Fresh Mex

Fresh Mex, at the corner of 5th and Keystone. sounds like a chain, but it’s not. I’ve been there a few times now and frankly, I think it’s just as good as Beto’s down the street, a place everyone raves about. So far, I’ve tried three kinds of their terrific tacos, al pastor, carnitas, and chile verde. The all come in a nice fresh tortilla and the meat is perfectly cooked, chewy, but not tough, with little pieces of fat that give it a delectable flavor. My favorite is the al pastor, which is pork marinated in various spices then roasted. Taquerias in Mexico frequently cook the meat on a vertical rotisserie similar to a Turkish doner kabab. Thin slices of meat are then carved off the roast and placed in small tacos with onions and cilantro.



On my last visit I had the enchiladas plate with one chicken and one beef. The food was nicely presented with rice, beans, salad, and a swirl of sour cream on top of the enchiladas, which were covered with a red picante sauce. The chicken enchilada was a little dry, but very flavorful; the in-house made sauce was excellent, with a very earthy taste. Its beefy cousin was outstanding, tender beef with wonderful flavor. I’m not a huge fan of sour cream on my Mexican food, but it went well with the flavors and I felt sad as I ate the last bite. The beans and rice were pretty pro-forma, but when covered with the sauce, were quite good.



All meals at Fresh Mex start with a basket of chips and a bowl of the outstanding salsa fresca. Tomato, onions, cilantro, and hot peppers, it was perfectly made, with enough bite to keep the salsa interesting. The chips are freshly made and had great taste.

The service at Fresh Mex is outstanding. Both of the women that have waited on me have been friendly and efficient, often returning to my table to see how I’m doing. The owner frequently walks among the diners also, saying hello and asking how the food it. Years ago there was a Chinese restaurant at this location where my son Matt and I used to get a lot of take-out, even though it wasn’t very good. It was followed by a place called California Burgers that also served Chinese food―not very good either. The owner of Fresh Mex tells me that people still come in asking for Chinese cuisine. What they can get instead is some of the best and most authentic Mexican food in Reno.

Lemons & Limes ... Getting Expensive??

The news reports that the recent freezing temperatures in California's Central Valley has caused the loss of approximately three-quarters of the state's $1 billion citrus crop. The Golden State supplies about 87% of the country's lemon crop. This big freeze, according to reliable sources, will cause the citrus prices to go up, including lemons. Go up? Holy smoke, they've been so expensive the past few years they ought to be called yellow gold. When did someone decide that a dollar was a good price for a lemon? Well, go to supermarkets in Reno and you find plenty of them for a buck a pop. Granted, they can be found a lower prices—I buy them in bags of five at Trader Joe's for $2.79, but they're not monsters, by any means.

So what can we expect if the price goes up—three dollars apiece? And what about limes? Will they become green jewels? Some stores in Reno try to get away selling them for 50 cents each, Albertson's for one. I buy them at the King Ranch Market on Well Ave., where they're always at least 4 for a dollar and sometimes twice that. If they go up I may have to quit drinking gin & tonics—heaven forbid!

Boeuf Bourguignon

Vicki and I had some friends for dinner last evening and I decided to to make boeuf bourguignon. It's something that I haven't cooked for a long time, but years ago I used to prepared it frequently. It's part of the basic repetoire I learned from Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking Vol 1. This book, along with her long running show, The French Chef (1962-73), founded my interest in fine cooking.

I love this dish, slow simmered pieces of beef swimming in a rich wine sauce with mushrooms, and pearl onions. It's classic French comfort food, perfect for the cold winter nights we've been having in Reno lately.


My dish is a variation on the Julia Child recipe. I researched a number of different recipes and came up with this one, which has some added ingredients. Basically, pieces of beef are browned, then slowly simmered for hours with bacon and vegetables in red wine. I also added beef broth, which is traditional, but some recipes don’t include it. I was very pleased with the results. I’m not sure it’s better than Julia’s recipe, just a variation.


We served the stew with garlic-celery root mashed potatoes, a classic Caesar salad, and for dessert, a lemon-yogurt cake with blueberry sauce and vanilla ice cream. The wine to accompany the dinner was Vino Noceto Sangiovese (2002) from Amador County’s Shenandoah Valley and a Cloudline Pinot Noir (2005) from Oregon.


Vicki is a fabulous dessert maker, but I promised to make the entire dinner, so I tried this Ina Garten recipe for Lemon Yogurt Cake with blueberry sauce. Everything went pretty smooth except when I poured the batter into the pan and popped it into the oven, I realized that I'd forgotten to add the eggs--quickly it came out, back into the mixing bowl, eggs added, beaten, and back into the oven. Okay, time was getting short and I was going too fast. Our guests loved it!

Sezmu

Vicki and I were excited about going to dinner at Sezmu last evening. It’s received a number of rave reviews and best of all, it is only two blocks from our house! When I first moved to the neighborhood the spot where Sezmu now resides was occupied by the Great Harvest Bread Company, renowned throughout Reno for its freshly baked bread. Then about two years ago they moved to Plumbgate, a yuppie little shopping center at Plumb Lane and Arlington Ave. Next came Bec’s, a frozen custard place that didn’t last very long. About six months ago I noticed there was a sign in the vacant spot indicating that a restaurant was going to open there. Finally, in November I drove by in the early evening and saw people eating at small tables—Sezmu had finally arrived!

