The Tap Room - Totally Tapped Out

Sunday, August 16th - The Tap Room, Schlafly Brewing, Downtown St. Louis, MO

Bless her generous heart ... when Grimace gets an idea in her head she latches on to it like a bulldog with a steak bone. Granted, in this situation Jay and I were partly responsible for the muck-up, but the woman refused to try for a meal on a different weekend.

It went something like this:

Grimace: We haven't seen D&J for a while; I think I'm going to send them a note and ask them to meet us for dinner at the Spaghetti Factory on the 15th. Will that work for you and Jay?

Bendy: This is July ... and why are you sending them a note? Why don't you just call them? But ... yeah, I think the 15th will be fine.

Grimace: I'm unemployed now, remember? I need something to fill the hours - I can't gamble all the time.

And so the plan was hatched. Then Jay and I threw a wrench into the mix by winning a bid on baseball tickets for the 15th. Then the Missouri Department of Transportation tossed us a rotten egg - they were closing all west-bound traffic on Highway 64-40 for the entire weekend for emergency bridge inspections / repairs. While I appreciate their diligence, perhaps they shouldn't have re-striped a bridge designed to carry two lanes of traffic to one that can "carry" three lanes of traffic. They have no one to blame for this predicament but themselves - waaaay back during the great flood of 1993 they had their chance to re-build that rickety piece of bridge-work spanning the Missouri River and were too slow-witted to figure out that development was moving West. And so today, rather than spend money building a new three-lane bridge, we have three narrow lanes of traffic moving perilously west on a bridge that wasn't constructed to withstand it. We try to avoid using the Boone Bridge whenever possible ... in our minds it's an unnecessary risk like smoking or using an electric tea kettle while taking a bath.

Anyhoo, this all meant meant that in order to get home from the restaurant Grimmie wanted us all to meet at Jay and I would have to travel many, many, miles out of our way. Being selfish jerks we immediately placed a call to the parental unit and requested a change of venue, change of date, and even suggested pushing it back to another weekend.

Grimace was all for a change of venue and pushing dinner from Saturday to Sunday but that was it - we're meeting this weekend, and it will take more than a bridge closure to change that! So Jay and I suggested the Tap Room as a dining alternative. While it represented a long haul for us, it would be a fairly easy spot for the parents and D&J to reach ... and they have hearty pub-style food and wonderful beer. What could be better?

Turns out a lot could have been better, more's the pity.

The Tap Room consistently wins awards for favorite local pub and grub, but either their standards have gone way downhill or we caught them on a bad day. Our waitress was a little less than knowledgeable when we asked which beers were on tap and I caught her flat-footed a little while later when I wanted to know which cheeses were featured on their cheese plate. Turns out almost none of the specialty brews that Schlafly is fond of touting were available that afternoon and what we did choose was served in wonky glasses. We wanted pints and we might have even wanted more than one but nobody ever came back to ask us if our thirst had been quenched until it was obvious that we were getting ready to leave. As for the cheese plate ... all I can say is WHAT WERE THEY THINKING???

It's a pub. Their cheese plate should include cheddar, Stilton, maybe some brie, or perhaps some goat or sheep's milk cheese. Wanna get interesting? Throw some white Stilton on there and WOW the polish right off my toenails. But lavender-infused goat and lemon-thyme something-or-other just don't work for me in a pub, and those cheeses don't seem like they'd work too well with beer, either. If they'd offered a boursin I might have been more willing to take the plunge, but the last cheese was a plain old stinky Stilton and that was the final nail in the coffin ... no cheese plate for our table.

It's the bar!


I ordered a glass of Biere de Garde, which is one of Schlafly's bottle conditioned beers - this one is based on a French farmhouse-style ale; it has a slightly sweet maltiness and seems to pair well with a variety of foods in my humble opinion. Jay selected Schlafly's Oatmeal Stout, which is one of the brewery's "standard" beers - that means it's available year-round in bottles or on tap. I took a taste of Jay's beer since I've recently discovered that stouts are pretty damn tasty and this one was smooth with a nice blend of sweet and bitter. Jon ordered a beer, too; it's lurking in the background of the picture below, but farg if either Jay or I can remember what it was.

