Omnivore Atlanta

The Shed at Glenwood is where I land every Wednesday night. That’s when Chef Lance Gummere prepares an ever-changing menu of fat, delicious sliders that cost all of $3 each. The regular menu includes the delicious novelty of pan-fried chicken hearts and a foie gras torchon with warm fig jam. Go Sunday and you get three courses for $20.

Favorite dishes: Recent favorite sliders have been wild boar with caramelized onions, and one showcasing a thick slice of fried green tomato with goat cheese.   475 Bill Kennedy Way. 404-835-4363 www.theshedatglenwood.com.

We will be counting down Cliff’s Top 10 Favorites every day between now and Oct. 21, the day our Food Issue 2009 launches. Check back tomorrow for Number 5.

(Photo by James Camp)

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Here’s a couple of tasty dishes. Above is the latest slider to erupt from Lance Gummere’s imagination at the Shed at Glenwood. It’s a super-slider-sized Reuben sandwich — only $3, like the rest of his creations every Wednesday night.

Yeah, I’m totally addicted to Gummere’s sliders. I’ve finally found my own version of crack. I feel like Wimpy in the old Popeye cartoons.

By the way, the restaurant also offers a Thursday-night “Harvest” dinner of four vegetables for $10, according to owner Cindy Shera. It’s a healthy follow-up to the Wednesday night pig-out.

This is the chile relleno plate at Taquería la Norteña (4166 Buford Hwy., 404-320-0770) in the food court of Plaza Fiesta. It’s a huge poblano pepper stuffed with a decent white cheese and fried in a light batter — a classic that is often poorly prepared around town. It was about $10, including the usual rice and beans and five or six corn tortillas.

I sliced up the quite hot chile and rolled the pieces into the tortillas with some of the beans. Unfortunately, there was only one salsa available — a generic, mediocre red dispensed from a gigantic jar like ketchup.

You can do a lot of grazing with very mixed success at Plaza Fiesta. But it’s a fun afternoon, no matter what you eat.

(Photos by Cliff Bostock)

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It’s time for your annual fix of New Mexico green chilies. All locations of Taqueria del Sol are stocked with them and are offering chile rellenos at dinner only. As I recall, the restaurant prepared a set number of these every night during last year’s season and ran out fairly often. So, go early. …

Lance Gummere, chef at the Shed on Glenwood, continues to produce new riffs on the slider every Wednesday night, when the restaurant offers sliders for $3 each. Last night, there was a new one stuffed with cotto ham, tallegio and fig jam. The other newbie featured fried mozzarella with roasted tomatoes. Both delicious and it’s cheaper than cooking at home. …

Are you a Krystal hog? Then be sure to show up at 1 p.m. on Sun., Sept. 13, at Lenox Square:

At the Krystal Square Off VI Atlanta Qualifier,
professional and amateur eaters will battle it out to see who can
consume the most Krystal Burgers and Big Angus Burgers in an 8-minute
eating contest. For the first time in Krystal Square Off history,
eaters will contend with two new rule changes—Big Angus Burger Bonus
Points and a No Dunking policy—that drastically alter the face of the
competition and have forced eaters to rethink their strategies.

And once again, five amateur hopefuls will be chosen on the spot an
hour before the qualifying eating contest to go head-to-head and
bite-to-bite against professional eaters. The winner of this event
earns one of the 12 coveted seats at the final table of the Krystal
Square Off VI World Hamburger Eating Championship, where the top
eaters compete for a whopping $50,000 in cash prizes, the largest cash
purse in competitive eating history

Good news release: “McCormick & Schmick’s Seafood Restaurants in Atlanta are demonstrating their passion for quality ingredients and commitment to the Georgia’s food and agricultural industry by adding two new items to their daily printed menus featuring certified Wild Georgia Shrimp™ and other locally-sourced products. The new menu items – Wild Georgia Popcorn Shrimp with Vidalia Onion Marmalade dipping sauce and Wild Georgia Shrimp Low Country Boil – are being launched in honor of the restaurants’ 10 year anniversary in the Atlanta market.”. …

