Category: Smoked Cured and Pickled

Smoke & Donuts BBQ

Not to be confused with the similarly named Smoke & Dough in Miami, Orlando’s Smoke & Donuts (https://www.smokeanddonuts.com/) is a relatively new restaurant that started serving excellent barbecue and beautiful, festive cake doughnuts just over a year ago, right in one of the best foodie neighborhoods in the city, the Milk District.

My wife and I recently had our first meal at Smoke & Donuts, and me being me, I made sure we could sample as many things from their eclectic menu as possible.  The restaurant is open from 11 AM to 9 PM on weekdays, but on weekends, it opens at 9 AM for a brunch menu in addition to the full regular menu.  We figured that would give us even more options to choose from, especially with my weird work hours that prevent us from going out to eat during the week.  Luckily, there was plenty of parking and no wait shortly after 11 AM on a Saturday.

Once you arrive, you take a paper menu to study as you walk down a line where you can see those dazzling, decadent doughnuts on display, then the stations where the staff assembles barbecue bowls, sandwiches, and “boards” (really metal trays).  My wife sat down at an open table while I took the walk toward an extremely patient woman who took our large order at the end of the line.  It’s a familiar setup — you pay at the register, take a number, and then someone delivers your food to your table.

Before I reveal everything we ordered, here are the sauces diners will be able to choose from, since sauces are such an important part of the barbecue experience.  They are all in squeeze bottles over by the self-serve soda fountain, and there are plenty of tiny plastic cups with lids to fill with the six sumptuous sauces.  Over here you have toasted guajillo pepper, KC (Kansas City) sweet, spicy vinegar (it’s a North Carolina thing), and a marvelously thick hot sauce with visible spicy pepper seeds and a touch of sweetness.

Next to them, kept on ice, are Lowcountry SC (South Carolina) mustard sauce (kind of a creamy, herby, tangy mustard, not like bright yellow mustard or overly sweet honey mustard at all) and AL (Alabama) white barbecue sauce, which is creamy, tangy, and sweet.  You KNOW I tried them all!

Here’s my sauce lineup.  Before our food even arrived, as I was assembling our sauces, they brought us each a sample of a perfect, delicately seasoned, crunchy pork rind, which we both liked.  Pork rinds can be heavenly or a pointless waste of calories, and the seasoning usually makes all the difference.  But this one was very light, which was also nice.

My wife ordered a blueberry “MOCK-jito,” a delightful mocktail with fresh mint, lime, and fresh muddled blueberries.  She said it was so refreshing, and it was one of the highlights of this epic brunch.  I am so glad to see more restaurants offering interesting mocktails made with the same love and care as their alcoholic cocktails.  Thank you, Smoke & Donuts!

It wasn’t long before our meals were walked out to the table.  My wife and I each chose a Pit Sampler board, which comes with a choice of three meats and either one side and a piece of cornbread or a glazed doughnut (one of the more basic doughnuts, not the fancier ones).  She chose pork belly (on the left; smoked and prepared in a sous vide water bath), pulled smoked chicken slathered in the Alabama white barbecue sauce, and sliced brisket for her meats.  When I was given a choice of ordering her brisket lean or marbled, I chose marbled, which we both prefer.  With steak, brisket, or pastrami, when in doubt, go for the marbling!

Instead of a side, she opted for a cinnamon sugar cake doughnut.  Those pink strips are pickled red onions, something I love a lot (and make myself at home), but she has no interest in onions at all, or anything pickled.  Needless to say, I got them for myself, along with the rest of the house-made pickles and pickled onions in the top right corner of her tray.

For my Pit Sampler board, I purposely chose three different things, knowing we would offer each other samples of ours anyway.  I got chopped brisket (doused in TG sauce, the toasted guajillo pepper sauce), chorizo sausage, and St. Louis ribs (rubbed in “red chile and brown sugar slather”).
I chose baked beans for my side (see above), which included Kansas City sweet barbecue sauce, caramelized onions, sorghum, and stout.  And you can see my cornbread up there too.  But wanting us both to have a chance to try more sides, I also ordered a side sampler with three additional sides:

French fries, a necessity for dipping in the six different sauces:

Crunchy cucumber and cabbage slaw, shredded and tossed in a sherry and rice wine vinaigrette.  I didn’t even try this until later, when we got home with multiple boxes of leftovers, but I liked it a lot.  What a gourmet, nontraditional take on cole slaw.  It was a bit dry, even with the vinaigrette, but a little Alabama white sauce perked it up.

Rich macaroni and cheese, featuring cheddar, Swiss, Chihuahua, and cotija cheeses and a little lager.  This is definitely one of the best versions of mac and cheese in Orlando, and my far-and-away favorite of all the sides we sampled.

Here’s a close-up of my chopped brisket, which was good, although I think I would definitely opt for the sliced, marbled brisket in the future:

I had no idea how many ribs came in the sampler, but I have to be honest, I only expected one rib (making me think of Chris Rock in I’m Gonna Git You, Sucka, a movie I made my wife watch for the first time recently, still as funny as it was when it came out in 1988).  Imagine my surprise when the guy delivered the trays to our table, and there were three ribs, although he told me he accidentally gave me an extra one.  So normally you would get two in the Pit Sampler, and even that would have been great.  The ribs were my favorite of the three meats I ordered, by far.  They were so tender and smoky and sweet and spicy, easy to pull off the bone, but not exactly “falling off the bone” (barbecue mavens try to avoid that texture).

And from the brunch menu, my wife really wanted to try the biscuits that came with a trio of different flavors of soft, spreadable butter.  It looks like they change these flavors all the time, but today we got  mango, cilantro-jalapeño, and strawberry-basil butters.  My wife really loved the two fruity ones, and I liked all three.  The biscuits weren’t huge, but we also shared my cornbread and still had plenty of these rich, creamy, velvety butters left to bring home in the tiny plastic sauce cups.  Thank goodness for the lids!

We were as interested in those stunning doughnuts as we were in the barbecue, so we ordered more to take home and parcel out over the next few days.  On the left is a blonde blueberry doughnut we intended to share, with vanilla glaze, oat streusel, blueberry compote, and a chewy, buttery blueberry swirl blondie (the triangle “hat” on top, definitely a fascinator).  In the middle is a red velvet doughnut my wife chose, with chocolate glaze, red velvet fudge, and a lightly crispy meringue on top, like a little beret sitting at a jaunty angle.  On the right is a passion petal dancer, the most butch-sounding dessert name ever.  I chose that one as soon as I saw it includes passion fruit cremeaux (I don’t even know how to pronounce that), lemon pavlova, and a dehydrated strawberry.

And this was one last doughnut for me, back at home: the key lime doughnut, with candied lemonade glaze, ginger snap streusel, key lime pavlova, and meringue.  Good grief, this was so good.         All the doughnuts from Smoke & Donuts BBQ are cake doughnuts, so they are really dense, heavy, and on the drier side, but not crumbly.  If you’re craving the light airiness of yeasty Krispy Kreme doughnuts, then go to Krispy Kreme.  But you’ll miss out on these lovely, luxurious, cakey creations.

We were lucky enough to meet Smoke & Donuts’ chef-owner Ian Russell, a graduate of the only CIA that makes the world a better place, the Culinary Institute of America.  He worked as an actor (appearing in at least one local production with my wife when they were both a lot younger!) and some other interesting careers before founding Smoke & Donuts as a food truck.  After building a reputation there, he then moved into the current space, directly next door to one of Orlando’s most famous and beloved restaurants, Se7en Bites.  I was impressed that Chef Russell went around from table to table, introducing himself and asking his guests how everything was, and that’s when my wife recognized him from when they were in Cyrano together.  Then the lady who had so patiently taken my large order introduced herself as his mother, and she stopped by to check up on us and kvell about her successful son.

I would be proud too.  Chef Russell and his entire staff (including his mom) were wonderful.  We felt very welcome and had a terrific brunch/early lunch that ended up being the only meal we needed for the rest of the day, with plenty of leftovers for the next couple of days.  The ribs and mac and cheese were definitely my favorites of everything we tried, but I would return just for a big ol’ order of fries so I could use them as sauce delivery devices, the sauces were that good.  People are intense (and intensely loyal) when it comes to barbecue.  Orlando is lucky to have some good options (along with Briskets in Oviedo and Smokemade opening a permanent location soon), and Smoke & Donuts is definitely among the best.  The Milk District has another winner, and since they have lasted over a year in this location, I’m sure they aren’t going anywhere.  Come try them when you’re craving meat and sauce, and they even offer smoky jackfruit for vegetarians!

