Nashville Food Blog

​This week's dining review features Drifters, the latest installment in restaurateur Matt Charette's east side eating empire. Our experience with Drifters' slow-cooked meats was a little uneven -- we had an excellent Saturday evening supper, balanced by a lackluster late-afternoon lunch. None the less, we concluded that the overall food quality coupled with the easygoing atmosphere and festive patio seating will make Drifters a happy Five Points landmark for beer and ribs.

One item on the menu piqued a curious conversation among our tasters: barbecue nachos. At first glance, Drifters' nachos appeared to be a bountiful pile of tortilla chips with chicken, cheese, et al. But the pyramidal presentation overlooked one of the fundamentals of nachos: The taller the pile, the more naked chips you get. In fact, our tasters each got about one loaded nacho before we ran out of toppings and were left with a lifeless leaf pile.

So, a word to nacho-makers everywhere: It's not the height of your tower, it's the toppings that have the power. Go low, nacho.

From Milano's flier.

​Quick: what's in a calzone? And how is that different from what is in a stromboli?

A calzone is a single serving. Meats, vegetables, cheese, especially mozzarella. Can be deep-fried or brushed with oil and baked. Whether it uses sauce or not isn't made clear by The Food Lover's Companion. Specialty of Naples.

Stromboli is a Philly thing, a sandwich-like creature of cheese and usually pepperoni. Food Lover's doesn't say whether it's baked.

Italian-Americans say a calzone has ricotta cheese and a stromboli doesn't. A calzone is served with sauce on the side. Philadelphians say a stromboli is an inside-out pizza; add ricotta cheese to make it a calzone. Some say a calzone is folded and a stromboli is rolled.

Maybe calzone and stromboli were once quite distinct, but as Italian ways became American ways, the Philly stromboli became indistinguishable from the Italian calzone. Like buttermilk pie/chess pie/ transparent pie: There was once a difference but it has eroded away.

If there is a definitive difference -- or an especially dramatic historic schism that cleaved the Calzonites from the Strombolists -- bring it to Bites.

​It wasn't until I was researching Denny's annual post-Super Bowl Free Grand Slam Breakfast Offer on Feb. 9 that I realized that according to their website the closest Denny's is now in Jackson, Tenn. Is it possible that they've all closed down? If one is still open around town, let your desperately hungry friends know in the comments.

I guess Bowling Green, Ky., is technically closer than Jackson, but I imagine it's against some federal law to cross state lines to commit crimes of nature against your own digestive system. True story ... on a college road trip to Disneyland in a Suburban full of slackers, we somehow managed to each consume three Grand Slams apiece in a 24 hour period. I guess I've never really fully recovered from that one.

​The last time I wrote about Diana's Sweet Shoppe, the 1920s-era candy store that Gibson Guitars transported from Port Huron, Mich., and reopened on Lower Broadway, the store had fairly limited hours and no working phone number.

Looks like it's time for an update, especially since the day when we worship the bonbon gods, Valentine's Day, is coming up next week.

Happily for weekend candy warriors, Diana's hours have expanded to 10:30 a.m.-8 p.m. seven days a week. The kitchen closes at 7, but the front counter stays open for another hour to sell ice cream sundaes, fudge, colorful candies and other sweets.

As I learned when I visited a couple weeks ago, the fudge is made in the store and the sundaes are awesomely constructed with Pied Piper Creamery ice cream made in East Nashville. Interestingly, although Diana's opened during severe cold weather, the ice cream has been a hit. (So far creamery owner Jenny Piper has been able to keep up with demand.)

​Because I'm a thinking-outside-the-box kind of rebel, I question the entire "cake" paradigm for celebrating birthdays. We're giving up "birthday cake" because the idea is stale, the one-size-fits-allness of the treat is so last century, and the execution so uneven.

For two years, we had Maggie Moo Better Batter cakes with chocolate icing. Awesome except for the icing. And last year's Oreo birthday cake with strawberry filling from Publix was very good and beautifull executed, ending our time under the cultural thumb of cake on a high note.

But from now on, something else must take cake's place. Cakeballs. Cupcakes. But these are still cake, and subject to degrading.

It has to be a treat, and symbolic. Other ideas: a make-your-own sundae bar. A candy shop. You all are outside the box, too --- what else can take the place of cake?

​To quote the inimitable Doyle and Debbie, there's wine and twang everywhere you look over the next couple of weeks. So grab your "third Debbie" and take her out for a nice night of tasting at any or all of these events.

