Category: Restaurants and Bars

Dogtown Coffee, Santa Monica, CA

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acaiSomething seems rather familiar at this place.  Perhaps it’s the bright airbrush paintings on the wall, the friendly hipster-cum-athleisure suited patrons, the sassy Sicilian guy taking my order, or all the years I spent hanging out with the X-gamer crowd.  Naaaaah, it’s the best açai bowl I’ve had since those two summers living in Ipanema, Rio de Janeiro.  This is a great little coffee spot, rife with hearty breakfasty and snacky items – it really is tough to choose and I look forward to several more mornings’ deliberations.  But that açai bowl – the right balance of granola, strawberries, banana, and just a sprinkling of coconut shavings on top.  My old Polisucos guy in Rio would be proud.  Oh, and the coffee’s good too, served with a return smile.

Dogtown Coffee, 2003 Main St., Santa Monica, CA  90405

Bar Nestor, San Sebastián-Donostia, Spain

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I heard about this place from a friend who had recently passed through San Sebastián.  It had been a good twelve years since I’d been through the gorgeous Basque fishing town and its horseshoe bay.  But the food I remembered well.  Years ago I had my local spot where I would get a late breakfast of mussels and cava, before going to sleep for a bit out on the beach.  Sublime.

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Chuleta de buey

At Bar Nestor questions are kept to a blessed minimum, and the answer is always “sí!”  Do you want chuleta?  Of course.  Do you want tomatoes?  That’s not a real question.  Will you have peppers?  You’re no fool.  The only real question to ponder is what wine you will choose, and they do have a selection.  One thing to keep in mind for those inclined to order a bottle:  in English we might use the words “powerful” or “strong” to refer to a big-flavored or robust wine.  In the Spanish wine lingo of Spain, the word “fuerte” (i.e. strong or powerful) actually refers to the tannins.  A fuerte wine will have a lot of tannin.  I learned this the hard way by expecting a powerful and robust red to accompany my chuleta, but ending up with a wine so tannic that it felt like sucking on tree bark.  Please be advised.

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Perfection.

The first thing you will see is the most gorgeous hunk of meat you have ever laid eyes on.  Amazing, sea salt-coated slabs of chuleta de buey (a bone-in local grass-fed ribsteak), steaming and spitting on their flatiron grills.  They don’t ask you what temperature to cook it.  They already know what’s best:  sizzling medium rare, with an emphasis on the rare.  Whatever alchemy Nestor has wrought; the incantations you will never learn.  Just be happy he lets you enjoy the fruits of his magical labors.  The tomatoes come crudely sliced into uneven hunks, coated with olive oil, and generously heaped with more sea salt.  The peppers are fried and deliver only light heat every seventh pepper, or so the local grandmothers will tell you.

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Tomates!

Nestor won’t discuss opening another restaurant or expanding the one he has.  Believe me, I tried.  He laughed heartily at the suggestion that he open a spot in Washington or New York, waiving his finger and shaking his head all the while.  Whatever else you do while visiting San Sebastián, do yourself a huge favor and just go here.  The staff is magnificently friendly (particularly for Spanish speakers) and you will not be met with a bewildering array of choices:  just an amazing steak, cooked perfectly.  Get the tomatoes and, if you’re hungry enough, get the peppers.  You can thank me later.

Address: Bar Nestor, Pescadería no. 11, San Sebastián-Donostia, Spain

Restaurant & Bar Reviews

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Over the course of our travels we are privileged to encounter some of the best food and drink in the world….

If you don’t know Nathan or Sheridan, this blog might help you navigate wine shops and restaurants in a better way than crowd-sourced options: a quick browse through the content will give you a sense of how your own tastes compare to theirs, whether these guys really know what they’re blathering on about, and, thus, whether you can rely on their recommendations. With no journalistic aspirations in play, hopefully they’ll free the reviews from the self-absorbed bloviating found on most crowd sourced options and keep things straight, to the point, and useful.

Barceloneta, Miami Beach, FL

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IMG_0002I had been trying to go here for a while. The last attempt I was rerouted to the sister restaurant, Pubbelly. It was a great experience (and where I first heard about la Guajira from the nice Colombiana bartender, nice and Colombian being redundant), but not on the same “wow” level as Barceloneta.

In case it isn’t already clear from the rest of the blog, I’m a Spanish food fanatic. As in, the kind of fatty that spends an entire summer eating and drinking his way through the country. There are many excellent spots along the Eastern and Western seaboards of the United States serving wonderful, and sometimes faithful, versions of many of my favorite dishes from Galicia, Castilla, Catalonia, Andalucia, and beyond. But only at Barceloneta have I been transported completely. A truly transcendent experience. I kept looking around the dining area wondering if the young models, rich yachters, and SoBe scenesters truly had a grasp on what they were undertaking with this menu. They couldn’t possibly – too skinny, the lot of ‘em.

