 Southern 35 Union Loafers Cafe and Bread Bakery 38

Latin American

Mediterranean

Bridge Tap House & Wine Bar 17 Remy’s Kitchen & Wine Bar 32 Taste 12

Blues City Deli 17 Gioia’s Deli 22

Burgers

Diner

Mexican

Southwest Diner 35

Baileys’ Range 15 Ferguson Burger Bar & More 21 Five Star Burgers 21 The Kitchen Sink 25

La Tejana Taqueria 25 La Vallesana 26 Milagro Modern Mexican 28 Mission Taco Joint 28 Público 6 Spare No Rib 36 Taco Circus 36 Taqueria Durango 37

Steakhouse

Middle Eastern

Thai

Kaslik Mediterranean Cuisine 24 Medina Mediterranean Grill 27 The Vine Mediterranean Cafe and Market 38

Forx & Stix 12 Rice Thai Bistro 32

Vegetarian

Pan-Asian

Vietnamese

Ferguson Burger Bar & More 21 The Kitchen Sink 25 Milque Toast Bar 28 Southwest Diner 35 Spare No Rib 36

Cajun/Creole The Kitchen Sink 25 Sister Cities Cajun and BBQ 35

Chinese Chef Ma’s Chinese Gourmet Restaurant 18 Lona’s Lil Eats 27 Private Kitchen 31 Tai Ke 37

Deli

Ethiopian Meskerem Ethiopian Restaurant 27

Filipino Guerrilla Street Food 10 Hiro Asian Kitchen 22

Food truck Gioia’s Deli 22 Guerrilla Street Food 10 Vincent Van Doughnut 38

French

Classic fine dining

Bar Les Frères 15 Brasserie by Niche 10 Stone Soup Cottage 6

Tony’s 8

Fried chicken Byrd & Barrel 17 Gallagher’s 21

Hiro Asian Kitchen 22

Pizza Basso 16

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Comet Coffee + Microbakery 57o8 Oakland Ave. / cometcoffeestl.com

Small plates

Elaia 5 Kaslik Mediterranean Cuisine 24 The Libertine 26 Olio 29 Remy’s Kitchen & Wine Bar 32 The Vine Mediterranean Cafe and Market 38

Breakfast

Tue: Chef’s Special of the Day Wed: Cajun Burrito – ask your server for details Thu: Grilled Mahi Tacos (3) 14.99

Sandwiches

Peacemaker Lobster & Crab Co. 29

The Vine Mediterranean Cafe and Market 38

Weekday SpecialS (Served all day)

HandleBar 22

Seafood

Lebanese

There’s always something great cookin’ at Riverbend. We run off-themenu specials every day, including:

Russian

Asian Kitchen 15 Público 6

314-664-8443

Soul food Diner’s Delight 20

Southern Juniper 10 Quincy Street Bistro 14 Southern 35

Southwestern

6 1 0 2 y a M g n i Open

801 Chophouse 15 Annie Gunn’s 10

Taiwanese Tai Ke 37

Tex-Mex Taco Circus 36

Pizzeoli 31 Tree House 37 Linh Mi Gia 26 Mai Lee 14 Pho Long 29

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7637 Wydown Blvd. Clayton, MO 63105 314-725-8880

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St. Louis' most affluent audience of tastemakers and trendsetters have chosen the area's top business to make the annual Ladue News Platinum List and now it's time to celebrate them at our first ever Platinum List event. Be among the first to find out who the winners are before the special Platinum List edition hits the streets. Enjoy live music, savory bites and tasty treats, an open bar, product samples and demonstrations. All guests will take home an events gift bag. Complimentary valet parking will be available.

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