Ploafmaster General

Okay, it's probably not tin. But it's a pretty cool lizard I saw while walking around Charleston.

I've been home from a long weekend in Charleston, SC since Tuesday afternoon this week, but I haven't had the time/energy to write about my dining experience with the attention it deserves. Granted, I have little excuse; I'm still on my spring break from grad school and I took the entire week off from work, but I've had film to scan and pictures to edit and all that good stuff, so here we are.

 

I normally research where I'm going when I travel, but for whatever reason I did no research whatsoever on Charleston. I relied, instead, on the recommendations of my wife's friend who knows more about that town than most folks do about their own hands. She gave Valerie a list of good restaurants and stuff to see and do, and off we went, neither of us having been to Charleston before. What I didn't know was that Charleston is a serious food town. Sure, lots of it is the kind of traditional southern coastal fare you might expect - crab cakes, oysters, some kinda seafood bisque, shrimp and grits, and so on - but there were a few surprises that caught me off guard in the best possible way. So rather than walk through every dining experience I had, I'll give you the highlight reel, which could be long enough on its own.

We had lunch on Saturday at an excellent little out-of-the-way place called Cru Cafe on Pinckney St. One of the specials that day was a house-made pastrami sandwich. House-made pastrami! In South Carolina! I had to try it, and I didn't regret it. I'm not kidding when I say this was some of the best pastrami I'd ever eaten. Smokey, salty, richly-flavored, and sliced up super thin in a generous pile on marbled rye bread. I could eat this sandwich for lunch almost every day. Valerie had an arugula salad with duck confit and fried onions, and we both thought the sweet tea was the perfect level of sweetness. Dinner that night at Slightly North of Broad (figure out the acronym on your own) was good, but not memorable.

We had Sunday brunch at Magnolias on E. Bay St., and while Valerie thought her smoked salmon frittata was okay, my meal was quite delicious. It was a variation on "pigs in a blanket," but in this case was made up of buffalo chipotle sausage wrapped in orange buttermilk pancakes. A fine elevation of a diner mainstay.

Sunday dinner was at Poogan's Porch on Qeen St, and it was absolutely tasty. And speaking of "a fine elevation of a diner mainstay," I can't recommend the macaroni and cheese appetizer enough. The menu stated, simply, that it had Tasso ham and smoked gouda, but the more-than-an-entrée-sized pile that arrived was the richest and creamiest macaroni and cheese I've eaten. Valerie, who's not a huge fan of macaroni and cheese, had to force herself to stop eating it in order to have room for her main course. I thought it was so good that I attempted my own variation (with Serrano ham) once I returned home.

Monday was our last full day in Charleston, and while we had a nice-enough lunch at Melvin's BBQ, our best eating and drinking of the trip lay ahead of us.

Neither Valerie nor I brought anything nicer than jeans, sneakers, and comfortable shirts, so while many of the restaurants downtown looked nice, we felt underdressed for most of them. We shared this concern with our cab driver that afternoon, and he assured us that with the exception of a handful of establishments in town, we had naught to worry. Armed with this advice, we made reservations at McCrady's Restaurant on Unity Alley. I double-checked the dress code and the host assured me that we would have no trouble. So wearing a long-sleeved New York Giants t-shirt, jeans, and running shoes, I showed up at the restaurant of James Beard award-winning chef Sean Brock. Not only has Brock worked under Alinea's Grant Achatz, but he also worked his way up to executive sous chef at Lemaire in my beloved Richmond's own Jefferson Hotel. The food was almost all local/regional, with many of the ingredients coming from the restaurant's own farm in nearby Wadmalaw Island. While credentials are nice it's the food, of course, that matters. Valerie and I both agree that McCrady's was the finest meal we ate in Charleston.

