Pho Ba Luu menu is online: Click here to check it out. One would think an opening is near, but no word on that yet.
Don’t miss next week’s Bourbon Mixer: Join me and Rick Redding on Saturday, Aug. 13, at 6:30 p.m., when Louisville’s Whisky Chicks and Bourbon Brotherhood co-host the third-annual Bourbon Mixer (at the Gillespie, 421 W. Market St.). This fundraiser will benefit the Coalition for the Homeless and combine great bourbon with upscale Southern cuisine. Fourteen distilleries will share samples chosen just for this evening, as well as cocktails and other bourbon treats. The event will also include music, an open bar with beer and wine, and auction items including one-of-a-kind bourbon experiences and rare bottles of whiskey.Tickets are $125. Click here for more information.
Where indeed is Guy Fieri’s Smokehouse? When I’ve been asked that lately, such queries smack of the annoying phrase, “Who is John Gault?” uttered far too often in the supremely maddening book, “Atlas Shrugged.” In other words, I sense people are really saying, “I really don’t care because I won’t go there, but it seems like it’s already a failure because Guy hasn’t been seen since the presser.” I get it, and I’m also not likely to go there. But I also find that a bit rude. It’ll be good for Fourth Street Live!, which brings jobs and tax dollars to the area.
Ed Lee planning new Louisville restaurant: Business First reported that the chef-owner of 610 Magnolia, MilkWood and Succotash (near Baltimore) will open a third Louisville spot by the end of the year. While that’s cool news, it sounds like an overly optimistic timeline since Lee is working on a second Succotash in Washington, D.C., plus he’s not identified the concept (at least to Business First) for the Louisville space. Since it’s already August, leaving a bit more than four months on the 2016 calendar to git ‘er done, that sounds like an ambitious and compressed timeline to produce a well-considered and highly specific concept like Lee has created in the past. Whenever it opens, I’m sure it’ll be good.
Copper & Kings‘ new release should be a stunner: The innovation never stops at this Butchertown distillery. On Friday, Sept. 9, it’ll host a release party for a 5-year-old apple brandy aged 24 months in tequila barrels (likely second-use bourbon barrels). It’s named 3 Marlenas, and I’m sure there’s a story behind that. Click here for more detail on the event. I love tequila and my enjoyment of brandy increases daily. (My wife and I are hooked on the Butchertown Mule made with C&K’s immature brandy and its Butchertown Soda Ginger Beer.) So combining these two fruit influences sounds just spectacular.
Red Barn Kitchen adds lunch, Artesano deletes it: In case you didn’t know, Artesano Vino Tapas y Mas halted lunch service a few weeks back. Apparently tapas don’t work at lunch, or the location doesn’t lend itself well to that kind of traffic in that daypart. However, its sister restaurant, Red Barn Kitchen, located about a mile away, just added lunch. With its dinner service hitting on all cylinders less than a month after opening, the crew is making all that wonderful Southern-inspired grub available for midday meals.
Movement afoot to create a Louisville food co-op grocery: As Lexington’s Crave Food & Music Festival is expected grow beyond last year’s 50,000 attendee mark, I’m reminded of something else that Kentucky’s second-largest city has that its largest doesn’t: a food co-op grocery. If you’ve never visited Good Foods Co-Op there, do so on your next visit. You’ll love it and want to join.
The good news is, according to a Jere Downs piece in The C-J, there’s renewed hope of creating a public co-op here. (The Louisville Food Co-Op is private but always accepting members.) Her Aug. 2 story said about 50 people gathered recently to discuss creating a co-op that would “increase the availability of organic and sustainably produced food in neighborhoods where affordable goods are scarce.”
That’s a great idea, and it should happen where proposed, in the West End. But beyond that, food co-ops also are for people who want to support smaller farmers, local businesses and artisan producers. They’re for consumers who want to eat food that benefits their bodies and the planet. That’s a mission worth following, and Good Foods in Lexington executes it well. Here’s to hoping it happens here. I’d join it in a second.
Safari Grill African & Mediterranean Cuisine open in Beechmont: Saw this on HotBytes and thought it worth a link. Sounds great to me. Address is 328 W. Woodlawn Ave. No website or Facebook page to tie to, unfortunately.