Skillet, Rustic. Urban. Food.

September 28, 2012 – 1:53 pm Posted by Katharine Moore

Filed under: Features, Restaurants, Skillet, Rustic. Urban. Food

Kevin Caskey is not just an interesting restaurateur with a madly successful business, he is a fascinating man who has organized a life in perfect alignment with his passions, talents and priorities. While the term “farm to fork” has been overused enough to fall into the cliché bucket, it is, in its most true blue fashion, the foundation of this seasonal operation. I knew we were dealing with the real deal when Kevin texted his apology for missing a Dine Originals Board meeting because he was butchering a red wattle hog! His educational path took him to New Orleans for medical school at Tulane, but he instead found himself trying to get into the back door of every kitchen in the city. Johnson and Wales was a much better fit and Kevin is a proud Alumna of the Providence, Rhode Island campus.

The exceptional concept for Skillet, Rustic .Urban. Food., the very small restaurant on Whittier Street with the very big reputation, came after a career of 20 years in culinary research and development that allowed Kevin to explore the world of possibilities. His neighborhood café has been featured on the Food Network, PBS, and is Zagat-Rated as having “extraordinary food.” Kevin gives the staff and his wife Angela all of the credit for realizing his vision since the 2009 opening. “Angela is vital to the business, and the staff’s hard work and sacrifice are what fuel the operation” he says. The blending of talents has created a space where patrons can be assured of a respite from the pressures and hassles of the day. A place that nurtures and feeds the guest.

The cadre of small producers, farmers, creameries, and artisans who contribute both inspiration and product to Skillet allow Kevin and his staff to maintain a staunchly seasonal menu. The commitment to presenting plates that contain a majority of food sourced within a 200 mile radius is what shapes Kevin’s days. He guesses that he spends as much time gathering as he does operating the business.

After a long hot summer that extended the growing season, Kevin reports that he is enjoying an unusual overlap… they are still able to get late season tomatoes, peppers, and beans that would normally have transitioned out by now, as the menu begins to feature the autumn harvest of brassicas and root vegetables.

As the Treasurer of Dine Originals Columbus, Kevin has a significant role in shaping the organization. He says he has made time for the group because of the camaraderie it provides and the connections he has made with the like-minded members. They, in turn, would tell you that this talented man with his generous heart has inspired Dine Originals to stay true to its highest ideals. They would also encourage you to dine at Skillet. Rustic. Urban. Food. You will taste the essence of Dine Originals Columbus.

Hours
Wednesday – Friday
Lunch 11am to 2:30pm
Dinner 5:30pm to 9:30pm
Saturday & Sunday
Brunch 8am to 2pm
Monday & Tuesday Closed

410 East Whittier Street
Convenient to German Village and downtown
www.skilletruf.com »

One of a Kind

September 12, 2012 – 2:18 pm Posted by Katharine Moore

Filed under: Features

Experience Columbus Days Oct 5-8

Experience Columbus Days! Our fall calendar is always jam packed (food pun!) with good times and great food. We will once again partner with Experience Columbus on a Columbus Day Weekend promotion. This year we are inviting locals and visitors alike to explore our one of a kind city at one of a kind prices October 5, 6, 7, & 8. See the offerings here .

Great Stuff Coming Up!

Buy Discount Cards

The next discount gift certificate release will take place on October 17 and we have big plans in the works for the November 12 – 18 Dine Originals Week. We are confident that the whole city will be ready to dine out and celebrate…because no matter who wins the election, that will be our first full week of a world without political ads in waaaaay too long!

Edible Columbus

Katharine Moore shares her favorites with Edible Columbus

Meet our Executive Director, Katharine Moore. Edible Columbus interviewed her in search of local suggestions and resources and posted the profile here.

The Taste of Dine Originals 2012 Celebration

May 18, 2012 – 12:25 pm Posted by Katharine Moore

Filed under: Features

The Taste of Dine Originals 2012 was the celebration intended, and the successful fundraiser hoped for. The Dine Originals Columbus member restaurants outdid themselves…which is no easy feat, given the track record they have for creating offerings that are over-the-top year after year. From fresh oysters to pork bellies and macaroons to baby key lime pies it was a showcase of the breadth and depth of the local food movement.

Columbus has gained increasing recognition for its innovative food scene and vibrant farmer’s markets. Our emphasis on localism led us to integrate local craft breweries, distilleries, farmers, and artisan food entrepreneurs into the annual bash, and your feedback assured us the broader reach was much appreciated.

The funds we are able to raise each year for our partner The Buckeye Ranch come from the tickets to the event, the sponsors who step up and provide the money needed to stage an event of this caliber, and of course the restaurants and wineries with their commitment to providing an extraordinary experience to our guests with generous samplings of innovative food and beverages.