Adega Gaucha

Adega Gaucha (https://adegagaucha.com/) is an all-you-can-eat Brazilian steakhouse located at 8204 Crystal Clear Lane, Orlando, FL 32809, right in front of the Florida Mall, just south of the busy intersection of Orange Blossom Trail and Sand Lake Road.  It opened about two years ago, and it is a single, locally owned restaurant, differentiating it from the similar chains Texas de Brazil (which I reviewed back in 2019) and Fogo de Chao (which I have been to twice, but never got around to reviewing).  I grew up going to all-you-can-eat buffets with my family, and then they helped keep me alive through college and grad school.  Because of my buffet background, I have a great appreciation for the variety and abundance of restaurants like this, even though I could never have afforded the typical decadence of a Brazilian steakhouse as a poor student.  Despite the never-ending parade of patient waiters serving roasted meats on giant swords, my favorite part of this meal is always the sumptuous salad bar buffet, where I can gorge on some of my favorite foods, like cured meats, smoked salmon, and various fancy cheeses and roasted and marinated vegetables.

My wife, on the other hand, is not a buffet person, but she does appreciate a well-cooked (but never well done) steak, far more than even I do.  We both like our red meat as rare as possible, and we share a fondness for marbled ribeye steaks, lamb, tender brisket, and gamey meats like bison.  That’s why these Brazilian steakhouses are a rare and luxurious treat for both of us.  We have gone to Texas de Brazil for a handful of special occasions in the past, and she suggested a return visit as a “last hurrah” before an upcoming surgery and a year where we’re both going to try to eat a little less and a little healthier.  I suggested we try Adega Gaucha as an alternative, and I am so glad we did, because we both liked it even more than the vaunted, venerable old standby.  Now I’m suggesting it to you stalwart Saboscrivnerinos, and I will do my best to point out the little differences that set this singular local establishment apart from its chain competitors.

I am happy to report that Adega Gaucha is cheaper than the “big two” chains.  The full churrasco experience for dinner is $55 per person, and lunch on weekdays is $40.  I would much rather eat a big meal like this for lunch than dinner, and ideally on a weekend, because I can’t think of anything sadder than gorging at a nice restaurant like this while worrying about rushing back to work in the afternoon and trying to be productive.  Luckily, Adega Gaucha offers all the same stuff from the dinner menu for their Saturday and Sunday brunch, lasting from 11:30 AM until 3:00 PM, for $45 per person.  To compare to the Orlando Texas de Brazil, weekend lunch from noon until 4:00 PM is $60.  That $15 makes Adega Gaucha seem like a bargain, and I haven’t even gotten into how good the food and service are!

We made a reservation for 11:45 AM on a Sunday, and we were the very first party to be seated and hit the gourmet table (salad bar and buffet), so I was able to pause for some photos.  Here is the charcuterie — pretty standard pepperoni, dry prosciutto and cured ham sliced paper-thin, and genoa salami folded into pretty flowers, atop a mountain of cheeses.  As one would hope, they had glass sneeze-guards in place, to prevent these decadent selections from people’s germs.  I grabbed some of these cured meats, along with the fine smoked gouda in the middle of the cheeses.

I helped myself to some melt-in-your-mouth nova salmon, leaving all the capers behind for diners who like them.  Those white things I cut off are hearts of palm, which I have never developed an appreciation for.

This was beef carpaccio, another decadent delicacy, that I have never noticed at Texas de Brazil or Fogo de Chao. 

My wife liked the sweet potato salad with raisins and dollops of goat cheese in the top left and the quinoa salad in the top right.  I really liked the potato salad in the bottom left and the seafood salad in the bottom center.  We both appreciated the tiny spheres of fresh, soft mozzarella cheese drizzled with balsamic vinegar in the top center.  I am slowly developing a taste for beets, but I was a little too overstimulated to sample what seemed to be beet salad in the bottom right. 

Back at our table, we were greeted by a basket of warm, freshly baked  pao de queijo, Brazilian cheese bread — chewy little buns that my wife always likes a lot.  She said these were better than Texas de Brazil’s version!

Something else Adega Gaucha does that Texas doesn’t is allow the table to select three sides.  My wife chose fried yucca, which I am not into, and I chose caramelized bananas, which I figured we would both enjoy.  They are so delicious.  Go ahead, take those bananas!   

I knew she would dig the sautéed mushrooms, so I let her take those.  She liked them, but she found little marinated mushrooms on the gourmet table that she liked even better than these sautéed ones.   Longtime readers know mushrooms are my Kryptonite, but I never claimed to be a fun guy.

Here is my plate after my first and only venture to the gourmet table, loaded up with some of my favorite foods in the world.  Aside from things I have already discussed, I treated myself to sweet and spicy Peppadew peppers I could eat like candy (and have before), pink pickled onions, roasted red bell pepper, and one of the jewels of the gourmet table, candied bacon, which had a hint of spice and was a huge hit with both of us.

Then we turned our little red cards green to signal the gauchos to arrive with gifts of meat.  (And how about Gaucho?  The last truly excellent album by Steely Dan, if you ask me, but I give Aja a slight edge.)

I lost track of all the different cuts of steak the gauchos brought by our table, but between the two of us, we probably tried them all: filet mignon, top sirloin, the popular Brazilian sirloin cut called picanha, flank steak called bavette or fraldinha, and our beloved ribeye.  Both of us always politely asked for rare, and the gauchos patiently offered us the rarest of the rare.  I was overjoyed that none of the meats were over-salted, which is a major issue for me at both Texas de Brazil and Fogo de Chao, where on top of the encouraged gluttony, everything is ridiculously salty.  I filled little metal ramekins at the gourmet table with fresh chimichurri, that wonderful, pungent condiment of oil, vinegar, garlic, and parsley, and fresh mango salsa that was tasty enough to eat with a spoon by itself.  The mango salsa passed my “Would I eat this over vanilla ice cream?” test.  Yes, it was that good — sweet and spicy and acidic and cool and refreshing and perfect in every way.  I should have gotten a photo of it.  I’m sorry!

But as good as the various cuts of steak were, for me, the highlights were the leg of lamb (also rare), the tender pork sausage called linguica, the roast chicken legs with crispy skin (capturing everything you would hope roasted chicken legs could aspire to be), and our absolute favorite meat at any Brazilian steakhouse, costela, the tender, juicy, marbled beef ribs that the gauchos serve sliced crosswise against the giant bones.  As soon as the first gaucho visited us, we asked for the beef ribs, and you should too.  Before we learned of the greatness of beef ribs at Brazilian steakhouses, we didn’t know to ask for it, and it rarely made appearances when we would dine at Texas de Brazil.  But at Adega Gaucha, ask, and you shall receive.

Below, you can thrill to a later plate with more beef rib slices and two more delicacies that I’ve never had at Texas de Brazil or Fogo de Chao.  You might have noticed the little dark round things at the top of the plate pictured above and the bottom of the plate pictured below.  Those are chicken hearts, and they are wonderful, hearty (heh) fare.  If you think that sounds gross, you are certainly welcome to your opinion, but they are such a delicious protein — dark and rich and slightly chewy, but so flavorful and extremely nutritious.  I have bought chicken hearts before, marinated them in Italian dressing and then sautéed them, but mine always came out a little chewier than I feel they should be.  I’ve had them on skewers, grilled over binchotan charcoal at Susuru and Tori Tori, two local Japanese restaurants that specialize in Izakaya-style pub grub like yakitori.  But I had never had them like this, and I absolutely loved them.  It’s funny that despite having all these different cuts of steak at my disposal, I liked the chicken hearts so much, but I did.

And that beautiful thing on the right is another hallmark of a meal at Adega Gaucha that I have never seen elsewhere: grilled pineapple, rich with butter, sugar, and cinnamon for a crispy, caramelized outer crust, like the best part of a pineapple upside down cake.  This was a huge treat, serving as both a palate cleanser between the rich meats and a dessert.  It was a damn delight, and we could not have been happier to end our meal with a few slices of the grilled pineapple, artfully cut off whole pineapples on the same kinds of swords wielded by the gauchos.

I have heard the cocktails and desserts at Adega Gaucha are as awe-inspiring as the meats and the gourmet table offerings, but we don’t drink, and we were too full for dessert, aside from that grilled pineapple.  But next time (and there will be a next time!), I am ordering a Brazilian limeade, with fresh-squeezed lime juice and sweetened condensed milk.  That has to be the best thing ever, to go with so many other “best things ever” we enjoyed and will absolutely return to enjoy again.  In the song “Hey Nineteen” on Gaucho, Donald Fagen sang “The Cuervo Gold, the fine Colombian, make tonight a wonderful thing.”  For your friendly neighborhood Saboscrivner, hopefully less pathetic than the narrator of that song, the beef ribs, leg of lamb, chicken hearts, chicken leg, linguica sausage, smoked salmon, caramelized bananas, mango salsa, and grilled pineapple made our first visit to Adega Gaucha a wonderful thing.

The Town House Restaurant

The Town House Restaurant (https://www.oviedotownhouse.com/), a friendly neighborhood diner in every sense of the word, has been slinging breakfast, lunch, and dinner in Oviedo since the 1950s, with a heaping helping of Southern hospitality accompanying each order of fresh, hearty comfort food from its kitchen.  I went there for the first time in November to meet a friend for breakfast, brought food home for my wife, and then brought her back to dine with me a few weeks later.  I tried to document everything that we ordered on those visits to paint a homey, welcoming picture of this beloved family restaurant.

