The Beef With the Beef
When it comes to steaks, HYDEPARKGRILLE sure does rustle up a mean salmon.
By Sara Roahen
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HYDE PARK GRILLE founder Alton Doody has created an elegant atmosphere for
his restaurant.
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WHAT: Hyde Park Grille
CUISNE: Steakhouse
WHEN: Lunch weekdays, dinner nightly
WHERE: 1525 St. Charles Ave., 586-1525
CARDS: Major
In a different era, the only luxury meal when dining out was the kind one
imagines Sinatra and his Rat Pack feasting on between martinis and puffs on
Havanas: a bloody hunk of beef. While dropping a hundred bucks on raw fish and
rice is becoming the measure for culinary class these days, the allure of the
steakhouse and its carnivorous decadence persists. The newly opened Hyde Park
Grille is no exception to such enticement, although I have a beef with the
beef.
Inside, the darkly stained walls, leather booths and copper bar are
decidedly masculine, but something about the place makes a lady feel like a
lady -- a lady who wants a stiff drink and a hand in a high-stakes poker game
maybe, but a lady nonetheless. A cross between a young Marlon Brando and
Christopher Walken, our server expertly distributed leather-bound menus of wine
and food, and then whispered the night's specials as if they were secret
instructions to freeing a friend bound in the basement. Ordering a steak should
always be so tantalizing.
For the most part, a steakhouse is a steakhouse is a steakhouse
when it comes to the menu. This one, too, includes the expected a la carte
strips, filets, ribeyes, porterhouses and standard sides. Not willing to shoot
itself in the foot in New Orleans, however, the Grille offers an all-seafood
appetizer menu as well as several wood-grilled fish. A salmon fillet served
atop a zesty beurre blanc was, in fact, the tastiest entree I sampled.
Salads here begin with the right recipe but fall short in important
details of taste. For example, the Romaine lettuce wedge, not a wedge at all
but a chopped salad, was doused in a creamy blue cheese dressing that was much
more mayonnaise than blue cheese. A salad of tomato slices, red onion and
buffalo mozzarella also was on the right track with ripe juicy tomatoes and a
fresh julienne of basil, but the mozzarella itself was a grainy, almost curdled
consistency unbecoming of a dairy product.
During one of my two dinners at the Grille, four servers in
matching black-and-white-striped vests and black neckties lined up on one side
of our table (looking like a barber shop quartet) before executing a
choreographed presentation of all four entrees at once. At all times, the
service was this impeccably polished. I wish I could say the same about the
entrees they placed before us. I must note that the lackluster food, in part,
could be attributed to the absence of an executive chef during the period of my
meals at the Grille. The restaurant opened its doors three months ago; Rick
Gratia, a managing partner, plans to formalize a contract with a new chef this
week.
Local entrepreneur Alton Doody is the powerhouse behind the
steakhouse, which is now the mothership for his other restaurants scattered
around Ohio. Since Doody opened the first Hyde Park in Cleveland in 1987, the
same company has supplied him with USDA prime beef from Iowa corn-fed cattle.
The company dry-ages all the beef, an old-fashioned method of tenderizing and
concentrating flavor. At the restaurant, the steaks face a state-of-the-art
broiler that quickly cauterizes and chars the outside, allegedly preserving
precious juices.
Somewhere along the line, the meat I tasted was cheated of that
enhanced flavor and those precious juices. When cut open, an a la carte, 9-oz.
center-cut filet mignon ordered medium-rare was a nice red-pink inside,
enclosed with just a narrow circumference of dark flesh. But where were those
oozing juices imbued with meaty essence? Bite after bite was dry and strangely
mealy, with no extraordinary flavor punch. Hardly a bargain at $23. In
fairness, I ordered the same filet on another occasion. The meat was juicier
this time, but the mealy texture prevailed around the outer edges.
True carnivores prefer a good chunk of beef unembellished, the way
the Hyde Park Grille proudly markets them. Salt and pepper, however, are not
embellishments but necessities undetectable on the filet and other cuts of beef
I tried. Two 4-oz. tournedos bound with bacon, topped with blue cheese and
surrounded by a deep bordelaise sauce, are the best selection from the steak
menu. Embellished they might be, but at least the dish is moist and
flavorful.
Like the salads, the well-portioned sides need coaching. For
example, the garlic mashed potatoes were tasteless save a hint of garlic on one
visit; they improved with slight dashes of butter and salt on the next.
If the steaks don't bring me back to the Hyde Park Grille, the
amber-lit ambience will. Next time, I'll order the seafood again, and then I'll
find one of those plush red-velvet chairs next to the piano player in the
raw-silk-curtained lounge. There, I'll order an appropriate dessert: a glass of
20-year port wine ... and maybe even a stogie.
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