Technically restaurant week is over, except for those few places that extend their menus until Mid-September, but I did not feel like writing last night on my return from my latest reservation. First a bit of back story. This past Saturday I attended my first Pampered Chef party and had an awesome time hanging out with my friends, purchasing new fangled cooking tools (Can you say pizza stone?), and eating...eating a bit too much. As I have mentioned before I do Weight Watchers to stay on top of my weight and to continue to work on my healthy eating habits. For all those people who do not have the slightest idea of what WW is all about you are basically given a certain amount of food points per day based on your weight, age, and gender. My good intentions to stick to my points on Saturday were blown. What can I say...I over ate and messed up and gained the weight I had worked all week to lose. Now I know that this was my own fault but I was pretty bummed and was not the poster child for happiness on Sunday. So here I was with a reservation to Art & Soul and I just wanted to drop it. I mean it is a southern style restaurant which brings to mind fried chicken, fried okra, fried hushpuppies, etc. Boo hoo me!
What I needed to do was give myself a swift kick in the ass for being such a miserable mop and move on. I wish I could say I did that, but to tell the truth I was pretty down on myself all day. I didn't cancel my reservation to Art & Soul though. What I did decide was to not do the restaurant week prix fixe. The last thing I needed was 3 courses which would only add to the problem. Nope, I decided I would maybe spend a little extra money but have the freedom to choose an appetizer and entree that fit into my parameters of having good food while being conscious of the ingredients that were involved. And though I spent a bit more money, I was ultimately happier with this decision and did not add any more weight from my meal, which is a small success.
So let's get down to original business. Art & Soul is located in the Liaison Hotel near Union Station with Chef/Owner Art Smith at the helm. I honestly do not think he is in the kitchen that often but after seeing him on Top Chef Masters I really wanted to go to his restaurant. I began my meal with a grilled shrimp and succotash appetizer. 3 grilled shrimp came out on a skewer with a bed of peas, corn, and chili limon sauce. The shrimp were cooked well, but were difficult to remove from the skewer which was square in shape and very soft. It was quite an effort to slide a shrimp off with both utensil and fingers. The succotash with the chili limon sauce was just too sweet. Peas and corn are already sweet vegetables and really do not need much to bring out their beauty. I felt that the sauce was more for show, with it's vibrant green color and frothy consistency, than to to complement the succotash. Overall it was a decent appetizer but was nothing to write home about.
For my entree I had the grilled lamb loin with artichoke hearts, white bean puree, and romesco sauce. The lamb was cooked perfectly and just melted in my mouth, and the romesco sauce only added to the depth of flavors. Yet I did not feel like it was a Southern style dish, instead it reminded me of something I would order at a Mediterranean restaurant. It was delicious, do not get me wrong, it just did not seem to fit in with the other dishes as I compared it to the BF's Fred Flintstone size pork chop with stone fruit and onion broth.
I would definitely love to come back here and have the true Southern dishes that Art Smith is known for: fried chicken and waffles, hoe cakes, and crab and grits. Hook still wins as being my favorite restaurant week dining experience ever, but I would recommend that you go check out Art & Soul if you have a hankering for all things cooked in oil and butter.
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