Omnivore Atlanta

Some exciting food and drink events coming up in the next week:

The 42nd Annual Moonshine Festival

Fri., Oct. 23- Sun., 25, 8 am-5 pm

Downtown Dawsonville will be holding its annual Moonshine Festival this weekend. You can come and explore Dawson County’s historical prohibition era, when many flocked to hiding in the Northeast Georgia Mountains to make moonshine. Admission is FREE and all proceeds for the festival go to Kare for Kids. There will be a number of activities, including a tour of an old moonshine still and lots of entertainment.

The Corner Pub’s Butt Cook Off

Sat., Oct. 24

This is Decatur’s The Corner Pub’s Fifth Annual Butt Cook Off. Judging for the cook off begins at 4pm, followed by FREE sampling of the foods. 627 D East College Ave. 404-377-0603.

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The Vine restaurant in Virginia Highlands closed for good on November 29th. Apparently the place went downhill under new management.

Read Besha’s most recent review of Vine and the AJC’s coverage of its closure.

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Executive Chef of Atkins Park in Virginia Highland, Andrew Smith, has plans for a 120 pound Fourth of July pig. A “meat and three” lunch and dinner for $15 will feature a roasted Berkshire pig from Riverview Farms.

Choices of sides include coleslaw, potato salad, baked beans, grilled corn, pole beans and tomato cucumber salad. The cost also covers cornbread or Texas toast, a watermelon slice and three sauces — NC vinegar, tomato BBQ and mustard BBQ.

The pig should serve 60-70 plates, so plan ahead and make reservations. Call 678-513-2333.

(Image of pig with sun shades from coloradopigroasters.com)

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This just in:

Stephen McGuffin, former chef de cuisine at Dish, will be taking over the restaurant and reopening in February. From the press release:

“We’ll be keeping Dish classics like the lobster lasagna and the duck tacos,” said Stephen who, as the restaurant’s former Chef de Cuisine worked closely with previous-owner Sheri in every aspect of the business. Stephen’s own style will be familiar to Dish fans as well because his creations were often highlighted on the seasonal menu and as top selling nightly specials.

Of course as the new executive chef, Stephen will be bringing his own flair. “The food will be a little sharper and a little crisper,” he said, adding that he is confident new diners and loyal customers will find the transition seamless. “Dish will keep that fresh, seasonal regional focus and continue to feature a lot of fresh seafood, and use local ingredients from small farmers. The cuisine will be a blend of my classic French technique with local and seasonal ingredients.

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I’m pretty well known for avoiding brunch. It’s a meal that seems to pile on needless calories, lasts too long and often turns up absurd concoctions. Well, that’s what I always say on the way to brunch, but once I’m there, I often enjoy it.

Such was the case Sunday when I joined two friends at La Tavola (992 Virginia Ave., 404-873-5430). The restaurant had a 15-minute wait for inside tables and we weren’t about to roast on the back patio. We landed three seats at the bar and decided to eat there. Lucky for us. The generous and funny bartender, Alli (above), attempted to placate Gregg by giving him his own wine tasting when he complained that they were no longer selling the particular wine he likes. Alli also gave him a sample of chicken sausage when he carped that sausage should be made from pork.

The meal was great, especially my starter — a beet salad (left) with goat cheese, shaved fennel and luscious slices of nectarine, whose natural sweetness worked well with the beets’ own acidic sweetness. The nectarine substituted for the usual Granny Smith apples. Gregg ordered a Caesar salad and Adam ordered bruschetta.

For an entree, I had French toast made with challa (below). It was topped with blueberries and blackberries, along with some honeyed mascarpone. True comfort food. Adam ordered the day’s frittata and Gregg had two tennis-ball-sized veal-mushroom meatballs atop spaghettini with a tomato sauce.

We were too stuffed to order dessert but enjoyed watching a marathon runner at the end of the bar devour enough food, including what seemed to be two desserts, to feed an army of Fire Island brunchers.

By the way, there is valet parking in the bank lot across the street from La Tavola. If you don’t use it, you’ll be circling the block for quite a while.

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I wanted to kill two birds with one stone last Friday night. First, I wanted to raid the Cupcake Factory and, second, I wanted to have dinner. So we headed to Eclipse di Sol (640 N. Highland Ave., 404-724-0711), a few doors from cupcake paradise, to dine.

Eclipse di Sol is the sister of Eclipse di Luna, the tapas restaurant on Miami Circle. It is located in the space originally occupied by Cafe Diem. Several restaurants have attempted business in the space since Diem closed, but Eclipse is the first to do so successfully. On Friday night, the restaurant was packed. People were even dining on the patio despite basting like rotisserie fare in their own sweat.

My only complaint: The place is an acoustic nightmare. It was so noisy, I got hoarse trying to make myself heard to our server. I don’t know what exactly the problem is, but the owners might want to contact Sotto Sotto and find out what they did to reduce noise in that once equally deafening restaurant.

If you’re wondering why the place is doing such good business, it’s the food. Pictured is my entree of roasted pork with potatoes and grilled corn. I know it doesn’t sound like summertime eating, but the sweet corn lightened up the rich pork. We also sampled roasted chicken with haricots verts and truffle-infused mac-n-cheese. A starter of fried mozzarella with pesto and marinara sauces actually featured decent cheese.

We skipped dessert, since we were planning to fetch cupcakes. The universe must have been trying to, like, tell us to cut back the sugar, because there were only a couple of cupcakes left and people in front of us were pointing covetously at those.

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