Two Finger Lakes
businesses make cheese the old-fashioned way
Posted inNews & Opinion
Adam Wilcox
Posted inNews & Opinion
Walkin’ the dog from Berne to Boston
“High concept” is usually reserved for describing movies, often disparagingly. It’s also useful for describing some restaurants. The high-concept restaurant has an angle you can describe in a few words, one conceived to appeal to a well-defined market. While this seems primarily the domain of chains, the local restaurant that combines quality with concept can […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
Staunch on the unbroken cord
Like his father, Fred, Steve Wayne is a graduate of the Cornell School of Hotel Management, and he’s been in and around restaurants almost his entire life. Fred Wayne ran the WayneHotel in Lyons — named for the county, not the family — when Steve was a boy. But for 45 years, the Wayne family […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
Loss, gain, and the yogic life
Most restaurants have some vegetarian offerings, and some even cater to strict vegans, but those that specialize in serving that population are uncommon here. Ithaca has one on every corner, but Rochester seems to support, basically, one at a time. Twenty years ago it was Jazzberry’s, with it’s creative and inconsistent food. A dozen years […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
Nelida y la Americana
Some spots seem cursed for businesses. When Katherine McGee looked across the street from the Yangtze at the shack on the corner of Church and State, perhaps she was too new to the area to know she was looking at one. Well, so much the better for us. McGee, or la Americana, as some customers […]
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Ricardo’s peck of peppers
After eating anonymously, I introduce myself to a restaurant’s owner to set up an interview. This sometimes inspires horror. Chilango’s owner Ricardo Jordan looked particularly nonplussed, but agreed to meet. When the hour came, Jordan greeted me, introduced his wife, Donna, and then disappeared. Donna, personable in the extreme, told me their story. Ricardo, a […]
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A honeycomb house of impossible style
I am watching Ukrainian MTV on a large screen in the back of the room. My server and cook, Roman Kshysyak, is having a running conversation with me throughout the meal. Every few minutes, an impossibly stylish woman who looks as if she walked out of Connery Bond flick strides by. Table settings include ornate […]
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Big food fun from the Bayou
“Cajun” is a contraction of “Arcadian,” which refers to French-Canadian settlers exiled from Canada in the 18th century. They scattered, with the largest concentration settling in Louisiana. They took classical French cooking ideas and married them to local foodstuffs to create Creole and Cajun cooking (the distinction between is shifty and somewhat classist). The food […]
Posted inNews & Opinion
Not waiting for his ship to come in
After the fire: Wayne Luong recently reopened his Golden Port and House of Sushi restaurants
