MERCATO

The brainchild of a couple of Cornell hotelies, Mercato is a congenial place with an Upper East Side feel, a sophisticated seasonal menu, great food (don't miss the liver paté crostini with pickled red onions), and a fun cocktail list -- try the Corpse Reviver, the Blue Moon, or one of their digestifs.

Unfortunately, they do not fly the local colors on their wine list, so we hope you’ll lean on them to up their representation of Finger Lakes wines - Finger Lakes vintners have much to be proud of these days. No reservations accepted – get there early, late, or right now, before the students return!

108 N. Aurora Street, Ithaca, 607.319.5171

www.mercatobarandkitchen.com

IN CAYUGA HEIGHTS: THE HEIGHTS CAFE'

This is a lunch-time favorite in Cayuga Heights, where the chef’s fertile imagination runs free with unusual combinations of flavors that always seem to work.  Try the oven-roasted Atlantic salmon with pine-nut risotto, capers, tomatoes, anchovies, Manzanilla and Kalamata olives, or the Korean grilled skirt steak with locally grown poi choy, sushi rice, and ginger cream sriracha Mongolian sauce. Somehow, though, after hearing the day’s exotic specials, we always wind up with the pesto-and-mozzarella-slathered flatbread topped with a Caesar salad, a hunk of grilled salmon or fried squid, and plenty of fresh lemon, enough roughage and Omega-3s for two meals.  

Dinnertime brings out faculty members romancing prospective faculty members. Their Wine Spectator Award-winning list features many great local wines as well as a full spectrum of international offerings. Portions are hefty. Service is exceptional. And it’s quiet enough for real conversation.  Fancy that!

903 Hanshaw Road, Ithaca, NY, 607.257.4144

www.heightscafe.com

WHY WE LOVE T'BURG'S HAZELNUT KITCHEN

  




In Trumansburg, riding the ridge between Cayuga and Seneca Lakes' wine trails, Justin Paterson and Lisa Jonckheere turn out an imaginative mix of sophisticated platters in their easygoing surroundings on Trumansburg's Main Street.  They classify their enterprise as "a farm-driven American bistro" with a menu that follows what's fresh on the market. 

We love their shaved Brussels sprouts with crisp batons culled from the pig’s lower reaches, maple sugared hazelnuts, all moistened with restraint in a cider vinaigrette, the whole held together by a perfect poached egg, a sort of breakfast and dessert combined. A Caesar salad, with its tender lettuce, scatter of coarsely ground peppercorns, and toasted brioche slices topped with Parmesan custard is another good choice.  




On other occasions we’ve also enjoyed the chef’s revolving preparations of house-made pork sausage with braised red cabbage, servings large enough to constitute a main course. Locally raised grass-fed-beef burger with blue cheese, crispy shallots, and frites. Plenty of vegetarian options too, and save room for one of their superb desserts. Make reservations – this small place fills up quickly. Closed Tuesdays and Wednesdays.

53 East Main Street, Trumansburg, 607.387.4433; www.hazelnutkitchen.com

LOCAVORES STRIKE IT RICH IN ITHACA -- GET YOUR OWN GOAT (with recipe)

For years local chefs searched in vain for home-grown center-of-the-plate goods, and now there’s no shortage of same, thanks to McDonald Farms, The Piggery, Northland Sheep Dairy, Autumn's Harvest, and others, many of them Ithaca Farmers Market regulars. Blue Stone Bar and Grill’s chef/owner Doug Gruen, a Culinary Institute of America graduate, veteran of many Big Apple top restaurants, and one of Ithaca’s burgeoning mob of talented “buy local, cook local” chefs, purchases vegetables and salad greens in their season from Nathaniel Thompson’s Remembrance Farm in T-burg, a member of the area’s Full Plate Farm Collective.

“The less traveling it has to do makes a big impression on the flavor of produce,” Gruen said. “And to sell [to restaurants], local farmers have to be better than average; they put a lot more effort into making their product more flavorful and tasty.” For winter, though, he has found a good source for goat meat in John Wertis, whose Searsburg BWW Farm produces a variety of goat cuts available year round, from leg of goat (think leg of lamb without the fragrance of Persian lamb coat) to goatburger, great for a warming chili, and even goat summer sausage. Goat meat is also known as chevon or, in the Southwest, cabrito (always makes me think of “cabrito ergo sum”: which translates to “therefore I am a young goat,” which doesn’t make any sense at all, but gives me the giggles). Low in cholesterol and fat (143 calories per 100 grams; chicken has 223, beef 305), and high in flavor, but without venison’s gaminess, goat cooks best at a slow braise, and Gruen’s recipe for goat curry is sure to fill a kitchen with lovely aromas as it cooks, and to elicit a chorus of yums around your table.

Doug Gruen’s Indonesian-style Goat Curry (serves 6)
2 Tbsp canola oil
2 lbs goat meat cubes with bones
1 cup diced onion
½ cup diced carrots
½ cup diced celery
1 tsp chopped garlic
1 Tbsp curry powder (Gruen prefers yellow curry powder, but curry paste can be used, or any other kind of curry powder)
½ tsp dried thyme
¼ tsp freshly ground pepper
1 bay leaf
1 Tbsp tomato paste
1 cup chicken stock
½ cup coconut milk
½ cup low sodium soy sauce
½ cup soy milk
1 Tbsp brown sugar
1 Tbsp lemon juice
½ cup peanut butter, smooth or chunky

 In a hot skillet, brown pieces of goat in canola oil. When meat is browned, add diced onion and sauté until onions take on a little color. Toss in carrots; cook for three minutes. Add celery. Make a place for the garlic in the middle of the sauté pan, and sauté the garlic until it has some color.
At highest heat, add curry powder, thyme, black pepper and bay leaf and sauté for a minute or two.