Frugal MacDoogal announces one of the most popular annual wine events tonight:

Friday February 5th | Wine Benefit Tasting, Art & Jewelry Show
Richland Country Club | 6-9 p.m.

Assistance League® of Nashville invites you to one of Nashville's best wine tastings of the year, at Richland Country Club.

Tickets for this event are $100 per person, all inclusive (food, wine, and gratuity included). There will be a silent auction and fabulous artisan jewelry sale. There is plenty of parking.

More information and a list of the wines being poured is available here.

For more information, call Kim Shallcross at 615-661-7749, contact the Nashville Chapter of Assistance League® through their website at http://nashville.assistanceleague.org/, or email to assistanceleaguenashville@yahoo.com.

I don't have a dog in the Superbowl fight, and don't really care who wins. I'm just using it as an excuse to buy Fritos and Cheetos. Fritos for scooping chili, Cheetos for enjoying for their own, pure cheesy crunch.

Photo thanks to ethidiumbromide.blogspot.com

​Does anyone really try all those "Superbowl menu" ideas in the cooking magazines? Football-shaped cakes and Pigskin Pizzas and such? I remember on menu with a lentil soup recipe -- lentil soup for company, really? Or do you depend on the tried-and-true chili, Rotel dip and subs?

The post earlier this week about kids and nutrition inspired Whole Foods peppy public affairs person Brittany Conner to throw WF's considerable support behind the effort. She joins the ranks of concerned individuals, companies and parents nationwide, including First Mom. Manna-Food Security Partners have joined the effort, too.

Bacon & Caviar is gladdening hearts in Melrose. So much good stuff happening in that neighborhood, which has waited a long time for an artisanal eatery movement to call its own.

And finally, Heinz redesigned its ketchup packet. Easier to dip, and holds three times more. Not sure whether that's a good thing or a bad thing.

​Even if you're a seasoned Trousdale Drive commuter (like we Scenesters are becoming in our new south-side offices), you might not have noticed an intriguing new lunch option.

Ant B's Burgers fills a little retail spot at 4663 Trousdale Drive (315-8846). It's easy to miss, since it adjoins the Marathon gas station. The restaurant's puzzling name, with its shades of Mayberry, is actually a reference to the two owners. "Ant" is Anthony Francis, and "B" is Bryan Robinson.

The two have run a heating-cooling business in the neighborhood for years and saw a new niche selling straightforward but fresh-made lunch delights like sirloin hamburgers and fries. They've been friends for years with the owner of the gas station, Ben Little (whose family has owned the station for decades), so they knew the spot was available for their burger ambitions.

If you are culinary professional -- you do something with food, for money -- you could be in the IACP, the international Association of Culinary Professionals. There are lots of food-oriented professional associations, but the IACP is the awesomest one, if only for its incredible annual conference. Just take a look at the program for this year's conference, April 20-24 in Portland, Oregon.

​There's more in just one day of this four-day conference than you can reasonably take in. But you could try for some in-depth programming on artisanal salt, terroir, seafood, oolong tea. A half-dozen writing workshops, digital food photography, urban food and farming, obesity. Panels where experts like Shirley Corriher answer cooking and baking questions. (They answered one of mine in 2008.)

Night tours take in eateries, watering holes and craft breweries. Offsite programs concentrate on professional skills and local businesses. Big names in the food world attend -- this year's marquee names include Madhur Jaffrey, Ruth Reichl, Michael Ruhlman and Ann Willan. The hardest part is deciding what to attend.

And there's the city itself. Portland's culture of street food is on proud display. Conventioneers get a special hour of their own at a street food cart festival going on during the convention. Check the link above, for some of the amazing street food in Portland, from crepes, risotto balls and Czech goulash, to classic grilled cheese, barbecue, Thai and vegetarian.

​Alimentum, everybody's favorite "bookazine" dedicated to the literature of food will be staging a reading tonight (Feb. 4) at Cumberland Gallery in Green Hills at 4107 Hillsboro Circle. As part of the exhibit THE FOOD SHOW: ART FEEDS PEOPLE, a benefit for Second Harvest Food Bank of Middle Tennessee, Paulette Licitra, publisher and editor, will read from Alimentum-The Literature of Food along with other writers beginning at about 6:30 pm. Donations of food or money at the door are requested for this event as well.

Fifteen percent of all sales during the show will be donated to Second Harvest, so go check out some art and listen to some great work being read aloud. More info can be found at the gallery website.