I don’t tend to outline every dish here, but am making an exception this time. But first, and to out myself completely, the captain of the kitchen is Juliana Gonzalez, a cousin of one of my closest friends. For me, that means I would have gone here no matter what, and even returned if it was at least serviceable. However, I would not have become an evangelist for the place, which is what I consider myself now: a convert. I passed by initially to finally grab a tapa or two so I could report back to my buddy in DC that I had finally made it. I told the bartender to let Juliana know that her cousin’s friend stopped in and was surprised when she pulled herself free from the line to say hello. Puerto Ricans: classy, kind, and all about family – why was I surprised?

IMG_0004Things kicked off mightily when Gabriel, the Mallorcan bartender, made the best gin-tonic I’d had since leaving Barcelona this July. I ordered the pulpo grillada (grilled octopus tentacle) and boquerones. For the boquerones, I requested the slight modification of no truffle (the allergy isn’t just from my wallet, people). Both were exquisite iterations – the boquerones came with some type of salty gel, olive oil, parsley, and many blessings, and the pulpo with shaved fennel and a fine aioli. Juliana then sent me an order of croquetas de jamon iberico that, I must say, were the best I’ve ever had. Whoever she has manning the fry station could not possibly be making enough money – a perfect shell of light crispiness that just barely resists the fork, creamy and hot in the center. Amazing balls. Yes, I said that.

IMG_0005The esqueixada gets its own paragraph. The traditional Catalan dish esqueixada is sometimes compared to ceviche or a salad in that it consists of fish, vegetables, oil, and an acidic fruit marinade. For her version Juliana substitutes the magnificent, if somewhat a hidden South Florida gem of a fish, wahoo for the traditional salt cod. The results are stunning. As good as the dish sounds to a ceviche fanatic such as myself, it tastes even better. At the end, I requested bread to sop up the last of the oil and juices left on the plate. I may have licked the plate too – I can’t say for sure because my brain and taste buds were in another world-level state of nirvana and joy.

Do yourself a favor the next time you are in Miami and go to Barceloneta. Order the esqueixada and anything else that strikes your fancy. If you are missing Barcelona or Spanish food in general, it’s a cheaper trip to South Beach than across the Atlantic and you run a very good chance of getting a better meal.

Address: Barceloneta, 1400 20th St, Miami Beach, FL 33139

L’Esquisse, Paris, France

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By Guest Contributor and all around food, drink, and travel pal, Linda French: 

L’Esquisse sits at the bottom of the butte of Montmartre, 2 sets of stairs below the Lamarck-Coulaincourt metro stop, on a small residential side street. It’s owned by two friends – Thomas runs the front of the house and his friend makes the food. The menu is on a large standing chalkboard that Thomas will bring over after seating you and lean it up against whatever wall is closest to you. The place is small enough that only one table can see the menu at a time.

I found L’Esquisse in August of 2014 when I was staying at a hotel just down the street. My aunt and I were traipsing back from the ballet, looking for a late night snack and a glass of wine. Thomas welcomed us into L’Esquisse, which we quickly learned had opened only a month before. We asked Thomas for a glass of wine and he started asking questions. “White or red?” I was in the mood for white. “Are you looking for something particular or are you open to trying something . . . interesting?”

I, of course, opted for interesting. (Editor’s note: really, is there any other way to answer that question?) I remember very clearly my first whiff of that glass of wine. It smelled like mellow burnt toast. The toast rapidly morphed into something else that I don’t exactly remember. Instead I have a memory of the sensation of tasting that wine – I remember looking at my aunt in wonder and thrusting the glass at her saying, “just smell this!” I was taking huge unladylike sniffs in shock at how the smell kept changing. I also ordered an oeuf aux champignons, which was a poached egg cradled in a dense mushroom foam. And then I saw figs, mint, and Parmesan marshmallows on the dessert menu and had to have it.

I returned in August of 2015. I was traveling with my husband and insistent on going back to L’Esquisse. Thomas greeted us and paused – “wait, you were here right after we opened . . . with your mom?” I texted my aunt after dinner to let her know Thomas remembered us. This time I knew exactly what to do. I confidently asked Thomas to pair wine with our dinner.

