Bix Engels: Let's Eat!

The emphasis has definitely shifted to the sweet side of eating, but there is still sustenance food. Although not of the caliber of the previous incarnation, the simple, sensible foods the Jeff now offers are light and healthy--soups aren’t made with heavy cream, salads have the dressings on the side, and nothing is drowning in mayo or overburdened with cheese.

Sandwiches are made each day and kept in the cooler; from 11 to 2, the kitchen will grill the sandwich for you, if you wish. Each is named for some aspect of Thomas Jefferson’s life, so you can make a parlor game of the meal by quizzing your lunch mates on the TJ tie. In the homey "Virginia,” the flavors were there in full force--who could complain with goat cheese, fresh basil, and smoked red peppers?--but it was weighed down by too much bread, which had got too hard on the grill. I wanted to explore the “Sacagawea”--tuna salad on a fresh croissant--but I was told that the outsourced croissant dough had not been baking well. Instead, the staff made a Sacagawea for me on Parmesan-pepper bread that had gone slightly stale. In the end I favored the “Sally Hemming” (their spelling)--grilled chicken, dill Havarti cheese, and sliced apples wrapped in a sun-dried tomato flat bread, which I had with homemade chips in a Chinese-takeaway-style box on the side.

The soups and salads in the cold case are the work of Melissa Reid, a longtime server at Zingerman’s Roadhouse who decided to put her passion for cooking to work in her own business, Soups from Scratch by Melissa. Her soups are available at the Jeff warm at lunchtime, or from the cooler case to take home. Salads include creations like a fresh corn slaw with crisp cabbage and kernels just sheared from the cob and very lightly dressed. Another summery delight was the spicy sesame noodle salad with fresh ginger, cilantro, and jalapeño swirling around vermicelli. A reheatable wedge of polenta covered with mixed sautéed mushrooms and blue cheese was commendable. And I thought the Yukon Gold potato salad was fantastic--until I bit into a Band-Aid. Reid seemed devastated when I called to tell her about it, and owner Mary Rasmussen later phoned to say that Reid is meticulous about food safety. I like Reid a lot, and her food could be a high point of the new Jeff, so I’m betting it was a one-in-a-million fluke--and that now that she knows about it, it will never happen again.

In contrast to the levelheaded soups and sandwiches, Rasmussen’s sweets are extravagant--like the dense yellow cake with layers of buttercream and raspberry puree, or the rich carrot cupcakes with nuts and a swirl of sweet creamy frosting. The cookies are exceptional too--like the shortbread with a layer of soft butterscotch and a cover of hard dark chocolate, or the Czech kolacky, hamantaschen-like triangles of crumbly dough wound around apricot jam and sprinkled with poppy seeds. Perfect alongside are the coffees and teas, both of which come from Michigan companies, Mighty Good Coffee and Great Lakes Tea and Spice.

All those beautifully decorated cakes give the place an air of celebration. And even on my first visit, I learned that Jefferson Market is still capable of making more good memories. It was the day the Dalai Lama came to Ann Arbor. A friend and I went to the morning teaching in cavernous, stuffy Crisler Arena, but when we emerged at lunch it was a perfect spring day, the kind of day you just have to play hooky. So we skipped out on His Holiness’s afternoon class and cruised over to sit in the sun and eat cake at one of the little tables outside the market. Somehow I think he’d approve.
--Bix Engels

Jefferson Market and Cakery
609 West Jefferson / 734-665-6666
jeffersonmarketandcakery.com
Mon.-Fri. 7 a.m.-6 p.m., Sat. 7:30 a.m.-
7 p.m., Sun. 10 a.m.-1 p.m.
Sandwiches $6.50-$8, soups $3.50, salads $5-$7, desserts $1.25-$3.50 (whole cakes and pies also available)
Steps at entry; not easily accessible to the disabled