This was modern haute cuisine without a doubt, executed masterfully in preparation, appearance, and flavor. We shared a first course of butter poached lobster and sea scallops with "sorrel bubbles" (an airy green foam) and a little parsnip croquette in the middle made up of a parsnip slice, parsnip puree, and coated in panko bread crumbs. The entire dish was also sitting in a popcorn purée and had little pieces of spiced popcorn as well. Valerie's dinner was grilled swordfish with shaved root vegetables, and she enjoyed it. My entrée, though, was called a "duo of pork." It looked like a zen garden with a little meat hill in the corner, and it was extraordinarily enjoyable in every respect. There was an exquisite peanut "granola," banana purée, and a number of preparations of salsify root. There was braised salsify that was savory and rich, a deep-fried stick of salsify that looked like a miniature log (but tasted much better), and an intensely flavorful salsify purée. The pork duo turned out to be a small piece of deep-fried pork belly from the restaurant's own farm, along with succulent slices of pork loin from the same. A little stream of cooked-down jus flowed under the pork across the plate. This dish was so good with all the flavors combining perfectly, and Valerie was completely distracted by the striking visual arrangement of my plate of food. Such inventiveness, attention to detail, and execution make me weak at the knees.

Bellies full of awesomeness, we shambled up the street to check out The Gin Joint, our final destination before heading home the next morning. This place is what would happen if you took the craft bar of Acacia here in Richmond, and mixed it with the casual small-plates atmosphere of Secco. Looking at their food menu made me wish I'd discovered it earlier in the weekend (I was too full for any more food), but the cocktails were some of the best I'd ever consumed. Whether it was the house-made cola syrup or the perfect proportioning and mixing of ingredients, or just the right amount of ice, this place knows how to serve some booze. I appreciated the careful pairing of the right gin or whiskey with the right juices and syrups, too. Be sure to check out the short video of the owner mixing up a libation (and ignore the cheesy Acoustic Alchemy music). Details, my friends. You know what? It's probably better that this place is 7 hours away or my friends and family would think me an alcoholic.

So there it is. I drove further south looking for nothing more than relaxation and a change of scenery, and I came back with a few extra pounds (like I needed that) and a well-satisfied palate. We saw some interesting historical sites in a beautiful town, but I'd go back to Charleston in a heartbeat just for the food.

This past Monday evening I was fortunate enough to participate in a practice run for the upcoming Sunday Supper series, organized by The Marinara himself, Matt Sadler. I was on hand to take promotional photographs, but my wife and I were also sharing in the event and the delicious food that came with it. This practice session, and the first official event in the series, focus on chef Carlos Silva of Bistro 27 in downtown Richmond. Matt is selling tickets for the meal on March 27th at 7 PM.

Now I'm biased because I was working for/with Matt on this practice run, but I did still eat the food, and it was delicious. The experience of sharing a meal with the chef in this intimate setting was fantastic, and the conversation built up by the end of the evening added to the convivial nature of the event.

So go ahead! Get a ticket or two while you still can. Let's make this first event a smash hit so Matt can organize more of them in the future.

Phil Barbato makes fantastical plush creatures, prints, paintings, cartoons, and whatever else his mind impels his hands to create.

Having studied fine art at Virginia Commonwealth University, Phil had spent a number of years working as a web designer here in Richmond before deciding to make hand crafting his vocation. Whether it's drawing a bear a day for a year on his iPhone, a wall of small paintings, or hundreds of hand-sewn monsters, bears, robots and sea creatures, Phil's work is unified by a playful aesthetic, reminding me that even serious art can be silly and light-hearted.

Oh, and buy his stuff, 'cuz it's pretty awesome.

Portra 160NC
Graflex Speed Graphic

P.S. I promise I didn't ask the last three subjects in a row to dress with any formality. Purely their choice, but I like how it worked out. I think I'll go for more casual shots on the next few, though.

Ross Catrow is a web designer/developer and co-owner of PharrOut, a Richmond-based design shop.

