The Loft at Traders Point Creamery--Revisit

We finally got around to taking the kids to Traders Point Creamery for lunch the other day—my in laws were in town and we thought it would be a nice place to go with everyone.  I haven’t been since my last post and honestly, couldn’t wait to try the grilled cheese again. I remembered it being so good.

Since there were so many of us, we also got a starter—it was the  “Bloomy Puff” ($14) which is one of Traderspoint’s cheeses wrapped in puff pastry and served with a bunch of fruit and veggies alongside—there were apple slices as well as zucchini, squash, and peppers.  There was also a bit of fruit preserves on the side.  The bloomy cheese is a fairly mellow cheese—it sort of has the texture of a goat cheese, although it is a cow’s cheese.  It is light and has just a little tangy kick—and when you wrap any cheese  in puff pastry, I am going to be a fan.  I did think the portion of cheese, particularly for the price, was a little small. I was expecting something a little bigger.

To continue with the cheese theme (it is a dairy after all), I got the same thing I ordered last time—the grilled cheese with avocado and bacon ($9) and upgraded my side dish to the mac and cheese ($4).  Sadly, I was disappointed with my sandwich.  The bread was much thicker and not really grilled much at all (I would call it very lightly toasted) and there was nowhere near enough cheese (just look at the one I had in my first post, they look really different).  The bacon and avocado were plentiful and tasty, but you really want to taste the cheese here.  Last time, the bread was really thin and grilled even flatter with a nice crispy exterior.  This sandwich made me a little sad, because I was so hyped up for it (and had recommended it to everyone at the table).  The side of mac and cheese was my saving grace—everyone really liked it and I ended up having to share mine with hubby and both my kids.  It was not over creamy, and had good flavor from the Fleur de la Terre cheese (which is a Gouda and also happens to be one of my favorite Traderspoint cheeses).  I will say, I thought it needed a little salt and pepper, which I added, and then it was perfect.  I picked up some of the cheese and am making my own variation of it at home tonight.

Hubby ordered the patty melt (we actually split half and half) ($12) and we both liked it much better than the grilled cheese. They raise their own cattle and the beef was great (and cooked to order properly).  There was Swiss cheese and grilled onions as well as a “special sauce.”  The meat was really super tender and juicy and there was more cheese here than there was on the grilled cheese.  The thicker bread worked on this sandwich because there was a lot of filling—you needed it with that big patty.  It was a good burger.

I like the atmosphere of the place—and the fact they have beer and wine.  The interior is like the inside of a nice barn—woodsy but with modern tables.  The service was good and very friendly. And my kids liked checking out the cows after lunch.  I just wish they hadn’t changed my grilled cheese, but at least now I know I will try something else next time.

The Loft

Traders Point Creamery

9101 Moore Road

Zionsville, IN 46077

317/733-1700

www.tpforganics.com

Shanghai Lil--Revisit

****NOTE:SHANGHAI LIL IS CLOSED*******

Shanghai Lil had been a fairly regular place for us (particularly for carry out and dim sum), but for whatever reason, we hadn’t been in ages (last time I posted about it was 2009, holy moley).  One of the reasons we don’t go a lot is because my son is allergic to a whole host of nuts, which pretty much rules out Chinese food because of all the nuts used-- I fear that there is a lot of cross-contamination going on with woks, etc.  It is just too scary.  But the other night he was spending the night at a friend’s, so we took our daughter and went.

I noticed a change on this trip—there are no longer any of the Japanese offerings that they used to have. I always wondered about this, because we never ordered Japanese, and I never saw people eating it. That has got to be expensive to keep up the fresh fish angle (for sushi) if no one is ordering it.  We went with a couple of things we have had before and a couple of new things as well.

We started with the stuffed eggplant ($6) and the dumplings in chili oil ($6).  The eggplant was a new dish for us—kind of interesting. It is slices of eggplant stuffed with minced pork and tempura fried.  It had a garlic ginger sauce.  We liked it—a lot of stuff going on here, but the more we ate it, the more we enjoyed it. It was really hot and freshly fried, so it was nice and crunchy on the outside, even with the sauce drizzled on top.   It is probably really more of a pork dish than an eggplant dish though—there was a lot of pork stuffed in there.  I liked the sauce—it had a nice flavor and wasn’t too sweet.

The dumplings in chili oil are an old standby (one is already missing in the photo), and I am not sure why, but they just weren’t as good as I remembered.  Maybe they weren’t made as freshly as other times I have had them or something.  They just seemed a little bland and the insides (that contain pork, shrimp, and scallions) didn’t seem to have enough seasoning or something.  They have a “spicy sweet” chili oil that was fine, but wasn’t saving the dumplings.

