Slice of Pie
By Andrew Zimmern
When the Guthrie's new restaurant re-opens (the eatery formerly known as Cue) under new management (Tim Mckee and Josh Thoma), it will have a new point of view and a new chef. The modern seafood restaurant's kitchen will be helmed by Erik Andersen, formerly of Porter & Frye.
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Anyone looking for a fun activity on Tuesday night should hop on over to Azia for the second incarnation of Bill Summerville’s Junior Gourmet Club dinner. There are still seats available. Bring the kids for this amazing family-friendly food event. The cost is $35 bucks a head, and you can call Azia for details, 612-813-1200.
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I was on the road last week on the West Coast. Ate some great food, and talked with some smart people who all feel energized by the economic downturn. How so? Well, these chefs seem to have navigated the waters away from fine dining in the first place and have a lock on casual fare within their respective categories. Phoenix’s Chris Bianco (Pizza Bianco) has a new bakery/sandwich joint that is killing in the Valley of the Sun, and his flagship operation is going great guns.
I pulled into the parking lot of his VPN (Vera Pizzeria Napoletana) pizza joint and was informed that the wait was three to four hours. Now, this is a pizzeria that is only open five hours a night, five days a week. Yowza! The homemade sausage pizza, roasted onion and Reggiano Parm pizza, and crushed tomato-oregano-garlic pie were all superb, and the price point is what keeps the people coming without a second thought. The quality is what makes 'em wait and wait and wait without breaking a sweat. Everyone needs to check out PB, one of the truly great VPN pizza places in the country. Bianco is a true master with more passion for what he does than anyone I have met in a long time.
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Up in Seattle, I checked out Tom Douglas’s Serious Pie. Not a VPN pizzeria, so Tom is not yoked to anything other than his own standards, which are pretty darn high. Serious Pie is impressive. Gossamer light calamari salad, superb ribbolitta, rustic duck liver pate, and locally raised field greens in a sherry wine vinaigrette. The wood-fired pies come out irregularly shaped and topped with superb ingredients. I ate a house-cured guanciale pie with baby arugula and two eggs, which are cracked and roasted as the pizza bakes. Killer stuff. And the pizzas bake at at 600 degrees versus Bianco’s 800-plus oven, so the crust and the ingredients have a chance to spend a little more time in contact with the heat, a nice change of pace from my usual VPN addiction.
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Back closer to home, Chef Steven Trojahn is no longer at Cosmos at the Graves 601 Hotel. Half my pals say he left and is looking for a new gig (Cue perhaps?), the rest say he was shown the door. Sign of the times perhaps? Well, one well-placed friend of mine pointed out that The Graves still hasn't replaced the front office manager let go in early February, and it has dropped the rates on the web almost 40 percent. Don’t let that shock you, however; this is an industry-wide fact of life.
So who is not discounting rates and reorganizing kitchen staffs? Pizzerias and sandwich shops, that’s who. BTW, a few weeks ago, I asked a question about local diners in relation to Paradise Pup in Chicago. I wondered if locals here would wait on line for a half-hour in the snow for a burger or dog like they do at PP. So I’ll try again: Would you wait four hours in Minnesota for any food experience at all? I think we wouldn’t. But at Bianco’s, they have been dealing with three- to four-hour waits five days a week for fourteen years. Interesting.
© 2008 MSP Communications, Inc. All rights reserved
Chef Trojahn is not the choice for Cue–that’s another cat.
Posted by: anonnie on March 23, 2009 at 1:22 PM
I waited 3 hours for a table @ Pizzeria Bianco last spring. Sat @ the bar and polished off a bottle of Nebbiolo and several chapters of The Omnivore's Dilemma while waiting, and was eventually seated right @ the kitchen counter. The food was fantastic, but it was worth the wait just to sit there and watch Chris Bianco work his magic.
I can't think of a meal in The Cities that I would wait that long for...other than something I smoke on my grill. Or naked sushi if the right people are involved.
Posted by: geoff on March 23, 2009 at 3:45 PM
I'd wait three or four hours for naked sushi with geoff. Well, not naked sushi on geoff. Actually, if they put sushi on a naked geoff, it'd probably be a good value, as he could hold a lot of sushi. So maybe I would go for that.
I can't think of anything here that I'd wait that long for.
Posted by: Jason DeRusha on March 23, 2009 at 4:03 PM
I wouldn't wait in line for naked sushi on myself...I have that all the time.
Posted by: geoff on March 23, 2009 at 4:23 PM
hey...that's not a geoduck!
Posted by: geoff on March 23, 2009 at 4:24 PM
I've spent an hour or so waiting for a table, if there was bar seating to wait in. If waiting means "put name on list and come back in three hours" I'd wait that long, but I wouldn't just stand around that long.
On the other hand, I'm not sure if that's really a particularly good way to gauge the quality of a restaurant and/or a restaurant culture. After all, people wait for hours to eat at Cheesecake Factory.
Posted by: Elsa on March 23, 2009 at 6:09 PM
The Cue chef is surprisingly unsurprising. It's not the obvious choice, but one that makes sense.
Posted by: Geri Wolf on March 24, 2009 at 7:22 AM
You may want to fact check that Vera Pizzeria Napoletana certification. Pizzeria Bianco is not certified.