Go shopping and have lunch with Chinese Southern Belles this Sat., Aug. 22. Sign up for the event online. For more events, check out their website. …

Get your fresh produce at Danneman’s:

Danneman’s coffee shop in the Old
Fourth Ward has partnered with Fresh Roots Farm, an Atlanta farm
project, to provide weekly baskets of freshly picked produce to
customers. A $25 basket includes five to eight different organic
vegetables and half a dozen free-range organic eggs, and pairs
perfectly with a pound of Danneman’s locally roasted coffee and fresh
pastries. All baskets must be ordered and paid for one week before
pick up, and can be pre-ordered for multiple weeks at a lower cost.

Danneman’s is located on the corner of Boulevard and Edgewood Ave. in
the Old Fourth Ward at 466 Edgewood Ave., Atlanta, Ga.   Call
404-380-1393 for more information,

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HAVE A BALL: The watermelon and feta salad at the Shed at Glenwood

When the Shed at Glenwood opened in April of last year, it had aspirations to bring a true neighborhood restaurant to an area that’s always struggled to resemble a true neighborhood. Tacked on to the back end of North Ormewood Park, Glenwood Park is a deftly designed and appealing example of a new urban development. But the timing of its completion, right before the housing bubble burst and the economy tanked, has left many of its wide, windowed storefronts empty. The result is kind of eerie, like an adorable ghost town.

Set up in a large corner space, the Shed seemed poised to bring new life to Glenwood Park. Here was a restaurant where you might drop in for a fresh fruit cocktail if you lived nearby, or wander over to for brunch on the weekend. Not a destination restaurant perhaps, but certainly a spot exhibiting higher aspirations than most of what’s available in the Grant Park/Ormewood/East Atlanta area.

Continue reading “Review: The Shed at Glenwood”

(Photo by James Camp)

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I stopped in the relatively new Chocolate Coffee (1159 LaVista Rd., 404-327-6060) today. Actually, I have no idea if it’s actually spelled Chocolate Coffee, ChocoLaté Coffee or Chocolatte Coffee. Literally all three spellings are used on the shop’s website. (This is a local chain of three cafes.)

In any case, I skipped the numerous chocolate-and-coffee concoctions and had a good espresso macchiato. Pastries looked better than average.

One sort-of complaint: The shop offers free Wi-Fi and in fact is an advocate of free wireless everywhere for everyone, according to its website. Why, then, are you limited to an hour of service at the shop and why do you have to enter a code to log on? It took me some time to get my iTouch to work and the barista told me she had given up on getting her own iPhone to work there.

This isn’t unique to Chocolate Coffee. It costs practically nothing for businesses to provide free Wi-Fi. Why the time limits, the codes and the log-on pages full of advertising?. …

We ate at — you know where — the Shed on Glenwood Wednesday night, having become totally addicted to the $3 sliders. Last night’s delicious newbie was one of ratatouille topped with goat cheese. We also ordered this plate of onion rings. The damn things were as big as the sliders, tasted sweet and almost tempura-crispy.

The Shed began a Thursday-night special this week too — a plate of four fresh vegetables for $10. This week’s choices were sunchokes, organic tomatoes, Swiss chard, arugula and sweet corn. I hope to get there next week. …

We indulged our addiction to Spoon in East Atlanta Thursday night. The restaurant now has its pouring license, so you can dull the fiery curries by numbing your entire head with liquor. As usual, I trotted across the parking lot to Morelli’s for ice cream — one scoop of ginger-lavender and one of goat cheese swirled with figs.

Morelli’s is featured in the current issue of the Porch Press, by the way. That’s the monthly newspaper for Grant Park and East Atlanta Village. The article’s not online — none of the paper is, incredibly — so you’ll have to find a copy to read it. Writer Darin Glass reports that business has been crazy at the shop since Bon Appetit cited it as one of America’s top 10 ice cream shops. …

Name Change: Food 101 Morningside becomes Rosebud on July 6. This follows purchase of the restaurant by Executive Chef Ron Eyester, who has been with the restaurant as a co-owner and chef since it opened. So, there won’t be any significant changes in the menu. A press release explains the new name:

So, why Rosebud? Well, as any “regular” will tell you, Chef Eyester’s second love (aside from food) is music. An avid fan of bands such as The Grateful Dead, Widespread Panic, and The Allman Brothers, Eyester has built a reputation for offering unique music tribute dinners throughout the year. Fittingly, Rosebud is the name of one of Jerry Garcia’s custom made guitars.