For a main dish, hubby wanted to try the pepper-salt flounder ($18) to see if it was as good as some salt and pepper fish we had in Chicago awhile back.  This is a dish that doesn’t really have a sauce—the fish is just lightly fried and has a very distinct salt and pepper flavor in the crust.  There are chilies and scallions chopped and served with it.  It was very good.  The flounder was nice and tender and the seasoning on the crust while simple, was really good (salty and peppery, go figure).  I think we may have even liked it better than the Chicago version.  The crust was a little crispier, and it had more of a battered kind of feel than the cornmeal crust that we had before.  Not the healthiest choice, but darn good.

My daughter got the crispy shrimp rolls ($4.50) and chicken fried rice ($11).  I have had the shrimp rolls a lot before and they are pretty basic (a shrimp wrapped in a spring roll wrapper and fried).  There’s a little seasoning in their (chives I think) and they are nice and crunchy, but nothing amazing.  Their fried rice is pretty good—not a ton of veggies which my daughter likes. In fact she ate it for several days after for breakfast and was very content. 

I still think Shanghai Lil is one of the better Chinese places we have on the Northeast side.  It isn’t cheap, but the ingredients are fresh—I feel confident ordering seafood there, which I can’t always say about some Chinese places.  And they have dim sum for lunch---and now I am craving that again.  But remind me again, what are your favorite places for Chinese?

Shanghai Lil

8505 Keystone Crossing

Indy  46240

317/205-9335

www.shanghai-lil.com

U.S. Adventures: Maui

Hubby is lucky enough that he gets a sabbatical from work every 5 years and this was the year.  We wanted to take advantage of him being off work for such an extended time and decided it would be a good time to try Hawaii with the kids.  I realize this may or may not be a place that everyone who reads my blog may be interested in, but I have to admit that while obviously the main point of this blog is to share my thoughts on restaurants in Indy, a nice secondary benefit for me has been that it has also turned into a type of meal/travel journal for me.  I do know that some of you travel to Hawaii though because several of you gave me recommendations. 

I am only going to talk about our top 3 places that we ate because we ate at a lot of places since we were there so long.  Unfortunately, as I have discovered in previous visits to other Hawaiian islands, the food is not the reason to go to Hawaii.  Overall, while you can get amazingly fresh fish, a lot of the food ends up only being okay, often because the fish is overcooked or under seasoned.  So the reason for going to Hawaii is the sheer beauty of the place—one of the most beautiful places I have ever been, especially Maui.  But here were our favorites:

Mama’s Fish House:  This is a place that I think everyone, and I mean, everyone, that has ever been to Maui recommended to us.  It has been around since 1973 and judging by the crowd is a well-known favorite.  The food was very good, but the prices for a lot of the entrees were pretty outrageous, even for Hawaii.  I started with the uku (a type of snapper) ceviche ($21) with Tahitian lime, kaffir lime leaf, cilantro and lychee.  It was really well done---lots of lime flavor but not so much that it was too tart.  There was a nice little bit of avocado served alongside which was a nice buttery balance to the citrus.  The fish was so tender and the housemade fried chips (taro and various colors of potatoes) were thin, crispy and salty.  Hubby was really jealous of this dish and still talks about it being one of his favorite individual items of the trip.  He had smoked marlin carpaccio with a sauce of lemon, olive oil and chili water ($12).  It was nice, soft, fresh, tender fish, but the smoke taste dominated all the other flavors for me. 

For my main dish, I had the mahimahi stuffed with lobster and crab and baked in a macadamia nut crust ($52).  You see this whole macadamia nut crust thing all over Hawaii because macadamias are local, but to be honest I had kind of avoided it because it seemed a little contrived to me, but this was very good.  It was a nice piece of fish stuffed with a mix of shellfish and topped with a perfect tender little lobster tail.  The crust was made of very finely ground macadamia nuts, making it like a breadcrumb crust with a little more of a nutty flavor.  Hubby had the opakapaka which is pink snapper, another local fave, more simply sautéed with garlic butter and white wine ($50). It was a preparation that accented the more delicate flaky fish nicely allowing the super fresh flavor of the fish to shine.  I appreciated the fact that the menu highlighted the name of the fisherman or woman that caught the fish and exactly where it was caught (assuming this adds to the price point) and the interior of this place is great.  It feels like what you expect to find in Hawaii—pretty much right on the beach, lots of wood inside and big open window. 

