Welcome back to Savannah Flavors, our weekly newsletter bringing you the latest delicious details from Savannah’s culinary scene every Thursday.

Here is what’s on the menu today:

• Elevated menu coming to Oak 36 Bar + Kitchen 🍸

• Must try spots in Bluffton, SC 🌮 

• Make this creamy shrimp pasta for a date night in 🍝

• New additions to Savannah Square pizza 🍕

THE MAIN DISH

New Executive Chef Luke Mattis ushers in new menus and methods at Oak 36 Bar + Kitchen 🥘

Unless you end up in one of the island community enclaves, crossing over DeRenne Avenue can be a discouraging dining crusade if only for the prevalence of chain restaurant choices. Heretofore, I have snidely labeled the entire region ‘SoD’ - ‘South of DeRenne’ - an area that is not home to much food that is worth the drive and the traffic.

Since it opened in August of 2020, Oak 36 Bar + Kitchen was decidedly different, a food phoenix that rose from the pandemic’s aftermath and that has survived and thrived in the Twelve Oaks Shopping Center, rather an anomaly on Abercorn SoD, if you will.

“We’ve always considered ourselves one-of-one, not being downtown,” said co-owner Brad Sellers. “If you want a really good elevated meal, scratch kitchen, amazing craft cocktails, plenty of parking, we’ve loved the fact that we’ve been able to be that destination.”

Earlier this week, the modern American gastropub launched new lunch and dinner menus that herald Luke Mattis’s recent appointment as executive chef, and the revamped brunch carte rolls out on Saturday.

“Where our menu is right now, we’re just so stoked that Chef Luke is going to take it up a notch to make us even more the go-to spot in midtown Savannah,” Sellers added.

What Sellers and partners Kara and Jason Ford have created is “the neighborhood go-to local restaurant with an elevated feel,” and Mattis aims to raise a high bar even higher.

Oak 36’s top chef chuckled: on the job three weeks and he has three new menus rolling out in Week Four.

CHEF’S CRAVINGS

FARM - Opie Crooks, Charles Alexander, Modou Jaideh, & Kelley Bryan 🥑🌶 🫑

Each week, I ask the folks behind the phenomenal food at our favorite places around Savannah these same simple questions:

When you are not in your restaurant kitchen, where do you go out to eat and what do you order?

This week’s Chefs’ Cravings come from the incredible crew at FARM, culinary director Opie Crooks, executive sous chef Charles Alexander, and cooks Kelley Bryan and Modou Jaideh. 

KB: Sandwiches all day, bro.

OC: I like La Poblanita over on May River Road. If you haven’t been there, the taco truck there is very good 🚚 

KB: Ooh, that’s a good one.

OC: I’m always mixing it up there.

MJ: I like a place near Okatie on the road to Savannah called El Comal Tapanejo. They have this chicken mole that’s really great, and the caldo del res, the beef stew, too.

OC: Charles is new here. He’s been here for about five minutes.

CA: Lately, I’ve been going to Ukiyo and pretty much ordering everything. They have this spicy egg noodle dish that I’ve been getting every week. It’s so good 🔥

KB: Alvin Ord’s (Old Town Bluffton) sandwiches, all day.

OC: He’s from Tennessee. It’s okay.

KB: You’re from Tennessee, too! It makes no difference! You’re just closer to Nashville. I’m a simple guy, just a roast beef, mayonnaise, tomato. 

OC: Their muffaletta is really good 🥪 

KB: Their muffaletta is amazing! Hang on a minute. Can we talk about that? The tapenade on that one. I think it’s a roasted garlic aioli that goes with it. Man, that’s a good one.

And for a special occasion?

OC: I think Late Air’s great. Obviously, Common Thread’s great. Strange Bird’s great (cue the laughter from the company men).

MJ: At my age, Wildflower Cafe for lunch because I go to bed early. I don’t do date nights anymore. It’s lunches. When you get to my age, you’ll relate.

OC: I like a date night at Over Yonder for a burger and wherever Chino’s popping up.

-Neil Gabbey

TRIED, TASTED, TRUE

Creamy shrimp pasta 🍤

THE STORY BEHIND THE RECIPE

There was a time when my wife and I ate takeaway maybe once a week. I am not suggesting that we have somehow evolved as epicureans to be ‘better than’ ordering in. Not at all. The busyness in our lives simply changed, especially after we moved to Savannah nearly a decade ago.