Then add all other ingredients except peanut butter, and lower flame to medium. Cover and cook until meat is tender and falling off the bone (start checking after an hour or so). Remove meat from pan; de-bone, and discard bones.

Add peanut butter to sauce in pan, whisk in well, then return goat to pan. Taste for seasoning, and serve piping hot with white steamed jasmine rice and the following garnishes: chopped scallions, chopped peanuts, chopped fresh coconut (roasted in a small pan in the oven for a short time), chopped bacon, and mango chutney. Gruen likes to serve all the garnishes in small bowls on a lazy susan in the middle of the table so diners can help themselves.

You, too, can order goat from Wertis’ BWW Farm at 387-4331; check out his Web site, http://goatmeatsny.com/, for additional recipes. You can find even more recipes at http://www.greatgoats.com/cooking.html. Should you have time, space, and inclination, there’s information on growing your own on the Web site of Cornell’s Sheep and Goat Marketing Program, where Trumansburg’s Dr. tatiana [the “T” is lower case] Stanton, a goat expert who got her start running a Peace Corps goat program in Jamaica, holds forth with good information and a few warnings.

We dined recently at Blue Stone Bar and Grill, (110 North Aurora Street, Ithaca) and enjoyed immensely Gruen’s creations, (especially his braised pork shank with brandy-glazed apples and his wasabi-glazed salmon), the restaurant’s atmosphere, and selections from their imaginative drinks menu. Call 272-2371 for information and reservations. You’re in for a treat if there’s curried goat on the menu.

BLUE STONE BAR AND GRILL

Ambling down Aurora Street, it’s hard to miss the Blue Stone Bar and Grill, with its startling blue-lighted façade. Douglas Gruen, a Culinary Institute of America graduate who’s knocked about starred restaurants in New York City and, more recently, in Santa Cruz, and his wife, pastry chef Nancy Gruen, came to Ithaca in search of a sensible place to raise a family and run a business. Since arriving here, they have kept the local quarry and neon sign makers busy.

The focus of Blue Stone’s dining room, accented by its quirky beaded lighting fixtures, is an impressive looking bluestone-topped bar. Bluestone is the local limestone – called Llenroc. Taking our cue from the bar’s smartly stocked shelves, we started our evening with a pair of topflight cocktails: a surprising Magellan martini, its blue blush a product of an iris infusion, and the freshest, fruitiest, summeriest margarita we’ve sipped in ages.

We blissfully kissed our diets goodbye – at least for an evening. Not that they don’t have an excellent selection of salads, but. . . The Gruens sent out a dazzling and tastebud-boggling parade of appetizers. A warm baby artichoke soufflé with little chunks of pecorino romano took the chill off the evening. Chunky-wonderful black bean crab cakes, served on a whoopee cushion of beans with a cap of chipotle tartar sauce, had a delicate flavor followed by a warm and tingly after-burn – nearly better than sex. Char-grilled strips of chicken breast floated in a Thai-esque peanut sesame sauce with a side of cilantro-laced cucumber and red pepper salad, an adventure in freshness. Bacon-wrapped scallops, tender and sweet, were served up in their shells – well, in somebody’s shells -- laced with a creamy Green Goddess sauce. And as we wondered how we’d ever have room for the entrees, a final affront to our diets arrived: rich puff pastry beggars’ purses stuffed with warm brie, pistachios, and dried cranberries, in a pool of raspberry coulis. Aaaaaaahhhhh! Arghhhh! Onward!

We determined gourmands eschewed the beef entrees – Kentucky Bourbon Black Angus sirloin, and grilled filet of beef – to sample a couple of the menu’s more unusual offerings. Jamaican jerk catfish was cooked perfectly, subtly spiced, served over bright, wilted spinach, its flavors brought to life with a sauce of cilantro and lime, with sides of a heavenly sweet potato and caramelized onion hash and meringue-light fried plantains. Across the table, a grilled eggplant half, stuffed with tomatoes and topped with creamy baked goat cheese, had the look of an oversized lobster tail, and a delicious flavor and tenderness. Its side was a homey conglomerate of couscous, lentils, and roasted red peppers. At some future date we look forward to sampling the roasted wasabi salmon with hoisin sriracha chili sauce, and the garlic chicken with a sherry-lemon pan drippings reduction. Bluestone’s chef has a great gift for combining unusual flavors. We were happy to find all presentations blessedly horizontal. The challenge is not in deconstruction, but in cessation.

Though we could barely open our mouths to it, we dutifully report that the carrot cake is moist and satisfying, and the flourless chocolate torte is everything one should be. Either would be delightful with an after-theater nightcap, say a warming brandy, or one of those goofy chocolate things that calls itself a martini.

Next morning we shunned the tyrannical bathroom scale. The day after, we were missing two pounds. We’ll never understand how that happened, but we’d love to fantasize that the Blue Stone diet is the wave of the future. Prices are reasonable. We were lured into writing this review by reports of great hamburgers at lunch. We’ll be back to sample those – and the salads. The place is cozy enough for the waitstaff to monitor patrons’ needs, but large enough to permit privacy – if that’s what you seek. Three cheers for Blue Stone’s friendly, attentive service. The wine selection, though reasonably priced, was a little disappointing, with only one Finger Lakes offering, but we were pleased to see a good number of wines offered by the glass. Blue Stone Bar & Grill, 110 North Aurora Street, is open Tuesday through Saturday from 11:30 a.m. to 10:00 p.m. For information, reservations, and catering, call 272-2371.