Now that I can’t ever meet friends for lunch or dinner during the work week, my friend was patient and kind enough to join me for breakfast.  She ordered a breakfast platter that came with eggs (she went with scrambled) and sausage (which she chose over bacon or ham).  You can’t go wrong with American classics like these!

Or “French” classics, for that matter.  I didn’t try the Town House’s version of French toast, but the menu described it as “fluffy, custard-dipped Texas toast,” and I don’t see how you can go wrong with that:

She then chose home fries instead of the alternative of grits, and I made a mental note of how great they looked, especially topped with melted cheddar cheese and sautéed onions and green bell peppers.

I’m a weirdo who always has to see if the lunch and dinner menu is available at breakfast time, and the Town House Restaurant allows you to choose from either.  They said only a few lunch and dinner options might not be ready — most likely the dinner specials like steaks and grilled salmon.

I had a hard time saying no to an order of fried mozzarella sticks at 10 AM.  These were really good — battered rather than breaded — and I got two sticks stuck together, which I have never encountered before.  I took it as a good luck sign.  Don’t worry, I shared with my friend!

There was so many things I wanted to try between the two menus, that I ended up splitting the difference and ordering Zephy’s Big Mouth breakfast sandwich off the lunch menu.  I love a good breakfast sandwich, and this one included a thick slice of sweet Virginia ham, two over-hard eggs (my current preference for eggs after a literal lifetime of ordering them scrambled), and pepper jack cheese on grilled Texas toast, a wonderful and underrated bread for sandwiches, especially warm, melty, comforting sandwiches like this.  I asked for mustard, because I always like mustard with ham and eggs, and of course it was typical yellow mustard to brighten things up.   

I asked if I could choose from lunch sides instead of the listed options of grits and home fries, and our very patient server told me to go ahead.  Then she called me “hon,” or perhaps “sugar,” as diner waitresses are wont to do.  I chose macaroni and cheese, a premium side, which was a little on the bland side but still pleasantly chewy and gooey.

Our breakfast was so nice, I texted my wife and told her to check the menu online and place an order with me.  She did not surprise me at all by requesting fried catfish, one of her favorite dishes to order at any restaurant.  It was still warm and crispy by the time I got it home, and here it is with her premium side of fried okra (and cocktail and tartar sauce for dipping).

Since her fried catfish entree came with two sides, she told me to go ahead and choose another one for myself.  I decided to try the Town House’s version of potato salad, which I enjoyed later that day at home.  I’ve had more exciting potato salad recently, but even average potato salad can still hit the spot.  I definitely hit it with some pepper back at home!

But my wife did want the sweet tater tots, made with sweet potato, as one would expect.  This is an appetizer portion, and they came with a little ramekin of powdered sugar to shake onto them once I got them home.  Neither of us noticed the sweet tater tots were also available as a side order, so I could have brought her a smaller portion of those and gone without the potato salad, but oh well.  These tots also stayed warm and crispy on my short drive from Oviedo back to Casselberry.

By the way, I was going out of town the day after this breakfast, which is why I was ordering a lot of food for my wife.  She also asked for the red velvet bundt cake from the dessert menu, and here is a really bad photo of it.  It was baked fresh, and it took a while because they were making a new batch of the cream cheese icing (served in those ramekins on the side).  She loves red velvet cake, whereas I am not a big fan, so I didn’t even try it.  But you can’t go wrong with cream cheese icing, especially when it’s fresh!

Like I said, I returned a few weeks later for breakfast on a Friday, this time with my wife.  She once again ordered the fried catfish and liked it even more this time.  On her first visit to the actual Town House Restaurant, she chose a side of grits.

And for her second side, she went with a Greek salad.  We both liked that they were liberal with the feta cheese, and she gave me her pepperoncini pepper and the scoop of potato salad at 1:00.  (As far as I can tell, putting a scoop of potato salad on a Greek salad is unique to Florida Greek restaurants, especially diners.  I am always happy to find it in my Greek salads.)

The fried catfish also came with a huge biscuit, which I simply forgot to photograph last time, but here it is now:

Because I am an altacocker (an old man, years before my time), I chose the baby beef liver and onions special, because I always love to eat liver in any form.  It was nice and tender and a little gamey, served smothered in gravy.  After trying it, I would opt for the gravy on the side next time, because I actually like ketchup and hot sauce with my liver and onions more.   For my two sides, I got the home fries with onions and peppers like my friend got on my first visit to the restaurant, as well as cool, creamy, crispy cole slaw that was nice to balance out the salty richness of everything else on the huge plate.

Here’s a close-up of the home fries, which I would definitely recommend to any Town House visitors.

So that’s Oviedo’s iconic Town House Restaurant!   They offer so many different things here, including burgers and gyros, but I probably wouldn’t order a burger at a down-home diner like this, and I still have a very strong opinion about the absolute best gyro in the Orlando area (Mediterranean Deli, my friend).  This gyro might be awesome, and maybe one day I’ll give it a chance.  But there is so much to choose from, and they even offer prime rib a couple of nights every month.  Maybe I’ll time my next visit to try that, because I really love rare prime rib with lots of creamy horseradish.  Basically, you can’t go wrong at the Town House, hon.

Palm Avenue Deli (Sarasota)

Back in November, I took my wife to Naples, Florida, to visit a friend who had traveled in from Maine.  Naples is almost four hours south of Orlando,  but it’s a hell of a lot closer than Maine, so we divided up the long drive by stopping for lunch in Sarasota.  I’ve never been to Sarasota in my life, so of course I did my research, and I decided to stop at a New York-style delicatessen restaurant that had a great-looking menu and enthusiastic reviews: the Palm Avenue Deli (https://palmavenuedeli.com/) in downtown Sarasota.  It was fabulous.  I’m so glad we chose to go there, and I wish I had opportunities to return.

When we arrived in the middle of the day on a Friday, I gushed about this being our first time, how we were passing through town from Orlando, and how excited I was to visit after reading their menu online.  Our lovely hostess and steadfast server must have thought they had a real live one here, but they had no idea just how much food we would order, or how much fun we were about to have.

We were seated near the open kitchen, and I was so tickled to see this old library card catalog behind our table, repurposed to add some flair to the dining room.  You can’t see it here, but each of the card catalog drawers was labeled for some kind of Jewish deli fare, like Bagels, Brisket, Chopped Liver, Corned Beef, and so forth.  You get the gist.  I’m a librarian, so I really knew we had made a great decision for lunch.  

The lunch menu literally offered a dish called “Pickles for a Nickel,” and they weren’t joking.  We actually got a couple of sour kosher dill pickles and a dish of cool, creamy, crunchy cole slaw for five cents, cinco centavos, whatever you want to call it.  For that alone, I would have to recommend Palm Avenue Deli, because where else can you get ANYTHING for a nickel, with or without a picture of a bumblebee on it?  Anyway, this is the cole slaw:

My wife and I both ordered egg creams, those fizzy, creamy concoctions from old-timey New York City soda fountains.  A place like this would certainly make them the right way, with Fox’s U-Bet syrups (which I have reviewed before), milk, and seltzer water, creating sweet and refreshing foamy drinks that contain neither eggs nor cream.  My wife got the classic chocolate egg cream, and I opted for a coffee egg cream, since I haven’t found coffee Fox’s U-Bet around Orlando in a long time.

We shared an order of excellent potato latkes, fried to golden-brown perfection and savory with onions and black pepper.  How do you like your latkes?  My wife likes applesauce with them, while I prefer sour cream.  But the ultimate question is, “Why not both?”  At Palm Avenue Deli, you don’t even have to choose.

My wife is a sucker for the Ashkenazi Jewish dish kasha varnishkes, which is kasha (buckwheat groats, toasted and then boiled until they are soft and tender) served with al dente bowtie noodles.  I’ve never had a strong opinion on the dish one way or another, until now.  Palm Avenue Deli went hard with caramelized onions, and let me tell you, that made all the difference.  I get it now.  Those caramelized onions added savory flavor as well as sweetness and brought this carb-fest to life (to life, l’chayim!).

She also ordered a smoked fish platter with sablefish, cream cheese, butter, and a toasted everything bagel.  The sliced onions, tomatoes, and cucumbers come standard on almost any deli or appetizing store’s smoked fish platter, along with salty capers and fresh dill.

Close-up on the sliced sablefish.  Also known as Alaskan black cod, it is a rich, buttery fish that is rubbed with spices and then smoked.  If you’ve ever had nova, lox, or gravlax (different kinds of smoked salmon), you know how delicious those are, especially offset against creamy, tangy cream cheese and some fresh vegetables on a good bagel or bialy.  Is your mouth watering yet?  Well, think about how tasty nova salmon is, and sablefish is somehow even better.  Many years ago, I introduced my wife to its glory at our beloved Ess-A-Bagel in Midtown Manhattan, and now she is a member of the Sable Squad with me.

