carytown musings

I'm hardly, if ever, ahead of any sort of curve. So it was actually quite surprising to stumble on a place that's brand new in Richmond. Ambling aimlessly in Carytown recently, in search of a place to eat, we were arrested by a large portrait framed in a brightly lit doorway and a clamor from up above. Spying a reproduction of "Portrait of Mrs. Allan Bott" by one of my favorite Art Deco artists Tamara de Lempicka, my curiousity was piqued. On closer look, we saw that it was a new restaurant - Xtras !
Xtras is located right next to the bangle and bead shop in C-town. Walking up the stairs to the high aspect ratio interior, we observed that the noises were coming from the outdoor balcony that overlooks Cary street. Sadly the balcony was full, so we had to settle for being seated indoors. At first glance, it is a bit hard to figure out exactly which vibe they are going for - the sports bar, the bistro or the lounge or all of the above.
The dinner was pretty good, if unremarkable (a full review will have to wait, if ever). They feature a menu that doesnt stray very far from the norm - sandwiches (I had an arctic char on ciabatta with avocado and sprouts and a nicely potent aioli sauce) salads and a handful of other entrees. Prices are around $5-$15/entree. Xtras was surprisingly full for a place that had apparently been open for all of 4 days. $5 cosmo specials (that day), a handful of beers and a wine list of around 10 wines by the glass made for a host of beverage choices. We tried each of their desserts - a caramel apple creme brulee, a bread pudding and cheesecake, all of which were surprisingly good and it was a good feeling that no one felt stuffed or bloated in the aftermath....
I suspect the owners (the eponymous Xtra Moore - a fascinating name !) will be filling up the walls pretty soon. If Lempicka is a "true" inspiration, I hope the results are interesting. I suspect that balcony will be seeing some patronage, given its location. Good luck ahead !

While in the neighborhood, several visits in to Secco starting from their initial weekends to their somewhat mature business now, I have yet to make up my mind about what to actually think of the place. I quite like the idea of a casual wine bar. Secco fits the bill in almost every respect - a very good selection of decently priced wines by the glass and a nice warm interior with those tungsten lightbulbs that are all the rage these days (an nyt article on the same).
I guess its the dining categorization and (perhaps to some extent) the crowd (in both senses of the word) that has me stumped. And the food has left me wanting on many an occasion, quite literally. Their "small plates" are actually quite small and more along the lines of mini-tapas perhaps - often pretty but hardly substantial...ranging from the exotic sounding but quite insipid harissa octopus to a well put together charcuterie plate (one the better ones for some radius around). ranging from $5 for 1 to $21 for 5 for cheeses and meats, Secco is actually not an inexpensive proposition. However, in times when double digit drinks appear to becoming the norm, they have a very large list of wines for around $5-$10...if one is looking for a wine and cheese detour alone, I would be hard pressed to recommend an alternative.
The staff is a mixed bag - ranging from the overly effusive to the oddly taciturn to the mathematically challenged to the ever so well informed one who turned us on to Midnight moon (one could do a short paean in the glory of this cheese)! And given that it is such a small space - the couirky bar (surprisingly unstained after all these months) seats around 10 and there are 4 tables and a couple of couches - it gets pretty packed often, especially weekend nights. Oddly enough this may be part of the allure, as opposed to say Cafe Caturra, which operates in the same genre.

Another intriguing store front that has been in development for some time now is the Belmont Food shop in that section of Belmont between Ellwood and Floyd that has been seeing increased traffic in the wake of Stuzzi. They have a menu posted ($15 for a boxed lunch !!) and a website but no semblance of a kitchen or seating or anything. West of the Blvd mentioned them last month but in the interim - the mystery !!

I'll just file this under this category since I've been thinking about it: Kudos to Sprout for their recent favorable rave in Style and of course I've been a fan for some time. However (oops !) a few lunches into the semester, a general consensus (sample = subjects with varying appetite sizes) has emerged that is giving us pause re: future lunch patronage. I'm hardly a fan of the typical Texas-sized portions around or of the mindless caloric consumption at fast food places but I have to say that feeling a stomach growl a mere hour post-a $15 lunch is a bit troublesome. One wonders if the Sisyphean task of research and education expands ones appetite inordinately.

Speaking of char, I wonder how long it will be before we see the GMO salmon in menus around ! I for one, while being quite fascinated by genetic engineering and the technicalities thereof, shudder at the prospect...

Post-op: clarification – I am not comparing Secco to Café Caturra. In all my ignorance, I wouldn’t venture to make that egregious of a comparison. Both share a structural homology and it may be instructive to think about the multi-factor dynamics thereof (?).
Separately, I've borne the pearls-before-swine argument before but that's perhaps, better addressed over a glass of Château Lafite Rothschild Cabernet and not blogged about :).

Data maps

Nothing to do with food, but I just thought this was rather interesting and wanted to document it. An "ethnic/racial" map of Richmond.
Using Census Bureau information (albeit from 2000) and the methodology of cartographer Bill Rankin, who produced a racial map of Chicago, this guy Eric Fischer created maps for several cities in the U.S. Here's the one for our fair city (you can barely see the James river snaking across).



The full set is on his flickr page. Some are quite fascinating like NYC and Washington DC
White areas = pink, Black = blue, Hispanic = orange, Asian = green and Other = gray.
I'm not sure I can/want to read anything technical/socio-economic from this data, just one of those Richmond thoughts that had nowhere else to go!