Cafe Natasha’s MIDDLE EASTERN, PERSIAN
Cafe Natasha’s is a cornerstone of the vibrant South Grand dining corridor. The Persian restaurant founded by Hamishe Bahrami and her late husband, Behshid, and now overseen by Hamishe and her daughter, Natasha Bahrami, is so essential to its neighborhood and the broader St. Louis dining scene that you might forget it isn’t the original location. From the original Little Kitchen to today, the Bahramis’ cooking has entwined itself in the fabric of St. Louis. Even for a newcomer to Cafe Natasha’s or Persian cuisine in general, a meal here — kebabs, ghormeh sabzi, fesenjoon, beef tongue in broth — feels like a homecoming. LAST YEAR’S RANKING Rest of the Best • OPENED 1983 (as the Little Kitchen) • PRICING Under $30
Feijoada at Cinder House
Fried whole fish with chili garlic sauce at Chao Baan
Beef shish kebab at Cafe Natasha’s
WHERE 3200 South Grand Boulevard, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-771-3411, cafenatasha.com • HOURS Dinner daily, lunch ThursdaySunday (closed Wednesday)
Cate Zone Chinese Cafe CHINESE
If you wanted to introduce visitors to St. Louis’ breadth of regional Chinese restaurants, you could do worse than begin at Cate Zone Chinese Cafe. Here your guests will find a specific regional focus on northeastern Dongbei cuisine (sweetand-sour pork, sour cabbage with pork belly) and also dishes from other regions (Yangzhou fried rice, cumin lamb, Chengdu spicy chicken). The cooking is technically impressive, from the shattering crunch of the aforementioned sweet-and-sour pork to the precise seasoning of the curry broth
26
Boulevard, University City • MORE INFO 314-7389923 • HOURS Lunch and dinner Tuesday-Sunday (closed Monday)
Chao Baan
Szechuan boiling fish at Cate Zone Chinese Cafe with sliced rib-eye and enoki mushrooms. The only downside to beginning your tour of the area’s Chinese restaurants here? You and your guests might
THAI
be perfectly happy going nowhere else. LAST YEAR’S RANKING Rest of the Best • OPENED 2016 • PRICING Under $30 WHERE 8148 Olive
The new restaurant from the family behind South Grand Thai institution the King & I — Sue and Suchin Prapaisilp, with their adult son Shayn — is a deeply personal project. Chao Baan’s menu eschews the central-Thai template
IAN FROEB’S STL 100 GO! MAGAZINE • ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH • 03.08.20
of many area Thai restaurants in favor of dishes from the country’s northeast (where Sue is from Loei province) and south (including Suchin’s native Yala province). Family-style dinners let you explore both regions, with such standout dishes as southern kua kling (ground beef stirfried in red-curry paste) and the northeastern khao tod nam sod (fried, chile-charged rice with cilantro, ginger, cured sausage, fish sauce and lime juice). A whole fried fish in a garlicchile sauce kissed with tamarind is the ideal centerpiece for a table you will crowd with food. LAST YEAR’S RANKING New • OPENED 2019 • PRICING Under $30 WHERE 4087 Chouteau Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-925-8250, chaobaanstl. com • HOURS Dinner daily, lunch Monday-Saturday
Cinder House BRAZILIAN, CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN, STEAKHOUSE
Gerard Craft has deepened the Brazilian connection at Cinder
House, the acclaimed chef’s collaboration with the Four Seasons Hotel St. Louis. Craft credits his childhood nanny, the late Cecelia “Dia” Assuncao, as a major influence on his cooking, and Cinder House opened with pão de queijo, feijoada and other dishes from her native Brazil alongside steaks and chops. Now Craft has introduced Dia’s Room in the restaurant’s private dining room. The tasting menu from Craft and executive chef Josh Adams bridges Brazilian fare and the progressive cooking of Craft’s late flagship Niche. My dinner in January included stunning dishes: dryaged squab and confit squab leg in a tucupi broth; a version of feijoada with A5 wagyu beef, fermented-orange puree and an intensely savory beef jus; a riff on moqueca with prawn lacquered in fermentedchile vinegar and agave with lobster-coconut foam over a dende-onion soubise. I happened to visit on the first menu that Craft credits to the then-recently hired Adams, and the evolution of Dia’s Room under Adams’ direction will be
Buttermilk Black Berry, Kick Ass Chocolate and Gooey Butter Cake ice cream at Clementine’s Naughty & Nice Creamery fascinating to observe. LAST YEAR’S RANKING Rest of the Best • OPENED 2018 • PRICING $45 and up WHERE 999 North Second Street, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-881-5759, cinderhousestl. com • HOURS Breakfast, lunch and dinner daily (Dia’s Room dinner Friday-Saturday by advance-purchase ticket)
Clementine’s Naughty & Nice Creamery BAKERY & DESSERT
Clementine’s Naughty & Nice Creamery doesn’t need a boost from the STL 100. If you love ice cream and haven’t yet discovered Tamara Keefe’s small-batch creations, both the traditional “nice” flavors and the alcohol-infused “naughty” varieties, I doubt whether you really do love ice cream. I could have written all this last year or the year before, too, but it is especially so
after Oprah Winfrey gave Clementine’s her coveted O List seal of approval in the November 2019 issue of her magazine. If that has further driven demand for Clementine’s, take some heart: Last year, Keefe opened a third storefront in Southampton, following the Lafayette Square original and the outpost in Clayton’s DeMun neighborhood. LAST YEAR’S RANKING Rest of the Best • OPENED 2015 • PRICING Under $15 WHERE 1637 South 18th Street, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-701-7581, clementinescreamery.com • HOURS 11 a.m.-10 p.m. Sunday-Thursday, 11 a.m.11 p.m. Friday-Saturday WHERE 730 DeMun Avenue, Clayton • MORE INFO 314-7017581, clementinescreamery. com • HOURS 11 a.m.-10 p.m. Sunday-Thursday, 11 a.m.11 p.m. Friday-Saturday WHERE 4715 Macklind Avenue, St. Louis • MORE INFO 314-701-7581, clementinescreamery.com • HOURS 11 a.m.-10 p.m. Sunday-Thursday, 11 a.m.11 p.m. Friday-Saturday
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