Restaurant review extravaganza 37

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

Broward-Palm Beach

Callaro’s Prime Steak and Seafood

My friend and New Times theater critic Brandon K. Thorp recently planned a pre-play dinner at Sushi Bon in Lantana. Soon after he arrived, his date called to say he wasn’t going to make it; worse, Sushi Bon’s credit card machine was down. He decided the best thing to do was to comfort himself with an exorbitant meal and deal with the damages later. More >>

Dallas

Loft 610

Tre Wilcox shrugs off the name recognition gained through appearances on some of television’s most popular cooking shows. “My window has passed,” he insists. “I don’t say ‘I’m Tre from Top Chef’–I’m just here at Loft 610.” More >>

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Denver

Cheeky Monk

The first time I saw the Cheeky Monk, I thought to myself, “Well, that’s going to last about five minutes.” An upscale Belgian beer cafe on one of the weirdest, wildest stretches of Colfax? It would be a nice idea somewhere else — like, say, Portland or Antwerp. But as I walked on past the Cheeky Monk, I saw an intemperate fella asleep in the back booth of the Roslyn, his T-shirt riding up over his enormous white belly, then almost got hit by a cop car screeching around the corner in pursuit of ghosts. I figured I could probably make a nice nickel or two laying down a death-pool bet on how long this Monk was going to last. Ten minutes seemed like a safe bet, but I would’ve been willing to go down to five if the odds were right. More >>

Houston

Killen’s Steakhouse

Our USDA Prime, dry-aged, bone-in strip was bright red and rare along the bone, and medium-well toward the thinner edge. It averaged out to the medium-rare we requested. The variance in doneness common in a bone-in cut worked out perfectly. Two of us were splitting the steak, and I like my meat rarer than my dining companion. More >>

Kansas City

Chilli n Spice Indian Bistro

“You have to admire a restaurateur who will open a new business in this economy,” said my friend Dan as he and Larry and I were driving to 133rd Street and Antioch, where chef-owner Davender Kumar’s ambitious Chilli n Spice Indian Bistro opened in May. At least I thought it opened in May. More >>

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Los Angeles

Indo Café

Have you ever tasted Indonesian urap? Because if you haven’t, it may be difficult for me to describe the version, which ranks among the most exotic salads in the world, made at Indo Café. The ingredients are straightforward enough: cabbage, blanched bean sprouts and parboiled long beans. The salad is tossed with coconut, then shredded into a rough, pink paste, whose overtones include sweetness and penetrating bitterness, fleeting perfume and a sort of persistent, almost human reek that is akin to the smell of a beaded angora sweater pulled from the bottom of a pile at a vintage shop. If you were going to wear the sweater, you would probably take it to the dry cleaner first, or at least put it in the sink with some Woolite, but we are talking about a salad. The antique scent of the seasoned coconut, which could be fresh galangal, or fermented shrimp paste, or kaffir lime, nestles into the flavor of the long beans like a fitted garment, and the urap is inconceivable without it. More >>

Miami

Balans

Eating at Balans is like buying clothes at the Gap. It’s like reading a novel by John Grisham. It’s like being a Blue Dog Democrat. In a word: meh. More >>

Minneapolis

Om

After the young, up-and-coming real-estate developer Vik Uppal bought the old Nate’s Clothing Building at First Avenue and Fourth Street in downtown Minneapolis, out went the sports coats and dress slacks. In came a gorgeous, two-story chandelier dangling over a reflecting pool, and lounge-y seating covered in fabrics as festive as wedding saris. Out went the artist Scott Seekins, with his stash of self-portraits and his wardrobe of white and black suits. In came a crowd of curious diners, more mature than the rest of the downtown dance-club scene, perhaps, but still young enough to wear high-heeled boots and sip colorful martinis before noshing on plates of paneer and tandoori chicken. More >>