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:

• Aldi opens its third Greater Savannah location on Victory 🥫🛒

• Eden Supper Club gathers to discuss favorite places in SAV 🍹🌮

• The perfect Rain day recipe: Homemade Daube Provençal ☔️

• Neil tries the legendary Taqueria El San Luis 🥑🍻

THE MAIN DISH

Aldi opens its third Greater Savannah location on Victory Drive 🌽🍅🥬

Admit it. Even when the exterior design took shape and was undeniably Aldi, you were hoping against hope that you would drive down Victory Drive one day and see the red hibiscus logo you have longed for.

Despite the proximity to Whole Foods, we all prayed that the property that was the nearly hundred-year home of Johnny Harris would become the 912’s first Trader Joe’s. Instead, what opened on August 8 was the area’s third Aldi outpost, the originally German step-sibling of the popular American grocery chain.

In 1979, after the suburban Deutsche corner store split into Aldi Nord and Aldi Süd, the former bought Trader Joe’s to enter the U.S. food marketplace and now has nearly 2400 stores spread from sea to shining sea. As of August, TJ’s was topping out at 593.

We wanted Monrovia, CA. We got Batavia, IL.

Nearly five years ago this very week, someone played a dirty trick on us, tacking a homemade ‘Trader Joe’s Coming Soon’ sign in the former Sav-A-Lot née David’s Supermarket storefront window in Starland. 

As soon as I saw it, I did reconnaissance on behalf of the local TJ’s faithful and spoke with Kenya Friend-Daniel, then Trader Joe’s National Director of Public Relations. Her most hopeful statement was, “Savannah is not a place we have ruled out.” 

In the meantime, the Hostess City has not been ‘ruled in’, evidently, and three Aldis have been bespoke built while the wait for palaka aloha-clad Crew Members ringing bells continues. 

One of presumably thousands who wanted #594 to be in the 314blankblank, I know that I will frequent the latest Aldi location semi-frequently because it is close to our house and because, like all of us, I would love to knock a few dollars off of our weekly grocery bill.

CHEF’S CRAVINGS

Eden Supper Club - Jared Jackson, Nicole Priore, & Justin Benassi 🍋🐓🌃

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?

On Friday, September 13, chefs Jared Jackson and Nicole Priore pulled into The Garage at Victory North, beginning what we can all hope is a long-term restauration residency of Eden Supper Club. Their concept is clearly in place with logo and artwork on the front door and window that give onto Whitaker Street and an verdant and cozy interior that is now a Garden of Eating. This week’s Chefs’ Cravings come from Jackson, Priore, and ESC’s do-everything FOHer Justin Benassi. 

NP: I feel like we’re all going to say the same thing.

JB: We’re hitting our neighbors, for sure, but I spend a lot of time talking to people about my recommendations. I have my neighbors. I have my celebratory meals. I have holes-in-the-wall.

NP: Shabazz. Their combo.

JB: Deluxe fish sandwich, the combo. You’ve got to have the deluxe with cheese on it.

NP: You think it would be weird, but it really works.

JJ: I think people sleep on whiting, but if it’s fried and done well, it works.

JB: And then Al Salaam, for sure. Anytime I need some gyro or falafel in my life.

JJ: I have not had a gyro over there in a minute, but that is a classic.

NP: Justin and I just went to Late Air on Wednesday and got to eat a little bit of Daniel’s [Harthausen] food for the first time. He had an anchovy, fig, prosciutto - (turning to DB, who shook his head) I’m sorry. I took that out of your brain. It was so good! He also had this…what was the sorbet?

DB: It was cantaloupe.

NP: Cantaloupe and saké sorbet, which was very surprising. The flavor complexity was great.

JB: I’ve got to shout out my boys at The Cuban Window. There, it’s always the Cuban, and if I don’t have time to make a meal before I get to work, I’ll pick up a breakfast sandwich - bacon, egg, and cheese, and I’ll also pick up a Cuban. I eat the bacon, egg, and cheese while it’s still warm, toss the Cuban in the reach-in, and when seven or eight o’clock rolls around and I’m hungry, y’know.