Biere de Garde and Oatmeal Stout


Well, when we get together at table there are usually a couple of appetizers being shared around and this meal was no different. After much discussion the group consensus was for Bavarian Style Pretzels served warm with White Cheddar Dipping Sauce, and Beer Bread - Pale Ale Bread served with Cheddar Butter and Bleu Cream Cheese.

Pretzels from Bavaria???


Beery Bread

The clear winner in this contest was the beer bread, hands down. I guess if Bavarian-style pretzels are hard, chewy, somewhat stale, and coated with salt then these were awesomely authentic. Having never been to Bavaria I cannot say if these were, in fact, true to the original. I will say that the white cheddar sauce was very very good, and did make up a little for the overall cussedness of the pretzel sticks. I'm still not convinced, however, that those pretzels weren't the same ones that are sold on Stinktown city streets in brown paper bags on the weekends ... if you're looking to break a tooth or give someone a concussion, then these are the food / weapon of choice. The beer bread, on the other hand, was wonderful - soft, warm, and yeasty it really hit the spot. And while it was equally good with the cheddar butter and the bleu cream cheese, my personal preference, oddly enough, was the bleu cream cheese. I know, I know ... Bendy doesn't like bleu cheese ... but this was mild and creamy, much more like a subtle boursin than a stinky, toe-jamb, cave-aged bleu cheese. At the end of the evening there was no bread left but there were still plenty of pretzels which tells you which of these two appetizers was truly the only one worth ordering.

When it came time to place our dinner order, I actually chose a salad because nothing else sounded remotely appealing. My selection was a Spinach Salad served with Grilled Chicken, Feta Cheese, and Bacon-Sherry Vinaigrette. While salad can be the intestinal kiss of death for this Old Crohn, for some reason spinach doesn't bother me like other greens. I don't order it often when we are dining out, but love to eat fresh spinach salad at home where the bathroom is just a few quick steps away should digestive disaster strike.

Spinach Salad Surprise

I was most displeased when this arrived at the table. For one thing it was covered in red onions, which were nowhere mentioned on the menu. I hate red onions like I hate mushrooms and olives ... none shall pass my lips. The other reason I was displeased is that every single spinach leaf glistened with vinaigrette. I blame myself for not asking that the dressing be served on the side - that was a stupid mistake on my part - but what gives with adding ingredients to the dish that aren't even listed on the menu??? It's a good thing for me that Grimmie likes onions so much ... she picked 'em out of my salad faster than you could say "pass the mouthwash."

Jay and Jon both ordered the same entree: Bangers and Mash with Red Onion Gravy and Fried Onions. If you ask me there seems to be a real onion-y theme going down at the Tap Room these days ... but the really strange thing about this dish was that the "fried" onions apparently means onion tings which was a surprise to all parties at our table. Hey Schlafly's ... how 'bout some Truth in Ordering???

Onion Rings with a side order of Mash


The good news is that both Jon and Jay enjoyed their dinner selections and that's really the most important thing, but I'm pretty sure that Jay likes the Bangers & Mash he's ordered down at WDW better than this version.

Dylan ordered Shepherd's Pie, only that's not really what it's called on the menu. I think he actually chose the Steak and Mushroom Pie - a British Meat Pie with a Green Onion Cheddar Biscuit. I believe that once he actually reached the meat / stew portion of his meal he liked it, but that topping was a catastrophe. If you ask me, and no one did, it looks like someone dumped half a box of Bisquick into a cement mixer and then spread it across this dish after it began to harden. The poor guy practically needed a jack-hammer to break on through to the other side.

That biscuit looks like the Lost Continent of Atlantis


Grimmie ordered her usual stand-by: The One-Pound Reuben with Corned Beef, Griddled Rye, Kraut, Swiss Cheese, and Thousand Isle Dressing with Potato Salad on the side. She was happy and that's all there was to it. Jen ordered a Vegetable Pita which came with sprouts and cucumber sauce and nasty purple slaw - she seemed to like the pita but wasn't interested in the slaw. Don't blame her one bit - I wouldn't want it either!

