Are restaurants better the second time around? Today we look at two suburban restaurants that underwent makeovers of a sort: Bamboo Blue, which began as a Homewood noodle market and has developed into a full-service, pan-Asian restaurant; and 10 West, which started life as Elaine in downtown Naperville but has since changed its style, name and chef.
Bamboo Blue
Bamboo Blue began as a quick-casual operation in which patrons ordered and paid at a counter and waited at tables for their food–a format that lasted exactly one day. “There was no way,” recalls general manager Kelly Caldwell about the complex system. “The next day I was pointing at staffers saying, `OK, you’re a waiter, you’re a waiter, you’re a waiter . . . ‘”
Which might explain some of the early service glitches that a colleague tells me plagued the place in its first few months.
These days, Bamboo Blue is a festive, brightly colored restaurant with a private-party room and, come summer, a 50-seat outdoor patio. Service is much improved, despite occasional lapses into Dinner Auctioneering (“Who gets the calamari?”). And the menu has expanded beyond its original noodle focus to include an interesting assortment of pan-Asian and fusion dishes.
These include such oddities as the Asian Nachos, a dish so strange-sounding we had to try it. It’s a platter of light and crispy wonton chips, piled high with melted cheese (a melted cheddar and white-cheddar blend), black beans and peanut sauce, drizzled with a sweet chile creme fraiche. I wouldn’t make a habit of eating this dish, but it was messy fun.
Fresh oysters are presented in a bamboo steamer filled with crushed ice and dabbed with a chile oil with hints of lemongrass and cilantro. Our waitress couldn’t tell us what variety oyster it was (she disappeared into the kitchen and returned to report that they were “farm raised”), but the well-chilled beauties were tasty regardless.
Other nibbles included chewy slabs of cross-cut, bone-in short rib, accented with Korean spices; crab cakes with a chile-mango sauce, and first-rate mussels in a delicious coconut broth.
Western tastes are accommodated by a couple of steaks; the Asian filet is topped with wasabi butter and served with chile-dusted fingerling potatoes, but it’s a good steak. Ditto for the teriyaki N.Y. strip with chile-laced mashed potatoes and excellent tempura onion rings. Temperature control is a problem, though; both steaks were overcooked, the teriyaki steak considerably so.
Seafood stars include salmon in tamarind-barbecue sauce, with tasty yucca fries; blackened grouper (more with Asian spices, which are sweeter than the sharp New Orleans spices) and the Pagoda, which layers medium-rare slabs of tuna with crisp wonton chips. The wine list shows an understanding for Asian flavors, offering a brief but food-friendly assortment of Austrian and Australian bottles; there are even four Israeli wines, which has to make Bamboo Blue a local leader in that category. The restaurant is hosting an Israeli wine tasting dinner at the end of the month, should you wish to convert curiosity into knowledge.
10 West
10 West was already an excellent restaurant when it was called Elaine and founding chef Ted Cizma was running the kitchen. Now Cizma’s off on other projects, and the new owners have shrewdly retained manager Randy Daniels and brought in Patrick Cassata, who already owns and operates three-star Eclectic in Barrington, as executive chef.
And so the game-focused, aggressively flavored dishes Cizma once cranked out have given way to the free-wheeling, three-countries-on-a-plate style Cassata created in Barrington. Indeed, the very good crab cake with Korean kim chee and mango chutney at 10 West this month is the same dish I ate at Eclectic in 2001.
But even if I’ve seen it before, Cassata’s food continues to impress, both for his fearless matching of unlikely ingredients and the disciplined way he takes the rough edges off even the oddest-sounding creations.A dish off a recent tasting menu, for instance, consisted of Southern-fried short ribs (the boneless meat dusted in rice flour and deep fried) alongside a golapki (cabbage roll) of Thai purple rice and homemade sausage–and both sauced with a blend of tomatoes and golden raisins. Remarkably, the flavors pulled together very well; my wife, who detests cabbage, happily polished off Cassata’s cabbage roll.
Other memorable moments from that tasting menu included seafood tacos, the chopped fish nestled in a shell of fried wonton rather than tortilla, bound with a spicy enchilada sauce and served on a plate bearing vivid-green pools of chimichurri sauce; and Broken Arrow venison with a blue-crab lasagna (Cassata’s skewed version of surf and turf) that layered crabmeat, curry-turmeric cream sauce and wonton skins.
The baked apple pie burrito with sweetened beans and rice pudding might initially remind you of a fast-food apple pie, but trust me–you’ll like this much better.
Spot-on service and the placid, intimate atmosphere (the space is divided among several intimate dining environments) are somewhat at odds with the lively menu, but I suspect most diners will happily adjust to the contradictions. And the contemporary-looking bar up front and 10 West’s very interesting wine list (chock full of lesser-known options) make this a great place for a quiet drink.
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Bamboo Blue
(star)
18147 Harwood Ave., Homewood 708-799-4700
Open: Dinner and lunch Tue.-Sun.
Entree prices: $15-$22
Credit cards: A, DC, DS, M, V
Reservations: Recommended on weekends
Noise: Conversation-friendly
Other: Wheelchair accessible; Parking lot
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10 West
(star)(star)(star)
10 W. Jackson Ave., Naperville 630-548-3100
Open: Dinner Mon.-Sat.
Entree prices: $18-$28
Credit cards: A, DC, DS, M, V
Reservations: Strongly recommended
Noise: Conversation-friendly
Other: Wheelchair accessible; Smoking at bar only
OUTSTANDING (star)(star)(star)(star)
EXCELLENT (star)(star)(star)
VERY GOOD (star)(star)
GOOD (star)
Reviews are based on no fewer than two visits. The reviewer makes every effort to remain anonymous. Meals are paid for by the Tribune.
