Bix Engels: Let's Eat!

Stepping into Bagger Dave’s the first time, I felt as if I were entering a giant time-and-space blender. Take a 1950s soda fountain, add a dash of 1980s sports bar, season with local nostalgia blowups from the 1920s and 1930s, and encircle it all with a model train. The dining room has an open kitchen that gives it a fast-food feel; the bar is cozier and provides a better view of the choo-choo, whose freight cars, emblazoned with the corporate logos of Coca-Cola, Heineken, Budweiser, and, natch, Bagger Dave’s, carry a load of metaphors around the restaurant. Wherever you sit, service is very casual—the fries are served in brown paper baglets, the hamburgers in a cake tin lined with baglike brown paper.

The first Bagger Dave’s made its debut in Berkley, Michigan, in January 2008, although the logo proclaims “Est. 2006.” Apparently during that long gestation the restaurant anticipated an eternal narrative for its fare, as its newly minted tagline already boasts of “legendary burgers and fries.” The Bagger Dave’s that opened in the Colonnade shopping center August 30 is the second; both are owned by Diversified Restaurant Holdings, which also owns a number of Buffalo Wild Wings franchises.
The menu is focused almost exclusively on burgers and fries, with a few sandwiches, chili, and salads. If you don’t like hamburgers, you won’t like Bagger Dave’s; if you’re a serious avant-garde-rare-Wagyu-on-challah connoisseur, you won’t like it either. But if, like me, you’re somewhere in the middle, Bagger Dave’s may have some appeal.

When Quarter Bistro’s new general manager, Tim Patino, is not bustling around the dining room, he’s most likely busy with one of several charity projects and organizations. Patino is president of the Great Lakes Rabbit Sanctuary and an active member of the Plymouth Rotary Club. Now he’s combining his interests in a “Wine for Your Cause” program, regular Thursday-night wine-tastings at the Quarter Bistro to benefit local non-profits.

Here’s the deal. A 501(c) (3) charity contacts Patino. They agree on a date, and the Quarter Bistro makes up an electronic flyer, which the charity sends out to its constituents. On that particular Thursday night, participants bring a printout of the flyer. From five to seven, the Quarter Bistro will host a wine tasting with a vintner or distributor, during which patrons can learn about and sample wines. Hot appetizers like fried zucchini or calamari, and cold bites like hummus, tapenade, and cheese are served alongside the wine. The cost is $15 per person, of which $5 goes to the night’s specified charity. (The evening is open to the public, but only those who bring in an event flyer from the charity are counted as going toward the nonprofit’s coffers.) If a charity can predict a larger turnout, say fifty people, the restaurant will set aside a separate room for them.

Knowing as he does first-hand the challenges of the non-profit world, he wanted to make it easy for groups to raise money. “Because I understand their needs, I’m trying to offer them a stress-free fundraising opportunity.” Contact Patino preferably by email at tim@thequarterbistro.com, or by phone at the Quarter Bistro (929-9200). The Quarter Bistro is in the Westgate Shopping Center.

The U-M’s latest restaurant may lack the aged patina of its brethren in  the Michigan Union and Michigan League, but it more than makes up for that in wonderful food. The Glass House Cafe opened quietly this past fall in Palmer Commons, at the curve where Huron becomes Washtenaw. It’s essentially a lunchroom in an office building—but what a building, and what a lunchroom. A restful and supremely unclaustrophobic space, its walls of glass bring in megalumens of natural light. The superb design picks up and plays off that glow with metallic-textured wall coverings and floating light fixtures in sculptural sheets of translucent acrylic resin. From the low upholstered banquettes to the chairs of steel and blond wood and the sky gray carpet, the graceful, airy furnishings have a streamlined moderne-deco cast, but the real stars in this room are the light and the view. What a lovely place to sit in winter.