Back in Baltimore, I coached in the fall and winter seasons, if not year-round, which meant plenty of late nights and no energy to home-cook a meal. At least twice a month, I would spend a Sunday preparing a couple dishes that we could quickly heat up and eat up during the week, but here and there, we stopped at the plaza just north of our neighborhood to bring home a pizza from Fortunato’s, a sandwich and fries from Vito’s, or some sort of bowls from Pei Wei Asian Kitchen. 

A favorite restaurant for a casual sit-down or speedy grab-and-go was Egyptian Pizza, which closed about a year after we left Charm City. I hope it was not the loss of our occasional business that tipped the scales.

Certainly several rungs below haute cuisine, Egyptian’s food was tasty snonetheless, and too often, my wife and I split their shrimp and linguine entrée, served with a side of toasted garlic bread. I know what you are thinking: not one word in that dish’s rundown says ‘Egypt’, but we overlooked geopolitical gastronomic appropriation for the sakes of our stomachs.

In my attempts to recreate this recipe, I found that Cafe Delites’ (cafedelites.com) Creamy Garlic Butter Tuscan Shrimp comes pretty close, mostly because it calls for sun-dried tomatoes and because I up the ante by subbing out the called-for half-and-half with a year’s FDA allowance of butter and heavy cream.

Honestly, as was the case with Egyptian Pizza’s preparation, the pasta is there just to pace your intake of an incredibly rich cream sauce. The original was served with linguine, but fettuccine and penne work just as well. 

Thanks to a Vidalia onion, fresh shrimp, and all that heavy cream, the dish is wonderfully sweet, balanced by the savory herbs and tomatoes and olive oil. If you do not like sun-drieds, do not make this. Removing them would be a comestible crime.

In addition to more butter and all cream, my other main alterations to the Cafe Delites’ recipe are no spinach, less garlic, and more of essentially everything else. I am not against what spinach does for the overall flavor, but it adds water to a concoction that has to be slightly glutinous, plus it turns an otherwise baby pink sauce weirdly gray-green.

If you use two pounds of shrimp, you will need to pan-sear them in at least two batches, both times using about a tablespoon each of butter and olive oil. There is no need to re-fat the sauté pan before you sweat down the diced onion, and as it browns the bottom of the pan, take heart: the white wine will deglaze all.

Altogether, this is a model mise en place preparation. Get your gear gathered, and toward the end, synchronize the pasta cooking time with the reduction of the cream.

R.I.P., Egyptian Pizza. We ate you well, and at least this one item on your bygone menu lives on.

-Neil Gabbey

THE RECIPE

HARD GOODS 

• 1 8.5-oz. jar sun-dried tomatoes in oil, julienned 🍅

• 2 lbs. jumbo (21-25 or 26-30) shrimp, peeled and deveined

• 3 cloves garlic, minced or grated 🧄

• 1 medium Vidalia (sweet) onion, diced 

• 1 t. fresh marjoram or fresh oregano, minced

• 1 t. fresh thyme, minced

• 1 T. fresh parsley, minced or chiffonaded 🌿

• 6 T. unsalted butter, divided 🧈

• ¼ to ½ c. freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano, plus more for service

• 1 to 1 ½ t. kosher salt, plus more for pasta water 💧

• Fresh-ground black pepper (to taste)

• 8-10 oz. pasta (fettuccine, linguine, or penne)

• 2 T. toasted pine nuts (optional)

WET GOODS

• 2 T. extra virgin olive oil, divided 

• 2 c. heavy cream (or more to taste) 🥛

• ½ c. white wine (whatever you have leftover in the fridge)

DO THIS

1. Drain the sun-dried tomatoes

   • Slice into thin strips, if need be

   • Set aside

2. In a large mixing bowl, toss the peeled-and-deveined shrimp with two minced garlic cloves and one teaspoon of salt 🥣

   • Set aside for 30 minutes

3. Bring a pot of water to a slow boil over medium-high heat and add one tablespoon of salt

   • Lid and lower the heat until you are ready to cook the pasta

4. Heat a large sauté pan over medium heat and add one tablespoon of butter and one tablespoon of olive oil

5. In at least two batches, sear the shrimp, roughly two minutes per side

   • Do not worry about cooking the shrimp through as they will finish in the sauce

   • Use another tablespoon of butter and another tablespoon of olive oil for the second batch