There was no major for web design at Virginia Tech while Ross attended, so he chose math in an effort to keep himself interested. It also afforded him more time to watch his beloved Hokies football. Tired of working for other people after college, Ross and his friend, Scott Pharr, started their business so they could be their own bosses. Out of this environment, Ross created RVANews - a publication of broad scope that covers news, events, and editorial content in and around the Richmond area. Ross maintains the website in addition to contributing a portion of its written content.

Look, I wanted to like Jaks Bagels. So Badly. The prospect of bagels in Carytown was wonderful. I like Cupertino's well enough (though they're no Bagel Oven up in Jersey), but they're all the way out near Innsbrook and I live downtown. Having a shop about ten minutes from home would be great. Sadly, it is not (yet) to be.

Now let me get this straight - I don't want any of this to come across as mean, because I understand that these folks are new. Not just new to a Carytown storefront, but new to bagel baking as well. But I'm not going to sugar-coat my review for the sake of politeness either. This is a business, and they want people to spend money on their wares.

I went in on Saturday morning with my wife. She had one bagel with cream cheese, and I had two different bagels, each with butter. Rather than a long, draw-out narrative, here are a few long, drawn-out points:

1. Service was terribly slow and inefficient from the start, with the people ahead of us already having ordered. The woman who took my wife's order was having some serious issues cutting the bagel with the knife and nearly mangled it in the process. There should be a better bread knife, or a drop-in slicer, I think. If a knife, I'm hoping a week of customers has been enough practice to speed that up.

They were also using a 4-slot consumer toaster. This is less than ideal for more uniform, commercially-produced bagels, but for Jaks, it was worse. These bagels were more amorphous and, having been cut unevenly, had to be shoved into the toaster slots. After the slow toasting time I watched as another server had to dislodge half of a bagel with the slicing knife.

Also curious was the storage of the butter and the cream cheese. The servers used individually packed condiment cups even for our eat-in bagels. I can understand keeping those around for take-out, but pulling little cups out of the bottom of the fridge case meant extra firm, barely-spreadable condiments that added more time to the order as our sever struggled to coat the surface of the bagels (the second of my two bagels was missing butter entirely).

I'm going to cut a lot of slack on these service issues - I understand they only opened on 2/2 and I visited on 2/5. I wish they had better prepared for customers, but these problems can be ironed out.

2. The bagels. Oy. Where to start? The outside, of course. I had a salt bagel and an asiago cheese bagel. The mention of salt bagels on their website had me excited about the place prior to their opening. It was a sign that, perhaps, the owners were familiar with proper bagels from Up North. But this salt bagel seemed to have only a light dusting of...kosher salt? Yeah, I think it was kosher salt flakes. The outer skin of the bagel was rough and uneven, as if it had been stretched but not rolled afterward. There was no faintly crisp skin, no shine to its surface. The asiago, on the other hand, was just so covered in the cheese that the skin/crust/whatever was less of a factor.

Taking a bite out of the bagel highlighted the real problems, though. The dough was too dense, so instead of the expected slight, tender chewiness it felt more like the bagel simply tore apart. The density wasn't uniform, though, so each bite varied slightly, and you could see some darker spots inside on my wife's bagel and mine where it seemed too much moisture had prevented part of the bagel from cooking all the way through. It wasn't un-cooked or doughy, but perhaps not as cooked as it could have been.

The flavor really wasn't there, either. I'm no baker myself, but It seemed to me that the floury taste hadn't fully cooked out of the bagels. But there may have been something else, too; if they par-boil their bagels - as any proper shop should - perhaps they are using baking soda in the water (some shops do this instead of honey or malt)? If so, maybe they're being a bit heavy handed with it? Not sure. I only ate the top half of each of my bagels.

I give a lot less slack for the food than I do for the service. I feel like something as simple in concept (though certainly not simple in execution) as a bagel should be all set before you open to the public. This reminds me of Pie in The Fan, a restaurant where the branding appeared more fully-formed than the dough recipe when they opened. People have strong opinions about pizza and bagels, so it's risky to serve something that isn't ready for prime time.