JJ: I’d put Chazito’s on that list, too. I’m a sucker for some Puerto Rican food, especially some traditional dishes. Getting some arroz gandules with some maduros is (tongue click sound effect) for me.

NP: Outside of that, Sixby, for sure. We love Natasha [Gaskill] and Matt [Palmerlee]. Bacon, egg, and cheese and a broth is usually my go-to, but honestly, anything. I’ve worked my way through that menu, and everything they do is great.

And for a special occasion?

JJ: With what little time there is available outside of this space, I’m probably going to Brochu’s, I’m probably going to Late Air. I don’t know if I’ve got much time outside of that (laughs the laugh of a busy chef). At Brochu’s, I’m smacking some oysters. I’m getting their zucchini or their rillette. I’m probably getting a sandwich. I’m definitely getting Georgia’s [Baker] biscuits.

NP: Definitely Brochu’s. Oysters are a top, next to any of the desserts that Georgia is making. They’re always out of this world. They have a few different versions of shrimp on the menu, and each one of them is a really fun, unique dish, especially the grilled shrimp on the skewers.

JJ: At Late Air, whatever Daniel has going on. I love Madeline [Ott] and Colin [Breland]. I let them pick whatever wine I’m drinking that day and pair it with some food. Honestly, that’s where I am right now. If I’m on a budget, I can go into Late Air and get a nice glass of wine and something to eat. If money’s no object, I can order the whole menu. I feel the same way about Brochu’s. I can go in there for a chicken sandwich or order the whole menu and feel good about either one of those decisions. That’s the beauty of both of those places. 

JB: My top three are always Common Thread, Husk, and mildly biased, my former employer at Fleeting. I really do think the food at Fleeting is up there. There are awesome restaurants in town that have super-consistent menus, like Cotton & Rye. I’m happy to recommend it. When you’ve lived in a town almost all of your life, you want to find those places that continue to bring the variety and be able to have new experiences every time.

-Neil Gabbey

TRIED, TASTED, TRUE

Daube Provençal 🍷🥖

THE STORY BEHIND THE RECIPE

Everyone who knows us is painfully aware that my wife and I have plans to move to France. 

We were there together for the first time back in 2000, one leg of what was a maiden European vacation for us both, largely to see in person what Peter Mayle had written about so spectacularly in his Provence oeuvre.

His depictions did admirable justice to villages and vistas that largely defy adequate illustration on a printed page. We fell in love.

Thanks to a biannual France trip that I chaperoned for several years at my former school, I have been in Avignon more times that I have been to New York City, and I could not be happier about the ratio. My wife and I have been in the erstwhile Papal City together three times now, most recently to celebrate our 25th anniversary back in 2019.

The majority of those two-plus weeks were spent between Avignon and Apt, the diminutive and less swish town on the Luberon Valley’s eastern edge. While the former bustles year-round with a population of nearly 100,000 and tourism figures that top a half-million visitors annually, the latter is home to about 12,000 and is only ‘crowded’ on market days. 

For us, both cities are le chat’s miaou, but after that last trip, we have our future sights set on Apt. Someday soon, I hope that we are regulars at Le Carnot Set, set majestically in the namesake square just steps from the Cathedrale Sainte-Anne d'Apt, lingering over dinner as long as we can as the sky slowly darkens to that indefinable gentian blue.

Until then, every so often, I will try to replicate Provençale recipes in our Savannah kitchen, one of which is daube, the southern cousin of boeuf bourguignon. 

When too many hole-punched pages of an original Cook’s Illustrated cookbook had torn out due to frequent use, my wife bought me The Complete America’s Test Kitchen TV Show Cookbook, updated in 2021 and hard-bound. In this colossal compendium are four French-styled beef stews: Daube Provençale is the leadoff hitter.

After making my Triple T rendition of ATK’s Creamless Creamy Tomato Soup earlier in the week, I still had a few cups of homemade chicken stock thawed in the fridge, and on my first visit to the Aldi on Victory Drive, I had bought two chuck roasts. 

