Restaurant Week First Stop – 44 Canteen
Not much will get me to leave the house when it’s 12 degrees outside and windy as heck. But today is the first day of restaurant week in Columbia, Missouri. There were so many delicious and interesting options awaiting us…so we bundled up and headed out. Nineteen different downtown eateries are participating in the event. The idea is for customers to select at least 3 different spots to try. You’re given a passport that you take with you and get stamped at each of the participating restaurants. Once you’ve visited at least 3 you can put your passport in for a drawing in which you have a chance to win gift cards to downtown businesses. I got lucky and won last time!
We chose 44 Canteen as our first stop this week. Mostly because it has really great food and we happen to have a long relationship with the owner and many of his hard working, talented staff. They had 4 features … so we ordered one of each and shared. Please know that all participating restaurants still have their regular menu items, but most have developed special dishes for this week long event.
The bisque had all the flavors of fall. The sweetness from the potato puree to the tartness of a crisp apple and a little herb kick from the bright green cilantro oil made a warm bowl of soup. Loved how they threw in some crunch with the chips and tiny diced, fresh pickled apples. Who knew you could pickle apples?
Next came the Poutine. What the heck is Poutine? Well it’s delicious that’s what it is. You don’t have to be a duck lover to love the flavors in this dish. A plate of luscious umami. Like how I used some food nerd terms? One of the reason I like eating at 44 Canteen and their other restaurant 44 Stone Public House is that you’ll find dishes here that you cannot find anywhere else in Columbia.
You can’t go to 44 Canteen without eating one of their creative variations on a taco. I lived part of my life in Chicago which has an abundance of Greek restaurants and that’s where I learned to love a good Gyro. Today’s Gyro Taco was a nod to those flavors…with the addition of bean hummus and pickled onions. Have you noticed they like to pickle things here? I need to take up pickling…maybe for a future blog post?
I must say one of my favorites of the day was the dessert. It sounded so interesting…again I’m pretty sure I’ve never had anything like this and haven’t seen it on another menu in town. Such a perfect combination of sweet, tart, creamy, and ginger cake all covered in a thin layer of chocolate ganache. I’m certain that you could cover cardboard in a layer of ganache and I’d eat it.
Today was some good food and good eats.
