Restaurant review extravaganza 33 page 1

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

Broward-Palm Beach

Creolina’s Dixie Takeout

The shrimp and grits in front of me at Creolina’s Dixie Takeout in Davie fill the entire white, oval plate. Almost two dozen plump shrimp are bathing in a pool of pink tasso cream sauce so abundant that it’s managed to spread underneath the dish of collard greens on the side. At its center is a “cake” of fried grits that looks like a massive cut of filet mignon, three inches wide and nearly that tall. More >>

Dallas

Urbino Pizza e Pasta

When David Pedack fires up his rickety ZAP car–a three-wheeled all-electric bug assembled in Hong Kong–and clatters down the street on a pizza delivery run, it may be the only time he feels real solitude. The pressure of opening Urbino Pizza e Pasta, his second restaurant, eases just a bit as the tiny vehicle whirs around corners. I’ve seen him smile as he bounces past the patios along Henderson, mashing the horn to generate an odd metallic honk, which, strangely enough, momentarily slows the car. More >>

Sara Kerens

“Owner/delivery driver David Pedack springs from his electric car–just one sign that Urbino cares.”

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Denver

Olivea

Jesus…,” I said to no one in particular, dopey smile aimed down 17th Avenue, waddling a little as I cleared the doors of Olivea. “He is just so fucking good.” More >>

Houston

Sher-E-Punjab

Using the handle of a plastic fork, I managed to get the marrow out of the bones of my sensational goat vindaloo. I spread the fatty, curry-flavored marrow goo on hot, puffy garlic naan bread and savored every bite. More >>

Kansas City

The Iron Horse: An American Bistro

The romantic days of dining on trains — real dining, with good food and cloth napkins and waiters — went the way of Pullman porters and Fred Harvey restaurants a long time ago. I still fantasize about what dining cars must have been like in their heyday, but I have to settle for living vicariously through old movies, such as when Cary Grant and Eva Marie Saint share a luxurious meal in Hitchcock’s North by Northwest. More >>

Los Angeles

JTYH

Have you encountered Shanxi knife-cut noodles? Because if you haven’t, you should really give them a try — thick, irregular things, frilled on one edge like the gills of an oyster, and about the size and heft of a businessman’s belt. More >>

Anne Fishbein

Knife-shaved noodles from Chef Shi at JTYH

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Miami

Palme d’Or

The old-world opulence of Palme d’Or seems especially anachronistic in the patently lax 21st Century. The 70-seat space, a restored homage to the original 1926 Biltmore Hotel restaurant, is a bygone world of ceiling frescoes, crystal chandeliers, intricately carved woods, black-and-white photos of vintage movie stars, and an almost fun-house abundance of mirror-covered columns throughout the room. (Choice tables are toward the rear, facing the alluring aqua gleam of the swimming pool, but you need to request one of these when making reservations.) Yet as archaic as Palme’s setting is, the cuisine is firmly anchored in the here and now — and, wow, is it good. More >>

Minneapolis

Sea Change

For the first few weeks after Sea Change opened, every time someone asked me about it, I found myself mentioning three things: The place was run by James Beard Award-winning chef Tim McKee, the theme was sustainable seafood, and it was located in the Guthrie Theater where, um…the old Guthrie restaurant, uh–what was that place called again?–used to be. More >>