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bobberqer
Member
USA
11268 Posts |
 Posted - 12/20/2011 : 06:37:22
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www.washingtonpost.com%2Flifestyle%2Ftravel%2Fpostcard-from-tom-st-louis-restaurant-recommendations%2F2011%2F12%2F09%2FgIQAaM2fyO_mobile.mobile&cid=585&spf=1" target="_blank">http://mobile.washingtonpost.com/rss.jsp?rssid=3766893&item=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Flifestyle%2Ftravel%2Fpostcard-from-tom-st-louis-restaurant-recommendations%2F2011%2F12%2F09%2FgIQAaM2fyO_mobile.mobile&cid=585&spf=1
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Marty Bradford, left, and Charles Jacks enjoy pulled pork sandwiches at Bogart's Smokehouse in St. Louis. (Johnny Andrews/For The Washington Post)
Tom Sietsema
Friday, Dec 16, 2011
If you want to know why St. Louis tastes so good right now, reserve a table at Niche restaurant. The maple custard layered with smoky shiitake mushrooms that launches chef Gerard Craft’s $65 tasting menu is one of many dishes that would look at home in San Francisco or New York but happens to be served in historic Benton Park.
Every local food observer I talked to singled out Craft, a Washington native who came to St. Louis from Salt Lake City in 2005, for raising the bar for his colleagues and the expectations of their audiences. Craft “proved to the other young chefs that they could take significant chances and succeed,” says Joe Bonwich, restaurant critic for the St. Louis Dispatch. “And the scope has expanded to, among other things, some nationally recognized barbecue places.”
This fall, I had the chance to visit St. Louis for three days. I drank more than I should have at Sanctuaria, the moody tapas bar best known for its handcrafted libations, and got to know why locals make such a fuss over their food traditions at Gus’s Pretzels and World’s Fair Doughnuts. But I spent most of my time checking out the city’s fresh crop of restaurants, these three the most enticing:
* * *
The most cherished piece of cooking equipment owned by the top dog at Bogart’s Smokehouse dominates a fenced-in yard outside the 43-seat dining room. That’s where Skip Steele, the first-place winner of the 2000 Memphis in May World Barbecue Championship, tends to a smoker that runs on apple wood and can handle up to 156 slabs of ribs at a time.
The most dramatic cooking tool here is a 50,000 BTU Red Dragon blowtorch. Roofers use the instrument to melt tar. Steele finds the flamethrower handy after he applies apricot glaze to his baby back ribs: The blast infuses the meat with color and gives it a welcome stickiness. (Kids, don’t try this at home. “We open the door, or the fire alarm goes on,” says Steele.)
Opened in February, Bogart’s follows two failed barbecue joints at the same location in the St. Louis neighborhood known as Soulard. Everything about the building’s latest occupant suggests that it’s in for a long run. Steele, the pit master, comes to Bogart’s from the beloved Pappy’s, which many locals view as the city’s finest barbecue. Mike Emerson, the owner of Pappy’s, encouraged his friend to go out on his own. “It’s a little more family” than rivalry, says Steele. For sure. Emerson lives on the floor above Bogart’s.
Bogart’s encourages customers to venture beyond the usual barbecue subjects. Sharing the menu with the ribs and brisket are turkey that smacks of having trotted through a bonfire; excellent prime rib with soft sweet onions; a zesty house-made breakfast sausage resembling scrapple; and pastrami made from top butt sirloin, generously piled as if by a New York deli. Leftovers, if there are any, are never reheated.
The only meat that needed a splash of sauce was pulled pork. To the rescue: some “voodoo” sauce. The house-made blend of habanero, steak sauce, Worcestershire and cola revives the dry meat and rouses the taste buds.
Be it a sandwich or a plate, every order comes with a choice of two sides. Cole slaw is creamy, sweet and so crisp you can hear yourself eating it. Potato chips are from the local Billy Goat Chip Co. Try to stop at one bag. Applesauce is out of a can, but Bogart’s doctors the chunky fruit with cinnamon and sugar. It would be a shame to miss any of the accompaniments, but if there’s a first among equals, it would be the baked beans, which are cooked in the pit beneath brisket for a night and take on enormous flavor from the meat drippings.
Steele thinks of barbecue as “lunch-driven cuisine.” He closes at 4 p.m., and he doesn’t serve booze, partly to keep diners from lingering.
Diners can anticipate a wait at prime time but also free samples, sometimes smoked chicken wings, “any time the line backs up,” the pit master promises.
All Steele will say about the dry rub he uses is that it contains 23 ingredients. “Whatever you pick,” he tells customers who try to guess, “I’ll say yes to.”
1627 S. Ninth St. 314-621-3107. www.bogartssmokehouse.com. Sandwiches $6.38 to $10.99, plates with two sides $9.99 to $14.99
whoddathunk???
FBA Member
Cant you'll talk faster, or at the least, hear faster?
100% North of the Mason Dixon Line |
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gma
Member
742 Posts |
Posted - 12/20/2011 : 17:11:31
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Nice!
