Restaurant review extravaganza 20

Here are some of this week’s most noteworthy restaurant reviews from across the country:

Broward-Palm Beach

La Fontana Pizzeria / Nino’s Restaurant & Pizzeria / Tucci’s Fire N Coal Pizza

Pizza expert Craig “Lapp” Agranoff sits across from me at La Fontana Pizzeria in Coral Springs, inspecting a warm cheese-only slice. He lifts the thin triangle by its crunchy lip with one hand and pokes at the underside of the crust with the other. It sags in the middle like a dog’s ear. Lapp shakes his head in disappointment. “See that?” he says, prodding the limp area of the slice. “It’s underdone.” More >>

Dallas

Cadot

There’s a timeworn bit of wisdom regarding too many cooks in the kitchen. They get in each other’s way, argue over the proper interpretation of recipes, bark countermanding orders to staff and generally muck things up royally–or so the story goes. Lately, however, accomplished chefs have been joining forces with some success. Randall Copeland and Nathan Tate’s AVA is breaking new ground in Rockwall. Veteran Stephan Pyles works side by side…well, worked side by side…with Tim Byers, late of Standard. And let’s not forget Gilbert Garza and Jeffery “Il Sole” Hobbs at Suze. More >>

“Kitchen veterans Jean-Marie Cadot (left) and Gaspar Stantic team up in a promising new kitchen.”

Denver

Sketch Food and Wine

Almost everyone at Sketch Food and Wine knows me. The above-the-line guys for certain, some of the bartenders. I have acted well and poorly in their establishment, used it for celebrations and decompressions numerous times since it opened in March. And I have experienced the all-too-classic result of blown critical anonymity: the frantic phone call from owner (Jesse Morreale) to chef (Sean Yontz), the screech of tires as a pickup truck comes to a rocking panic-stop in front, disgorging Yontz, who immediately takes up his post behind the slicer and salumi bar as though he was already on his way there and hadn’t just been called off the line at one of his other properties to take care of the dimwit local restaurant critic who’s brought in his high-tone foodie friends from other cities, other gigs, for a taste of the Yontz & Morreale magic. More >>

Houston

Sabine River Cafe

The paneed rabbit appetizer at ­Sabine River Cafe looked like a plate of McNuggets, but the white meat was sweeter and lighter than chicken breast. It came with a little side dish of creamy creole mustard dipping sauce. I could have eaten three or four orders by myself. More >>

Kansas City

Infused Restaurant & Bar

Two people walk into this bar and grill on a Monday night. They sit down and see this big sign — a poster, really — on the wall that lists the weekly specials. In plain English are these words: “Every Monday, 1-pound crab legs, potatoes and corn $12.99.” The two people say to each other, “Well, that’s a nice deal.” Then they notice that there’s a four-color monthly calendar on the table, which also lists all the specials, including the crab legs. And there’s a cute little table tent next to the calendar, which also touts the crab-legs special. More >>

Los Angeles

La Chente

Have you ever encountered pescadoZarandeado? Beacause it is as intimidating as an entrée can get, a vast, smoking creature split open at the backbone and flopped open into a sort of skeleton-punctuated mirror image of itself, wisps of steam rising around the onions and lemon slices with which it is strewn, served on the kind of plastic tray you may remember from your high school cafeteria, which is probably the only vessel broad enough to handle the fish. As served at Mariscos La Chente, a Westside restaurant specializing in the seafood dishes of Sinaloa and Nayarit, it is so menacing that you scarcely know whether to eat it or beat it to death with a stick. More >>

“Killer Fish” La Chente

Miami

Hakkasan is drop-dead gorgeous, a dusky Oriental lair of dining alcoves seductively lighted by Chinese lanterns and separated by walnut and teak latticed screens. Beyond the darkened den lies a lengthy bar backed by faux gray brick with pale waves of light shimmering upon it like sunlight patterns reflected from a swimming pool. (Hakkasan is on the top floor of the Fontainebleau’s spa. The actual pool is four floors below.) The 130-seat space, including lounge, has the ambiance of a haute Hong Kong dining establishment; the cuisine is what you’d assume patrons at such places get served. More >>

Minneapolis

Risotto

Risotto, the new Italian restaurant at Lyn-Lake, might be the only place in the area where Andrea Bocelli can play on the stereo without seeming cheesy. The night I heard the blind tenor’s passionate crooning, the restaurant wasn’t very busy and its owner, Gabriele Lo Pinto, the chef who ran Edina’s Arezzo for the past eight years, periodically came out of the kitchen to check on his customers. Lo Pinto’s partner, Patrice O’Hanlon, who manages the front of the house, was taking a few minutes off to eat dinner at the bar, and Lo Pinto stopped to inquire about her food, in his thick Italian accent. He doted on her for a minute or so, draping himself over her shoulder in a cute display of affection. As if on cue, the stereo played “That’s Amore.” More >>