I ordered a classic sandwich that is a great benchmark to gauge any deli: a combo sandwich with sliced pastrami and corned beef on rye bread with caraway seeds.  It was excellent quality.  I’ve certainly had more ridiculously overstuffed deli sandwiches, but I can’t complain about the quality or the flavors of this one.  I still prefer pastrami to corned beef, and I still prefer my pastrami hand-sliced (like at Katz’s in the Lower East Side, Langer’s in Los Angeles, and The Pastrami Project here in Orlando), but I can’t take anything away from this lovely sandwich.  The rye bread here at Palm Avenue Deli was certainly better than Katz’s, and the meal was so much more leisurely and relaxing, as opposed to Katz’s chaotic atmosphere.

I opted for a side of potato salad with my sandwich, since I already got to sample the cole slaw in my “Pickles for a Nickel.”  For sharp-eyed Saboscrivnerinos who are eagerly awaiting my next set of Cutting the Mustard reviews, I was thrilled to try a new (to me) mustard here: Sy Ginsberg’s New York Style Deli Mustard.  It was perfectly good — very similar to Gulden’s, but not as good as Ba-Tampte, which is pretty much my go-to deli-style mustard.

As long as we were tearing things up at this deli and just passing through town, I figured “Why not try the chopped liver too?”  I was able to order a bissel of chopped liver — just a small side portion to taste it.  It was very rich, thick, and savory, with a pleasant consistency — smooth with some little chunks for texture.  I’m very glad I tried it, because chopped liver is a decadent treat that even a lot of delis don’t serve that regularly anymore (at least not here in Central  Florida).  I wish they had served it with some extra rye bread and caramelized onions, but I could say that about almost anything.

My wife feels as strongly about desserts as I do about delis, although she has definitely come around to appreciating delis like I do.  She saw flourless chocolate cake on the menu and made sure to save some room for it.  It came with a glistening dark chocolate glaze, a scoop of vanilla ice cream, a puff of fresh whipped cream (not the canned stuff), and fresh diced strawberries, and she loved it.  

I did not intend to order dessert at all, but I might have made a comment like “Mmmmm, blueberry cheesecake.”  Much to my surprise, our very friendly server brought out a slice of blueberry cheesecake on the house, which we neither needed nor requested, but I certainly welcomed  it enthusiastically.  It was “New York style” cheesecake — rich, thick, dense, and a little bit tangy — more like the legendary Junior’s than the familiar Factory, but made in-house.  What a delightfully unexpected end to this epic road trip lunch!

Even the restrooms had character and style.  The men’s room had a framed photo of Marilyn Monroe and Andy Warhol-inspired Elvis wallpaper.  My wife reported the ladies’ room had an Elvis photo and Marilyn wallpaper.  Who were you expecting — Joan Rivers and Jackie Mason?   

So I says to my wife, I says, “I wish this place was in Orlando, because we would be regulars for sure.”  She agreed.  Sadly, Sarasota is nowhere near home, and I can’t imagine returning anytime soon, as good as our Palm Avenue Deli experience was.  It’s amazing that this small city on Florida’s Gulf Coast can support three Jewish delis (Palm Avenue,  the Meshugana Deli, and the newly opened Wolfie’s), which is definitely more than we have here in our progressive and cosmopolitan City Beautiful.  I have some strong opinions about dangerous and disquieting things happening elsewhere in Sarasota, but a food blog is no place to get into that kind of editorializing.  That said, for our first visit ever and probably our only one for the foreseeable future, I could not have chosen a better restaurant for our own meal in town.  If you’re anywhere close, drive into clean, welcoming downtown Sarasota, park in the nearby garage to avoid having to parallel park along the busy streets, and check it out.  You won’t be sorry.  You can tell them I sent you, but even though I ordered half the menu, they probably won’t know who you’re talking about.

Briskets BBQ Shack & Grill

Briskets BBQ Shack & Grill (https://www.brisketsbbq.com/) is a literal shack in quiet Oviedo, Florida, slightly off the beaten path but well worth the schlep.  I met some of the nicest, sweetest people — a true family operation — serving some of the best barbecue I’ve ever had in the Orlando area. 
Needless to say, just discovering a new barbecue joint is pretty exciting, especially since I work odd hours now and rarely get out to eat during the work week.  Briskets opens at 10 AM, and since I don’t start work until noon (the joys of working on Pacific time), I made sure to be there right when it opened to bring home plenty of delicious takeout.  My wife and I got several meals out of this barbecue bounty from Briskets.

You order inside the small shack, where you can see everything ready to be portioned and served.  Briskets serves two kinds of house-made smoked sausages, wrapped in natural casings for that perfect snappiness that causes momentary happiness.  Did I try them both?  Have you ever read this food blog before?  What do YOU think?!?!

Sides are on display: elbow macaroni in the front left with creamy smoked cheddar cheese sauce behind it for mac and cheese, green beans topped with crumbled bacon in the back right, and in front of that, awe-inspiring cornbread casserole.  (More on these soon enough.)

Here we have smoked corn and the best baked beans I’ve ever had in the back (more on dem beans in a bit), and something else next to sweet potato casserole in the front right — possibly loaded mashed potatoes topped with cheese and bacon?  I did not try that one, so apologies. 

These are savory brisket and cheese hand pies, with a nice, flaky crust.  Of course I had to try one!  I don’t have a picture of it cut open, but it was really good, like everything else from Briskets.  They also offer pulled pork hand pies sometimes, but not on the day I visited.  I would have preferred that, because pulled pork was one of the only meats I did not bring home, but the brisket pie was excellent.  (I didn’t detect any cheese inside the pie with the shredded brisket, but it came with an additional ramekin of the smoked cheddar cheese sauce for dippin’, so maybe that’s where the cheese comes in.)

This was the highlight, the glorious beef rib, something my wife and I have both craved for far too long.  Charismatic barbecue boss Chuck Cobb blessed  Central Florida with Git-N-Messy BBQ before passing away in early 2022.  In in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, back in the spring and summer of 2020, when Chuck served his barbecue out of a convenience store in Winter Park, I brought home many flawless beef ribs that each lasted us multiple meals.  They were one of the only highlights of those weeks and months of isolation, fear, and uncertainty.  Finding out Briskets served wonderful beef ribs of their own was my main impetus for visiting it in the first place.  There is so much meat, you won’t believe it if you’ve never had one.  If you’ve had “kinda big” pork spareribs, forget it.  Those don’t even compare.   While this is not the cheapest item on Briskets’ menu, one rib is more than enough for a meal, even for Chris Rock in I’m Gonna Git You, Sucka.  The beef is so tender and juicy with lots of marbling from fat and a nice outer bark made from rubbed spices, and the rib easily pulls off the Brobdingnagian, brontosaurus-sized bone in one piece.  Briskets serves their beef rib with whole smoked jalapeño peppers and a mound of really good bread and butter pickle slices, all atop three slices of white bread that soaked in all those juices and flavors.  We both loved this beef rib, and I loved everything else that came with it.

Beyond that, I selected a Texas three-meat plate, which came in those great plastic containers that are dishwasher-safe and microwave-safe, with a clear lid that snaps on.  I wish more restaurants would use those.

For our meats, I selected brisket (you have to try the namesake meat!), pork spareribs (excellent in their own right, just don’t expect them to equal the beef rib in size), and the smoked sausage.  I mentioned there were two kinds of smoked sausage on the day I went: Texas beef sausage and jalapeño cheddar sausage.  I would have had a hard time choosing, but they were kind enough to let me try both together as one of my meat choices!  Of course, both were excellent, and that snappy bite you get from the natural casing really elevates them above and beyond most other sausages.The brisket also had some nice marbling — not too lean nor too fatty — and was very tender and packed with flavor from smoking it low and slow.  The pork spareribs had a slight sweetness from the sticky glaze to counterbalance their salty smokiness.  Every single one of the meats amazed and astonished, but that’s not all!  The Texas three-meat platter came with two sides, and because this was my first visit, I brought home a couple of others, too.

Here is the macaroni and cheese.  The smoked cheese sauce ladled on right before packing it up in the to-go container really sets it apart.  I think adding something else to it might put it over the top, like diced pimentos or other peppers for some acidity to balance out the smoky richness, or a seasoned bread crumb topping for a bit of crunch with all that silky smoothness.

I loved the creamy potato salad, which had a slight crunch from bits of celery(?) and tanginess from yellow mustard.  Yes, this was a Southern-style potato salad, and it was damn fine.  My constant readers, the stalwart Saboscrivnerinos, may be noticing that I try to sample potato salad and macaroni salad wherever they are available, and this one did not disappoint.

These are Bob’s country beans, and they were the most perfect, most glorious, and most beautiful barbecue baked beans I’ve ever had in my life.  Just from one glance, you can see they aren’t your typical brown baked beans, swimming in a sweet, sticky sauce.  There are multiple varieties of beans at play here, and my wife and I could not identify all the different shapes, colors, and sizes.  I took to Facebook to ask what kinds of beans were included, and someone from Briskets (Bob himself?) told me “it took oh maybe half my life to figure that particular recipe out I’m not too quick to share it if that makes sense.  I’ve had a lot of people make a lot of guesses of what’s in there and none have gotten it yet.”  I get it, and I appreciate that.  Unless you are Penn and Teller, most magicians don’t reveal how their tricks work either, and I am perfectly happy to be caught up in the mystery of it all.   

