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MIGHTY OAK BARREL’S HOUSE SALAD WAS TRULY EXCEPTIONAL
FAMILY COOKING {BY RYAN DETO} The Gibson family is too large and has too many great cooks to have just one restaurant. Its original restaurant, Gibson’s, in Penn Hills, offers Southern specialties and sides and has experienced continued success since opening in 2006. So the family decided to open another location in Bloomfield. Nana’s Place opened in July in the heart of Bloomfield, on Liberty Avenue. The sit-down restaurant was named after co-owner’s Amicia Collins’ grandmother, and the space was designed to recall the visits Collins had with her grandma every Saturday. “When you walk into [Gibson’s], you can get your meal in less than three minutes,” says Collins. “Here, it is a bit more relaxed, and [it’s] made to feel like her living room.” Nana’s menu is slimmer than Gibson’s, offering turkey, roast beef, baked ham and catfish dinners with a few sides and salads. And while you can’t sample Gibson’s charcoal-grilled ribs (which sell out every Saturday), you can still enjoy the family’s most popular dish: macaroni and cheese. Nana’s hopes to add desserts soon. Collins says the desserts will be in honor of her grandma, who passed away recently but was baking pies for Gibson’s up until three months before her death. It’s this spirit that drives the family enterprises. At the cozy Bloomfield space, diners might be greeted by Collins’ siblings, aunts or cousins — whoever has time to help out. “My granddad, who is in his 80s,” says Collins, “still comes up and pitches in from time to time.” RYANDETO@PGHCITYPAPER.COM
4510 Liberty Ave., Bloomfield. 412-682-1400
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fundraiser, sample ample delicious food prepared pared by some of Pittsburgh’s burgh’s best chefs, and feel good knowing the proceeds go toward YouthPlaces, which trains young people for careers in the food industry. Fifteen chefs will put their spin on “Fall BBQ,” from 3-6 p.m. Sun., Oct. 25, at YouthPlaces, on the North Side. Tickets $35, at www.showclix.com.
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{PHOTOS BY HEATHER MULL}
Royal Canadian salmon in tarragon-avocado butter
{BY ANGELIQUE BAMBERG + JASON ROTH}
F
OR AWHILE, the charmingly named
Mighty Oak Barrel was a word-ofmouth favorite, offering some of the region’s best food and wine in a surprisingly nondescript building tucked into a humble neighborhood of riverside cottages beyond the Oakmont business district. Part of its charm was this hidden aspect, which — in the pre-Urbanspoon era — allowed everyone who dined there to feel like they had discovered this delicious secret themselves. Eventually, the Mighty Oak Barrel closed, and its owners moved on to other ventures. Recently, however, a new restaurant has opened in the old spot under the old name, but with a distinctly new personality. Gone are the dim lighting and plastic grapevines draping the dropped acoustical ceiling tiles. The reopened dining room is brightly lit, the better to display the local art that’s a cut above typical coffee-shop
PITTSBURGH CITY PAPER 10.14/10.21.2015
fare. Black tablecloths set off brightly colored Fiestaware dishes. And as for the menu, where the old Mighty Oak Barrel was ahead of its time — seasonal and bold when those were still rare qualities in the local scene — the new
MIGHTY OAK BARREL 939 Third St., Oakmont. 412-826-1069 HOURS: Mon.-Sat. lunch 11:30 a.m.-2 p.m.; dinner 4 p.m.-close PRICES: Appetizers, flatbreads and salads $7-14; entrees and pasta $16-29 LIQUOR: Full bar
CP APPROVED venue is more of a throwback, with chops and pasta dishes, all pretension-free. Nothing here is cutting-edge, but neither is it boring, for example, grilled salmon with avocado-tarragon butter. Indeed, lack of pretension seems to get
at the heart of new owner Michael Flowers’ vision. Flowers, an Oakmont native who’s worked at the renowned Oakmont Country Club as well as a few of the area’s fine dining spots, seems to be looking to affirm the Oak Barrel’s neighborhood vibe. Thus, while the menu includes refined dishes like seared duck breast with blood-orange sauce, the atmosphere is warm and welcoming, not cool and professional. Bacon-wrapped shrimp, a riff on that canapé classic, bacon-wrapped scallops, was served with horseradish aioli. Firmer and less buttery-sweet than scallops, the shrimp could stand up to such an assertively flavored sauce, and their texture was close to perfect, plump, not dried out. The bacon was great, too, crisp at the edges but mostly tender. This was supposed to be a shared starter, but it was so good, it would have been easy for one person to devour it all.