Friday, February 15, 2008

Top Chef, Broad Ripple, and Blogs

Whither El Morrocco? I'll check it out this week, but Traci Cumbay at the Star reports El Morrocco's phones are disconnected and the restaurant has been dark. A few months ago, they announced a format change to "small plates" and we heard they did away with the floor seating. Anyone know more?


Top Chef Cheftestants Announced: For those of you who aren't Bravo TV junkies (between Project Runway and Millionaire Matchmaker, how can you not be?), Top Chef Chicago starts in just a couple of weeks! The cheftestant bios are online. Here's what we know so far: 7 are from NYC including the chef de cuisine at Mai House (a Bouchon and Le Cirque alum), the chef/owner of 24 Prince, the sous chef from Public, the Lareado native who's exec chef at Dos Caminos (also a Babbo and Le Cirque alum), and the sous chef at Buddakan (also a Vong alum). From San Francisco, there's the chef at Myth Cafe, and the exec chef at Circa (wearing muy gold chains with a dress shirt), and the exec chef at COCO500, along with a club/restaurant consultant. From LA, there's the exec chef from Foxtail. From Chicago, there's a personal chef (hey, Casey did a great job in the last Top Chef) and the chef/owner from Scylla.

Updated Blog List: Just a little light housekeeping, but I've cleaned up a the Indiana blog list and added a few new food blogs. Seems like lots of folks had New Year's resolutions this year to write more about what they're cooking and eating. So, check out Susan Gillie's Indieats.com and a newcomer, Middle West Meals. Welcome to the food blog world! Need help keeping up with all the new blogs on your list? Try a reader or aggregator that will pick up syndicated feeds and bring new posts to you. I use Bloglines -- web-based, simple, and free, but Yahoo, Google and many more have great readers.

Trouble Brewing in Broad Ripple? Rumbles from Broad Ripple are that there may be a fight brewing over approval of Brother's Bar and Grill, slated to begin construction in the trophy shop building across from La Jolla this spring. While the small, mid-western chain is known for expensive renovations and large restaurant spaces, opponents believe another college beer isn't the best idea for the neighborhood. Possibly most alarming is the lack of necessary parking. Some say we should be ready for $10-15 parking on evenings and weekends. Neighborhood restaurant owners are reportedly unhappy and for good reason. Look for more to come this spring as the approval process progresses.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

While this bar isn't my ideal choice of things to be located at this location, the argument about parking is absurd. There is AMPLE parking in Broad Ripple. You just might have to walk a few blocks to get to where you want to go as opposed to parking 5 feet away, like you can in Avon or Fishers. Its a shame that Indy's zoning requirements have such absurd, suburban parking requirements and I applaud the ruling granting this bar and exemption.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the recognition, braingirl.

Au contraire to New Year's resolutioons,indieats became my love 'chil when I broke my arm Oct. 26, 2007.

braingirl said...

Good for you!

re: New Year's. There were actually 5 or so new central Indiana food blogs that sprung up in January. I just happened across Indieats at the same time. I don't put blogs on the list here until they look like they're going to stick around and sure enough, at least two of the new ones haven't updated in a few weeks.

Kirsten said...

Thanks for adding Middle West Meals.

Like Susan, New Year's didn't have a lot to do with the blog, even if my timing made it seem that way. It was really just carving out the time after a very busy year.

It would be such a loss to see El Morocco go away - I'm eager to find out the result of your digging.

Anonymous said...

Somebody must know the sekret places to park in Broad Ripple. In the summer on weekends parking is impossible unless you want to pay people who take over all the lots. My friends who live on sidestreets are sick of people puking on their lawns before they drive home.

Anonymous said...

Braingirl: Did you go to the 7 deadly sins dinner at lex?!?! If so, how was it?