I chose this sweet potato casserole for my wife specifically, although I ended up eating most of it after she first tried some.  (She doesn’t dig on leftovers quite as much as I do.)  It was your typical Thanksgiving style — very rich and sweet from butter, brown sugar, and pecans, but no marshmallow topping here.

And this was the magnificent cornbread casserole, which was topped with a drizzle of honey.  It was sweet — not savory at all — to the point of it practically being a dessert, and so rich and satisfying.  This was a huge hit with both of us.  

I also had to get some banana pudding for us to share back at home.  It was creamy and cool and refreshing, and I strongly recommend it.  Banana pudding goes so well with barbecue, Nashville hot chicken (it might have saved my tongue at the legendary Hattie B’s in Nashville), and so many other Southern meals.  This one was no exception.

While I have every intention of returning to Briskets BBQ Shack & Grill and becoming a regular, I feel like I definitely tried enough menu items on my first visit to write a comprehensive review.  This is still a new business (and did I mention it’s a small, family-owned business?), and I want word of mouth to echo from computers and phones, resonate from the rooftops, and spread throughout the Orlando area.  We are two weeks out from Christmas, and Briskets is even offering a special Christmas menu for feeding huge parties.  In the cooler months ahead, you may want to trek out to Oviedo and enjoy your food al fresco, at those picnic tables they provide, before the humidity becomes unbearable (in March).  But Floridians love good barbecue year-round — I know I do — and at this moment, I can’t think of any better barbecue around here.  Trust me, you need to discover this place for yourselves before everyone else in town does, because long lines of loyal customers are inevitable.  Why not join me in becoming a loyal customer before the lines get out of hand?  You won’t regret it!

D’Amico & Sons Italian Market & Bakery

After a long wait (which probably felt much longer for the owners than people like me looking forward to the opening), D’Amico & Sons Italian Market & Bakery (https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100093695793933) has officially soft-opened in the Oviedo Mall.  Sometimes I go to the Regal movie theater in that mall, and it desperately needs something else to keep bringing people in.  I am pleased to report that D’amico & Sons should flourish there, if the enthusiastic crowds on the second day of its soft opening continue.   Its hours are 7 AM to 7 PM, Monday through Saturday, and 7 AM to 3 PM on Sunday.

I am thrilled to have another Italian market in town, especially one that is much closer to me than my beloved Stasio’s and Tornatore’s.  It is a much larger space than either, having completely refurbished the old Chamberlin’s health food store, bright and clean and spacious, with plenty of natural light and ample parking.  There is even a covered patio with tables under an Italian flag awning, for those who want to enjoy coffee, gelato, pastries, and sandwiches on the premises.

Like any good Italian market, you can order a variety of coffee drinks.  I am happy to see any locally owned and operated coffee shops to combat the Starbucks stranglehold.

There is a gelato counter too, although it was too crowded today to get a photo of it.  It looked like they might have twelve or 16 different flavors, and I’m sure my wife and I will work our way through them eventually.  Of course I like ice cream (who doesn’t?), but I like gelato even better.  I prefer the texture, the intensity of the flavors (especially fruity flavors), and somehow, it is even healthier (or less unhealthy, if you will).

When I arrived around 12:30 on its second day open, there was a long line just to get up to the bakery counter.  I managed to snap this shot of  beautiful macarons and pastries in a glass case, but there were other cases to behold on each side of it, with cakes to the left and cookies to the right:

Here is another vertical refrigerated case full of gorgeous gelato cakes: chocolate raspberry, triple chocolate, and pistachio.

I ended up bringing home two lobster tail pastries that were so flaky and crispy — the top one filled with rich Bavarian cream, and the bottom one filled with cannoli cream and tiny chocolate chips.  Below that are two zeppoli, fried pastries dusted in powdered sugar.  Those were my wife’s favorites.  

They also sell these Italian wedding cookies and black and white cookies, which I highly recommend.  I have bought this brand of black and white cookies before (Bakery Boys of New York), but I brought home the Italian wedding cookies because she loves those, and she was really happy with them.  I don’t think they sold individual Italian wedding cookies at the cookie counter, but one would not have been enough!

There are plenty of savory foods to choose from too, including golden-brown arancini, rice balls coated in bread crumbs and lightly fried, for a texture that is crispy-crunchy on the outside and soft and yielding inside.  If you’ve ever had a papa rellena from a Cuban cafe or bakery, these are similar, but with rice instead of mashed potatoes inside.  There are original, cheese, and cheesesteak arancini to tempt you.  D’Amico & Sons definitely have a lot of balls.

I brought an original rice ball home for my wife.  The thing is the size of a baseball!

A butcher case of fresh sausages was tempting, but I passed on this first visit.  I’ll definitely be back to try some.

They also offer pizzelles, which are pizza-like flatbreads, sold by the slice (and possibly also whole).  They looked great, but I treated myself to a pizza yesterday and still have leftovers.

You can also get sandwiches made to order, and I took great care to get a legible photo of the hanging menu, since it is not listed on the Facebook page yet.  Right-click this image and open it in a new tab for a larger, more legible photo.   
I was really surprised they don’t offer a traditional Italian sub with salami, ham, and other deli meats, plus the typical provolone cheese, veggies, and a vinaigrette, so I ordered what seemed like the closest approximation: the Italian Cubano, with Boar’s Head prosciutto Riserva, porchetta, Swiss cheese, pepperoncini peppers, tomato, deli mustard, and Boar’s Head Pepperhouse Gourmaise (a really good mayo-based condiment) on a sub roll.  It was ready pretty quickly, despite how slammed they were at the deli counter.

This is the Italian Cubano sandwich, unwrapped back at home.  I would have preferred the pepperoncini peppers to be sliced or chopped rather than whole, but at least they removed the stems.  The bread, prosciutto, and Pepperhouse Gourmaise really made this sandwich, but it was a little light on ingredients, and the bread was not fully sliced all the way across, so the ends didn’t have any of the good stuff on them.  I didn’t get a taste of the porchetta by itself, but at least I saw it in there.  I wonder if they would consider getting a sandwich press for more of a traditional Cubano experience.

I would absolutely try other sandwiches from here, even if they’re not going to dethrone Stasio’s (and my favorite sandwich in the city, the namesake Stasio) anytime soon.

There is a separate counter next to the gelato for ordering fresh-baked bread, and I wisely bought two different loaves to bring home.  The sub roll was great, but this sesame seed-studded semolina loaf was even better — warm and fluffy inside, crackly crust outside, and so wonderful when spread with some of our room-temperature butter back at home.

I also bought a pull-apart olive batard, which didn’t have a crunchy, crackly outer crust, but was also warm and fluffy and full of salty, chewy, pungent black olives, baked in.  I’m not the biggest olive guy in the world, but I like them as olive salad on a muffuletta sandwich, and I liked them in this bread.  My wife really loved this one, and olive her.

Over by the pizzelles, there is a refrigerated case brimming with different Italian cheeses, including ricotta, fresh mozzarella, and even some delicious-looking smoked cheeses.  I abstained this time, but I’m glad to know they have all this variety.

And since I am infamous for documenting my love of sardines with my ‘Dines List reviews, I could not leave without a can for this Cuoco brand Seasoning for Macaroni with Sardines.  I’ve made the Sicilian dish pasta con le sarde before, with fresh fennel, but I look forward to trying this ready-made combination of sardines, oil, fennel, onions, raisins, and salt the next time I cook up some high-quality imported pasta.  Of course I will review it in a future installment of The ‘Dines List!  Good for Kaley Cuoco for choosing to diversify, selling sardine seasoning while still performing the animated voice of Harley Quinn.  Beauty, talent, and business savvy!

While D’Amico & Sons does not have a full-service Italian restaurant next door like Tornatore’s (probably my favorite Italian restaurant in Orlando), and while the sandwiches may not be Stasio’s quality just yet (definitely my favorite sandwiches in Orlando), Central Florida’s newest and most spacious Italian market, bakery, cafe, and deli is already off to a terrific start, and Seminole County residents are lucky to have it.  I know I am.  I strongly encourage all my regular readers to make a pilgrimage out here ASAP and consider getting Christmas and New Year’s Eve goodies for any entertaining you have planned.  Heck, Hanukah celebrators should find a lot to love here too!

Pigzza

Pigzza (https://pigzza.com/) is described as “An Italianish joint” on its website.  The creation of Thomas Ward, the chef-owner of Orlando’s beloved Pig Floyd’s Urban BBQ, Pigzza combines Ward’s love of barbecue with Italian food, specifically pizza and pasta, the same way Pig Floyd’s combines barbecue with Latin and Asian flavors.

