Tag Archives: Mark’s American Restaurant

Queen of Salads

22 Thursday Jan 2015

Posted by in Far Away Places, In the Kitchen

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AT HOME, CURRENTLY READING: “The Book of Strange New Things,” by Michael Faber

For a girl who once rarely ate salad, it’s strange to find myself now eating a generous portion five days out of seven, and stranger still to have my salad-making skills often solicited by others.  The request, I find, comes packaged in various forms, ranging from a gentle question, such as, ….”You don’t mind bringing salad, do you?”… to the more formal pronouncement, the kind that almost rises to foregone conclusion, that sounds something like… “Well, Janell’s coming, she can bring a salad.”

I do enjoy making a beautiful salad, with all my ingredients fresh and finely chopped, so that any given bite of salad looks and tastes exactly as salad should — a colorful mix of bright greens and vegetables and fruits — rather than that single pathetic hunk of brownish-tinged iceberg lettuce, that is too obese to accommodate other salad fixings beside it on the fork, that usually passes for salad at most dining establishments, fine or otherwise.

Why is it that eating a salad at most restaurants is not like eating salad at all? Due to course chopping, one can rarely get two salad fixings on a fork.  First, there’s the big bite of lettuce, then perhaps a tomato wedge, then the thick slice of cucumber or a husky chunk of what-have-you.  Sometimes I wonder why these salad-makers bother to mix all their fixings in a bowl!

There are, of course, exceptions.  Mark’s American Restaurant, located in Houston, is one.  It’s an exceptional place for salads and everything else listed on its menu.  Last October, I enjoyed the most wonderful luncheon salad full of mandarin oranges and grilled salmon and sunflower seeds and mixed greens with a light citrus dressing that, even now, makes my mouth water to think of it.  I eat at Mark’s every time I go through Houston, which unfortunately, is not often. So I feel lucky and grateful that another restaurant, Paseo Grill, located just a few blocks down the road from my house, also serves wonderful salads.  Paseo’s salads are so good (and so good for me) that I resolved on New Year’s Eve, to enjoy lunch there once a week, throughout 2015!

In case you’re wondering when I became such a salad snob, I don’t mind confessing that it occurred the very instant my physician told me, in so many words, that I needed to eat healthier…. that I needed to eat more vegetables and more salads and a whole lot less carbohydrates!  All of which, in turn, led me to search for new salad recipes, the sort that I knew I’d look forward to eating, as much as if I were eating a salad at Paseo or Mark’s.

And ta-da, here’s one lovely recipe that I found, that’s fit for a Queen, and fit for salad snobs like moi who need to be more fit, and even fit to be called a Queen of Salads. It’s one I’ve been making since last November, which I adapted from the pages of a recipe appearing in the Sunday newspaper.

Who says healthy has to be tasteless?  Or New Year’s Resolutions can’t be fun?  Not this snob, that’s for fit sure.

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Asian Slaw with Peanut Dressing

4 servings, if served as a small side rather than a main course

Wash, dry and finely chop following and add to a salad bowl:

2 cups curly kale, thick stems removed
1 cup red cabbage
1/2 cup grated carrot
1/4 cup bell pepper
1/2 cup of dry-roasted, unsalted peanuts
1/2 cup drained mandarin oranges

Mix and toss the salad with the following dressing — I use about a third of the recipe and refrigerate leftover two-thirds of dressing for up to a week.  If you prefer, you can easily cut dressing recipe in half.

Peanut Dressing

Mix following in a deep bowl with an immersion blender until emulsified:

1/4  cup honey
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/4 cup unseasoned rice vinegar
1 Tbsp soy sauce
1 tsp sesame oil
1 Tbsp peanut butter
1/2 tsp salt
1 Tbsp finely grated fresh ginger

Note:  For Main Course, add grilled chicken or shrimp to salad before tossing with dressing.

Making Do

31 Tuesday Aug 2010

Posted by in Far Away Places, Soul Care

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All the easily developed land has been developed.  And what isn’t easy – like building the parking garage in downtown Juneau that required excavation and removal of a colossal size rock – is sometimes taken on too, if the rock is taking up prime real estate.

Not all rocks require excavation.  I found a good many turned into billboards, like these that line Skagway’s port and harbor.  But nowhere did I find evidence of new buildings beside old ones within historic districts.  Rather than tearing down and building new, like the good folks of West “U” –  that posh neighborhood inside Houston’s Loop, where many three story mini-mansions keep company with cottage bungalows  — the people of Juneau and Skagway tend to recycle, to just make do with their land.  Between mountains and sea, there’s no other choice but to make do.

Who cares if a building, that today houses one of Juneau’s many souvenir shops, still boasts that carved-in-stone name of “Juneau Laundry?”  Or that a sporting goods store now resides in the old home of Alaska Electric Light and Power Company?

Or that Rainbow Foods operates in excess space from a church whose name is not as prominently displayed?

Whether “Rainbow Foods” Church has a little grocery side-business or whether it supplements its pass-the-plate collections with rental income, either causes wonder on which part of their building is busiest – the one devoted to groceries or the one devoted to worship of God.

Downsizing church property is one thing, but within a block of “Rainbow” Church, two churches have closed their doors.  Though nearby signs indicated both spaces were available, I couldn’t imagine any kind of business willing to resurrect this once sacred space.  Until I recalled my favorite eating place — located again — inside the Houston Loop; of all places, Mark’s American Restaurant runs its business in the lofty cathedral arched building of a former church on Westheimer Street.

I can no longer recall the name or the denomination of the former church that once filled this prime piece of real estate.  Though I’m a little bothered by my memory lapse, I’m more bothered by the thought of dying churches, especially when evidence of resurrection – by a subsequent succeeding business – proves it wasn’t the location but something else that needed tending.

When Mark’s was rated by USA Today as one of the top ten places to eat in the United States, it took weeks to secure a dinner reservation.  Last time my husband and I dined there, which happened on just an ordinary week night – five years after USA Today’s blessing — every seat was full.  Had this ever been true for the church that once inhabited “Mark’s” space?

All these words on rocks and churches and resurrected buildings and “making do” has me recalling a few words of Jesus in the Gospels — “On this rock, I will build my church” — spoken in response to Peter’s confession to Jesus, “You are the Christ”; Jesus spoke to Peter and to all the disciples and whoever else was in hearing range of Peter’s Great Confession.

Thinking about that ragtag band of Peter and the other disciples — who never understood Jesus’ teachings, who were busy jostling for heavenly rewards (like the right hand seat of Jesus), who as a group, betrayed and scattered and even denied knowing Jesus the night he was arrested – alongside the words “On this rock, I will build my church”, only goes to show Jesus was making do too.

I suppose he still does.