Can a simple bowl of soup do what Tony “Mr. Personality” Hsieh’s millions could not?
Could a kick-ass sandwich:
…. accomplish what all the well-intentioned-yet-ultimately-tepid redevelopment plans could not? Mainly, create a sense of neighborhood economic accomplishment among the downtown denizens who are hungry for the barest glimpse of something substantive, beyond cocktail bars and used furniture stores?
Continue reading “The Pho (and Sandwich) That Saved Las Vegas”
Quality is diametrically opposed to quantity. – Lionel Poilâne
We recently were talking doughnuts with a prominent local chef.
“What’s the best one you ever had?” we asked.
“A little shop in a small town in Texas,” he replied. “All they sold was a small, right-from the fryer yeast doughnut, with a vanilla glaze that melted in your mouth. The line was down the street every day for them.”
“And you?” he shot back at us.
We returned the volley fast without missing a beat: “The Downyflake in Nantucket, Massachusetts. They only did three, small cake doughnuts every morning: plain, sugar and chocolate glazed. So rich, yet so light and tender and soft they practically evaporated in the mouth. Never had anything close before or since.”
And yes, there was a line out the door every day for our ethereal little circles of carbo-sugared bliss on Nantucket, just like there was for the chef’s favorite in Texas.
What was the common denominator(s): size and perfection. The pleasure of eating something human scale, made with love, and with a commitment to quality over quantity.
As you can see above, none of these prerequisites of refinement burden the operation at Donut Bar, where the doughnuts are, first and foremost, big.
It’s very strange when someone dies over the Christmas holidays.
For one reason or another, we’re all so busy running around and doing things with friends and family that news takes a back seat to all the shopping and frivolity.
And even in these days of in-your-face social media bombardment, the death of an acquaintance can slip through the cracks and catch you by surprise ten days after the fact.
So it was with Linda Rodriguez’s passing on December 27th. By the time we heard about it last weekend, the funeral and memorial service had already been held.