So to our title sponsors Bailey Cavalieri, LLC and United Healthcare, our two dozen other benefactors, the beverage hosts, member restaurants, volunteers and those of you who purchased tickets, we say thank you for your support and collaboration; you are the foundation of the DINE LOCAL initiative and the contributors who allow The Buckeye Ranch to open up futures of possibility and potential .

Taste of Dine Originals Tickets on Sale Now

April 2, 2012 – 8:02 am Posted by Katharine Moore

Filed under: Features

50 restaurants…30 vineyards…2 microbreweries, and a couple of local distilleries

If that isn’t a foodie’s dream come true, what would be?!

Our signature annual event, Taste of Dine Originals, is one of Ohio’s best food and wine events, featuring tastings and samplings from 50 regional restaurants, 30 vineyards, 2 craft breweries, and a couple of micro distilleries. Whether you’re a seasoned foodie or an intrigued beginner, chefs, brew masters, and winery representatives welcome you as they mix useful knowledge with tastings of signature dishes and interesting beverages. The silent auction features cooking lessons, private dinners, special events, works of art, and rare bottles of wine.

This year’s event on May 10 will be held at Capital University’s Capital Center, at 2360 East Mound Street Columbus, OH 43209. The event will be open from 6:00 – 9:30pm.

Tickets are $100; proceeds from this event are shared by Dine Originals Columbus and The Buckeye Ranch, which offers mentalhealth treatment and alcohol and drug services for children. Dine Originals Columbus celebrates, supports and promotes the culinary diversity that locally owned and operated member restaurants contribute to the identity and culture of our city. We are committed to strengthening the local economy and enriching our community through education and charitable partnerships. The Buckeye Ranch and Dine Originals both support this community and strive, each in their own manner, to make Central Ohio a better place for everyone.

Join us for a glass clinking, swishing, swirling, people watching, mouth watering kind of fun!

Click Here to Purchase Tickets

Tasi Café

March 12, 2012 – 3:32 pm Posted by Katharine Moore

Filed under: Features

The easiest way to write a profile of Tasi Café would be to cut and paste the rave reviews the restaurant has received since the month it opened four and a half years ago. As G.A. Benton of Columbus Alive noted “Generally I would never fully review a restaurant barely open a month, but Tasi’s hit the ground sprinting.”

But a cut and paste job would eliminate the need for a visit with Tasi Rigsby and a jolt of her passion for fine food and loud fun. Tasi danced into Columbus, Ohio and we all owe Ballet Met a formal thank you for luring her here. Her California roots, Greek heritage, and opinionated voice blend together to fashion a civic activist, acclaimed restaurateur, and devoted mother who has contributed significantly to the development of the Short North Arts District as well as to the evolution of Dine Originals Columbus.

Tasi is married to Kent Rigsby and has collaborated with him since retiring from the ballet world in 1995 as general manager and catering director of Rigsby’s Kitchen. They share a vision of providing good honest food with a twist…never intimidating, but always presented with extraordinary service. When Tasi explains it is never a business, but rather an expression of their passion and respect for the role good food should play in our lives, you know she is being truthful. Their efforts to feed and nurture a community have been successful enough to land them on all of the top ten lists, to garner a hearty number of inches in the national press, and to create a destination that has been a signature of the Short North for over 25 years.

With a dancers need to stretch, Tasi took the opportunity to lease the space behind Rigsby’s Kitchen when Pistacia Vera relocated toGerman Village and set about realizing a long time fantasy of operating a casual café on a European scale. Tasi says she loathes large scale houses, schools, public spaces, and restaurants. The café is intimate, busy, occasionally loud, and always inviting.

The recipes that don’t come from Tasi’s family or Kent’s work come from Chef Milton Espinoza’s mother and grandmother’s Bolivian kitchens. The café is a corn syrup free zone, where local sourcing and house made dishes attract a devout following. They offer breakfast, lunch and dinner, with a foundation of their own dressings, condiments, potato chips, and soups to support artesian sandwiches, amazing breakfast dishes available all day, and classic fare like meatloaf, baked chicken, and macaroni and cheese. The only thing as great as the price points on all of these splendid offerings is the availability of a frosty beer or a nice glass of wine to go along with the fare.

Poring over the collection of rave reviews, I couldn’t find one that didn’t mention the Sourdough Pancakes ($7) that come with thick, crispy, country-style sweet and salty bacon and warm Ohio maple syrup. I can’t ever pass up the Cubano sandwich ($9) with Roast Pork, Pickled Veggies, Mozzarella, Bolivian Salsa, on a Sourdough Panino, so the only time I enjoy the pancakes is when I can talk a friend into sharing them for dessert. Which doesn’t take much arm twisting. Ever.