I met one of my best foodie friends for dinner there in May, and we shared a lot of food, as we usually do whenever we have out.  We started with a beautiful order of oven-roasted chicken wings that were crispy but very juicy and tender, not greasy at all.   The plating elevated these even further, garnishing the wings with arugula, chewy craisins, and an artistic flourish of green goddess dressing.  Not many restaurants oven-roast their wings, but I always love these as an alternative to fried versions, which are more likely to get dried out.  Glancing at the menu on Pigzza’s website, it looks like these specific wings are not available anymore, but now you have a chance to get Calabrian chili and orange double-cooked wings instead, and that sounds pretty spectacular.

We also shared the Rhode Island-style calamari, crusted with cornmeal and tossed with garlic-herb butter, spicy pickled cherry peppers and banana peppers, and fried capers.  These were terrific too.  So chewy!  Such good breading!  I always appreciate cherry peppers on or in anything.  The calamari came with tangy red sauce and garlic aioli for dipping, and dip them I did, but they were so good that they didn’t even need the condiment.

For a pizza, we chose the CBW, topped with Alabama white barbecue sauce, barbecue chicken, bacon, smoked mozzarella, candied jalapenos, cilantro, and green onions.  Usually I’m a pizza purist who prefers red sauce to “white pies,” but since we got to taste Pigzza’s red sauce with the calamari, I was happy to try something different and unique.  And this isn’t any ordinary white pie, as you can tell.  These are 12″ pizzas, more Neapolitan-style than New York, and ideal for sharing between two people.The crust was very good, but I prefer the crispier crunch of New York- and Sicilian-style pizzas.  With this CBW, it was the combination of toppings that set it over the top.  Everything was fresh, high-quality, and combined so well together.

We also shared the spicy sausage tortiglioni pasta, which I learned is very similar to rigatoni.  The pasta was tossed in a vodka sauce, so it was tomatoey and creamy all at the same time, topped with grated Parmesan cheese and fresh oregano.  The sausage had a nice heat, and my only wish was that there could have been more of it in the dish.  I could have easily eaten it all myself, but I am always happy to share food with friends.

I returned to Pigzza in late July to meet two former co-workers, right after leaving my old job after 15 years.  We started with the Rhode Island calamari again, which was just as good this time (although my photography wasn’t).  My former supervisor went to school in Rhode Island, and this calamari earned her seal of approval too.

This was the pizza she ordered for herself, topped with pepperoni, Pigzza red sauce, smoked mozzarella (the smokiness makes such a huge difference), pecorino romano cheese, oregano, and marjoram.  We didn’t share each other’s pizzas, but she seemed very happy with it.

My other colleague, a vegetarian, got a pizza that I believe is called the Big Mo.  If this is it, then it was topped with roasted mushrooms, pink pickled onions, caramelized onions, and chives, along with vodka sauce and smoked mozzarella.  She was also really happy with her choice.  It wasn’t this blurry in real life, I swear!

And perhaps saving the best for last, this was my pizza, the Meat Me at Floyd’s, named for Pig Floyd’s just up the road.  It was topped with braised beef brisket, grape jelly barbecue sauce, smoked mozzarella and cheddar cheeses, pickled onions, green onions, and cilantro.  I loved this combination, even better than the CBW I shared on my previous visit.  But if I see brisket, pickled onions, and smoked cheese, I am going to be happy no matter what.

I’ve been sitting on this review for a while, half-written, hoping to visit Pigzza for a third time.  Working from home until late these days, it is much harder for me to get to the side of Orlando with all the great restaurants clustered together, plus parking is kind of abominable there unless you arrive super-early.  I will absolutely return, but I figured I should let everyone else know about it sooner rather than later, even though by now, probably — hopefully — everybody does.  It is a fine addition to the Mills 50 District and Orlando’s pizza scene, and Thomas Ward has done it again!

 

Smoke & Dough (Miami)

I try to visit Miami at least once a year.  I always enjoy it a lot more as a visitor than I did growing up down there.  On my last trip down in late July, my BFF (best foodie friend) and I went out to two different restaurants, which were both great.  But I could not wait any longer to rave about Smoke & Dough (https://smokeanddough.com/), which just this week made the New York Times’ 2023 Restaurant List, “the 50 places in the United States that [its reporters, editors, and critics are] most excited about right now.”  It was one of only three Florida restaurants to make the prestigious list, so it is in rarified company.

Smoke & Dough (not to be confused with Smoke & Doughnuts, a new Orlando restaurant I have not yet tried) is located in West Kendall — hardly the “cool, fun, sexy” Miami you are envisioning, but a pretty typical suburban area.  However, it is totally worth the drive from wherever you may be staying (or partying) in South Florida.  It is a barbecue restaurant first and foremost, but like so many things in Miami, it blends Latin and Caribbean flavors together to set it apart.  Owners Harry and Michelle Coleman opened its doors in January 2022, next door to their previous venture, the acclaimed Empanada Harry’s Bakery and Cafe, serving savory empanadas from Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Venezuela, and Peru, as well as gourmet signature empanadas, vegan versions, and sweet ones too.  Unfortunately, Empanada Harry’s was closed when we went to Smoke & Dough for dinner, or we would have tried it as well.

But Smoke & Dough was a marvel, a singular restaurant that amazed and astonished in every way, and not just because I had just driven down from Orlando and was starving.  We started out with ultimate loaded nachos, topped with smoked pulled pork, avocado-cilantro sauce, pickled red onions, pickled jalapenos, tomatoes, cilantro, salty cotija cheese, and nata, a Brazilian dairy product that is similar to sour cream, but is a little sweeter on top of being creamy and rich.  The tortilla chips were freshly fried, and all the ingredients sang in hot harmony, backed up by spicy Latin rhythm.  These were easily some of the best nachos I’ve ever eaten in my life.

Next up we shared some cafecito-rubbed brisket.  We got three huge, thick slices of USDA Prime Angus brisket, smoked for 15 hours and rubbed with spices blended with Cuban espresso (maybe Cafe Pilon or Cafe Bustelo, the Marvel and DC of Cuban coffee).  It was so tender and juicy, with great fat marbling — not too lean or too fatty — and practically melted in my mouth.  The Cuban coffee flavor really came through and blended with the rich, smoky meat.  If you ever have a chance to try this, or anything like this, like a coffee-rubbed steak, I definitely recommend it.  The brisket came with piquant, vinegary chimichurri sauce that it didn’t even need, but it was delicious anyway, as well as more of those pickled red onions and house-made dill pickle slices that were also top-notch.

I ordered a side of platanitos to share, sweet plantains (one of my favorite foods in the world) topped with more cotija cheese and a drizzle of nata.  These were even better than they look.

Smoke & Dough only serves its smoked burgers as specials on Friday, and we were lucky enough to go there on a Friday.  These are half-pound patties made out of smoked brisket, ground in-house and served on beef tallow-toasted potato buns, accompanied by a choice of fries or cole slaw.  We could not refuse!  The only question was which burgers should we get?

Well, there were so many things on the menu we wanted to sample, including pork belly and pastrami.  Luckily for us, one of the burger specials was an al pastor burger, topped with smoked pork belly, smoked pineapple, smoked gouda cheese, pickled red onion, and chipotle mayo.  Those are all things I love on their own, so how could they go wrong combined on top of a smoked burger? 

We cut it in half to share, and it was a truly inspired burger.  The al pastor pork belly was so rich and luxurious, and the sweet, crunchy pickled onions, sweet and smoky pineapple, and tangy chipotle mayo added so much depth of flavor.  Here’s a cross-section:

And here are the fries, which were fine, but better when dipped in the house ancho chile-guava barbecue sauce (which we had to ask for, but you can also buy it by the bottle).

I was thrilled to see a Reuben burger was another option, this one topped with pastrami made from smoked, house-cured brisket, Swiss cheese, thousand island sauce, and sauerkraut.  I asked for slaw with mine, to get two kinds of cabbage on one plate (practically a salad at this point!), and to try as many things as possible.  

This was another winner — a beautiful burger with all those great Reuben ingredients.  Even though corned beef is much more common on a Reuben, I will take pastrami over corned beef pretty much any chance I get when it is an option, and this was top-notch pastrami.  It was sliced thin and had plenty of peppery bark and marbled fat.  The sourness of the sauerkraut helped break up all the salty richness, and the slaw had a nice vinegary crunch to it.

I wasn’t going to bother with dessert after a meal like that, but my buddy ordered smoked flan (something that would never even occur to me to make, much less order), and it was killer.  I usually don’t even care for flan, but this was the best flan I’ve ever eaten, and it did have a light smoky flavor.  I ended up a big flan! 

If Smoke & Dough was in some trendy part of Miami, like Wynwood or (God help us all) South Beach, it would probably have lines out the door all the time.  Instead, on a Friday night in the humble ‘burbs of West Kendall, we only waited 15 minutes for a table.  But the legend is growing, even beyond Miami, thanks to making the New York Times’ 2023 Restaurant List, and here’s your friendly neighborhood Saboscrivner, boosting that signal even further (although let’s face it, probably not that much further).

