Brookhaven Updates!

I had drinks with some work ladies at Haven last night. Not the best place for drinks (aka beer- they have a minimal bottle selection, no draft + they don't have a great place to just hang out & drink), but the food is pretty good. They cater a little more toward the older Brookhaven crowd. Cory and I have eaten there with family, and they have a great outdoor patio (dining only) and good food, but a little pricey (typical dish $18-30).

Which leads me to... Brookhaven is screaming for more reasonable, fun places to eat & drink & hangout, so we are looking forward to Kaleisocope opening up in a month or two. I passed by there last night (too dark to take a photo), but its coming along. The bar and kitchen area has been constructed, but the floors and walls are still unfinished. My guess would be a Dec/Jan opening (previously anticipated opening of October). We look forward to checking it out! My only advice to them- make sure to have a great draft beer selection, reasonable prices, and great food!! :)

Also while walking over to Haven I noticed two new spaces being developed. One, POUR (no link yet, only Twitter: @PourWineAtlanta) looks very interesting. All they had was a printed out sign that said POUR - Wine Bar & Tasting Room. Sounds very fun and exciting! They are expanding into a huge area directly next to Verde. The last space I noticed was a new boutique coming in called Egg's Nest- next to the Cocktails & Canvas space. Looks like more of a kids boutique.

Lots of stuff moving into the area! Keep em' coming!! Especially the restaurants.... stay tuned as we try everything out!

El Potro

This weekend we decided to try out some more local ethnic Brookhaven Restaurants we had heard about. Cory was really in the mood for Mexican (as he is most Friday nights) so we tried out El Potro. El Potro is located just north of Briarwood & Buford (3396 Buford Hwy NE), directly under the massive Asian Pearl billboard.

We were pleasantly surprised to find a nice outdoor patio and quickly grabbed a seat. The restaurant was bustling with patrons, but it wasn't too difficult to find a table which was nice. The menu was pretty typical Mexican with quesadillas, tacos, combo plates, etc all roughly $6-$9 (not bad!). Drinks were also pretty reasonable: Cory enjoyed a 32 oz. Dos Equis Amber and I enjoyed a $3.75 house margarita in a cute glass. For dinner Cory had the vallarta special (it was ok...) and I had the chimichangas (very delicious! pictured below- $6.50). We also saw a few others ordering some interesting looking sauces/salsa, so we will definitely try those next time and see how those are.

Overall, we were hoping for some more authentic mexican cuisine and less tex-mex (we do, however, need to go back and explore the menu a little more). We were really on the lookout for some aztec-style Mexican (like Zapata in Norcross) complete with molcajetes and mole. The atmosphere was pretty cool (helped by a gorgeous night), there was a diverse group of folks there, and it was pretty inexpensive. We definitely were pretty happy walking out of there will full stomachs for less than $20! This will probably become a good hangout for us and our friends as an inexpensive local Mexican, but we will still be on the lookout for some down home mexican cookin'.

Taste Of Brookhaven

We have been looking forward this event for awhile now. We have both been to "taste of" events before (Roswell, Alpharetta, Norcross, etc.) but never had to pay for it, so we didn't really know what to expect. The event featured "tastes" of local restaurants around Brookhaven and Buckhead. They also had live music which consisted of a guy playing guitar to a backing track and a silent auction with items donated by local artists and such.

The clientelle was interesting (and older). Lots of plastic surgery and leather skinned women in dresses that were too revealing (not in the good way). We expected more of a festival atmosphere and got more of a summer garden party vibe. Seating was limited and the wine line was long so we ended up standing up most of the time without anything to drink. I was quickly asking myself what we paid $30 for. Wading through the perfume and fake tan smell, we finally hit up some of the restaurant booths.

The first booth we hit was from Kaleidoscope. We were glad to see them make an appearance and they said they're still on schedule to open this fall. We were excited to see what they were making. They offered a pulled pork slider with a pickled coleslaw on top. They also offered a sliced beef tenderloin on a soft pita-like bread topped with a peaunt bbq sauce and fresh pickles.


We stopped by Eclipse di Luna's tent. I think this is technically located in Dunwoody but close enough. They had their chef making paella right in front of us. They also had sangria which was excellent. The paella was definitely authentic with mussels, calamari, sausage, chicken, and saffron rice.




This is from the Brookhaven Bistro which is located behind the health food store on Peachtree called Nut's 'n' Berries. We've always wanted to try it but the thought of eating somewhere healthy and attached to a place called Nuts 'n' Berries always scared me. This was actually our favorite booth. The offered a falafel on a pita wedge with a yogurt sauce and a salmon quesadilla. Both were very unique and I love falafel. Can't wait to try this place.
Finally, we stopped by the Sugar Shack. They had little cupcakes and cookies. Our favorite was the lemon cupcake and the plain old chocolate chip cookie. They win the award for the best presentation.

So all in all, the food was good (there was plenty more than shown here), atmosphere was a little too formal and the people a little too... "buckhead". Unfortunately, it was only a small "taste" of all these restaurants. All of their menus are excellent and expansive and I wish we could have tried a couple more dishes from each of the restaurants, but obviously resources were limited. I can't say that we'd go back next year. Maybe we'll wait until our skin gets a little more weathered and we can spend some money on nose jobs. I think we'll just stick to going to the real thing.

Kaleidoscope

We walked by the new restaurant/pub Kaleidoscope in the Village Place shopping center on Dresden. Looks like they are making progress (on the bar at least!). Hopefully, we can still expect it to open this fall. See more pics on their facebook page.

Little Bangkok Thai

We used to know of a great local Thai food spot in Norcross that we would get take out from all the time. It was our go-to comfort food. So now we are down here in Brookhaven and we are so close to the ethnic mecca that is Buford highway and we need to find our comfort food. I looked up some places and I found one that got some decent reviews and was close. But after driving up and down Buford Highway 3 times, we couldn't find it - most likely closed. Quickly searching out a decent alternative we found Little Bangkok Thai which is down Cheshire Bridge Rd. (yeah, not really Brookhaven, but close enough). It was a little hole in the wall but absolutely packed for a Sunday at 8pm. We were sat in about 5 minutes and service was speedy. They had all the traditional thai dishes as well as Chinese food if your date doesn't like Thai.

We had:

• Thai iced tea - Malory had to fill her sweet tooth
  
• Coconut soup - excellent, great flavor and fresh ingredients
• Fried Spring rolls - your typical fried cabbage with tasty peanut sauce on the side

• Masaman Curry - (on the right) very fresh ingredients and a sweeter curry sauce than I have tasted before.
  
• Panang Curry -(on the left) again, fresh ingredients. The curry was spicy and flavorful.

We will definitely be hitting this destination again and will be a great weeknight takeout spot. Go check it out.