Okay, I'm a sucker for the new menu concept--focusing on fresh, seasonal ingredients from local farmers--and even if more and more restaurants are charting the same course, I’m always thrilled to see another. And Vinology is doing more than paying lip service to a hot trend: Johns can be seen walking the walk at the Farmers’ Market, and he lists many of the local farms whose produce and products are on the week’s menu. The offerings are serendipitous, like the seasons. One night we lucked into a starter from the chef’s own garden--ephemeral squash blossoms, long delicate buds stuffed with creamy herbed goat cheese, fried with a whisper of tempura batter, and served with a green tomato sauce alongside. On another, we reveled in a plate of gnocchi and Michigan morels.
It’s not all Michiganiana, of course; we’ve grown accustomed to our Alaska salmon and gulf shrimp. But Johns combines even the more exotic ingredients with elements recognizable from our own backyard--and does so with imaginative flair. His seared scallop appetizer comes with a swirl of sweet-potato puree and a really smashing gingery compote built around rhubarb that sprang from Washtenaw soil. To go even more local, try the fennel-and-goat-cheese tart, a flat crisp of puff pastry spread with whipped goat cheese from Four Corners Creamery in Tecumseh and topped with chopped braised fennel from the Farmers’ Market alongside a lightly dressed mound of baby lettuces from one of his steady sources--Chelsea’s organic Tantré Farm, or Prochaska Farms, a third-generation operation between Saline and Tecumseh.
Johns’s kitchen is producing its own terrines and pates to excellent effect--as his staff showed on their charcuterie plate, which makes a fine shared starter and works in perfect synergy with a glass of wine (pairings are suggested on the menu). On the night we sampled it, the plate was arranged with three thin slices of classic rolled prosciutto (from La Quercia, an artisanal producer in Norwalk, Iowa), a tiny terrine of the house’s chicken liver pâté covered in a thin layer of duck fat, a wonderful rough-textured country pâté made with duck, and classic accompaniments--house-made crackers, spicy grainy mustard, and crisp cornichons.
The smokery skills were on display with my favorite main course, a salmon that was almost transcendently delicious: a deeply peachy-colored fillet of grilled wild Alaska salmon, surrounded by a cream sauce with intense, crispy lardoons of bacon hot-smoked in house, and braised lettuce. It was quite rich, but those few bold flavors played together beautifully. The vegetarian plate of ricotta gnocchi in a cream sauce with morels and fresh peas was rich like the salmon, but here the earthy elements brought in with the morels made a sensational contrast. I liked this one so much I went back later on my own dime to try it again; the second time, the staff used a similar prep with a mix of wild mushrooms and snap peas that was equally luscious. (Most of the mushrooms are supplied by Earthly Delights in DeWitt, which has foragers all over the state.)
Chef Johns generally has a fabulous hand with veggies, which occasionally upstage the meat “star” on the plate--we liked the mix of morels and fiddleheads even more than the walleye they accompanied. The Niman Ranch rib eye was good, if slightly overcooked, but the garlicky fingerling smashed potatoes and the sautéed pea shoots were stunning. The pork dish looked swell on paper--roasted Berkshire loin alongside pork belly confit--but both were a smidge extreme: the loin was flavorful but too dry, and the confit a little heavy. But the chicken was wonderful: a chicken breast with a preserved Meyer lemon-garlic puree rubbed under the skin and then pan sautéed. It comes to the table with the meat juicy and the skin crispy, and in between, there’s that symphony of seasoning. The chicken was served with a mix of wheat berries and quinoa, and those crispy pea shoots again.
If it’s on the dessert menu and you’re not alone, split the pound cake, a raucously buttery slice whose richness is cut with a puree of fresh berries.
Service is improved, but still not always where it should be. On two evening visits, we asked to start with a featured wine, but each time the server came back and said there weren’t any chilled bottles. Why promote a wine and not be ready to serve it? Our servers were attentive and efficient on weekday evenings, but on a busy Friday we were left waiting fifteen minutes after we arrived without so much as a hello or a glass of water--long enough for me to go back to the hostess station and ask her to flag our guy. Things perked up sufficiently after that, although he didn’t seem familiar with what was on the charcuterie platter and at the end he left us cooling our heels as we waited for the check. On the other hand, our reservations were honored to the minute, and the charming dining room manager always came to check on us--making me think they’re getting their act together.
Chef Johns made the rounds too, beaming when we pulled him aside to praise the gnocchi. This leads me back to the food. If it’s this good this early on, we’re certainly putting Vinology back on our favorites list. It seems to have replaced the roller coaster with one of life’s great delights: a ramble down a Michigan country road.

Vinology
110 South Main Street 222-9841
vinology@vinowinebars.com
Mon.-Thurs. 4 p.m.-midnight, Fri.
& Sat. 11 a.m.-1 a.m., Sun. 4 p.m.
10 p.m. (Note: hours may have changed. Call ahead.)
Snacks $4-$5, small plates & appetizers $7-$12, shared platters $11-$14, entrees $19-$25, desserts $7-$12
Main floor fully disability friendly