This was one of the best meals I’ve eaten in 2023, and one of the best meals I’ve ever eaten in Miami.  That’s high praise either way.  Next time you’re hitting the beach or da clubs, take a detour to 4013 SW 152nd Ave (right off Bird Road), a part of Miami you never would have ventured into otherwise.  Consider making a reservation first!  By the time you finally make it down to Smoke & Dough, you might need it.

Primrose Lanes

This may be the most predictable review I have written for The Saboscrivner food blog in a long time, probably because this particular restaurant is the talk of the town right now.  Orlando-based foodie social media has gone gaga (or gone to the dogs, if you will) discussing, debating, and deconstructing the $15 hot dog from Primrose Lanes (https://www.primroselanes.com/), the new restaurant and bar from former Luke’s Kitchen and Bar Executive Chef Jason Campbell.  I will say that if you haven’t heard about this hot dog, then congratulations — you haven’t been spending much time online, and that is laudable.  But if you are familiar with Orlando’s latest obsession, sometimes things that get a lot of hype have earned it and deserve it, and this fabulous, fantastic, first-class, fine freakin’ frankfurter definitely lives up to the hype, hoopla, hubbub, and hysteria.

But Primrose Lanes is not just some hot dog hut.  It used to be the bowling alley Colonial Lanes, founded in 1959.  It was sold and set to become yet another self-storage facility, and the owners even started ripping apart the bowling lanes.  Then the Team Market Group bought the building, refurbished the eight remaining lanes, and worked with Chef Campbell to create a dining and drinking destination far beyond what you would expect from “bowling alley food.”  Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed the pastrami sandwich and house-made potato chips at Brooklyn South Bar at Aloma Bowl, but this is a legit gastropub — a true culinary experience that is far better than anything you’re envisioning.  It may not be the cheapest meal in Orlando (although plenty are way more expensive), but as someone who seeks out bargains and hates feeling ripped off, you will definitely get what you pay for at Primrose Lanes, and you’ll leave the restaurant feeling like you just bowled a perfect game.

On my first visit to Primrose Lanes, I went alone and sat on a high-top stool along a beautiful polished wood countertop.  I believe a lot of the wood in the restaurant was salvaged from the 24 original bowling lanes that had been destroyed.  The restaurant and bar area is a beautiful space, both modern and retro at the same time, with a big glass window overlooking the eight bowling lanes.

I started out with the “Funyun” fried onions, because I review onion rings wherever I find them on menus with a special notice longtime readers know as “RING THE ALARM!”  Of course I’m more about the concept of fried onions than the classic ring shape, so I am not a stickler for literal onion rings every time.  These fried onions were unlike any other fried onions I’ve ever had, with thin stems serving as handles to hoist the thick, rounded bulbs and dip them into creamy comeback sauce.  For a guy who eats a lot of chips and other salty snacks (and reviews them in my recurring Tight Chips features right here on this blog), I almost never eat Funyuns, those vaguely onion-flavored corn snacks, but they made a very interesting coating for these very real onions.  

The O.K.C. smashburger was a magnificent double-decker monster, extremely juicy despite the two patties being smashed flat on the flattop grill (hence the name).  I always liked thicc burgers (R.I.P. Fuddruckers) and bemoaned the smashburger trend, worried that everyone would be serving dried-out, overpriced hockey pucks.  But smashburgers like this one have won me over and give me hope for the future.

This O.K.C. smashburger was dressed with American cheese (still the best burger cheese), mayo, thin slices of delicious house-made pickles, and lots and lots of thin strands of fried onions, which really make a burger for me.  Dating back to the Great Depression, Oklahoma-style burger patties are pressed into super-thin strips or slices of onion, which then cook in the heat and the meat juices.  It was served on a brioche kaiser roll baked by the Olde Hearth Bread Company, which provides baked goods (no baked bads, ever) to many of the best restaurants in the Orlando area.  Even without ketchup, it was a winning burger through and through.

And what about this bougie $15 hot dog?  Well, like I said, it surpasses the hype, and anyone who has tried it will probably agree.  I rarely order hot dogs when I’m out on the town, because you can pay $7 or $8 for a pack of good-quality Sabretts or all-beef Boar’s Head dogs in the natural casing, so why would you pay that for a single hot dog?  But I’m glad I recently treated myself to the brilliant Detroit coney dog at SoDough Square, and I thought I had discovered the best hot dog in Orlando then.  It is great, no doubt about it, but Chef Campbell’s hot dog is a triumphant treasure in every possible way.

It is house-made, and I don’t know who else around here goes to the significant effort of making their own hot dogs.  It has such a fantastic snap, the way the best hot dogs and sausages do, and I had to close my eyes to savor every bite.  In a recent article by Orlando Sentinel food writer (and mah friend) Amy Drew Thompson, Chef Campbell said the hot dogs are made with “Certified Angus. Ribeye, short rib, brisket and chuck in a lamb casing,” and then smoked.  That lamb casing is what gives it the satisfying snap, and if you don’t know what I’m talking about, then you need to treat yourself to a higher standard of hot dogs, my dudes.  The tangy, zingy relish is house-made too, but I don’t know if the buttery grilled bun is from Olde Hearth Bread Company or baked in-house.  The pickle spear next to the burger and the hot dog were delicious too, much to nobody’s surprise.  I have no doubt they were also made in-house by Chef Campbell and his team.

Oh yeah, I had heard you could get it topped with smoked trout caviar for an extra $5, and I said “Yes, let’s do that thing.”  It added an extra level of decadence to the best hot dog ever (to say nothing of additional salt and smokiness), and I have no regrets.  Hey, I’m eating at home more than ever now that I have a remote job, and this was my first trip out of the house in several days, so I felt like living large!  WHAT?

Anyway, when I picked up my wife a little later after enjoying that epic meal, she was really hungry and wanted to go to one of her favorite spots for chicken tenders.  I was raving about the meal I had enjoyed earlier, and I told her Primrose Lanes had chicken tenders too, as well as a Shirley Temple made with house-made grenadine syrup.  I thought for sure she would say “Let’s try it some other time,” but instead she said “That sounds really great, and we’re close, and I’m hungry.  Would you mind going back the same day?”  And I said “Hell yeah, girl,” and back I went, fewer than two hours later!

She loves Shirley Temples, so she ordered that, and I ordered a lemonade that was nice and cold and tart and refreshing, and not too sweet.  She said her Shirley wasn’t as sweet as most, which probably use all kinds of artificially flavored grenadine syrups, possibly bolstered with high fructose corn syrup.  She said it was almost “savory,” but I tried a sip and can tell you it wasn’t necessarily savory, but definitely not cloyingly candy-sweet like most.  It was also garnished with a dark cherry that definitely wasn’t a bright red maraschino, but maybe an amarena or Luxardo cherry.  

She ordered the chicken tendies [sp], which came out darker than either of us expected.  I asked if they were burned, and our lovely, patient server Claire, who took care of me on both back to back visits, said they all look like that.  The tendies (I still can’t get used to that) came with a ranch dip seasoned with dill and “sha’bang sauce” that was thick and spicy — not exactly buffalo or sriracha, but they could have been involved — with tiny bits of sliced orange in it.

We also shared hash brown bites, perfect potato cubes that were crispy on the outside and soft and yielding inside, dressed with garlic crema and topped with more of that smoked trout caviar.  These would be a terrific appetizer to order with any meal, unless you are a vegetarian, and then they could easily hold the trout roe for you.  They reminded me of LEGO blocks, the way they were stacked so nicely.

One of the biggest hits of my wife’s first visit to Primrose Lanes and my second was the tuna tartare (her choice), a refreshing portion of diced raw tuna with avocado, spicy mayo, lightly pickled cucumber slices (so good!), sprinkled with regular and black sesame seeds and accompanied by what had to be fried Saltine crackers.

This dish knocked my wife’s socks off.  Every ingredient, every taste, every texture worked in perfect harmony.  It was my favorite part of my second visit, after all the heavy stuff I ate not that much earlier in the day.  It was so cool and creamy and crispy and piquant, especially since I love spicy tuna rolls and poke bowls so much.  She was in love with the fried Saltines, which had some kind of mysterious seasoning on them too, and I couldn’t believe nobody else had ever done that before.

And because my wife loves soft serve ice cream, she ordered vanilla soft serve for dessert (because they were out of chocolate) and got it topped with fudge sauce.  While I thought the smashburger, the hot dog, and the tuna tartare could not be beat, this was her overall favorite.  She looked pensive after the first bite, engrossed in thought, consumed as she consumed it.  Her eyes rolled back in her head.  She said she had never had soft serve ice cream this good; nothing else had ever come close.  She used the word “orgasmic.”  Ladies and gentlemen, you heard it here first.

I could usually do without soft serve ice cream — it tends to be kind of bland and tasteless for me, and rarely tastes like vanilla so much as some kind of plain whiteness.  But upon her urging, I tried it, and it was as inspired as the rest of the food on this menu, so far above and beyond what most people might expect, so much better than it even needed to be.