When I asked Tasi what keeps her engaged in a business she has been devoted to for almost 2 decades, she said the diversity of the customers. A day at Tasi’s is a day filled with people from all walks…who share a like-mindedness about nutrition and the social rewards of eating in a small busy space filled with light and newspapers and laughter. It doesn’t get any better than that in Dine Originals Columbus Land!

σας ευχαριστώ Ballet Met! (translation…thanks Ballet Met…we adore her!)

Tasi Cafe
614-222-0788
680 N. Pearl St., Columbus, OH 43215
www.tasicafe.com »
Hours
Monday- Thursday
7 a.m. – 5 p.m.

Friday – Saturday
7 a.m – 9 p.m.

Sunday
8 a.m – 4 p.m.

Dine Originals Week: Explore New Flavors; Meet New Characters

March 5, 2012 – 9:42 am Posted by Katharine Moore

Filed under: Features

This edition of Dine Originals Week comes with four new members to explore. Babushka’s Kitchen in Clintonville has a $10 special for both lunch and dinner. Whether you called your Grandmother “Babcia” or not, the home made crackers alone are worth the trip! Betty’s Fine Food & Spirits, the homecoming queen of Short North restaurants, is featuring a three course dinner all week for $20, Dirty Frank’s Hot Dog Palace will serve 3 dogs, a side, and Baklava to-die-for in exchange for a $10 bill, and the Jury Room has both a $10 lunch special and a $20 three course dinner on the blackboard for the whole week.

New is good. New is often great. But a friend of mine has taught me the appeal of ritual over the years. This is a guy who thinks the Buckeyes can’t win if he doesn’t park in the same lot, enter by the same gate, and wear the same boxers to every game. That translates to “We always go one place we have never been, one place beyond 270, and The Refectory for that twice-a-year opportunity to have a James Beard Award nominee prepare a three course French dinner for $30.” So this week, I get to have dinner at Vino Vino, lunch at the Inn & Spa at Cedar Falls, and an AMAZING dinner at the Refectory.” How about you? What’s your strategy for making the most of 50 delicious offers in just 7 days?

Get started on a plan now, with the menus offered →here.

Dine Originals Week AND a Jeopardy Clue Who knows? You might need both!

February 29, 2012 – 1:44 pm Posted by Katharine Moore

Filed under: Features

While few of us would advance on Jeopardy if the answer was “Portmanteaux,” and the question Alex was looking for was “A word created by combing other words,” I bet many of us share “brunch” as the most frequently used portmanteaux in our vocabulary.

The combination of breakfast and lunch is obvious enough, and although we didn’t smash it together to be “bunchtail” …there usually is a cocktail of some sort involved!

On Sunday, March 4, Dine Originals Columbus is kicking off Dine Originals Week with two special brunches, and nothing would please us more than to have you on hand.

Barcelona Restaurant and Bar, located in the heart of historic German Village, is offering a buffet with items smoked salmon pintxo and veggie paella, a complimentary glass of cava or mimosa, and a jazz band to ease you out of the weekend. They are contributing a portion of the proceeds to the Livingston United Methodist Church Food Pantry, with the amazing spirit of generosity that defines the Barcelona brand.

Mozart’s Bakery & Piano Café, a signature destination in Clintonville, is serving what only Mozart’s kitchen could produce, with piano music and a mimosa to boot. A portion of the proceeds will benefit the Clintonville-Beechwold Community Resources Center
Food Pantry. As Bill Owens, the Executive Director, said when he heard of the pledge, “Wow! Once again Anand and Doris Saha come through for their neighbrohood!”

Brunch is from 11:30 – 3:30 on Sunday March 4. Tickets may be purchased online at www.dineoriginalscolumbus.com/brunch

And just in case you are preparing for a pub quiz: other portmanteaux we all recognize? Brangelina and snark!

Join us for brunch and/or delve into the amazing array of menus that have been created for Dine Originals Week. Our invitation is to come “Taste New Flavors; Meet New Characters. We promise both.

Tip Top Kitchen & Cocktails

February 21, 2012 – 4:27 pm Posted by Katharine Moore

Filed under: Features

When Alice Wing was ready to sell her Columbus institution “The Vine” on Gay Street, it was important to her to hand it off to another woman, so she placed a call to Liz Lessner. Sure enough, Liz was interested in the space, and with partner Chuck Hootman and brother Tim Lessner she purchased the business in May 2007.

The Tip Top Kitchen & Cocktails served as an early champion of the revitalization of Gay Street. Tim Lessner explains that they loved being in on the beginning of that effort and hope to be what the Short North Tavern is to the Short North neighborhood…an early investor in the community, providing a destination for the Urban Pioneers who blazed the trail, and those who have followed.

The concept of a classic whiskey bar was developed with help from the Ohio Historical Society and executed with DianaLessner’s interior design (yep…their mom!) and a menu featuring Ohio comfort food. The Tip Top is the “tipsy downtown watering hole” the partners dreamed up with a reputation for being casual and welcoming, never fussy or pretentious.