Weber Ranch mod w/10"stainless ring. Double capacity
3 weber one touch
1 weber performer
(3)22.5" Weber Smokey Mountain's
(2)Stumps GF 223's
Weber Gasser
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SWATPigBBQ
Member
USA
288 Posts |
Posted - 12/20/2011 : 20:50:11
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Can't wait to go there!
Jeremy from Missouri the REAL home of BBQ!
CBJ-KCBS.
SWAT Pig BBQ Team!
American Barbecue Systems "Judge" Pit
"The true test of BBQ is not the amount of people who love your BBQ because it is free but it is the ones who have to pay for it and still enjoy it."
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BILLYBONESBBQ
Moderator
USA
1707 Posts |
Posted - 12/21/2011 : 05:57:09
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THE BOYS HAVE A WINNNG FORMAT .. SEATING THAT FITS THE AUDIANCE. NOTHING SAYS SUCCESS LIKE A LINE AT THE FRONT DOOR. PRICES THAT SAY GOOD VALUE FOR PORTIONS RECEIVED AND PERSONALITY TO SPARE FOR "OUR CUSTOMERS" . I KNOW THEY WILL DO WELL WITH THIS FORMAT .. CONGRATS GUYS AND THANKS BOBBER FOR READING THE ST LOUIS NEWSPAPER.. GOOD NEWS, FOR US ALL ..
locate billy in Red Keg, michigan - half way between Paradise and Hell |
Edited by - BILLYBONESBBQ on 12/21/2011 05:57:59 |
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bobberqer
Member
USA
11268 Posts |
Posted - 12/22/2011 : 09:07:07
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quote:
Originally posted by BILLYBONESBBQ
THANKS BOBBER FOR READING THE ST LOUIS NEWSPAPER.. GOOD NEWS, FOR US ALL ..
locate billy in Red Keg, michigan - half way between Paradise and Hell
I tried finding a Ked Keg Gazette to read, but apparently......
whoddathunk???
FBA Member
Cant you'll talk faster, or at the least, hear faster?
100% North of the Mason Dixon Line |
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BILLYBONESBBQ
Moderator
USA
1707 Posts |
Posted - 12/22/2011 : 12:58:38
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FIRST YOU HAVE TO HAVE FOLKS WHO CAN READ .. RED KEG GAZETTE HMNNNNN!!!PROBABLY ANOTHER REASON I'VE NOT DONE A BOOK HOHOHOHHO.
locate billy in Red Keg, michigan - half way between Paradise and Hell |
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pushfrog98
Member
USA
66 Posts |
Posted - 01/10/2012 : 12:50:42
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| I'll have to add this to my places to eat! I'll be headed to St. Louis in the next few weeks. Looking forward to it! |
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Cactus1
Member
USA
1630 Posts |
Posted - 01/12/2012 : 07:35:36
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I'll be going to Bogart's on my next trip to St. Louis.
Got to spend some time with Skip, at Pappy's, when I was there in November and was supposed to go to Bogart's the next day but it didn't work out. I've always been impressed with his work ethic and his pursuit of barbecue perfection. I'll always be a Pappy's fan when in St. Louis but can't wait to try Bogart's!
* IHP Cactus Farm & Sauce Shack *
" A Balanced Diet Is A Rib Bone In One Hand
And ... Uh ... Oh Yeah ... Maybe A Chicken Wing In The Other!"
Member - IBS, Nelsen's Hall Bitter's Club, & West Side Rooters Social Club
Whatever You Do - Wherever You Go - Have A Great One! |
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bobberqer
Member
USA
11268 Posts |
Posted - 01/13/2012 : 05:47:21
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quote:
Originally posted by pushfrog98
I'll have to add this to my places to eat! I'll be headed to St. Louis in the next few weeks. Looking forward to it!
Make sure you introduce yourself to Mike..He's usually sitting up near the front door
whoddathunk???
FBA Member
Cant you'll talk faster, or at the least, hear faster?
100% North of the Mason Dixon Line |
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SWATPigBBQ
Member
USA
288 Posts |
Posted - 01/13/2012 : 08:36:00
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I was "allowed" to go to Pappy's for my birthday. I was "allowed" to order the Big Ben and it fed my wife and I and our two little girls. I loved everything about that place and only had to wait in line for about an hour. The only one thing I didn't care for a whole lot was the pulled pork. It was terribly dry but everything else I enjoyed a lot. Now I am trying to find any kind of holiday to convince her to go back.
Jeremy from Missouri the REAL home of BBQ!
CBJ-KCBS.
SWAT Pig BBQ Team!
American Barbecue Systems "Judge" Pit
"The true test of BBQ is not the amount of people who love your BBQ because it is free but it is the ones who have to pay for it and still enjoy it."
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chef skip steele
Member
USA
128 Posts |
Posted - 01/22/2012 : 07:37:01
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Thanks for the kind words
st louis
ole hickory pits
collector of big green throphies |
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Bogarts, St Louis