This is the exact kind of restaurant I love to review on my blog.  There are countless restaurants where you can get a decent-to-good meal, and if you pay enough money, you’re bound to get something above-average.  But I especially love finding good or great food where you don’t expect it, whether it’s a nondescript food truck or trailer or a restaurant inside a place where you wouldn’t go looking for one, and especially wouldn’t dream of finding a good one.  I’d say an excellent restaurant in a bowling alley counts for that, even though Primrose Lanes is more of a restaurant and bar with eight really cool bowling lanes than a bowling alley with that serves food.

I don’t mind admitting that I’m a pretty rotten bowler.  Because I suck so much, I don’t particularly enjoy bowling, so I don’t do it, and that means I never improve.  But if you ever go out for a trivia night with me, you will see me kick all kinds of ass and be impressed, then maybe a little scared, then annoyed, then bored, and then probably round the corner to impressed all over again.  And if you ever join me for karaoke, you will find that I am not a particularly good singer, but I will do my damn best and cheer like crazy for my friends who are doing their damn best along with me.  Unfortunately, I have yet to find ridiculously elevated food like this at any local trivia or karaoke spots, nor do I have many friends who are ever up for that kind of thing.

The good news about Primrose Lanes is that you don’t have to bowl at all.  Plenty of people go just for the food, and you can too.  But if you like to eat and bowl, then my stalwart Saboscrivnerinos, this needs to be your next night out with the ladies or the fellas, or your next hot date.  Everyone will love it.  But if you’re trying to corral 15 or 20 small kids for a bowling birthday party, I would advise against schlepping the little dudes to Primrose Lanes.  Children are certainly welcome, but I’d say it is more of a place for adults to have fun.  And as a non-kid-haver who ate there twice in one day, adults will likely have more fun there without kids… unless your kids are really cool.

Four Flamingos: A Richard Blais Florida Kitchen

Four Flamingos: A Richard Blais Florida Kitchen (https://fourflamingosorlando.com/) is an upscale restaurant at the very upscale Hyatt Regency Grand Cypress Resort hotel near Walt Disney World in Orlando.  This is not the kind of restaurant The Saboscrivner and his wife usually dine at, as constant readers can attest.  We prefer the hidden gems for affordable everyday meals, not these high-roller, baller, shot-caller spots.  It even has a Michelin recommendation!  But I offered to take Doctor Professor Ma’am, aka Señora Saboscrivner, somewhere nice to celebrate her birthday earlier this year, and as usual, I sent her a bunch of different menus to choose from.

Four Flamingos is usually only open for dinner, but they happened to have a fancy all-you-can-eat brunch on a Sunday in late February, and it sounded really good to both of us.  It was a whopping $92 per person — a huge indulgence for sure, but we live as simply and within our means as possible, so we can indulge like this once in a while with clear consciences.  However, if anyone decides to stop reading right here and now, I couldn’t even blame you.

Richard Blais is a big-time celebrity chef, a Top Chef winner, and he was even there on the day of the brunch, helping Chef de Cuisine Shelby Farrell cook (or at least helping direct things in the kitchen) and greeting some guests who were marking out in his presence.  We got the latest possible brunch reservation (quite late in the afternoon), which was a lucky break due to what a big deal this was, and I knew we were going to have a memorable experience.

When we entered the busy dining room, there was a singer-guitarist who was quite loud, making it difficult to carry on a conversation.  Thankfully, at least he was good.  As I get older, even though I still love going to concerts, I find live music at restaurants tends to be oppressively, unpleasantly loud, to the point of detracting from the overall experience.

The brunch menu featured five small plates from the kitchen, and they were all on display as we walked to our table in a glass-enclosed atrium-like dining room.  However, each guest could only select two, and they all looked so good.  The “Floribbean” influences of Four Flamingos were strong in each of these dishes, featuring flavors that are native to our strange Southern state and its island neighbors in the Caribbean Sea.

The sweet tea short rib was served on a bed of grits, with squash and an orange glaze.  I love short ribs, so I ended up selecting this one.

Even though I’m not typically an eggs benedict fan (or a brunch fan in general), I also selected this mangu benny, a Dominican twist on the iconic brunch dish, with mashed plantains, a poached egg, Portuguese-style linguica sausage as a higher-end version of the classic Dominican salami, and datil pepper hollandaise sauce.

My wife wisely chose the SBLT, with swordfish bacon (holy moley, this was incredible), local lettuce and tomato, and peppercorn aioli on grilled Olde Hearth Bakery sourdough bread.  She loved it, and she was kind enough to give me the tomato and pink pickled onions, as well as a taste of the smoky swordfish bacon.  We both love swordfish as well as any kind of smoked fish.  What a brilliant idea this was!

She also chose the guava and goat cheese tart, with chevre (goat cheese) panna cotta, guava jam, and preserved lemon in a flaky little crust.  I usually like guava a lot more than she does, but she ended up really loving this one too. 

Sadly, neither of us got a chance to try the chicken & the egg, the fifth and final small plate — a Scotch egg made with chicken sausage cradling a soft-boiled egg, served with coconut white barbecue sauce.

Beyond the small plates, there were all kinds of decadently delicious options to choose from, including tiny WiAnno oysters from Cape Cod, venus clams, and house-made cured salmon gravlax, dyed purpley-red with beet juice.

There were also poached, peeled shrimp and cracked stone crab claws, a real delicacy.

Needless to say, I went to town on these paper-thin slices of “Southern Smash” salami, bresaola (air-cured salted beef, kind of like beef prosciutto), and sumptuous duck pastrami.

There were fancy cheeses to choose from, including an olive oil goat cheese in that glass bowl.

I really liked the port wine pate mousse, since my mom introduced me to the wonders of liverwurst when I was a little kid, and I also love Jewish-style chopped liver like crazy.  (This was good, but honestly, good chopped liver is so much better!)

I had to photograph this gorgeous antipasto salad with multicolored cauliflower, grape tomatoes, and Brazilian sweety drop peppers.  It tasted good too, but there were more exciting things to sample.

Pardon the mediocrity of this photo, but this wagyu beef tenderloin with a chimichurri rub was one of the only letdowns, sitting under the hot lights of this carving station.  My wife and I both prefer our steak juicy and rare, and these pre-sliced pieces were all more done than we like, and dryer, too.  But realizing this in advance, I only took a couple of small pieces, so I could say I tried it.

Some of the tastiest things I tried were the sauces.  Every sauce was magnificent, including the California red barbecue sauce, jalapeño chimichurri, and Richard Blais steak sauce.  Each one was better than the last, and they helped add dimension and excitement to the overdone tenderloin. 

And this isn’t a monster from a Final Fantasy game at this carving station, but rather a whole marinated and fried black grouper.  Grouper is one of our favorite fish, and it is so hard to find on menus in and around Orlando.  Usually we have to schlep out to Florida’s western Gulf Coast for buttery, flaky grouper around St. Petersburg and Clearwater, but this guy was pretty great.  Unlike the cauliflower salad, this tasted a lot better than it looked. 

Anyway, here is my actual sweet tea short rib, which was cooked to tender perfection, soft enough to cut or shred with the side of a fork.  For a lifelong Florida Man, I admit that I have never been into grits and probably never will get into them, but these were far better grits than anything else I’ve ever had.

The mangu benny was perfectly fine.  I loved the linguica sausage, the perfectly poached egg (a reminder of why I never poach eggs at home), and the datil pepper hollandaise sauce, but the mangu mash was a little bland.  Maduros (sweet fried ripe plantains) are one of my favorite things to eat in the entire world, but mangu is one plantain dish I will probably continue to pass on.

And this was the gorgeous SBLT up close, with the swordfish bacon on full display.  It was a hit.

Unfortunately, my wife wasn’t feeling fantastic on the day in question, and she was feeling worse and worse throughout the meal (through no fault of the restaurant or the food).  After all that anticipation, we left much earlier than we would have liked, and definitely did not get to eat as much or for as long as we hoped.  I feel like I performed valiantly, doing what I could to “beat the house,” as I do in any buffet setting, but could have fought harder and gone on longer.

In the end, we paid a hell of a lot of money for some fancy foods that I love — cured meats, oysters, smoked and cured fish, cheese, grouper, interesting sauces — but I don’t think we would return to Four Flamingos for another one of these brunches.  Not for that price, at least.  My wife agreed.  I’m glad we did it, and my only regret was that I didn’t put away more.  But there are better values to be had, even if you’re looking for luxury, seeking swankiness, or on an odyssey for opulence.  I remember the Sunday jazz brunch at the Boheme restaurant at the Grand Bohemian Hotel had a lot of similar things back in the day, but was cheaper and closer to home for us.  I wonder if they’re still doing that.  I wonder if I can “beat the house” there like I used to.  Stay tuned, stalwart Saboscrivnerinos.

But Four Flamingos recently had another one of these all-you-can-eat brunches for Mother’s Day, and I’m sure they will do more in the future, so be on the lookout.  Did anyone attend either this one from late February or the Mother’s Day one?  What did you think?  What were the high points for you, and were there any low points at all?  For those who have eaten dinner there, how would that compare to a brunch like this?  Let us know!