Bobby Flay meets some of his biggest fans from western Massachusetts.
After reading this post on AnnArbor.com yesterday (“Dear Bobby Flay, please stop”) I had to laugh. I like Bobby Flay, and I enjoy the “Throwdown” series where he sneak-attacks and challenges hometown chefs known for their iconic recipes. I like it better when the hometown people prevail, which they seem to about 90% of the time.
Flay is a brand by himself, opening restaurants all over the United States (two now in Connecticut at Mohegan Sun – Bobby’s Burger Palace and Bar Americain.) And when chef/personalities verge on overexposure, criticism builds. So I wasn’t surprised to see this blogger, John Moors, ripping on several Food Network stars. He put Flay on blast for his partiality to Southwestern ingredients. “Really Bobby? You’re going to add green chiles to this recipe? No way.”
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Harpoon Oyster Stout, brewed with real Island Creek oysters
I’ve been reading a lot about Harpoon Oyster Stout this week – a new, limited-edition dark beer brewed with Island Creek oysters from Duxbury, Mass. And I became a little obsessed with finding it. But it seemed like the tasting events set up to accompany the beer’s release were all located closer to Boston. And if you’ve ever lived an hour or more outside of Beantown, you’re familiar with the “Boston gets everything good” jealous-stepchild mentality. (Or if you’re in Hartford, it’s: “New York gets everything good.”)
But the beer heavens must have aligned, because a rather serendipitous check of Facebook led me to Lattitude’s fan page. Could it be? Yes! The trendy West Springfield restaurant had Harpoon Oyster Stout on tap, paired with Island Creek oysters. Within 45 minutes, my favorite foodie friend Kat and I were seated at Lattitude’s bar, awaiting a pour.
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Crawfish po'boy at Wood-n-Tap
The popular Wood-n-Tap chain, with locations in Hartford, Farmington, Southington, Rocky Hill and Vernon, is offering a Cajun-themed menu for Mardi Gras this month. Items include jambalaya, pulled pork, fried catfish, crawfish, blackened swordfish and bananas foster. There’s even a cocktail list to match, including a Hurricane, red and white sangria, a berry mojito and Louisiana-brewed Abita beer. (I’m a big fan of their Purple Haze.)
We ate there Sunday and I tried the fried crawfish po’boy, pictured at left. The crawdads are lightly cornmeal-battered and served on a thick hoagie roll slathered with coleslaw, with tartar sauce on the side. I could have done without the coleslaw and I would have preferred tangy remoulade to tartar, but the sea creatures were plump and flavorful. The sweet potato fries, which I substituted for an upcharge of 99 cents, were delicious.
Bison Bites
Since it doesn’t feel like a W-n-T visit without ‘bar bites,’ we also got a plate of miniature bison burgers. Bison meat, touted for its flavor, is said to have less fat, calories and cholesterol than even chicken.
While the meat itself was plenty tasty, the burgers were missing or lacking the promised toppings of avocado aioli and fried onion strings. Rob missed the pickles and Dijon spread that normally come standard with the regular beef Bar Bites.
Nothing that would keep us from future visits, though. I’m still pulling for a W-n-T to come closer to Enfield.
Would you like your vodka infused with...Twizzlers?
My friends and I went to Worcester last night for a post-holiday get-together. We only had one stop planned: our favorite pub, The Boynton, for dinner and drinks. But through some impromptu exploration, we realized that Central Massachusetts has more going on than we knew…
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Island Creek oysters by way of Duxbury, Mass.
Our friends Kat and Ben are even wilder foodies than we are – they’ll spend their weekends scouring Whole Foods for exotic ingredients, traveling all the way to New York to visit a Bobby Flay restaurant or in Ben’s case, smoking a pork shoulder for 12 hours and topping it with homemade ancho-chipotle sauce. So when they recommended we try Lattitude in West Springfield, we sat up and listened.
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Leeanne Griffin is a freelance writer and food enthusiast.