Posted by: RobertR on March 24, 2009 at 8:25 AM
I'm going to Pok Pok in Portland in 2 weeks. I'm prepared to wait for 2 hours if that's what it takes.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=siXc_Mfj9FI
Posted by: geoff on March 24, 2009 at 10:08 AM
You don't have to wait 3 hours here because so few people support the real independent places. Not to knock PB, but great pizza is a much easier draw than a menu changing, seasonal, familiar ingredients with a twist, do everything joint. It's like comparing apples & oranges. If I had my choice, I want the best from both worlds.
I was just touting the Modern Cafe to Dara and I will repeat it here. You'd be hard pressed to find as creative an outlet where innovative, yet affordable, food is put out every single day. I'd put it up against the best in Portland, San Francisco, Chicago & even New York - at their price point, obviously. Go check out their new website & click on the link to the Food Network spot. Both owner Jim & chef Philip are deserving of a 2-hr wait.
Posted by: Jphan on March 24, 2009 at 10:36 AM
Depends. I waited an hour standing at the bar at the Red Stag shortly after it opened. Worth it.
There are a few items around town that sometimes I MUST have (chick pea fries at Vincent, pork bun at moto-i, chawan mushi at Midori's...) but I don't think I would wait three hours for them.
Posted by: jane on March 24, 2009 at 2:16 PM
Geoff ... nice link. You don't need to be Thai to cook good Thai food. You have to be a good cook first, and love Thai food. Thanks.
Posted by: Jphan on March 24, 2009 at 3:16 PM
I think the question is lacking. I can't imagine waiting for more than 30 minutes because if the food was worth it, I'd call ahead and make reservations.
Any place that doesn't take reservations is deathly afraid of making patrons wait, so they wouldn't be so pretentious to assume they're worth a four hour wait.
So a better question might be: What kind of person waits four hours to be seated for a meal?
Posted by: Brian on March 25, 2009 at 7:50 AM
I agree with Brian.
All of Bianco's establishments are open one meal period, five days a week, and they close early. To eat his pizza you have to wait for hours, often on the street. He's entitled to run his business how he chooses, and I respect the decision to keep things manageable for him and his staff, but I also think it's unreasonable to expect customers to wait that long. I think average folks, not foodies, but just folks who like good food, have better things to do and would find all our swooning silly.
And this gets directly to the disconnect between the foodie community and that broader universe of eaters. It's why Kincaid's wins restaurant polls. Hospitality matters. Part of being hospitable is making your product accessible.
Bianco, whether deliberately or through happenstance, is creating a false scarcity. If he opened at 11a and closed at 11p and took Sunday or Monday off, there would be a wait between 6-9 on Friday and Saturday and 7-8 another couple nights, and that's it.
Posted by: Adam Platt on March 25, 2009 at 10:06 AM
I would never wait that long, unless I was told ahead of time that I would enjoy a 3 hour long 'cocktail hour', and was able to budget the time.
As to Kincaid's being hospitable, I had terrible food and service there last I went. That place (St. Paul location) is resting on it's laurels and no where near what it once was.
Posted by: Tamara on March 25, 2009 at 12:11 PM
Sure... Have a reservation policy and then wait two months like the French Laundry to get in.
Personally I see no easy solution to solve the wait time at Pizzeria Bianco. It is nothing more then supply and demand. But then I guess there are those who will dictate how many hour Chris Bianco should be working a day. Unfortunately it appears Chris will be working around the clock as the last I knew dough needs proofing.
Just cook pizza's for twelve hour's Chris and close only to start making the dough again. But then on a positive note you have the choice of Sunday or Monday off.
Posted by: RobertR on March 26, 2009 at 8:07 AM
Two Predictions:
1. Erik Anderson, best new chef 2009.
2. Porter and Frye, 4 Chef's in 3 years.
what do you think AZ?
Posted by: diggitydog on March 26, 2009 at 8:15 AM
I like the call on Erik Anderson...but I have a feeling your call on P&F is a little ambitious as I just don't see them being open for another 2 years.
Posted by: geoff on March 26, 2009 at 11:13 AM
dined at Heidi's last night, and Spring is definetly on the menu over there!..flavors of ramps, spring onions, yuzu, foie, star anise and shrimp, turmeric, celery leaf, citrus, rabbit, quail, fresh pulled motz...oh my!..why fly to NYC, when Stewart & Heidi are right in our city...aren't we lucky to have them? If you haven't experienced Stewarts cuisine yet, call today. it's extraordinary! and affordable!
Posted by: pastry chef Carrie Summer on March 28, 2009 at 6:03 PM
Erik Anderson at Cue???? I pity his crew. The man know's food but is a total a-hole.
I for one will never eat there. Two freinds of mine worked with that prick and have nothing but horror stories regarding him.
I pity his crew.
Thumbs down on Erik Anderson
Posted by: Doug Hodder on April 1, 2009 at 12:01 AM
Black Sheep Coal Fired Pizza. It's teh bomb. I'd wait 4 hours for a table & then spend 2 hours eating & drinking.
http://s4xton.com/1914/black-sheep-coal-fired-pizza-minneapolis/
Posted by: burtldy on April 7, 2009 at 7:22 PM
Before you proclaim Bianco's (Phoenix) as King Of The Pizza Hill, you've got to try Biagio's in Upland, Ca. Untouchable!!
Posted by: Dominic Giamarino on July 29, 2009 at 12:28 AM