So.

I want Jaks to succeed for selfish reasons. I want good bagels closer to my house. But I cannot tell my friends to go eat bagels that I don't like just to keep a restaurant alive. I may not have to, though. Plenty of people might love Jaks. They may very well survive on the palates of Richmonders, and that's fine, I suppose. Most folks in my fair city did not, after all, grow up in the Tri-state Area, so they have different tastes and that's okay. But if other people feel the same way I do, it could be a rough road for the new shop. One of the most important parts of a brand is what you're actually selling, and no website or clever slogans can hide that.

For the time being, I can only hope the new Cupertino's location (now open on Main between 12th and 13th) is open on weekends so I can get a serviceable bagel without having to drive out to the West End. If anybody DOES repeatedly eat at Jaks Bagels, however, and notices improvement over time (and consistency is established), I'd love to give it a second try. But I'm not going to pay to be a test subject.

Outtake from my Creatives series.

Perfect example of how well Ansel participated in my silly little endeavor.

Ektar 100
Graflex Speed Graphic

I wasn't really looking to get a Leica any time in the near future. I've always admired them and thought, "Someday I'll get a used one." But then I saw a listing in, of all places, Craigslist. A listing with a price that seemed too good to be true. So I met the seller today and examined the camera. Everything seems to be working just fine. So I pulled the trigger and picked it up.

It's a 1956 Leica M3, double-stroke film advance converted to single-stroke. It came with a Leica screw-mount adapter and these two lenses:
1. A Voigtlander Heliar 15mm with accessory viewfinder. This lens is multicoated and has a reputation for being incredibly rectilinear. We'll see...
2. The seller threw this in extra - a Leica Elmar 90mm f/4. The aperture is stuck mostly open which is why he included it extra, but I'm betting I can figure out how to fix it. If not, the Heliar and the M3 were still a great deal (if my roll of film turns out okay).

So I have a roll of Tri-X in this puppy right now, and I plan to start shooting tomorrow. If it all works out, I hope to have some shots up next weekend. And then I start saving for a 50mm Summicron :-)

Ansel Olson makes environmental graphics through Ansel Olson Design and puts his camera to work for Ansel Olson Photography.

Photography has been a thread running through Olson's life and career. While he holds degrees in Interior Design (BFA) and Graphic Design (MFA), he has created an additional business for his work behind the camera that highlights not only the output of skilled architects, but Ansel's own love of the created space. His primary line of work, through Ansel Olson Design, involves a broad range of signage, wayfinding, and brand/identity work projects around Richmond and far beyond.

His professional and personal work have been an inspiration to this photographer.

Ektar 100
Graflex Speed Graphic

I've started a personal photo project celebrating people whose daily work revolves around their own creative output. All of them will involve my Speed Graphic large format camera. Here's the first shot, taken with Kodak Ektar 100.

Tim Bereika is the executive chef at Secco Wine Bar.

Once a graphic designer for a national advertising agency, Tim has turned a mixture of classes (both domestic and abroad) and a variety of commercial kitchen experiences into an extensive culinary toolbox. Blending his skills as a designer and cook, he produces some of the most creative food in Richmond, VA.

A 19th century French metronome given to me by my flute teacher when I was 10 years old.

Shot on The Impossible Project's PX 100 Silver Shade film. Ain't it tasty?

My friend Ross has written up a great piece on RVANews about the care and feeding of a home kegerator. REALLY tempting to get one of my own some day...

I'm totally singing the Trogdor theme song in my head right now.

A friend of mine informed me that Belmont Butchery's Tanya Cauthen is suing Sausage Craft, the nascent wholesale sausage company started by former employees Chris Mattera and Brad Hemp. While the Style Weekly article and Mattera suggest this is about the sausage itself, Cauthen intimated that the wholesale sausage business was the cause for concern. I don't know the main parties here on a personal level, and I don't think I could expect Tanya to discuss this during business hours with a semi-regular customer like myself, but I do have some lingering questions about the whole situation, because this whole thing leaves a bitter taste in my Richmond-food-scene-loving mouth...

