sörenberg bahnen

****As of 2/6/12, Caracas has closed.**** I know it is said often these days, but it really is true that Indy has so many ethnic restaurant gems scattered throughout the city and I think Caracas Arepas Grill is certainly one of them, and quite a unique choice as well.   The menu just calls itself more generally a “Latin restaurant,” although most of the press you see calls it specifically Venezuelan.   Regardless of where it comes from, it was all pretty good. I went with the BFF and we decided to split a ton of stuff to get to try lots of things.   The first thing they brought, and probably a favorite for both of us were the “ Patacones   con Esmechada o Pollo” ($6).   These were fried green plantains topped with shredded beef or chicken, onions, cilantro, white cheese and their house sauce, which seemed to be made with avocado and cilantro-- among other things I am sure.   They also bring you a big squeeze bottle of this sauce, as well as a bottle of very spicy red sauce to use throu

I met a friend for lunch the other day at Gumbo a Go Go.   Honestly, I hadn’t really even heard about this place until he mentioned it to me.   I am a fan of Cajun food in general, so of course I was game.   This is more of the slow cooked types of Cajun food—things like gumbo (obviously), étouffées, jambalaya, etc.   None of the po boy type sandwiches or fried items on their menu. So I went   for a combo plate with 2 items (regular size, they also have a larger size) ($7).   On mine, I chose shrimp étouffée and chicken yaya.   The étouffée was only okay—it is a lighter colored roux flavored with Cajun seasonings, but this one was a little bland.   There were several good sized shrimp in there—I am thinking they threw them in just before serving, probably so they wouldn’t get rubbery, but they didn’t taste very seasoned either.   Not sure how to remedy this, maybe crawfish would have been a better choice, because it doesn’t get as rubbery when overcooked, but usually when I order crawf

A couple weeks ago, three people in the same week recommended Saffron Café to me.   It has been on “the list” forever (someone actually recommended it to me the week it opened) so I figured it was some kind of sign that I needed to go.   So we did. We had looked at the menu online, as well as some of the comments people have made about it here and there on the web, and knew we wanted to try a couple of things—for starters the shrimp avocado and citrus salad ($8.95) and the antipasto plate ($10.95).   We really enjoyed the antipasto plate, and it was a great way to try various things.   It had hummus, bakoula, and zaalouk.   So you are probably familiar with hummus, most people have had it these days.   It is a spread made of pureed chickpeas with garlic, lemon and tahini (sesame paste).   It had some diced tomatoes and kalamata olives on top as well as a chunk of feta cheese. I really like hummus and it was good hummus, not the best I have had and not the worst, but certainly serviceab

                                       Image via Wikipedia So, the other night hubby and I were out and happened to stumble upon another half price wine (by the bottle) night and we got to talking about how much we like these because it gets us to try new things (and usually more expensive things than we might otherwise).   Or it allows us get what we usually would, and save a bit of money. (**Please note, most restaurants have limitations on which bottles are ½ off, it is often the bottles under $100, but they each have slightly different limitations). I thought it would be fun to put together a list to see if we could go out to eat every night of the week and get half priced bottles of wine (not that we ever eat out every night, but I just wanted to see if you could , if you wanted to). And then I thought, of course, I should share it with you all. Okay, so here’s what I came up with after some fairly minimal research.   Please let me know if you know of add itional ones (or if any o

Based on recommendations from readers, hubby and I headed north to Noblesville for a new breakfast spot.   It was a Sunday, and there was a bit of a wait.   We settled on bar seating because we looked around and realized we were going to wait a fair amount of time if we wanted a table.   Hubby usually isn’t a fan of bar seating because he likes a back on his chairs, but it actually turned out nice because we got to watch them cook everything.   The kitchen is really small—mainly just the area behind the bar with one large griddle on which is mainly piled their breakfast potatoes (“Ava potatoes”).   The place is decorated in a gambling theme which is carried through on the menu. So I had “The Bluff” which was 3 eggs, your choice of sausage (2 patties) or bacon (2 slices), their “Ava” potatoes and a bottomless basket of buttered wheat toast ($6.50).   This is sort of a large meal for me, I would never eat three eggs at once (and only ate two on this visit), but there aren’t a lot of opti