Newbies on my list: RA Sushi, Evos, Nonna Mia, Midtown Mediterranean Diner, Teela Taqueria, Nectar, Noon Midtown and Bistro in a Box. I also hear stuff’s happening at Saba. Any reports on any of these?

(Photos by Cliff Bostock)

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We went — where else? — to the Shed at Glenwood Wednesday night, for the $3 sliders and had another great meal. I’m addicted to the barbacoa but tried a new one made with meatballs, which turned out to be another winner.

The place was packed last night. In fact, we had difficulty finding a parking space.

Speaking of parking, I headed to P’cheen Monday for its “Bone Lick BBQ” night. After 10 minutes, I gave up trying to find a parking space, so I didn’t get to pig out on the Carolina-style ‘cue. Instead, I headed to the Standard for its regular Monday night special of Indian curry. …

As I mention in this week’s Grazing column, we ate at Solstice Cafe twice recently. Today, Erick Newman, a partner in the restaurant who recently assumed management of it, made this cryptic announcement on Facebook: “Erick Newman has signed his separation agreement with Solstice Cafe and thanks all of his friends for the support they provided.”…

The Reynolds Group is this week’s winner of the Florid Writing Award in its announcement of a new pub:

Rí Rá Irish Pub, debuting in mid- July at the intersection of 12th Street and Crescent Avenue in Midtown, will epitomize a true Irish pub experience, building a comfortable neighborhood environment where conversation flows as smoothly as Guinness ebbs in the glass. Constructed from a pub meticulously restored in Ireland then shipped to Atlanta, the location is destined to be Midtown’s latest hotspot, offering an impressive line-up of live music, a comprehensive drink list and fare that defies pub standards. After all, when your name is translated as “celebration and good fun,” it would be blarney to have it any other way!…

How I dearly and futiley wish that well-intentioned PR firms would learn that they can greatly, hugely, impressively increase the chance of their oh-so-very-important news being published by sticking to the facts and leaving out the baroque, frilly, subjective adjectives.

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Here it is! I couldn’t resist going back to the Shed at Glenwood tonight for the $3 sliders but I also had to order Chef Lance Gummere’s pan-fried chicken hearts over “egg in a basket” — a fried egg inside a slice of toasted brioche.

I could easily become addicted to this.  As I wrote last week, when I was a kid, my father and I competed for the heart and gizzard when my mother fried chicken. She would sometimes throw extras into the pan , so we could both get a fix. I told one of the servers tonight that I have only seen chicken hearts on one menu in my life. That was at a soul-food cafe in downtown Augusta over 25 years ago.

I also ordered two sliders. One was a burger made with Wagyu beef. The other featured goat cheese and crimini mushrooms. Both were killer but the Wagyu bordered on trance-inducing.

(Photo by Cliff Bostock)

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I’m totally craving a return trip to the Shed at Glenwood for the $3 sliders tonight.

This evening, Chef Lance Gummere is offering:  crimini & goat cheese, Wagyu burger, liver & onions, porkbelly BLT, fried chicken, schnitzel and chicken salad.

I want: a plate of chicken hearts, the Wagyu burger and the porkbelly BLT.

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We hit the Shed at Glenwood tonight for its regular Wednesday “$3 Slider Night.” I admit that I was skeptical about this but — damn — whatta deal. Chef Lance Gummere was cooking six sliders, all of which we tried: fried chicken, pork schnitzel, liver and onions, chicken salad, pork belly BLT and an Angus burger.