I can't speak for anyone else but Jay and I really thought this whole meal was "meh." It didn't live up to our expectations at all and it will be a long time before we decide to try the Tap Room again. The next time we get a crave for pub food in Stinktown we'll go back to the Scottish Arms. And as an aside I apologize for putting this here rather than at the end but this effing programming is driving me bugshit and keeps arbitrarily changing font sizes and styles on me. So I'm quitting now before I throw the damned laptop out the front window.

The only thing better than a Philly Cheese Steak is a Reuben

Veggie Pita with Purple Slaw ... it tastes like purple!

Busch Stadium V.3 ... Third Time's a Charm???

Cardinals vs. Padres, Saturday, August 15, 2009

We didn't even expect to attend another baseball game this year after being fortunate enough to be invited to join some friends in a private box in July. But sometimes fortune smiles twice and while participating in a trivia night for a local school we put in a bid for some baseball tickets. Miracle of miracles I won the silent auction and got four tickets that retailed for $265 for a mere Benjamin. The school gets extra money from us and we get to attend another baseball game - HUZZAH!!!

Even better ... these seats were in something called the Redbird Club. It's a private entrance area on the third level of Busch Stadium that has its own concession stands, bars, and bathrooms housed in an enclosed, air conditioned pavilion with tons of flat panel television sets and comfy seating. It's conceivable that someone could have a ticket to the baseball game in the Redbird Club and never actually leave the place to take his or her seat in the stadium proper.

What, I ask, is the fun in that???

Jay and I considered inviting several different someones to join us but in the end decided that we would rather have the evening to ourselves and would just sell the other two tickets. There are always people skulking around downtown St. Louis looking to score cheap baseball tickets. As long as you don't "scalp" your tickets it's perfectly legal to sell them on the streets - we sold ours to the first taker who turned around and then sold them to someone else! HAHA!!!

I may be in the minority among Stinktown baseball fans, but I don't really like this newest incarnation of the ballpark, or Busch Stadium V.3. It's visually clunky and the concourses are airless and sticky ... like being stuck inside the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory right before the fire broke out. There is nothing unique about this stadium that hasn't been seen in any team's "retro" stadium rebuild since the Atlanta Braves started the trend in 1996. At least they had the Olympic Games as an excuse for a complete and total lack of imagination ... all the Cardinal ownership had was the joy of not spending very much of their own money to build "baseball heaven."

Yeah, you read that right. The public address announcer actually welcomes fans to Baseball Heaven before the start of each game.

Hubris much?

I love the Redbirds as much as any other dork who cut his or her teeth on a corkball, but I don't drink the kool-aid, ya know what I mean?

Baseball Heaven.

The last time I checked that was in an Iowa cornfield where the ghost of Shoeless Joe Jackson was wearing shoes and Kevin Costner was pretending to be a farmer.

But I digress. We had a good time at the game, especially because the right team won. The Redbird Club had stands selling the usual ballpark fare: dogs, brats, pretzels, nachos; but they also had burgers, pizza, chicken nuggets, pretzel dogs, Asian stir fry, monster cupcakes, and gelato. The beer offerings were swilly and we both got a big laugh out of the fact that a bottle of water at Busch Stadium costs five dollars while a bottle of water at WDW only costs two. Who would have thought Disney would offer something less expensive than Stinktown???

There are no food porn pictures to share with you ... mainly because other than Jay's box o' stir fry we didn't order anything worth photographing. And while I would have loved to take pictures of the various stands and their product offerings there were just too many people milling cluelessly around. And speaking of people in general ... what gives with the texting while at a baseball game? There must have been at least ten people in our section who spent the entire night texting, putting their phones away, being beeped or otherwise alerted that a message of the highest importance had been received, pulling their phones out, and then texting some more ... except for those times when they were standing up in the middle of play to take a self portrait with the baseball diamond in the background.

WTF???

Not interested in the game? Fine, but for gawd's sake let the rest of us enjoy it in relative peace. And while I'm thinking about it, you gormless, double-jointed thumb-monkeys, could you please refrain from taking pictures with your phone and otherwise blocking the field of play until the mid-inning break?