1. What IS the suit really about? Is it the recipes? The wholesale sausage concept/business model?
2. Did Mattera and Hemp actually plan and start executing on this idea while Cauthen was away?
3. Is Sausage Craft actually an idea stolen from Cauthen? That is, was it a firm plan in motion (about which at least Mattera or Hemp was aware) that Sausage Craft preempted? Did Mattera and Hemp work with Cauthen on the idea under false pretenses?
4. Most important, I think...Was there any kind of non-compete contract?

Without a contract I don't think there's much support for this suit because, regardless of the ethics behind the formation of Sausage Craft, this is a lot closer to a carpenter saying he's going to start building cabinetry, and his partner parts ways to start a cabinet business first. Making and selling sausage is trade craft, not trade secrets, and the concept of wholesale commerce is older than the city of Richmond. If Mattera and Hemp did anything sneaky (and I don't know enough to say whether they did or not) than it sure dues suck, but I just don't see grounds for legal action.

Now I like Chris and Brad and Tanya, and I like their work a lot. I always liked chatting with the guys when they were still at Belmont, and I still like chatting with Tanya when I go in there. I've always felt like, for a layman like myself, they were able to assist and inform me when I needed help or suggestions. I don't really want to take sides here, but I'm honestly kind of miffed that this lawsuit even exists.

Why not simply try to compete instead? Belmont Butchery is already well-established. Wouldn't they, then, have an advantage over Sausage Craft if they wanted to move into the wholesale business? They have an existing reputation on which to trade and existing facilities to get started. That, at least, could have been a head start over Sausage Craft. But Sausage Craft is making deliveries today and Belmont, to my knowledge, doesn't yet have a wholesale operation. I say just let the market and consumers decide this one. I buy sausage from both outfits, and I buy plenty of other products from Belmont Butchery that Sausage Craft never intends to sell. Perhaps we'll find that Richmond has plenty of room for both companies.

Maymont.

Speed Graphic
Ilford FP4 Plus

The "front standard" - or the flat plate with the lens on it on my Speed Graphic - can shift upward by about 1.5 inches. It's how you get pictures of buildings without converging lines. That's one of the movements available on tilt/shift lenses. In this case, I used a level to make sure the camera was pointed straight ahead. At first, the top of the building was cut off. By shifting the front standard upward, I was able to include the top of the building without affecting the perspective. Most of the vertical lines are parallel in this shot (where the building is plumb, of course), but the effect is less pronounced with a lens like mine that isn't really wide angle. For a better non-Photoshopped examples of this effect, check this awesome shot from Ansel Olson on Flickr.

Up close, because it's personal.

Dave. Standing by Main St. Station. Lookin' real tough, or something.

And here's my last shot, until this weekend, from The Howitzer.

My sister-in-law, on Brown's Island in Richmond, VA.

My lovely wife, photographed with The Howitzer, on Brown's Island in Richmond, VA.

In a lovely grouping of, I think, sycamore trees on Brown's Island.

Taken with The Howitzer (Speed Graphic). At this point I'd received my new (used) film holders, so no more light leaks!

My older brother in the field beside my parents' house on Christmas morning, 2010.

This was from the second pair of shots taken with my Speed Graphic, and I used one of the old holders that came with the camera. This side clearly wasn't light-tight at the flap, so the right side is overexposed to the point of near total white-out.

At least the important part of the frame was okay.

This is my first shot taken with the Graflex Pacemaker Speed Graphic I purchased before Christmas. I finally have my Epson V700 scanner, and with the help of Silverfast scanning software, I've managed to see what I saw on the negatives and contact prints. My focus and exposure could use a little work, but at least the shutter appears to be firing fairly accurate at the higher speeds.

[vimeo 18555817 w=640 h=360]