   • Set aside

6. Without cleaning out the sauté pan, add the diced onion and sweat until the pieces just begin to brown, about ten minutes, stirring occasionally

7. Add the remaining tablespoon of minced garlic and count to 30

8. Stir in the half-cup of white wine and allow it to bubble and reduce, a total of about ten minutes

   • Every so often, scrape up the browned bits with the backside of a wooden spoon

   • Five minutes in, add the julienned sun-dried tomatoes 🥫

9. Around this point, cook the pasta, which should time up with the sauce

10. Add the remaining four tablespoons of butter

11. When the butter melts into the vegetables, pour in the heavy cream and stir to combine

    • At first, the oil from the tomatoes will separate and glisten on the surface of the cream, but it will emulsify into the sauce as the cream reduces

12. After about five minutes, stir in the Parmesan cheese 🧀

13. After about ten minutes, stir in the shrimp and any residual juices

14. Test the sauce’s thickness on the back of a spoon

    • If need be, dissolve one teaspoon of cornstarch in one tablespoon of heavy cream and stir into the sauce

    • NOTE: the sauce will thicken as it cools prior to service

15. Ladle the creamy shrimp sauce on top of a portion of pasta and top with parsley, more Parmesan, and pine nuts (optional)

BEEN THERE. ATE THAT.

Savannah Square Pizza 🌅 🍻 

The cod fillets had not completely thawed, so my wife only needed me to ask if she wanted to head out for a light dinner.

Though the felt-like-fifty temps posed an al fresco challenge, we headed up to Big Bon Bodega 🍕 for a couple slices of Savannah Square Pizza, only our second sampling of the program recently reimagined by Big Bon Momma Kay Heritage and chief operating officer Shahin Afsharian. 

We were happy to be greeted by ever-present pizzaiolo Alex Viles, who explained some changes that had been made to the menu, an all-day carte that serves the takeaway eatery’s seven-to-seven hours.

While he said that a full 12”x12” pie is still available, what is now featured are seven versions of 6”x6” slices, each still “inspired” by and named after the city’s singular downtown layout. 

The main new additions are six different Bodega Bowls, served over either steamed rice or Mac & Cheese ($12.99 to $15.99), but we had come for the pizza.

On our first visit right after Big Bon’s latest pizza program launched, we really liked the Johnson Buffalo ($7.99) topped with fried chicken, bacon, pickles, scallions, mozzarella, and shredded Cheddar and drizzled with Buffalo hot sauce and ranch aioli. 

This time, we were happy with a slice each of the Liberty Pepp ($5.99), and I added on a side of Mac & Cheese: cavatappi swimming in a white Cheddar and seasoned Parmesan sauce ($4.49).

As the sun set and the traffic picked up on Bull Street and West 37th, it was just warm enough to sit outside at one of the patio’s picnic tables, and Viles brought us our order in no time.

The olive-oily ochre Savannah Square crust is a little thinner than my own Sicilian, somewhat Detroity, with a puffy, air-pocketed crumb that produces a nice chew. Along with a generous dusting of Parmesan, the ‘Cheese Crown’ along the edges makes the money bites.

One slice is pick-uppable if on outstretched fingers, like you are holding a platter, and the size and thickness make it plenty filling. This is a more-cheese-than-sauce pizza, and the heaping helping of cupping pepperoni provides some sneaky spice.

Since it began back in 2021 under the leadership of Buffalonian Jay Langfelder, Big Bon Bodega’s in-house pizza program is now on its third iteration, and Afsharian, Heritage, and Co. will surely keep testing and tinkering to create a lasting concept.

After two satisfying samplings of Savannah Square Slices, our only mildly contrary observation is that the pizza is heated up to order and not baked to order, which comes through in the chew. Were the slices somehow first-time out-of-the-oven fresh, the crust would surely be even better.

Nevertheless, we will be back soon either for a slice of the eponymous Heritage K-Beef or that bagel sandwich Guy Fieri inhaled.

-Neil Gabbey