As befits most stew standards, the rest of the daube ingredients were already on-hand: dried mushrooms, flour, carrots, garlic, onions, tomato paste, anchovies, some fresh herbs, and half a bottle of red wine. 

Though the ATK inventory calls for salt pork, Niçoise olives, orange zest, and whole canned tomatoes, the sauce does fine without, and the only ‘extra’ that I like is a pound of button mushrooms, as recommended in The Café Sucre Farine’s (thecafesucrefarine.com) recipe. For several years, I have blended these two blueprints to bring about my own daube. 

Any home chef who has scratch-made a stew knows that it is a process, but the lion’s share of this legwork is done in one dutch oven.

Even though it adds one step, ATK’s inclusion of dried mushrooms is the matter of five minutes and adds an earthly note to the gravy. I also eschew flouring the raw meat before browning, simply searing off batches seasoning with salt and pepper.

Without wiping out the pot, I toss in the onions and carrots and cook them for just a few minutes before adding the garlic and tomato paste. After those ingredients are slightly soft and barely brown, they are dusted with flour and remain on the heat for two minutes, tops.

ATK calls for a full bottle, but two cups of both wine and broth marry in a sumptuously rich sauce. Plus, that leaves a glass or more for my wife to enjoy with the meal. I add the wine first, scraping up any fond and making sure that the flour granules fully dissolve. In goes the stock as the pre-stew is brought up to a simmer. In goes the reserved beef and residual juices, reconstituted mushrooms and that strained liquid, anchovies, and herbs, which are always two full stalks of rosemary and an even bigger bunch of thyme.

After three hours in a low oven, the gravy will have tightened up, the carrots will be fork-tender, and the cubes of beef will be ready to fall apart.

So that they do not overcook to actual mush, I recommend sautéeing the quartered mushrooms separately, adding them to the stew perhaps a half hour before you remove the pot from the oven, at which time you also need to take out the bare herb stems and the bay leaves.

My wife likes her daube as a proper unaccompanied stew, and I often boil a handful of extra-wide egg noodles to be the base in my bowl. This particular batch yielded enough for a third night’s dinner. I loosened up the last servings’ sauce with some stock and made fries for dipping and dredging.

Until we move to Apt, this will do nicely.

-Neil Gabbey

THE RECIPE

HARD GOODS 

• ¾ ounce dried mushrooms (chanterelle or porcini) 🍄

• 3-4 pounds boneless beef chuck roast or sirloin tip roast 🥩

• 2 medium or 1 large sweet onion, peeled and cut into ¼-inch slices

• 6 large carrots, peeled and cut on the bias into 1-inch rounds

• 6 garlic cloves, peeled and sliced thin 🧄

• ⅓ cup all-purpose flour

• 4 anchovy filets, minced (or 1 tablespoon anchovy paste)

• 2 stalks fresh rosemary

• Handful of fresh thyme stalks 🌿

• 2 bay leaves

• 1 pound button mushrooms (optional)

• Kosher salt, for seasoning

• Fresh-ground black pepper, for seasoning

• ¼ cup fresh Italian parsley, chopped

WET GOODS

• ¼ cup olive oil 🫒

• 2 tablespoons tomato paste 🥫

• 2 cups red wine (Cabernet Sauvignon, Côtes de Provence/Rhône/Roussillon)

• 2 cups chicken (or beef) stock

• Water (as needed for loosening gravy)

• 1 tablespoon butter (optional) 🧈

DO THIS

1. Put the dried mushrooms in a microwave-safe boil with a cup of water

2. Cover the bowl with plastic-wrap and poke with a few holes

3. Microwave on high for 30 seconds

4. Let the mushrooms steep for another five minutes

5. Strain the mushrooms from the liquid and reserve both

6. Chop the reconstituted mushrooms into ½-inch pieces

7. Trim the beef, removing solid and stiff streaks of white fat

8. Cut the beef into 2-inch chunks

9. In a large bowl, season the beef with a two teaspoons each of salt and pepper

10. Heat a dutch oven over medium-high heat

11. Working in batches with the divided olive oil, brown the beef, turning pieces after every two minutes (8-10 minutes total per batch)