Amasia:

If you asked hubby, he would probably tell you that Mama’s was his favorite.  If you asked me, I would say my favorite meal of the trip was Amasia, which is a new restaurant that had just opened in one of the resorts where we stayed.

Amasia is the newest restaurant by Chef Alan Wong—and it is a tapas type concept but with influences from Asian countries as well as Hawaiian/Polynesian influences.  As is the case with a lot of tapas restaurants, the kitchen just sent things out as they finished.  Because there were several different kitchens (sushi, hot, cold, etc) it was random and the only downside was just about everything we ordered came at once which was a little too fast paced.  If I were ever in Maui again, I would most definitely go again, but I would only order one or two things at a time.

The first thing we got was the seafood wontons with a black lemongrass lemon chili veloute ($12).  Seriously, this is the item that I will not forget from this trip.  And may go onto my personal “best things I ever ate” list.  There were three wontons filled with shrimp and lobster held together by scallop mousse, wrapped in wontons and served in this amazing broth.  The seafood filling inside was somewhat compressed in the way pork wontons are, but it was still really tender. And there were bits of ginger that were still a little crunchy mixed in.  The broth was buttery and rich with a little heat, but also the spicy lemon flavor from the lemongrass.  The wontons were fresh and perfect.  After we were done with the wontons we were trying to figure out a way to soak up the rest of the sauce but we didn’t have any appropriate items.  Our server walked by and just said, “I’d recommend your spoon.”  Good call. That dish was amazing.

The next thing was the chef’s interpretation of shrimp tempura ($14).  This was interesting because it was a sort of mousse as well (shrimp) that was on a stick and then tempura battered and fried.  I appreciated it for the crunchy texture variation.  It was good, although not the highlight of the meal by any stretch.  We also got the beef tenderloin skewer from the robata grill section of the menu ($14).  This was very good as well—the beef was on a skewer along with shishito peppers (generally fairly mild peppers) and served with a mustard foie gras coulis on the side and a miso sauce on top.  The coulis served to dip the meat into was what made this dish.  The meat itself was done well—super tender and pink, but the sauce had both a touch of mustardy heat and tiny bits of rich, buttery foie gras.  What a cool way to incorporate it to make the fairly simply grilled meat feel completely decadent.  I have never had foie served in quite this way.

The chopped ahi sashimi with avocado, wontons and soy wasabi was next ($12).  Like I said, ahi is amazing in Hawaii, if usually a little under seasoned, but this one was great.  I would call it more of a tartare type of consistency—there was the chopped tuna on top of lots of seasoned chopped avocado and the crispy wontons were actually incorporated into the little stack instead of being served alongside.  It made it really easy to eat and get a little bit of all the flavors in each bite.  My only complaint was the amount of ahi was a little stingy I thought in comparison to the other ingredients.  But the wasabi and soy gave it nice flavor and the textures were pretty perfectly balanced.  Finally, we had the Kona Kampachi tiradito with passion fruit ceviche sauce and topped with peppers ($15).  This was good, but probably my least favorite of the evening.  The pieces of fish were rolled and sitting in the sauce—I love passion fruit, and rarely have I had really good passion fruit flavored things outside of Hawaii, but this one was just a little too mild—the fish pieces were so large, it was hard to really feel like you got the right amount of the sauce with it.  Again, it suffered the fate of being slightly under seasoned. My favorite part of the dish was the little “cornuts” that were served with it adding a little crunch. But after ordering this one, I really wished we had just ordered another bowl of those dumplings. 

Monkeypod:  This was our first venture outside of the resort on one of the first few days—and I think one of the reasons I liked it as much as I did was just because we got out and about.  They had amazing fries that we all shared as an appetizer (reminded me completely of Brugge fries).  They were hand cut and nicely browned.  For my main dish, I had an appetizer of ahi tacos ($17.95) (by the end of this trip, my mercury level was probably through the roof) which were little wontons fried and shaped into little taco shell shapes, filled with seasoned ahi (marinated with soy and ginger) and topped with cabbage and an avocado cream sauce.  They were really good—small for sure, but tasty.  Hubby had fish and chips ($19.95) (which were made with mahimahi on this day) and they were quite good as well.  Luckily he shared with me because mine was kind of small.  This place is supposed to be known for their house made cream pies, so we go the banana cream as well as a chocolate cream ($6.95 each).  They were good, but not amazing (I don’t know, maybe I am never really amazed with cream pies?).  All in all it was a nice, family friendly place with good food.