I should have taken pictures of the labels, but I have a thing about using my phone during meals and I foolishly let that hold me back. Eventually I gave in and snapped the label of this one particular bottle that Thomas described at length. Something about how they harvested the grapes after this huge storm and found that the flavors had intensified in this odd way. I also remember being shocked at how articulate he was in English. It’s hard enough to describe wine in your native tongue. Then again, it’s clear he’s obsessed. Thomas told us he bought as many bottles of that vintage as he could, but that there were only a few he could get his hands on.

The oeuf aux champignons was, thankfully, still on the menu. Again, I don’t have a factual memory of the rest of that dinner, just a memory of the feeling of being that level of delighted where I was bouncing in my chair, almost vibrating in ecstasy.

Address: L’Esquisse, 151 bis, Rue Marcadet, 75018 Paris, France

Café Havana, Cartagena, Getsemaní, Colombia

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All good nights in Cartagena revolve around the “Havana club.” Simply put, it’s among the best small live music venues in Latin America. Whether you like Salsa, can’t dance to save your life, or are a serious aficionado, if you can’t have fun here you don’t belong in Colombia. My all time favorite live Salsa experience is dancing here, the band made up of mostly 60+ year old pros, simply killing it. James Brown would be proud to watch these gentlemen “do it to death.” What makes it even more amazing is their banter with the crowd, excited encouragement to get you up and moving – no canned Señor Frogs tourist nonsense here; these men mean business! One of my favorite moments here was the first night in Cartagena, my good law school buddy Jorge and I flanking my 19 year old nephew and teaching him the basic salsa steps, and we called out to the band during a small break between songs “El Cuarta de Tula!” The bandleader nodded in recognition of our refined taste, and fired up the horns for a rousing rendition. One of our last nights we hauled a chiva full of people from all over – Portuguese, Bolivians, Colombians, Gringos – and to a person we were thanked, hugged, and a fine time was had by all. I’ve sent several people there since and they all gush. If it’s quiet when you go, give it until the 10-11pm hour and watch it go. If you’re into partying with drunk Aussies and the backpack set, all of Calle 30 next to Havana will be full of it.

Address: Café Havana, Corner of Carrera 10 y Calle 30, Cartagena, Getsemaní, Colombia

Local Corner Pub, Cartagena, Bolívar, Colombia

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This is the placeholder for a great little “locals only” spot at the South West corner. It probably has a name, but I have no idea what it is. You’ll know when you pass by whether to stop in by the squeals and peeling laughter of neighborhood folks – if it’s full, step inside, order a beer for yourself and one of the locals, and prepare for a lovely time that might include a Salsa lesson from one of the ladies, some soccer talk with the guys, and just great, authentic times. You’re welcome.

Address: Local Corner, Carrera 9 and Calle 38, Cartagena, Bolívar, Colombia

 

La Casa Del Habano, Cartagena, Bolívar, Colombia

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Stay away from this bar. Do not go here. For anything. The owner showed us photos of his “women” – these were gringa travelers who had clearly been drugged, Devil’s Breath or otherwise. It was disgusting. We warned the nearby hostel staff and let them alert the local officials, though I doubt anything ever came of it. Just steer far clear, especially women. It still gives me chills of disgust.

Address: La Casa Del Habano, Calle 24 #88-38, Cartagena, Bolívar, Colombia

2d Visit, Bowery Meat Company, New York, NY

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After having such a great experience on the first visit, I knew I had to haul the media-porteña for a second visit soon. Arriving 15 minutes late for our 9pm Saturday evening reservation, we barely had time to hand our coats to the greet staff and say hello to Steve behind the bar (who remembered my cocktail from a month prior), before being shown to what is already my favorite table in the place: a small table in the back corner. You can see enough of the dining room if you wish, but it feels more intimate than certain other parts of the room. The table service differed somewhat from the bar service in pacing and steps, but the same high level of service persisted.

At the table the server brings by a butcher block exhibiting each of their signature cuts and explains texture, preparation, sourcing, and anything else you may want to know. We went for it again, this time with the Cote de Boeuf. I don’t mean to give the salad or Kumamotos we started with short shrift, but let’s be clear what we came here for: the beef is outstanding, cooked spot-on with the right amount of medium-rare blood and salty outer char. The brussels sprouts, the wines by the glass (we went for the Catalonian red, which the Barcelonan could not help but correct the menu’s printing of the name), and the cocktails were like a 440 Hz A-note: scientifically perfect in every way.

When the bill came, my companion nearly fell out of her seat. I didn’t even flinch. To me, it was like a Ferrari: it was worth every red cent I paid for it and I look forward to happily shelling out in the future for one of the consistently finest meals I’ve had in years.

Address: 2d Visit, Bowery Meat Company, 9 East 1st Str., New York, NY