Lunch With An Old Friend At Bar Cento

I recently received a Facebook message from a longtime acquaintance of mine whom I have known since 1996. I discovered that since we had parted paths professionally toward the end of the 1990's, he had subsequently moved to Chicago to pursue medical school. Seeing that he and I haven't physically spoken in such a long time, coupled with the fact that he was going to be in town over the weekend, he asked if we could get together for lunch. Knowing that Chicago has some really great restaurants, I wanted to take Mike someplace uniquely Cleveland. My first inclination was to take him to someplace like Wonton Gourmet, Ha Ahn, or Superior Pho, but I knew that you could get killer Asian food in Chicago, too. As I started looking at some of the other powerhouse restaurants Cleveland offers, many of them were closed for lunch on Saturday. Fortunately, I discovered that Bar Cento opens up at noon on Saturday to encourage the folks visiting the West Side Market to stop in and grab a bite.

Bar Cento was located at 1948 West 25th Street, Cleveland, OH 44113 and can be reached at 216-274-1010. Parking was pretty much wherever you could find it. I actually parked on the street over by St. Ignatius on West 28th and walked the two blocks over the restaurant. There was a paid lot I could've used, but it was a nice Spring day and I definitely didn't mind the walk. Bar Cento was interesting because it shares a space with McNulty's Bier Markt located physically next door and you can order food from Bar Cento and drinks from the Bier Markt regardless of which part of the building you reside.

Here was a shot of Bar Cento's front window:


While we could've sat outside on the tiny patio, the warmth of the day and the slightly windy conditions made for an easy decision to dine in the actual restaurant itself. I also had decided to snap a photograph of the posted menu out in the sunshine so I would get a better exposure:


What I've always liked about Bar Cento's menu was that it wasn't too much. Sometimes I will walk into a restaurant and the tome that is dropped off at my table is page after page after page of menu items, all of which are vying for space in my brain while I try and decide what to have. Bar Cento's menu consisted of a few choices in various categories and it all nicely fit together on one page. The other plus to Bar Cento's menu was that they try and source as much of their produce, meats, and other items served in the restaurant from local farmers.

As Mike and I were looking over the menu, I asked him how hungry he was. It turned out that both he and I were only moderately hungry. My friend Diane, upon learning that I would be having lunch with Mike at Bar Cento, had emphatically suggested the duck confit pizza. She had recently had it and pronounced it to be utterly fabulous. I figured that Mike and I could split it, gauge how hungry we still were and order something additional if we felt it was necessary. Mike was at first a little leery of a duck confit pizza, but admitted that he was willing to give it a try.

After what seemed to be only minutes (Mike and I really did lose track of time catching up), this arrived at our table:


Cut into six pieces, the thin and crispy pizza bread had been topped with shredded duck confit, blobs of melted goat cheese, thin slices of rhubarb, chopped chives, and drizzled with just a bit of extra virgin olive oil. Here was a shot of my piece:


Upon my very first bite I realized that Diane had not steered me wrong. This was a killer slice of pizza. I was a little worried that the sourness from the rhubarb would be too overpowering, but it was perfectly balanced. The savoriness from the duck combined with the tanginess from the goat cheese combined with the sourness from the rhubarb came together in my mouth in an explosion of flavors. One bite and Mike was hooked as well. The crust was also perfect, slightly chewy but nice and crispy on the bottom, as I have come to expect from this restaurant's stone pizza oven. To be honest, in my mind, Bar Cento and Lolita have the best two Neopolitan style pizzas in the city of Cleveland. It really has been too long since I have returned for a meal at Bar Cento, and today's pizza was a positive reminder that I need to schedule visits more often.

Having finished our pizza, Mike and I were still a bit hungry, so I suggested that we split an order of the Pommes Frites, or Belgian French Fries. As soon as I smelled the rosemary and garlic, I knew our order had arrived:


This paper cone of deliciousness held a cornucopia of expertly fried and dressed French fries. Imbued with the flavors of rosemary and garlic, the perfect amount of salt had been used to season the fries. They were certainly good on their own, but four dipping sauces came with the fries, too:


The top sauce, unmistakably, was ketchup. The other three were variations on mayonnaise. One was a chili-infused mayonnaise, one was a Dijon mustard-infused mayonnaise and the third was a more traditional garlic mayonnaise (aka aioli). All four were good, but like I said, the pommes frites were good enough on their own that we didn't venture into the sauces all that often.

Having now fully sated our appetites, I asked for the check. The total for both of us, including an iced tea that Mike had ordered, with tax, came to slightly under $25. For food executed at this level, I think that this was a solid value and I was only too happy to pick up the check. Honestly, I had wondered what would happen to the food after Chef Jonathon Sawyer left Bar Cento to open the Greenhouse Tavern, but clearly Chef Mike Nowak knows exactly what he is doing and I am here to tell you, it was delicious. Personally, I know that I plan on returning much sooner rather than later.