We had a great trip, and some amazing food (and a lot of just okay food). But the reason to go to Maui?  Here’s the reason:

Mama’s Fish House

799 Poho Place

Paia, HI 96779

808/579-8488

www.mamasfishhouse.com

Alan Wong’s Amasia

Grand Wailea Resort

3850 Wailea Alanui Drive

Wailea, HI  96753

808/891-3954

http://wailearesortdining.com/alan-wongs-amasia/

Monkeypod Kitchen

10 Wailea Gateway Place

Kihei, HI 96753

808/891-2322

www.monkeypodkitchen.com

BRICS

I don’t usually do dessert places, but lately, for some reason we have been hitting several of them a lot.  It started this summer with BRICs—we have been before, but there is a growing obsession with it in my family.   It’s right on the Monon Trail too, so several times recently, after dinner somewhere in Broad Ripple (usually Brugge); we take a walk down to BRICS.

I have to admit, a lot of dairy doesn’t sit particularly well with me, but it is hard to resist at BRICS—the first time we went, hubby and I split the caramel x 3 which I am pretty sure is my favorite flavor to date—although it is hard to choose.  This is caramel ice cream with caramel swirls and little caramel filled chocolates mixed in.  Well worth the heartburn I often endure after too much dairy.

The most recent time we went with the kids, and I just had a bite (ok, several) of everyone else’s.  My daughter had the yellow cake batter which is rich golden ice cream that really tastes like cake batter with chocolate swirls throughout.  This may very well be my second favorite so far.

Hubby had one of the rotating flavors which involved lots of toffee—it was tasty too, but loved the caramel more.  My son went with chocolate chip cookie dough.  I love raw cookie dough (one of the main reasons I ever make cookies), but I am not as big of a fan of it in ice cream—something about the coldness takes away from the dough angle—but still tasty. If you are into cookie dough ice cream, I am sure you would like this one.

yellow cake batter

cookie dough

toffee

On this trip we also discovered the “briclet” which is a smaller-sized scoop than their normal scoop (which is huge).  The briclet is $2.70 and the regular scoop is $3.20.  Trust me, the briclet is enough.  We also got our cones chocolate dipped, which added $.60.  They have a ton of different cone options as well, from huge waffle cones (made in house), to the traditional cake and smaller waffle cones.  The people who work there are super friendly and happy to give you a free sample of any of the flavors.

They have a large list of regular flavors that they always carry as well as a rotating list of various special flavors. I like this so you don’t get bored—but thank goodness the caramel x 3 is one of the regulars!

BRICS

901 East 64^th Street

Indy  46220

317/257-5757

www.bricsindy.com

U.S. Adventures- San Francisco: Gary Danko

Our last night in San Francisco, hubby and I went to Gary Danko.  Gary Danko is a restaurant that opened while we lived in San Francisco and at which we had a couple of amazing meals. It had been probably close to 8 years or so since our last meal though, so we really wanted to go again.  The funny thing about Gary Danko is that I don’t think the menu has really changed that much in all that time.  There are certain dishes that they are pretty well known for, and while they certainly add seasonal ingredients, the menu stays pretty similar I think.  But before I even talk about the food, I have to mention service again.  It was amazing once again.  This is one of the nicest restaurants in San Francisco—but the servers treat you like you are a regular and talk to you like you’re an old friend.  We chatted about various restaurants in San Francisco, and he let us in on the fact that the bar at Gary Danko is a great deal because you don’t have to order the 3 or 4 courses.  We chatted about our kids and his kids and our upcoming trip.  There was not an ounce of pretentiousness or snobbery. 

The food at Gary Danko is really good and really solid. I like that even though you have to choose 3, 4, or 5 courses ($71, $89 and $104), you can order whatever you want from whatever part of the menu (there are appetizers, a fish and shellfish section, a meat section, cheese and dessert).  He told us if we wanted 4 courses of dessert, go for it.  I started with the “crispy farm egg” with white polenta, mushrooms, frissée and pancetta.  It was great.  It was the smooth, slightly sweet polenta on the bottom with some dressed greens, and the egg on top.  The egg was actually breaded and lightly fried—and perfectly runny inside.  It was a nice take on the classic frissée salad with a poached egg, the breadcrumbs giving it just a little more substance.  It had a nice balance of flavors though with the dressing on the greens and we both really liked it.  Hubby had the risotto with lobster, rock shrimp, mushrooms, corn, roasted tomatoes and peas. We have had a version of this before and as before, it was spectacular.  How they get the lobster and the shrimp EXACTLY perfectly cooked, I don’t know, but I wish they would teach all the other restaurants in the world.  The shellfish just melted in your mouth.  The risotto is rich and creamy, but not so much so, and not such a huge portion that you were sick of it by the end (often my problem with risotto).