Sezmu is on the east side of a fairly unattractive building on Mt. Rose Street. It’s a small space, but they’ve done a great job with the furnishings and décor. The west wall is covered with large fabric squares lit from below with lights embedded in the top of the long banquette. The remainder of the walls are the original red brick with windows all around and a high beam ceiling. Seating is at small tables along the two walls, along with bar seating on the opposite side and two tall tables near the kitchen.

The three-tiered menu is not huge, but is certainly innovative and wide-ranging. The wine list is extensive and varied with both inexpensive and more pricey bottles—we chose a nice sauvignon blanc from New Zealand, which we enjoyed with the fresh home-baked bread.

The first menu tier consists of several small bites including house marinated olives, sweet potato chips, and almond stuffed dates with bacon bits. The is followed by a number of small plate appetizers. We started with crispy fried calamari on a bed of pickled vegetables. It was wonderful—perfectly crisp calamari that went well with the unusual Thai basil sauce and the spicy/tangy vegetables. Next came the Beet Study, beets presented in three different ways—all of which show off the vegetable's fabulous flavor. Finally, seared diver scallops with cauliflower puree, red curry, and almond-raisin salad. This was heaven, beautifully cooked scallops, with inspired accompaniments. We both agreed that these were the best scallops we’ve ever had.

We decided to split an entrée and settled on the pork chop that comes with parsnip-pear puree, chard, and orange gastrique. This was a pork chop to make you completely rethink any previous ideas you may have had about pork: it was full of flavor, moist, and delightful with the vegetables that lay underneath. Other entrees on the menu included beef, fish, lamb, chicken and pasta—all very innovatively prepared, with a true passion for the food itself. Dessert consisted of a ru-laced crème brulee, gingersnaps, and roasted pineapple. Accompanied, of course with a couple of espressos.

The service too was outstanding; our server was helpful, knowledgeable, and even found time to stand and chat with us. The food came quickly, but not too … and there was always someone there when we needed something. The seating is cozy, which enabled us to have a wonderful conversation with the two couples seated next to us—longtime Reno residents who were also thoroughly enjoying their meal.

The chef/owners of Sezmu are the husband and wife duo of Larry Dunning and Kristi Hoffman. Dunning is the former owner/chef of Truffula in Tahoe City and executive chef at Squaw Valley’s Plumpjack Café and the Westside Café in Tahoe City. Evidently, Chef Troy and Coleen Cannan, the owners of LuLou's Restaurant, wanted to get Larry and Kristi to Reno so they helped them find the Mt. Rose Street location.

Sezmu is just what Reno needs; creatively prepared food with an emphasis on freshness and the use of organic ingredients, presented in an outstanding manner. Its menu gives the diner an opportunity to eat a variety of light plates or have a more substantial entrée. It’s everything that an innovative upscale neighborhood restaurant should be. By the way, the name Sezmu comes from that of the Egyptian deity of wine and oil presses.

670 Mount Rose St. Reno
327-4448

New Year Lobster - Addendum

I received a very apologetic phone call yesterday from the manager of the Raley's food story on Keystone. He said that more than a third of the Maine lobsters the Reno stores had ordered died on their way here from the Bay Area. No reasons why, perhaps they didn't like the altitude in the Sierra.

It's great to get this kind of follow-up. Makes the consumer feel like he/she has a voice. I should add that they are sending me a $20 gift card for my trouble -- I think I'll start sending them a complaint once a week.

New Year Lobster

Vicki and I spent New Year’s Eve with our good friends Tom and Joyce. We wanted to do something simple, so Joyce suggested lobsters―Raley’s was having a sale on the Maine imports ($9.99 lb.) and they had purchased a couple on Friday afternoon. I stopped at Raley’s that evening but they were all sold out, or at least couldn’t be found. I called the next morning and was told that they were gone from all Reno Raley’s stores because there had been some question regarding the origin of the lobsters―only a small number had been ordered. Mr. Thrifty was disappointed, but went to Albertson’s and found them for $12.99 lb. These were BIG BOYS, almost three lbs. each! I swallowed hard and ordered two, watching as they were fished out of the tank by an apprehensive clerk; sure he was going to be shredded by these denizens of the deep.

I decided to prepare the briny boys using a recipe my friend Dan had found in the food/wine section of the SF Chronicle. It consists of par-boiling the lobsters for a few minutes, cooling them to room temperature, then coating them with seasoned butter and finishing them in a 400 degree oven. No problem, right? I dumped the lobsters in my sink and discovered I didn’t have a pot nearly big enough to accommodate even one of them. Out to the car, race to Marshall’s to find a big pot− no luck− so I dash across Plumb Lane to Gottschalk’s where an 11 qt. stockpot is found for $40 bucks. No problem for Mr. Moneybags. It rings up as a sale item for $16.00, I coulda kissed the young sales clerk, but resisted, fearing she’d have me arrested.

Back home, the lobsters are thrashing around in the sink. I quickly dismissed the idea of clubbing them to death, so boiled water, added salt and plopped one in. Fifteen minutes later I had two red boys in post-mortem, cooling down.

The remainder of the cooking went quite well. The lobsters were fabulous, accompanied by Vicki's wonderful Caesar salad and an outstanding bottle of Chateau Woltner Russian River Chardonnay. We finished up with a croissant bread pudding, a recipe I got from the Barefoot Contessa, Ina Gartin; well, not from her personally, but her tv show. This dessert is not for dieters, as it contains three whole eggs, eight yolks, 1 1/2 cups of sugar and six buttery croissants. But it was loved by all and Vicki had some for her New Year’s Day breakfast as we watched the Rose Parade.

Here are links to the recipes I used:

Roast Lobster – SF Chronicle
Croissant Bread Pudding – Ina Garten