Lunch Out @ Lucky John Slow Market

Lucky John Slow Market opened in Walnut Hills within the past year or so, and serves a lunch/early dinner menu along with its offerings as a local market with everything from produce to household items.  We went in on a quiet Thursday for a late lunch recently, and found the food to be quite good.  With minimal foot traffic in their area, it will be interesting to see how LJSM does, and how well they are embraced by the surrounding neighbors.  Their commitment to local, sustainable food is definitely to be applauded!

The Food:  Even though I was a vegetarian for a few years, when I see a menu that is all veggie, I do get a bit worried.  I've been to enough places in town with a vegetarian where the options are super weak, that I'm a bit gun shy I suppose.  But, with the "haute vegetarian movement" on the rise, where vegetables are being discussed as the next pork belly, it's about time there are more solid options in town.  And from what we can tell, these are indeed those solid options.

I ordered the BLT with "bacon," which the server described as being one of the most flavorful dishes on the menu.  It had fresh heirloom tomatoes that were great, as well as a garlic mayo and black pepper jam that gave it some interesting kick.  In fact, I would have liked more of those condiments.  The fake bacon wasn't an offense to the real thing, and while it was a bit tough, it did add a nice texture of crispness to go with the soft oat nut bread.  I wouldn't rave about it, but this is a nice lunch option, especially for a vegetarian.

Sarah chose the chick pea and spinach wrap, which came with paneer, roasted peppers, and seasonal herbs inside.  This was the big winner of our lunch - it was very flavorful, full of fresh ingredients, and was filling without being heavy.  Also, I'd never had paneer (a cheese probably most famously a part of saag paneer at your local Indian restaurant) used in that way, and thought it was done quite well.

Lunches come with side options as well, and we chose the kale.  It was lightly dressed with a vinaigrette and the vegetable was bright green and extremely fresh.  We got a bit burnt out on greens from our CSA last year, so it was refreshing to have them be so tasty.  There were also a handful of green grapes on each of our plates.

The Ingredients:  Many of the ingredients are sourced locally, and are available for purchase in the store that the cafe sits in.  The menu doesn't explicitly state where everything is from, but they seemed to happy to answer any of our questions.  We were glad to see another local option for buying local produce and other sustainable products.

The Story, Setting, & Service:  As I mentioned above, we went on a Thursday at about 1pm, and Walnut Hills was very quiet at that time.  There was one other pair of diners at LJSM when we were there, and they were in a lively conversation with the chef/owner's son.  I was on the lookout for the owner's son, because one of LJSM's vendors' (Trades Point Creamery) sales folks I've exchanged some emails with had been talking up both the place and the idea behind it, and in the process had mentioned that the owner's son was likely soon coming back from New York City, where he went after going to the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, New York.

The interior of LJSM is simple and eclectic at the same time, and with just a couple of booths, it is cozy as well.  The service was very nice, and while we'd heard concerns that they lived up to their name a bit too much and that food was very slow to arrive, we didn't have that problem.

The Last Bite:  Lucky John Slow Market is worth a stop, especially if local food is a priority for you, and even more so if you are a vegetarian or love vegetarian food.  We'll likely return to LJSM, but it's hard to imagine it being a frequent stop because its not super convenient for us Northsiders.  The spinach and chickpea wrap is great go to ordering option, one we happily endorse.

Dinner Out @ ZZ's Pizza

What actually got me to ZZ's Pizza was a Restaurant.com coupon (hat tip: wine me, dine me - thanks for getting me to pay attention to these deals!) - nothing too big, just a $10 gift certificate that cost me $4.  Since we already wanted to go, that's money in the bank!  As we were heading toward Walnut Hills, I was thinking how this would have to be awful good pizza to warrant bringing the restaurant back into existence - and with the same recipes as the first go round.  Now I know, this is fantastic pizza!

The Food:  We ordered a couple pizzas so that we could sample the goods, and also ordered a caesar salad to get a sense of whether or not ZZ's could be a solid replacement for our typical Dewey's order.  First, we got the Shitake Mushroom Pizza - it has goat cheese, sundried tomatoes, shiitakes, and onions on a sourdough crust with olive oil and basil.  Next, we wanted to sample the whole wheat and honey crust, so we had our regular - pepperoni and green olives.

The salad came out first, and had a light, flavorful dressing that was just a bit tangy.  With grated parmesan on top, and standard crispy croutons, this salad was a pleasant surprise at a pizza place.  But, the stars of the show soon arrived.

Both pizzas were good looking for the get go, and they were as easy on the mouth/tummy as they were on the eyes.  We had red sauce on our pepperoni and olive pizza, and it was very flavorful.  I love Adriatico's spicy sauce, but this had just a hint of spiciness and was more up Sarah's alley.  The crust on both pizzas was done just right too, with a nice crunch but also a good chewiness.  But what was probably most impressive was the balance.  On both pies you could really clearly taste each ingredient, and at the same time the bases (crust, sauce, and cheese) were notably good.  It's all too common that a pizza has too much of one thing, but these were great all around.