My next course was the roast Maine lobster with potato puree, mushrooms, corn and tarragon.  This was a dish I had once before (or a similar version anyway) and I loved it so much, I had to have it again.  It was just as good as I remember. I love lobster when it is cooked properly, but honestly I rarely order it because it so rarely is. Again, they had it down—especially that claw.  It was amazing. A little crunch from the corn and slight anise type flavor from the tarragon with the milder potatoes—the ingredients just let the lobster shine through.  Hubby had a pork dish with pork belly and pork tenderloin medallions with potato ramp puree, cauliflower, roasted peppers and maple cider glaze.  The pork belly was beautiful—I love it when it is served in a slice type format and you can see the layers of fat. It also seems more balanced between the meat and fat when it is cut like that as opposed to some of the overlarge hunks with too many gelatinous fatty bits I have seen at other places lately.  The tenderloin wasn’t as good—it just doesn’t have as much flavor and depth.

I have pretty much given up on fancy cheese services since leaving San Francisco—but Gary Danko reminded me why I like them so much.  They brought us the huge cart and let us pick whatever we wanted (we only ordered one cheese course and then one of us got the dessert). We had a nice selection of things and a nice discussion about cheese carts in San Francisco with our waiter.  Apparently there are only 3 or 4 restaurants that have them even in San Francisco.

Dessert was warm Louisiana butter cake with apples, huckleberry sauce and vanilla bean ice cream.  It was basically croissants that were cut up and then more butter and caramel added.  Can you say buttery and rich?  It was really good though, and the huckleberry was nice because it was a little tart and you always need some sort of creamy type thing to go along with something like this.  This is one of the desserts they are known for, and it is clear to see why.  All I know is I am glad we only got the three courses option because we were completely stuffed at this point.  I would say the portions are very generous, especially for a multi-course fine dining experience.

Even though we were stuffed and done with our dinner, we still enjoyed the extra little petit fours that they brought out at the end.  It is always fun to bite into them all and taste all the different flavors.  As if that wasn’t enough, they even bring you little cakes (these were pineapple upside down cakes) wrapped up to take home.  Because our waiter knew we were traveling all day with our 2 kids the next day and gave us 4 to take home (see what I mean about the service?).  Because we had had a fairly long chat with our doorman at the hotel about how much he also loved Gary Danko, we gave him the extras—we figured he would appreciate them more than our kids. (Other thing I love about San Francisco—everyone loves food in this town. I have had long discussions with taxi drivers about restaurants, and they all know where the restaurants are unlike a certain city’s taxi drivers—talking to YOU Chicago!).

All in all, this trip was a bit of a whirlwind, but we ate really well and satisfied my son’s need for Dungeness crab (had several crabs at Fisherman’s Wharf for lunch one day too) as well as taking them to a few more places that they haven’t been yet (the Exploratorium was a favorite spot).  San Francisco certainly owns a little piece of my heart that is for sure.

Gary Danko

800 North Point

San Francisco, CA  94109

415/749-2060

www.garydanko.com 

Bluebeard

I finally got a chance to check out the new darling of the restaurant scene around here—Blubeard.  You certainly have to appreciate all the love that new local places are starting to get in the press these days.  I waited the several weeks that I like to wait before going somewhere new and then we met my friend wibia and his girlfriend for dinner.  Unfortunately, that means two reviews based on the same dinner, although knowing him, it will be weeks before he writes his post. 

I really like the space of Bluebeard, especially the back bar room—the restaurant is much bigger than I thought from looking in from the street.  It is very hip—lots of irregularly shaped wood tables—a young staff and a very mixed clientele age-wise.  I should point out that I do know one of the chefs at Bluebeard—John Adams—and he did come over and say hi, so we aren’t totally anonymous here.  Anyway, we did chat about the menu a bit and got some ideas for things to order.

