Grub Crawl

Last night I met some friends and went on a grub crawl around Bloomington. Eleven local restaurants were participating in the event, and my goal was to visit at least five of them.

We all met up at FARMBloomington, which is an amazing restaurant that uses locally grown ingredients in all of the dishes they serve. After we bought our wristbands that would give us access to all the grub, we each chose a different item off the special Grub Crawl menu. I picked a mushroom and escargot skewer which was delicious. Chad got a polenta and vegetable dish, which was way too heavy on the anchovies for my palate--but he loved it! Two of my friends got the cheese risotto (creamy) and another two got the sausage stuffed puff pastry (tangy). We all split some artisian bread and herb butter, too. Pretty damn good for the first place! And all plates were $5.

We moved on to an art gallery called Pictura which was hosting two local places: Sweet Grass and Oliver's Winery. I love Oliver's, and definitely tried the tasty semi-dries they had out, but I was super excited to try the liquid nitrogen ice cream from Sweet Grass. And, man, it did not disappoint. Not only was the technique innovative, so was the flavor--brown butter, chocolate chip, and bacon. Yes, bacon. It was surprisingly delicious! The best part was watching a batch of the ice cream being made. The ingredients were mixed in a large metal bowl, then they added what I assume was the liquid nitrogen. A big cloud of billowing cold fog covered the table while one of the chefs madly churned his whisk in the bowl. He said that the ice cream was boiling, but it was also freezing. When the fog cleared, the ice cream was done--it took two minutes tops--and we got to taste it right then. Amazing! Everything here was free.

After that, we tried a pasta bar set up by another art gallery. The pasta chef came from Talons Restaurant out at the Eagle Pointe Golf Resort. They had a spread of ingredients to choose from and the chef created each dish individually to order. I got chicken and artichoke with squash, sun-dried tomatoes, banana peppers over fettuccine with the "famous" cream and crimson sauce (which is half alfredo, half marinara). It was fresh and tasty, and only $4.

Some of our friends had to leave after this, but I'm pretty sure they left with full bellies. The small plates, the ice cream, and the pasta would have been enough for most people, I think. But there were still so many places left to try! We carried on, and continued our crawl down to the Spectrum art gallery where we tried pulled pork BBQ sandwiches, macaroni and cheese, and sweet ice tea prepared and served by Smokin' Jack's Rib Shack. This restaurant actually catered my wedding last year, so I knew it was going to be good. I probably should have skipped it but they were offering all three of their items for $5--and that is a guaranteed happy tummy, right there.

Our second to last stop was Dats for some good ole Cajun etouffee. It was a big plate full of chili cheese etouffee, all over rice, with a buttered roll for just $4. At this point, I think all of our seams were busting. We heard some thunder in the distance, so we decided we needed to call it quits and head on back to FARM and join in the after-party down in the Root Cellar bourbon bar.

Thank god we walked to all the different places! Without those few minutes for my stomach to desperately digest whatever it could before the next thing made it down my esophagus, I think I might have tossed my cookies. And that would have been very sad indeed.

We made it to the Root Cellar just as it started to rain and we all settled in to listen to an old-timey country band called the Drovers. I tried some Rowan's Creek bourbon and it really wasn't too bad (for straight liquor). The music was fun and the crazy dancing guy was even better. We stayed for the raffle of gift cards (to all the participating restaurants) and then we headed our separate ways. Honestly, it was probably one of the best times I've had in Bloomington. I can't wait to go again.