The cafe is run by Elizabeth Kennedy, owner of one of my favorite restaurants, Evans Street Station in Tecumseh; Evans Street’s chef, Alan Merhar, also heads the Glass House kitchen. I cherish Evans Street so much, in fact, that I was hesitant to try the food at the Glass House, fearing it might fall short of my happy memories of the parent. After my first bite here, I breathed a big sigh of relief. Then I commenced to clean my plate.

The operating times and menu reflect the restaurant’s core functions of  breakfast and lunch: the dining room service operates only from half past seven in the morning until two in the afternoon, and only during the week. The coffee bar dispenses Starbucks drinks and prepacked edibles through the dinner hour.

Although lunch entrees are on the pricey side, the value is in the careful cooking and the quality of ingredients—where feasible, the kitchen uses local products. The chicken, for example, is a skinless breast, pan seared without a lot of fuss. It comes from Eat Local Eat Natural, the new Scio Township company that supplies restaurants with local goods. Chicken this fresh translates to a very juicy and tasty fillet. Served alongside are creamy mashed potatoes and simple steamed broccoli from Prochaska Farms near Tecumseh, surrounded by a thin ribbon of light lemony Mornay sauce. It was so light I wondered if, in traditional Mornay style, it had cheese in it, and asked the chef. Merhar told me he adds just enough Parmigiano-Reggiano to give it a creamy mouth-feel but not enough to weigh it down. The sum is a dish that feels straightforward, wholesome, and home cooked.

As down-home as that chicken dinner was, the tuna salad is anything but traditional, and more exotic than local. The star ingredient, a fairly sizable fillet of fresh, high-grade yellowfin tuna, is flown in overnight from Hawaii. It is slathered in white shiromiso paste and black and white sesame seeds and briefly seared, but only enough to form a sort of sesame shell. The miso paste gives it a saltiness and the sesame seeds a nuttiness, and the combined effect is of a flavorful crust giving way to velvety raw tuna. The fish is sliced and fanned over chilled soba noodles (from Eden Foods in Clinton) tossed with julienne carrots, yellow and red peppers, scallions, shiitake mushrooms, and a ginger-citrus vinaigrette. 

Garden-variety lunch staples—soups, salads, and sandwiches—are a good value at less than $10, and even these quotidian offerings feel special when plated on white porcelain and eaten with heavy cutlery. The traditional hamburgers are made with Knight’s beef and expertly grilled to order with a few choice toppings like Maytag blue cheese and sautéed mushrooms. There are also panini and wraps, but the “Little Italy” panino I tried was a disappointment, despite quality prosciutto and capocollo—the lettuce melted to a mushy state, and the whole thing became something of a greasy muddle. All sandwiches come with either a mixed salad or thick fries dusted with an appealing salt-rosemary-Parmesan mixture, not bad though not made from fresh potatoes. My entree salad, a midsize Caesar, used good crisp lettuces, although the agreeably creamy dressing lacked the garlic-lemon-anchovy punch of a serious Caesar sauce. With those fresh local greens, though, it made for a fine lunch, bolstered by a trim fillet of salmon on the side.

If you have been good with the main course, you still have a chance to let loose at dessert with treats like the gigantic brownie sundae. Our waiter had the kitchen split one for us on two plates, where it was mounded with whipped cream and drizzled with dark chocolate; as the chocolaty brownie merged with vanilla ice cream, it was fully, gooily satisfying. My own favorite sweet is the understated lemon pound cake, baked here and served in slim slices topped with whipped cream and homemade peach jam.

I had just one Glass House breakfast, but it rivaled my lunches: a light, classically constructed omelet filled with fresh spinach, Vermont Cheddar, and sautéed mushrooms. It was exceptional, as were the accompaniments: thick rashers of crisp apple-wood-smoked bacon; substantial slices of toast; and a mound of hash browns that mixed cubed Russets and sweet potatoes with caramelized onions, fresh chives, and sweet basil. My one small quibble would be that the Glass House needs better jams at breakfast—those little packets don’t cut it, and I know from other dishes here that the place does a mean homemade jam. Aside from that, even the coffee was terrific, served in a pretty porcelain cup with cream in a sleek angular metal pitcher. The tea water here is hot enough to actually brew a decent cup.