I didn't come down to your seat, thrust my ample behind into your face, and expel fart gas at you ... the least you could do is not thrust your effing blackberry or iphone into my field of vision ten times in a row in one half-inning while the game is being played.

There's a reason I'm referred to as the Cranky Crohn. ;-)

And now, please enjoy some pictures from our evening.

Tickets


Keener Plaza - the Old Courthouse where the Dred Scott decision was originally heard


Fun little MLB-decorated arches leftover from the All-Star Game


Yep ... 10-times World Champions ... only the Skankees have won more.


View of the field from our seats




Look ... no cell phones ... yet


Mr. Baseball

Fly your freak flag high!

WAAAAASAAAAABI!!!!!

Sushi, Sushi, Sushi ... Eat Them Up Yum!!!

Jay and I were the fortunate recipients of a gift certificate to a local sushi joint called Wasabi this past Christmas season and we finally decided to put it to good use. They have more than one location in St. Louis but the closest one to our stinky homestead is in Clayton - a harrowing thirty-mile drive over the river and through the stench-filled haze that surrounds the city.

To get back into practice for our upcoming WDW trip we snapped a self portrait.

Say Fisheeeeeez!


For some reason we expected Wasabi to be much larger than it actually was ... I guess we've just become too accustomed to dining in places outside of Stinktown that are designed to serve multitudes of guests at the same time. This is not meant to be a criticism, just an observation. Luckily Jay and I arrived shortly after they opened for dinner so they weren't very crowded; by the time we left the place was filling up fast (and we were able to ogle other peoples' sushi on our way out). Despite the relative smallness of the restaurant Jay and I actually liked Wasabi's decor, which was clean and simple and welcoming.

Sushi Bar


To start our evening off properly we ordered some Nigori Sake, a variation of which we first tried last fall at WDW (where else, right?). We enjoyed this sake, but both agreed that we've tried a couple of others that were better - the problem with this statement is that neither of us can remember the names of the other two Nigoris that we prefer to this one. Now that's a special kind of stupid.

A bucket with your Sake?


These plates need sushi, STAT!


Alright ... lemme tell you what we ordered before I share the cool presentation with you:

Nigiri:

2 pieces of Bluefin Tuna
2 pieces of Sake (Salmon)
1 piece of Smoked Salmon
1 piece of Hotate (Scallop)
1 piece of Maguro (Yellowfin Tuna)
1 piece of Unagi (Freshwater Eel)

Rolls:

1 Crazy Roll - tuna, salmon, yellowtail, cucumber, avocado, and spicy sauce.
1 Rainbow Roll - inside out California Roll with five kinds of mysterious fish.
1 Caterpillar Roll - unagi, smoked salmon, cucumber, avocado, and massago.
1 Terry Roll - fresh Scotland salmon, cucumber, crunch (roe), and spicy mayo wrapped in soy bean paper.

It's a boatload of fish!!!

Is that or is that not the coolest sushi delivery you've ever seen? Some patrons of a less gluttonous nature than Jay and me had their sushi presented on little arched bridges similar to those you might see stretching over a lily pond. We thought that was pretty neat and we also cracked ourselves up by suggesting that it should be mandatory presentation for patrons who order unagi so that they can call it the Bridge Over the River Unagi.

HAHAHAHAHA!!!

Bluefin & Salmon Nigiri

Salmon and Unagi Nigiri

Smoked Salmon and Yellowfin Nigiri

Hotate Nigiri

So, what did we think? It was lovely and light and tasty ... the best sushi we've had since leaving Florida last October. The nigiri surprise of the night for me was that I liked the eel and thought the scallop was disgusting. The eel was no different than eating meat - a little chewy but with a mild flavor that the soy sauce really enhanced. The scallop, on the other hand, had the consistency of slimy, chewy mucous - kind of rubbery with a texture that made my digestive gears threaten to slam into reverse faster than I could yell, "where's the barf bag!?"

And then it was time to dive into the rolls we ordered. I started with a piece of the Terry Roll and the Crazy Roll, which ended up being my two favorites of the evening. The Terry Roll was light and crunchy and I really liked that it was rolled with soy bean paper, which was light and crisp and a nice change from seaweed, which can sometimes bother the Crohn goblin. And the crazy roll was a wonderful mix of tasty fish with just a hint of spice - the seaweed made it a little chewy at times but overall it was a definite winner.