A Second Visit To Light Bistro

For our second evening out in Cleveland, I decided to take my friend Chris to another favorite of mine, Light Bistro. I have written once before about Light Bistro and thought that after the upscale-ness of Lola Bistro, Light would be that nice blend of excellent food, more laid back service, and certainly a more approachable price point. I have had a handful of meals at Light and have always walked away a happy diner.

We were fortunate to get a parking spot on the street just down from the restaurant and walked in through the front door promptly at 6:30 PM. We were warmly greeted and shown to our table by the large front window, fortuitous for me since my camera phone doesn't have a flash on it (nor did I want to use the flash even if it had it). We were handed menus (which appear in my previous post on Light) and soon thereafter, a small bag of fresh hot bread and butter arrived at our table:


Inside was a mixture of regular French style bread and a Parmesan cheese crusted bread. Here was a shot of my bread slathered liberally with some of the nicely softened butter:


The bread was wonderfully fresh and warm and the butter almost instantly melted into the tight crumb. The crust had a nice chew to it and the bread had a slight tang to it, indicative that a starter had been used.

One of the aspects of dining at Light that I really appreciate is the division of the menu into smaller tapas style plates as well as larger entrées. Depending on who you are dining with and the table's preferences, you could make up your entire meal on small plates alone or a mixture of small and large plates. Tonight Chris and I decided to share two of the tapas plates and then we each got our own entrée.

First up was a platter of bacon-wrapped dates:


These porky nuggets had been stuffed with almonds and Valderon cheese. Valderon cheese is actually a blue-veined cheese and thus, had quite a strong flavor. While these were delicious, the problem was that between the bacon and the blue cheese, the sweetness and flavor of the dates were almost entirely lost. The almonds lent nearly no flavor and in fact, if it weren't for the occasional crunch of the nut, I might have thought that they were left out entirely.

Our second tapas was from the more modern section of the menu, the creamy polenta with braised oxtail:


The polenta was definitely creamy and the braised oxtails were completely tender. Topped with a little bit of Ricotta Salata (salted Ricotta), to me this was a nice blending of flavors. Texturally it probably could've used some contrast as everything was a tad on the soft side. Chris felt that the polenta added nothing to the dish and could've easily been left off. I disagree in that the polenta added just a touch of sweetness to balance the savoriness of both the beef and the cheese.

For my main course, I decided to stray from the entrée section and ordered the Kobe beef burger with pommes frites instead:


I normally don't go all agog when I see a Kobe beef burger on a menu (which seems to be all the trend nowadays), but when I saw that it was topped with a mushroom duxelle, truffled creme fraiche, arugula, and Fontina cheese, that just sounded too good to pass up. I ordered my burger medium; here was a shot of the interior of my bisected burger:


This was a bit closer to medium rare than medium, but I was happy to eat it anyway. The bun had been nicely grilled and stood up well to the onslaught of juice that came from this patty. The burger was seasoned properly and tasted "beefy." I could taste the Fontina and the earthiness from the truffled creme fraiche, but the arugula didn't do a whole lot for me. As for the mushroom duxelle, I wasn't exactly sure where it existed on the burger. Looking at my photograph, it appears that it may be between the arugula and the slice of cheese, but I certainly didn't get any mushroom flavor when I took a bite. Which was sad because I love the flavor of duxelle. At $16 for this burger, I don't think what I received was worth the price. Next time, if I'm in the mood for a burger, I'll stick with the "regular" beef burger at only $12.

The pommes frites that came with the burger were quite good though. The potato sticks were crispy on the outside and just a little bit creamy on the inside. I think my preference would be for a thicker cut of potato, but these were just fine and served as a nice foil to the burger. By this point Chris had finished his entrée and had begun stealing fries from my plate. He wasn't sure why I hadn't sent my burger back to be cooked to the correct temperature, but honestly, it didn't bother me that much. In the worst case, they would refire the burger and fries and I'd be sitting there for ten more minutes watching him eat.

Overall I think that I enjoyed my experience at Light Bistro tonight more than Chris did. The food was better than average, but not outstanding. I didn't bother to ask if Chef Matt Mattlage was running the pass tonight, but honestly it shouldn't matter. I still think that Light Bistro is a great place to eat, even if they had a somewhat off night tonight. Considering that an off night at Light Bistro is comparable to a great night at some other restaurants at which I've eaten, I'm not too concerned. I would suggest that if you happen to be in the Ohio City area just west of downtown Cleveland that you give this eatery a try; I think you'll be happy with the entire experience.