Best Place to Scrounge Free Lunch 2003 | Best Cellars | Best of Dallas® 2020 | Best Restaurants, Bars, Clubs, Music and Stores in Dallas | Dallas Observer
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Best Place to Scrounge Free Lunch

Best Cellars

It's a frugal place already (see above). On Saturday afternoons, however, it becomes a freeloader's heaven, as top Dallas chefs drop by to offer sample plates paired with a good wine. That's right. For the cost of a little gas and a bit of shoe leather--well, not leather, perhaps, but whatever Target makes their shoes from, you damn cheapskate--you can try out crab cakes or risotto or whatever while sipping a red or white from the Best Cellars collection. The likes of Gilbert Garza from Suze and Bartolino Cocuzza of Amici prepare dishes for the Saturday fete. Best of all, the chefs hang around to answer questions, which makes it easier to say, "I didn't notice the hint of basil, let me try another free sample, chop chop." Yes, the wine comes in little plastic sample cups, but we assume they're clean. Besides, it's all free, so quit your bitching.

Best Foie Gras

Citizen

Citizen's neo-Asian fusion menu stapled to a traditional sushi bar has eked out a foie gras recipe that is virtually peerless. It's seared and draped on a brioche seasoned with a little cinnamon and sugar and placed on a square plate with dots of dark berry sauce in each corner. It's an ample bit of flesh, mottled with blotches of yellow, beige and gray. But the richness spreads with such smooth elegance across the tongue, you'll forget your mouth is lounging on a swollen waterfowl organ.

Best Chef Comeback

Matthew Antonovich, Sipango

He was a founding partner of Sipango, which in the mid-1990s was perhaps the hottest restaurant in Dallas. But after cashing out some five years ago, Matthew Antonovich trekked a bumpy road, sustaining a bruising at III Forks, a bounce on Chuck Norris' defunct Lone Wolf Cigar Bar, a fizzled restaurant project with former Mansion maître d' Wayne Broadwell and the fast and furious crash of his own restaurant, Antonovich's Tuscan Steak House. But just as he was about to hit the most bizarre pothole in this trek--selling residential real estate in Kentucky--he landed back in Dallas on a lark and did a guest-chef stint that led to Sipango redux. Now, after striking a deal with his former Sipango partner Ron Corcoran, Antonovich is taking another taste of his former glory, albeit as a leaner, wiser, cooking machine. And God knows he needs a good meal after that long strange trip. So do we.

Best Catfish

Hattie's American Bistro

Catfish can often be dull, spongy and soggy, even when fried. It takes a special set of fingers and a deft mind to breathe life into these supple fillets. Hattie's chef Lisa Kelley does it. Her pecan-crusted catfish resonates with such rich buzz that you'll find it bathes your mind as well as your buds. A long fillet, tapered on one end, shimmers in a scaly gold coat glossed with lemon-butter sauce, ebony patches breaking through where heat held more sway. It's crisp, nutty and draped over a mashed-potato cushion snarled with bits of scallion melded into reverential communion with lemon-butter sauce. The butter is full-throttle stuff--rich and salty--and the citrus is dribbled to perfect pitch.

Best Japanese Restaurant That Doesn't Have a Sushi Bar

Waka

Waka chef-owner Seiji Wakabayashi defines his craft as nouvelle Japanese. And the nouvelle part is like a projector or viewer for peering at Japanese cuisine from a different vantage point. The examples are subtle--creamy carrot soup, rich nutty foie gras perched on yams, mixed seaweed salad fluffed with baby greens and little surprises like a thing called an eel carpet ride (the kind that won't skin your knees). Though there is no sushi bar, you can watch them carve it from the stools perched near the open kitchen.

Best Popeye Growth Hormone

Royal Tokyo Sushi Den's chilled horensoo oshitashi

This spinach never saw the inside of a can. A square dish is layered in the center with steamed spinach leaves, and soy sauce is channeled between the stack and the edge of the dish. The leaves are dusted with shredded bonito, blond thin curls of dried skipjack tuna. The bitter, leafy earthiness--silky in texture--is deftly foiled by the concentrated sea wash, delivered in whispered bursts shrouded in a delicate crunch. This stuff can do more than just swell biceps.

Best Calamari

Cru Wine Bar

Fried calamari is as ubiquitous as Monday-morning yawns, but it's the subtle details that make it shine. Crú's scraps of squid are light and airy and virtually greaseless. And the spicy sweet-and-sour sauce kicks your senses back into alignment, should your wine-tasting flights knock you off course.

Best Turkey Burger

Janine's

Turkeys were never meant to trod where cattle hoofs tromp. And that fleshy wattle growing from its throat ain't no set of horns. That's why turkey burgers don't have steer power: They often lack juice and richness, and they crumble like parched bran muffins under stress. Here the burgers are juicy and rich, and they stick together like their beefy counterparts. Pesto topping and a whole-wheat muffin don't hurt any, either. It's enough to make one utter an aria of rapid gobbles.

Best Sushi

Blue Fish

We hear that one of our staff has had a bad waitstaff experience here. Not saying that isn't possible, just saying that we've never experienced anything except top-notch attention and care from the folks at Blue Fish. The sushi here is fresh and huge--it's often hard to put it all in your mouth. (Stop it.) The specials are rich and original (the crab bake over California rolls is not for the weak of stomach). If you're a Blue Fish virgin, you'll need to know these two alcohol facts: They have an outstanding cold sake selection, and Wednesdays offer $1 Blue martinis. Chop chop.

Best Fancy Restaurant Where You Can Take the Kids

Cafe on the Green

Our 3-year-old was greeted enthusiastically at Café on the Green, and the staff really meant it. They immediately brought out a basket of colorful building toys and an Etch A Sketch, more than enough amusement to sustain the tyke through four courses of nearly flawless Asian-accented cuisine. Café on the Green has a surprisingly good children's menu with fare that's healthier than the usual, including a grilled chicken breast served with spaghetti noodles and marinara sauce. Café on the Green also has another attractive option, available for children 6 months and older--the Kids Club baby-sitting service at the hotel, which costs $5 an hour per child for up to two hours. The service is offered to Café on the Green guests with confirmed reservations every evening except Sunday.

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