The Glass House has managed to find some of the most personable servers in Ann Arbor, and we were well looked after on all of our visits; recommendations were knowledgeable and delivery was prompt. At one lunch the server misheard our order and delivered a sirloin medium well instead of medium rare. We didn’t have time for a do-over, so she tried to make it right, ultimately taking our drinks off the bill. At one lunch our waiter even brought us each a gift—a bottle of Jones soda with a picture of John McCain on the label. The restaurant staff had ordered two cases each of McCain and Obama soda, and though they’d sold out of Obama quickly, they couldn’t give away McCain. I really didn’t mean to, but when I packed up my stuff to leave, my subconscious left my McCain on the table.

As a townie, I might never have found my way to Palmer Commons if not for this assignment. But for anyone interested in architecture, this dazzling and functional building is worth a trip. And for foodies, the stunning space has its culinary counterpart in the impressive homespun fare of the Glass House Cafe.

Glass House Cafe

100 Washtenaw Avenue (Palmer Commons); the elevator stop is PL (Plaza Level)

734-647–3777Dining room Mon.–Fri. 7:30 a.m.–2 p.m., counter service & coffee bar Mon.–Fri. 7 a.m.–8 p.m.

Breakfast entrees $6–$9. Lunch: soups & salads $4–$7, burgers & sandwiches $7–$9, entrees $9.50–$18, desserts $4–$6

Fully disability friendly

Reviewed in the Ann Arbor Observer, January 2009.

When transplanted to a new land, even the most adventurous diners will miss the tastes of home—and yearn to rekindle family memories connected to food. Maite Zubía, thirty-one, came to Ann Arbor four years ago from Chile when her husband, Matias Bargsted, began a doctoral program in political science at the U-M. She dove into community life, teaching Spanish to students of all ages and acting in the Wild Swan Theater ensemble. Then, two years ago, their son, Pedro, was born—and she found she wanted to share her cherished family food traditions with him. The handmade sweets she made so impressed her friends that last year Zubía launched a company, Maitelates Chocolates, to turn out the exquisite and delicious artisanal treats known as alfajores.

Food has always been a big part of Zubía’s life, she explains via email. “All the big important family celebrations have been around lots and lots of good food,” she writes. One of her favorite memories is of visiting her grandmother’s home in the Chilean countryside and making dulce de leche. The family would gather outside around a big copper pot over a wood fire. They filled the pot with fresh milk from their creamery, added sugar, and stirred. “In order to get a smooth and nice syrup, you have to be stirring all the time,” she says, so a long-handled wooden spoon would be passed from one to another of the dozen or so grandchildren standing around the pot for each to take a turn at the task, as the milk concentrated and turned a golden brown. At the end, the kids got the big prize—scraping the sides of the bowl for the best part of the dulce de leche (the photo shows one of Zubia’s uncles).

Now Zubía is making her own dulce de leche in Ann Arbor, as a chief component of her alfajor cookies (the name comes from Arabic and means “stuffed” or “filled”). She uses it as a filling between two very light, thin shortbread cookies and coats the sweet sandwich in semisweet Belgian chocolate. Working in Pastry Cart owner Barbara Steer’s professional kitchen, she turns out alfajores in five variations, each with its own taste and texture: straight dulce de leche, coffee, roasted almond, coconut, and white-chocolate-dipped. They’re $2 apiece at the Farmers’ Market, online at maitelates.com, and—starting in February—at Everyday Wines in Kerrytown.

I'm a sucker for secrecy; maybe that's why I'm intrigued with the new "clandestine supper club," Bona Sera. This community dining project is the work of Barbara Marcotte, Annette Weathers, and Mary Lavin, a group whose local restaurant bona fides are as diverse as The Earle and the late La Pinata. For $50 you can join twenty-five or so others for a Bona Sera dinner--home-cooked, but "generally more interesting and experimental than in local restaurants," says Annette Weathers, sous chef of the group.