They also have a number of interesting ingredient options - including lobster and gouda.  So, I'm not dead set on my regular order quite yet.

The Ingredients:  While there was nothing on the menu about local or organic items, we did learn a few tidbits of information that you may be interested in.  They have whole wheat crust, which is made up the street at Giminetti Baking Company.  It tasted so good, I figured it was 25% whole wheat or so, but they told us it is 75-80% whole wheat - in terms of eating a healthier pizza, that's a significant step in the right direction!  We also noted that the ingredients really tasted quite fresh at ZZ's, which isn't always the case, particularly at pizza joints that tend to stockpile ingredients for the long haul, often to a flavor seekers demise.

The Story, Setting, & Service:  As I mentioned at the top, ZZ's has the unique distinction of opening and the closing again several years later.  Polly Campbell explained this a bit, but the best explanation I've read comes directly from the source - the back of the menu (and also on the About Us part of ZZ's web page).  I'll refrain from repeating the story myself, but will say that one of the original owner's was there when we were, so it's clear they're keeping an eye on things!

The service was solid - one server for a nearly empty weekday night, but he was very nice and had a good sense of humor.  At one point one of the owners came out of the back (the kitchen can be seen through a glass window, but my back was to it).  We got to talking a bit after I overheard him talking about the Taste of Cincinnati.  There was some buzz about how the Taste is not so accessible because of how expensive it is for small businesses.  We tend not to even go because of how often the food is poor and mass produced by mostly chain places, but it was great to hear that ZZ's really enjoyed doing Taste, and thought it was worth it as a small guy.  I am really hopeful that it will become affordable to others in future years so that the event will only continue to grow.

Finally, ZZ's has a small triangular interior and a number of great prints of Cincinnati locations on the walls. They're on Gilbert Avenue in Walnut Hills, just down the hill from where it hits McMillan.  The neighborhood has struggled, so there's not a ton of foot traffic at the store front.  Hopefully, people will learn its worth the trip and local folks will embrace it as well.

I was thinking this pizza would have to be "bring back the dead" good.  And as it turns out, zombies may come back to life after eating this pie.  Adriatico's is solidly in first place in our pizza rotation, but especially for specialty ingredients, ZZ's is either tied or in a close second.  You should definitely go give this place a try.

Dinner Out @ Suzie Wong's on Madison

The top "talk of the town" on Urbanspoon Cincinnati is Suzie Wong's on Madison, and that was enough to get us out tonight to try more of the menu.  We'd gone the first week it was open, before it even had the "Grand Opening" sign, but that was take out and we weren't really paying close attention.

The Food: We started with 2 appetizers - crab rangoon and calamari. There's a calamari on the "Starters" menu and another on the "Garden Salads" and we're pretty sure they brought us the salad, but its hard to tell which was which (forgot to look at the receipt). The rangoon were par for the course - not much to say.  They came with a tangy sauce that was somewhere between sweet and sour and duck, as well as some hot mustard.  I'd never put mustard on a rangoon - not too shabby.  I generally find that calamari can either be great or just blah.  This was definitely elevated above blah by the basil, green chili pepper, pomegranate, onion, and scallion mixture and sweet and (not so) spicy dressing - but it wasn't great either.

For entrees, we split the Bangkok Coconut Curry and the Bi Bim Bap.  The Bap (I'll call it that for short) was the clear highlight - it's a Korean dish made in a clay pot.  This was a great dish - and a big one too!  Rice gets crispy and yummy on the bottom as its cooked, while a perfect fried egg that oozed as its poked, kimchi with a nice kick, and sprouts hold down the top. Tender beef was quite tasty, and there's a sweet and spicy sauce on the side for added flavor and to bring balance to the whole dish.  As for the curry, it's put right into a real coconut, so you can scrape off the sides if you want. It's got a good full flavor, but I would have liked it to be a bit thicker.  The chicken was in the coconut, while the broccoli (a bit overcooked - no snap), peppers, and onions were in a small bowl on the side.  It also comes with white or brown rice.  If you're going out just for curry, I think there are better options in the city, but its still worth ordering and wasn't bad by any measure.

The Ingredients:A special shout out to anyone who offers brown rice!  There are only a few places in town that do.  Other than that, nothing notable here - no local or seasonal ingredients mentioned.

The Story & Setting: It's a bit odd eating on what is basically a pass through intersection that has no other life in the evening. I have to imagine this was the main reason that Seny, which was in the space previously, didn't make it.  A weekend when Manifest art gallery is open would be a good time to try out Suzie's.  On a Monday at 7:30 the place was about half full.

The service was very friendly, and except for the fact that we asked for tofu and got chicken in the curry (which we didn't care enough about to ask for a change), everything was nice and easy.

Overall - solid experience, we'll definitely be heading back. See the slideshow below for more pics.