Wayne and I ordered four each and, despite being professional over-eaters, could not finish them all. These are smallish — compared to one of Miss Anne’s Ghetto Burgers. But as Wayne said of the one he carried home, “This here fried chicken one is bigger than a Chick-fil-a.” Indeed, I’m tempted to say they’re almost all as large as the burgers at Flip.

All of them were tasty, although I didn’t much care for the mustard on the schnitzel. I’m not sure why. It’s certainly a classic condiment for schnitzel. My favorite was probably the least adventurous — the plain Angus burger.

An average eater would be quite happy with two of these, I think — three at the outside. Thank God we scrapped our plan to order some truffled fries on the side.

I have yet to taste Chef Gummere’s fried chicken hearts. As a kid, I used to fight my father for the heart and gizzard when my mother fried chicken. Gummere is serving the hearts over so-called “toad in the hole” — toasted brioche with a hole in the center in which an egg is fried.

Gummere is  interviewed on the restaurant’s site. I like this:

What got you interested in cooking in the first place?
The television show Three’s Company!  Jack Tripper was a chef and lived with two beautiful girls.  I wanted that life.

(Photo by Cliff Bostock)

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I’m sure you’ve noticed that a lot of restaurants are offering recession-fighting prix fixe menus these days.

I’m a sucker for them much of the time. These menus usually tempt diners by offering them an extra course, usually dessert, basically for free. If you stick with just ordering an appetizer and an entree from the regular menu, nine times out of 10, you’ll end up spending about the same amount of money — sometimes less — and getting a better range of choices. And, of course, if you just ordered an entree, you’d save even more money.

Oh well. We visited The Shed at Glenwood recently and both of us ordered the $24 prix fixe menu, mainly because we wanted the restaurant’s excellent profiteroles made with Valrhona chocolate sauce and espresso ice cream. The rest of our meal was great, too: a pan-seared, free-range chicken breast with butternut squash for me and (cod)fish ‘n’ chips for Wayne.

The restaurant posts its special menu on its website daily … .

I returned to La Pietra Cucina with friends last week and, as usual, had a phenomenal meal. I ordered the short ribs, but this amazing snapper with caponata and a creamy tomato sauce (left) also made its way to the table.

A dish of brussel sprouts with butternut squash puree and gnocchi (below) was, hands down, the best treatment of the vegetable I’ve ever encountered … .

Note to Publix: Find a new supplier of Fuji apples. Kroger’s are about 10 times better than yours. While you’re at it, put cherries back in your nuts and dried fruit bins … .

Flip is open! Everywhere I go, people are taking bets about how long Richard Blais will remain at the restaurant. His technical title is “creative director,” so I’m not sure we’re even supposed to expect him to remain there as chef … .

I had probably the worst meal and service I’ve had in years at a new Buckhead restaurant last week. We’re talking entree side dishes served literally in little butter cups and service so bad that my annoyance turned into resigned embarassment. You’ll have to wait for next week’s Grazing column to learn the identity.

(Photos by Cliff Bostock)

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We dined at The Shed at Glenwood (475 Bill Kennedy Way, Glenwood Park, 404-835-4363) last Saturday night. The menu here is another attempt at farm-to-table cooking and changes daily. Chef Daniel Atwood is a veteran of Tom Catherall’s Here to Serve Restaurants (like Prime and Twist), as well as Murphy’s and Woodfire Grill.

Mainly, we enjoyed our meal, especially the simple salad of local red and gold beets with goat cheese and oranges (right). We also liked the profiteroles (top photo) made with homemade vanilla ice cream and Valrhona chocolate. Entrées of a BLT sandwich and whole roasted red-snapper were good too, with only a few minor glitches.

The restaurant is generous with the amuse bouche. We received this colorful assortment of olives (left) and a bunch of potato chips with a blue-cheese dip. The chips frankly were not much better than your basic Lay’s.

The Shed is another restaurant that serves not-so-small plates for sharing as starters. I find this trend a bit annoying, since it rapidly increases prices if you want to sample more than one item. You’re also encouraged to share entrées. This is all about marketing. We’ve always been able to share food, but now we’re paying to do so.

More in next week’s Grazing column.

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