2-Bit Review: lunch @ everyday cook

One or two visits. A few hundred words. Sometimes that’s all it takes.

First, you need to understand that lunch @ everyday cook is NOT open every day. It is not open on Sunday or Monday. Once I got that fact through my thick skull, I was able to successfully sit down for lunch with a friend recently.

Wander upstairs at Kerrytown into the old Workbench space (over Hollander’s) and you’ll find everyday cook, the kitchen gear offshoot of everyday wine downstairs. Mary Campbell, owner of edw, has installed a restaurant-grade kitchen staffed by Brendan and Chewy, the heart of a somewhat unusual lunch operation.

Entering everyday cook, you wander over to a blackboard that posts the day’s offerings, a limited menu each day. You select your entrée, pay a cashier, and then take a sticky note with your choice written on it to the chefs. Sticky note submitted, you then grab a drink, silverware and have a seat – lunch is brought to your table. Keep in mind, the atmosphere is about as minimalist as it gets. There's no waitstaff, and the room is just some tables and chairs in the open, wood-beamed space, with the boys in the kitchen in clear view.

I had fried catfish with red pepper, tomato, and green bean salad over polenta. The two slices of catfish had a nutty breading that struggled to stick to the fish, but boy howdy was it good! And the chunks of breading that fell off actually added a little crunchy kick to the excellent polenta beneath. The green bean salad had something going on that was a little sweet – perhaps the baby tomatoes had been carmelized a bit? Awesome.

My friend Kathy ordered chicken with bacon and asparagus salad, also served with the polenta. “You can really tell this is some kind of organic, free-range chicken,” she commented. I had a bite, and it was very tender, fresh, and juicy. The bacon made the asparagus taste a little smokey – good, but I think we both liked my green beans better. “This is how I like green beans prepared,” Kathy said. “Hint, hint,” she added, just in case I didn’t get it.

On another recent visit, we ordered a duck breast salad with poached pear and gorgonzola. I'm a sucker for a nicely-done, rare duck breast and this did not disappoint. Entrees were $10-15 range, a fair price for such fresh, high-quality ingredients, prepared and presented expertly.

Finally, Kathy and I should not have ordered the Italian Strawberry Shortcake dessert. But in the interest of research…. I asked what made it Italian? Lady fingers was the answer. Constructed in a fashion similar to tiramisu, only with strawberries. Absolutely fabulous. “I don’t normally care for strawberries,” Kathy observed. “But this is really good.”

Lunch @ everyday cook appears to be still relatively undiscovered. The atmosphere is somewhat spartan, but it was a great, quiet place to catch up with a friend and linger over a lovely, reasonably priced meal.