Courtesy Terry Pollack
Ann Lemons Pollack at a book signing in 2018.
St. Louis has lost one of its most prolific, versatile journalists. Ann Lemons Pollack, longtime local restaurant, theater, and movie critic, died April 13 from complications resulting from a fall in her home earlier this week. She was 76. A memorial service is being planned for later this summer.
According to her biography in St. Louis Magazine, where she was a contributor, Ann began writing about food in 1984 for St. Louis Dining. It would be another 10 years before she married former St. Louis Post-Dispatch critic Joe Pollack. Over the years, the couple wrote three local guide books together. They also penned restaurant reviews for SLM under the banner of “The Well-Seasoned Life,” a monthly column that Ann continued after her husband died in March 2012. Over time, Ann contributed to the Post-Dispatch, Sauce Magazine, Ladue News, and New Orleans Menu, among other publications.
An aficionado of Sunday brunch, she would often spend weekends visiting restaurants for her ongoing series Tour de Toast. Ever fair and even-handed, she would exult in small victories (“the pancakes kept warm in a chafing dish were great survivors,” she wrote of YaYa's), happy to while away a paragraph on a grapefruit’s presentation. (“Upon spooning out the first segment, one discovers that in addition to the traditional cutting across the equator of the fruit, the kitchen has removed the South Pole and most of Antarctica,” she noted of the Half & Half dish.) Her experience as an accomplished cook was evident in her reviews and cooking columns. She appreciated the addition of ricotta in pancakes, for example, because she'd likely experimented with the fillip herself.
Ann's vast catalogue of dining memories became the source of another popular SLM series, Memory Lane, in which she’d recall the rise and fall of a closed restaurant, sprinkling in memorable anecdotes. (Regarding the erstwhile Busch’s Grove, for instance, she wrote, “The staff knew who belonged. Years ago, a man I accompanied wore a threadbare Brooks Brothers suit to dinner there. After years living in Boston, he insisted that was what Old Money wore. I have never experienced such chilly service at a restaurant.”) These articles were a springboard for two books, Lost Restaurants of St. Louis, published in 2018, and a follow-up, Iconic Restaurants of St. Louis, published in late 2020, in which she chronicles such beloved institutions as Carl’s Drive-In, Cardwell's, and Chuck-A-Burger.
On a personal note, Ann was a colleague, friend, confidant, and arbiter of common sense and decency. Her reviews were opinionated but never overly spirited or emotional. (“That’s the bailiwick of the owners and chefs,” she used to joke.) Ann clued me in to the wonders of jack salmon (“fried whole, of course—is there any other way?”), took me up on the challenge to critique the 10 best fast food fish sandwiches in town, and gets full credit for turning me onto an amazingly tasty and very affordable breakfast sandwich (the breakfast slider at White Castle).
Blessed with a razor-sharp memory and a penchant for detail, Ann was my go-to when the subject was a closed or obscure restaurant: “No need to Google The House of Maret. Just ask Ann Pollack.” She also knew most of the city’s restaurant owners and the people who knew them. When a legendary restaurateur passed away, I would ask her to offer some insightful words. Just in the past three months, Ann paid homage to esteemed local restaurant icons Al Baker, Michael Malliotakis, Angelo Lombardo, Jr., and Rich LoRusso.
Last weekend, Ann attended St. Louis Actors’ Studio’s production of Hand to God at The Gaslight Theater and critiqued it in her blog, St. Louis Eats and Drinks. The April 10 entry was her last published article.
Editor's note: Donations can be made to the St. Louis Media History Foundation where Ann was a member. In addition, Joan Lipkin, producing artistic director of That Uppity Theatre Company, created an online fundraiser in her memory. Those monies will be sent to Jose Andres' World Central Kitchen to benefit the displaced people of Ukraine. That link is here.