Terry Roll and Crazy Roll

My next choice was a piece of Rainbow Roll, which in this case is a California Roll with various fishies draped over the top. This was OK - not as good as I had hoped it would be, but I think that mentally I was comparing this to the Rainbow Roll we first tried at Wolfgang Puck's in October. And who in Stinktown can possibly compete with the god-like fishlieness of the Puck???

Rainbow Roll with Tuna ...

Jay and I were a little disappointed in the presentation of the Caterpillar Roll only because on the menu they actually show it presented as a bug, with eyes and attenae and a green wrap. I guess it looked a little buggy, but because it was tucked into the middle of our sushi boat the whole effect was lost. The caterpillar was my least favorite of all the rolls we ordered - I thought it had too much sauce and a distinctly smoky flavor, both of which are things that turn me off. Jay made a good point and that was this: there was a lot of stuff going on in that roll and the texture was a little odd, so it's not really a surprise that I didn't like it as much as some of the others. With sushi, as with many other food joys that I've discovered over the years, I like things simple and clean whenever possible.

Caterpillar Roll & Terry Roll

Terry, Crazy, and Rainbow Rolls

Our overall impression was strongly favorable - not only would we go back to Wasabi but we would recommend it to all of our friendies. They actually have quite an extensive menu that includes appetizers, entrees, combination meals, and tempura but on this visit we only had eyes for sushi.

On the drive home I told Jay that I really wanted some Dairy Queen for dessert ... a place we haven't paid a visit to in years. My lovey hubby obligingly stopped at the DQ drive-through just a few minutes from our house and I ordered an Oreo / Brownie Sundae type thing and Jay chose a Peanut Buster Parfait (or as my mom always calls it ... a barfait).

Here I am getting ready to inhale both desserts ... one for each hip!

So hungreeeee...

Oreo-Brownie Caloric Overload

Mmmm, that's good barfait


Our desserts really hit the spot .... light, airy, cold, white-flavored soft serve drowning in hot fudge and / or peanut buttery goodness. Ahhhh, who doesn't like a Saturday evening sugar rush like this?

Now, I promised you guys a funny story about Dairy Queen and I'm going to make good on that - unless you don't think this is remotely amusing, but I can't do anything about that. ;-)

Many, many years ago when Jay and I were dating we would occasionally venture over to a DQ near my parents house and indulge in a frosty treat or two. Even then, which was pre-Crohns diagnosis, I avoided certain foods because I knew they bothered me even though I didn't know why. Among those foods were nuts of all shapes and sizes. So one evening when Jay and I placed our order I requested my Hot Fudge Brownie Delight sans nuts - normally they would sprinkle almonds or some other nut over the top of the dessert, but I always requested that mine be served plain.

Jay's barfait arrived at the counter in short order but for some reason it seemed to be taking my brownie delight a verrrry long time to make an appearance. It's not a difficult dessert to make: add soft serve to container; open pre-made brownie, split in half, tuck into soft serve on either side of said container; add two pumps of hot fudge and a spritz of whipped cream; present to customer and have a nice day.

I noticed suddenly that the young lady who had taken my order was standing over a trash can with what appeared to be one of the brownies for my dessert. I squinted for a moment and then clapped a hand over my mouth to smother the shriek of laughter that was bubbling up from my belly. I turned away from the counter and started giggling, motioning to Jay to come closer so that I could share my discovery with him.

The poor girl had taken my request for a nut-free dessert so literally that she was patiently picking bits of nut out of the brownie and flicking them into the trash with her fingernails.

It took several minutes for both Jay and me to compose ourselves to the point where we could speak intelligibly. And then I immediately told her that I didn't mean that she had to de-nut the brownie, I only wanted to be sure that she didn't sprinkle nuts over the top of the dessert after she was done making it. She looked like I'd just given her the best present ever and much to my relief tossed the brownie into the trash can and started making my dessert all over again ... without picking the brownie to pieces in the process.

The lesson is: be careful what you ask for, especially at Dairy Queen!!!