The Pot Roast Sandwich, with Sweet Potato Fries and Spicy Mayo is the number one seller, but that’s not to say its ever reasonable to have a group for dinner without someone ordering (and sharing) the Mac and Cheese! The bar offers an inventory of whiskies like you read about, but is also known for its broad selection of microbrews. With 22 taps, there is always something new and something seasonal to tempt patrons away from their usuals.

Tim Lessner is the Managing Partner of the Tip Top, and also serves as the President of the Board of Trustees of Dine Originals Columbus. He believes independent restaurants are the face and personality of any city, and is proud of what the Tip Top Kitchen & Cocktails adds to Columbus. Not only have they been successful with their retro concept and Gay Street revitalization, but they have distinguished themselves as forward thinkers with green efforts that are industry achievements other food and beverage operations strive for. Utilizing the resources of Eartha Limited they combine alternative waste control and energy reduction methods with eco-friendly carry out containers. Just recycling beer bottles takes a very mindful approach to standard operating procedures.

With this commitment to sustainability, fostering a vibrant downtown, and serving Columbus-centric food and beverages, The Tip Top Kitchen & Cocktails helps shape the character of Columbus and strengthens the very backbone of Dine Originals Columbus.
To learn more about Eartha Limited visit www.Earthlimited.com

Tip Top Kitchen & Cocktails
http://www.tiptopcolumbus.com/
73 East Gay Street
Columbus, Ohio 43215
614-221-8300
Open 11am until 2am everyday.

Spinelli’s Deli

February 7, 2012 – 4:24 pm Posted by Katharine Moore

Filed under: Features, Restaurants, Spinelli’s Deli

Trattoria Roma

January 26, 2012 – 2:28 pm Posted by Katharine Moore

Filed under: Features, Restaurants, Trattoria Roma

Shawn Mason’s connection to Trattoria Roma predates his driver’s license! The once teenage busser climbed the ranks at the restaurant’s original Morse Road location to become the General Manager, and was then given the charge of opening a new location in Grandview in 2000. Who better to spot the work ethic and talent of a scrappy apprentice on break from Columbus State’s culinary program? Soon after the Grandview opening, Shawn hired Matt Prokopchak as a prep cook. Shawn became a partner in the business, and over several years and a number of transactions, a majority owner. As he was navigating the business of operating a restaurant, Matt graduated from Culinary school and sharpened his skills at each of the kitchen stations, eventually becoming the Executive Chef, and then a co-owner.

Together the guys have shaped a restaurant that embraces classic Italian cuisine with a contemporary approach. The chef works closely with the finest purveyors and local farmers to ensure that his kitchen produces a lovely progression of dishes that take each patron on a journey from antipasti to primi, then onto secondi and dolci.

The handsome dining room and Sinatra-esque bar provide perfect spaces for intimate dinners, as well as long lunches around a table packed with friends. A monthly schedule of wine dinners allow Chef Matt to pore over his library and match wines with dishes from the selected region of Italy, always with a hint of the gluttony and lust of the early Roman banquets that capture his imagination. On February 28 a winemaker from the Graffigna Winery in Argentina will describe what happened when an Italian family immigrated with their business to South America. The kitchen is jazzed to play with Argentinean fusion cuisine. Or, quite possibly, to invent it.

The energy of young talent and authentic hospitality infuses the experience of dining at Trattoria Roma. Shawn and Matt welcome you with wonderful dishes, interesting and affordable wines, and a vibe that seems more uptown than the address would indicate. Their passion for creating memorable occasions, rather than just perfectly executed dishes, is in perfect alignment with the sensibilities of the tight knit Dine Originals community. Whether collaborating on cooking classes at the North Market, launching the Dine Originals Culinary Scholarship at Columbus State, or serving on the Board of Trustees, they bring a spirit of camaraderie and diligence that explains their remarkable accomplishments over the last decade.

When I said “handsome dining room” did I forget to mention it is a painted a deep rich red? Make a reservation there for the 3 course Valentines Day Dinner value-packed at $45, and you won’t have to do another thing but sit back and let the evening play out. Trattoria Roma is, Matt tells me, not a first date sort of place, but a come-to-close-the-deal destination when you know there is a considerable connection. Artisanal food, sparkling glasses of crisp champagne, a deep red dining room…none of that should be taken lightly. Or too seriously. A balance that has only been mastered by the Italians.

Trattoria Roma
1447 Grandview Ave, Columbus, OH 43212
614-488-2104
www.trattoria-roma.com »
Lunch: Monday-Friday 11-2 Dinner: Sunday-Thursday 4-9 Friday & Saturday 4-11
**Photos by Melissa Roberts