Hog & Hominy & the Traveling Times Critic

[lance murphy for the times] andrew ticer, left, and michael hudmanFor his review this week, Pete Wells files the third installment of the Critic on the Road column. The column started in early April with Wells' dual review of Oxheart and Underbelly in Houston. San Francisco's Saison was the focus of the second COTR at the end of April and, today, Wells brings us a look at Hog & Hominy in Memphis.

The restaurant is the sophomore effort of chefs and long-time friends Michael Hudman and Andrew Ticer. "The two men bonded in sixth grade while guarding each other on the basketball court," Wells writes. "Talking outside the gym, Mr. Hudman said, each realized for the first time that he was not the only boy in Memphis who spent “crazy Italian Sundays” at his grandmother’s house eating pasta with what each was convinced had to be the world’s best sauce."

Before Hog & Hominy, Hudman and Ticer opened Michael Andrew Italian Kitchen in 2008. That restaurant "is the dutiful and responsible first born," the critic writes. "Hog & Hominy, which they built in another ranch house across the street four years later, is the scrappy younger sibling who stays up later, keeps rowdier company and gets away with things the older brother can’t." Wells enjoys most of the food at Hog & Hominy, adores the pies, and finds that the chef's second efforts have created "a more relevant and original restaurant."

This is to the credit of the chefs' humble approach to food and a synergy they've found between their past and present. "One day Mr. Ticer was talking to the head charcutier for both restaurants, Aaron Winters, about being a kid," Wells writes, "and splitting a hot dog down the middle, and arranging cheese in the crease, and then blasting it in the microwave until it puffed up and bubbled." The result? A beef hot dog on a pretzel bun with yellow mustard, aka what Wells writes is "as good an example as you’ll find of an American restaurant vastly improving something lowbrow without falling into the trap of making it highbrow."

Critic on the Road is a pleasant break from this city's tough lovin', chew-you-up-and-spit-you-out food culture. Wells clearly takes his enthusiam and passion for food with him when he leaves town, but the reviews he writes of these experiences are without the stars and what can turn into the critic's informed, make-you-or-break-you opinions. That could change should Wells write a negative review for COTR, but that doesn't seem to be the agenda. Instead, these reviews can be read as a breath of fresh air – one thousand plus words about the rest of the country; a pocket many of us New Yorkers sometimes forget about, but a chunk of geography full of food people just as passionate and smart as those doing it here. [NYTimes]

On the Road Again; Wells Visits Saison in San Francisco

[jim wilson for the times]On Apritl 9th, Pete Wells filed a review on two restaurants in Houston: Oxheart and Underbelly, marking the start of a new series for the Times called "Critic on the Road." Today, Wells visits San Francisco, where chef Joshua Skenes and sommelier Mark Bright serve a $298 tasting menu at their restaurant Saison.

Wells ate at the San Francisco restaurant twice, with a year between visits. "During my earlier meal," he writes, "I would have given anything to speed things up." On the food, the critic noted, "A few dishes had a rough, unfinished quality, and some felt repetitive, but others were like nothing I’d seen before." On the service the first time around, Wells "was less thrilled by the attitude of the servers," and writes, "I know nobody asked if I was having a good time, because there were two long stretches when I wanted the whole thing to stop."

One year and a venue change seemed to be the breath of fresh air Skenes and co. needed to hit their stride. Wells found the staff "kinder and less cocky" the second time around, with Bright's wine pairings and desserts from pastry chef Shawn Gawle sharing an elegance that mimics the price tag.

"Saison brings together some of the best and the worst things about tasting menus, but now, I believe, the good has the upper hand. Facing down more than 15 courses, I wasn’t bored once," Wells writes, "and several times I was on the edge of my seat."

In a separate piece written for Diner's Journal, Wells sheds some light on what to expect with the new "Critic on the Road" column. "I think it’s time for the restaurant critic of The Times to cast a wider net," he writes. "The Times has been a national paper for years now, and its Web site is seen all around the world." There are no stars in place for the COTR template, "at least for now" Wells writes. "I don’t intend to skip out on New York City every three weeks," he adds, and explains, "This critic will be on the road regularly, but not that regularly." [NYTimes] [DJ]

Houston, We Have a New York Times Restaurant Review

[photos: michael stravato for the nytimes] clockwise from top left: oxheart, justin yu, underbelly, chris shepherdPete Wells files on two restaurants in Houston, Texas this week in Oxheart and Underbelly, and it looks like we can expect more cross-country reviews from the Times critic. "[Oxheart] is also an example of the growing ambition of the Houston dining scene, and one of two places that lured me here to kick off this occasional series of reviews of restaurants outside New York City." At Oxheart, Justin Yu serves three menus on a nightly basis. Two are four courses ($49), one is seven ($79). But each highlights much of what Yu learned in Northern European kitchens, "he creates plates that take their visual cues from the colors and shapes of nature," Wells writes.

"Some things about Oxheart reminded me of other new restaurants that emphasize the personal and the handmade. The naturalistic look of Mr. Yu’s dishes, too, is familiar. But every course of my meal," Wells continues, "showed an instinct for the delicious that is rare in any city."

A few miles to the southwest of Oxheart on Westheimer Road is Underbelly. There, Wells explains, chef/owner Chris Shepherd tells "a story of many cultures and cuisines meeting in a place that has become the most ethnically diverse metropolitan region in the United States." For one dish, "Mr. Shepherd tosses chewy rice cakes with butter and gojuchang, the Korean chile paste," Wells explains, "which together make something like what you would get if you fermented Buffalo wing sauce and aged it in a barrel."

The star-system isn't in place for the new "Critic on the Road" series, but Wells is a clearly a big fan of both Oxheart and Underbelly. He writes that the restaurants "share Houston, the city that they are both helping to make into one of the country’s most exciting places to eat." [NYTimes]