“I have been a lot of places, and this place is good.”   That was my favorite quote of the night from hubby about our second trip to Joseph Decuis (pronounced “day-QUEEZ” for those of you who are like me and have always wondered if you were pronouncing it right. They finally put it on one of their brochures).   This comment was made shortly into our appetizer course during the dinner I was lucky enough to convince hubby to take me on to celebrate Mother’s Day. I was excited to get to try it again in the springtime. We started with the pan sautéed morel mushrooms (um, duh)($18) and the Strauss Farms sweetbreads ($14) for our appetizers.   The morels were extremely crispy and freshly sautéed with just a hint of a crust on them, and were amazing.   They were uniformly cooked in exactly the right way.   There were no mushy bits and the coating was super light and even.   There was a tiny pool of veal glace (or veal stock reduction) at the bottom of the bowl—just the right amount to give a

In continuation of Diners, Drive-ins and Dives   week, I recently visited 3 Sisters which was also recently featured on one of the recent Diners, Drive-ins and Dives .   I had been to 3 Sisters once before, but pre-blog days, so I thought it was a good time to give it another try.   What I remembered about this place from before was that they had a pretty extensive menu, use a lot of high quality healthy ingredients, but that I hadn’t been inspired to return for several years. The restaurant is set in an old Victorian house in Broad Ripple, and I like the homey feel and squeaky wood floors (I love a good creaky floor). The service staff was pretty friendly, although possibly a little harried.   I think the DDD publicity has been good for business. The menu has been re-vamped since the DDD visit, with notations on the menu pointing out which items were featured.   The BFF ordered one of them, the D’Nai, which is a crusty French roll covered in house roasted ham, sautéed kale and jack ch

I have decided it’s Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives week on my blog.   Indy has been lucky enough to have several of its local restaurants featured on the show in the last several months, and Zest is the most recent episode, set to air tonight (May 9 th ). Later in the week I am reviewing another recent restaurant to have been featured already.   Anyway, I have reviewed Zest a couple of times before , but thought a revisit would be a timely post.   I am curious as to how being featured on DDD increases business—from what I have heard and seen, it seems to help increase business immensely, and since they feature local places cooking fresh food, I am all for it.   But I would love to hear from people in some of these places as to just how much it has helped. So the BFF and I headed in for lunch the other day—I was in the mood for something fairly light (which can be somewhat challenging with Zest, hard to pass on their macaroni and cheese) but I started with a cup of their soup of the day,

So I have to say I sort of have a bad habit of judging Chinese restaurants by their “cover.”   Well, by the way they look outside.   Happy Dragon is a place I drive by at least once, if not twice every day, and I often shop at the Kroger next door.   Honestly, I never thought I would step foot inside. I was having lunch with a friend on a very limited time frame in the area, and for whatever reason, we decided to try it.   It is a small place, with maybe 6-8 booths and a little counter where you order.   Interestingly they bring you your food served in take out containers, even if you are eating there, which I guess is convenient if you are going to take the leftovers home, and saves them from having a dishwasher I guess, but I tend to prefer to sit and eat a meal on actual dishes.   But maybe I am too high maintenance. The prices are reasonable for lunch.   For around $5, you get the entrée and either fried or steamed rice and a choice of soup, egg roll, or a can of soda.   I splurged

**THIS RESTAURANT IS CLOSED** You know how I feel about Italian places in Indy, but a friend of mine kept nagging me to try this place for lunch (they are also open for dinner).   It is a little mom and pop place, with about 6 tables over on Shadeland.   I am a sucker for places like this that I have never ever heard of, so off we went. At first we were the only ones in there, and we were given quite a warm greeting.   Our server was exceptionally friendly and answered our questions.   The chef came out toward the end of the meal to make sure everything was ok.   These are people who really seem to care about their business and what they are cooking.   For instance, although they serve their sodas in cans, they still offered us free refills. They are certainly geared toward very good customer service.   They do sandwiches, pastas and pizza, and ok, pretty much all the pastas are with marinara or Alfredo sauce, but I pretty much assumed that this was going to be your classic Midwestern-