We started with the bread plate ($7).  The restaurant includes an Italian bakery as well (Amelia’s) that makes its own bread (a niche in Indy that needed to be filled).  I really liked the spreads that were served alongside the bread.  There was anchovy butter, a roasted garlic olive oil, and lardo.  My favorite was probably the anchovy butter—it was nice and salty, but not over fishy. The garlic olive oil was good, but fairly simple.  The lardo (which is basically cured pork fat) was a favorite of hubby’s but was a little smoky tasting for me—it was pretty strong.  I love the fact that they give you all these different things to try though.   There were also four types of sliced bread from the bakery.  The bread was good, but honestly, the way it was grilled, it had a fairly distinct burnt flavor.  It was hard to get any real flavor nuances from the bread because of the grilled parts. We also got a cheese plate (3 cheese choices for $14).  They have a nice cheese list and do a good job of serving the cheese at room temperature.  We had Piper’s Pyramid (a goat), Fleur de terre (local cow) and the house ricotta.  They served it with small rounds of baguette, an apricot spread and a rhubarb spread and several caper berries. The house made ricotta was really nice—really creamy and tangy—great with the fruit.  The cheeses were also nice with the bread from the first bread basket too.   Oh, we also had a little “snack” of wine poached olives too ($5)—the firmer olives I liked a lot. Some of the mushier ones were a little wine heavy for me and I couldn’t taste the olive as much.

Probably my favorite dish of the night was the Sicilian sashimi ($13) from the small plates section of the menu.  It was raw fluke, with bits of chopped red onion, lemon, capers and nice olive oil.  I had faith in the sashimi knowing that John Adams had been a sous chef at H2O sushi—and I wasn’t disappointed. The fish was really fresh, and all the accompaniments gave it just the right amount of crunch and acid—I loved the fancy blue salt on top too.  I think everyone enjoyed this dish quite a bit.  At the same time, we were served the broiled razor clams with parsley, garlic, butter and red pepper flakes ($15). There were two of the large clams and the seasoning was very good—nice and buttery but enough garlic and red pepper that you could taste it.  The biggest problem was the clam itself—we keep ordering razor clams thinking we will like them, but I think they are just too inherently chewy for me.  It is just a texture thing, and I think this is maybe just how they are, but just not our speed. I would love to see them get some little regular clams and do a dish with these same seasonings—they would be great.

Our next course was a large plate—the pan roasted game hen with pommes Anna, sherried figs, sage butter and almonds ($22) and a side of the spaghetti with parmesan, crème fraiche, and lemon ($9).  Both were quite good as well.  The Chef had recommended the dish, so we were happy to try it—normally I am not one to really order chicken type dishes at restaurants, but this was nice.  It was a dish in which all the ingredients together really enhanced this dish.  It was tough to get them all—there were the thinly layered potatoes with lots of butter and a nice crisp crust, the sweet figs, the almonds, as well as some arugula and pickled onions.  The hen was sliced with nice crispy skin on the outside.  I really liked the pasta too—simple but had a nice amount of lemon flavor, as well as the slight tartness of the crème fraiche—it wasn’t just flat and creamy like pastas often seem to be when they’re just doused with cream and parmesan.

Of course we had to have some dessert too, so we tried the buttermilk bread pudding with ricotta and marinated cherries as well as the chocolate goat cheese cheesecake (Lord, I think it was goat cheese, there had been a lot of wine consumed at this stage).  Both were very good as well. We all had our favorites, but I liked the cheesecake the best I think—it was not as thick as most traditional cheesecakes and had a fairly light dose of chocolate.  The cheese aspect was a little more sour than usual and I thought it was good that way.  This isn’t to say they bread pudding wasn’t good—it was as well. Two little mounds of very moist cake topped with more of the housemade ricotta and with the marinated cherries. I would easily get either again.

I thought the service was pretty good. It wasn’t perfect for sure, but the pacing was pretty good—we were there for a couple of hours, and with that much food, that is pretty much what I would expect.  There was certainly room for improvement though—our server knew the menu pretty well food-wise and specialty drink-wise, but when it came to the wine, everything we ordered seemed to throw him a little.  He had to look over the menu to see what wine we were talking about, and it isn’t a huge list.  And for some reason, while the food pacing was good as I said, the drink service was slower. I also really wish they took reservations.  We had already planned to go early and just leave if the wait was too long, but I hate to have to do that.  I would much rather go just knowing there was a table waiting for me.

outside patio-love the trees

All in all, I see a lot of promise in Bluebeard—it is still new and I think, working out some of the kinks, but I think it is a place that brightens Indy’s food scene for sure.  It feels current and modern and I am so glad to see someone FINALLY cooking food with an Italian theme that isn’t just the same pastas drenched in marinara and cheese.  It is certainly going into our rotation.

Bluebeard

653 Virginia Avenue

Indy, 46203

317/686-1580

www.bluebeardindy.com