12. Set the seared beef chunks aside

13. Preheat an oven to 300°

14. Reduce the heat to medium

15. Add the onions and carrots and cook for approximately 4 minutes

16. Add the garlic and cook for 1 minute

17. Stir in the tomato paste and cook for 2 minutes

18. Stir in the flour and cook for 2 minutes

19. Pour in the wine, scrape up any fond to dissolve it and any clumped flour granules, and bring to a slow simmer

20. Pour in the stock, stir, and bring back to a slow simmer

21. Add the reserved reconstituted mushrooms and their juices, anchovies, bay leaves, rosemary, and thyme

22. When the pre-stew is simmering steadily, add the reserved beef chunks and their juices and stir to make sure that the beef is mostly covered with liquid, adding a little water if needed

23. Cover the pot and place in the oven

24. Cook for at least 3 hours

25. About 30 minutes before that time is up, melt the butter in a sautée pan and sautée the quartered button mushrooms until they are lightly browned and the liquid has cooked away

26. Add the mushrooms to the stew and stir

27. Top each portion with the chopped parsley

BEEN THERE. ATE THAT.

Taqueria El San Luis 🌮 🌯

Back in the thick of the COVID pandemic, Jorge and Chris Banda beat the entrepreneurial odds to the everlasting delight of their loyal clientele.

Ever since father and son opened Taqueria El San Luis in the Eisenhower Shopping Plaza in July of 2020, fans have flocked to their family-owned-and-run traditional taco shop. Serving a half-dozen proteins offered five ways and several sides, the Bandas’ unique and authentic brand has boomed in Savannah’s Mallville over the last four years, annually garnering rave reviews both online and by word of mouth.

Since CONNECT launched this Savannah Flavors newsletter back in January, only E-TANG and Over Yonder have been mouthwateringly mentioned as often by fellow food industry folks as an off-shift favorite.

Virtually everything on the menus is scratch-made in the pequeño space, notably the corn tortillas that star in the tacos and tostadas.

I am embarrassed to admit that it had been more than a year, perhaps two, since my wife and I had returned to Taqueria El San Luis, and when we pulled into the parking lot that rainy Saturday, she said that she had never actually been inside. I must have brought home takeaway in those masked-up days.

A little before noon, the cozy, bright interior was bustling FoH, at the counter, and in the kitchen, Chris Banda manning the register between strolls into the dining room to check on diners and shifting deftly between English and Spanish with each guest.

In the corner, five Hunter Army Airfield soldiers in full camouflage had finished up lunch and chatted. If I were posted there, I would be here every day.

Even before the delicious food was brought to our table, happiness and hospitality abounded here, Banda ending every sentence with a smile and “my friend.” His employees followed suit, exuding graciousness to create a familial atmosphere.

Having been highly recommended by chef friends, I opted for an al pastor torta ($11.99) and a horchata agua fresca ($2.50), mostly because I am not a melon man, which was the day’s other flavor. 

The torta fillings overflowed the butter-grilled telera roll: saucy, tender bite-sized chunks of pork, chunks of crisp white onion and smoky pineapple, slices of avocado, and shredduce. The only stumper was how to pick up the supple sandwich for that first bite.

Bring on the napkins. 

The al pastor itself is plenty savory, but I dunked every other mouthful into a pool of the house-made creamy orange and mellow tomato-based salsa.

Like my torta, my wife’s chicken taco ($4.50) was piled high with fillings, which meant a fork-first approach before she even tried to pick it up. She opted for the mild pico de gallo, and even with that added moisture dripping into the wax paper, the fresh corn tortilla stood up.  

Both the frijoles refritos and guacamole sides, served in 3.5-ounce styro cups, were muy autentico and were more than ample accompaniments.

All in all, this was double what I usually eat for lunch each day, but there was not one bit left on either of our trays. On a rainy errand day that was not fit for sitting outside, as is our wont, Taqueria El San Luis was the right call.

-Neil Gabbey