Photography by Kevin A. Roberts
Let’s pull a misdirection play by starting a food review with a few words on wine. It’s appropriate in this case, because the restaurant’s name, Louie’s Wine Dive, is itself a misdirection. For one thing, Louie’s is in Clayton, which hasn’t exactly been famous for dives since sometime in the last century. And for another, a dive isn’t where you’d expect to find by-the-glass selections of an 2005–2007 vertical selection of Jordan cabs, a 12-year-old Barolo, or red and white blends of obscure grapes grown in the volcanic soil of Mount Etna.
In fact, if you’re with another wine adventurer (or, like me, just greedy), Louie’s Wine Dive will open any bottle on its list if you’ll order two glasses. The rest of that bottle is then offered on the chalkboard in single glasses, which is how I was able to treat myself to a generous pour of Freemark Abbey cabernet sauvignon for $22.
As for food? Well, Louie’s is part of a mini-chain that started in Iowa. The menu is common to all locations, and that does give it a bit of a well-vetted corporate feel. Tandoori salmon sits right below Tuscan chicken on the menu, with tacos and poutine listed nearby. With a résumé that includes Cardwell’s at the Plaza and Boundary, executive chef Patrick Baltes might be able to execute such a menu blindfolded. He gets a chance to show off every night, though, with a different prix-fixe of his choosing. (We stuck with the standard menu to ensure that you could still get the dish when you visit.)
The four porks in the four-pork gnocchi are loin, braised shoulder, sausage, and bacon, providing the fluffy pillows with an interesting counterpoint. Steak de burgo is to Des Moines what T-rav is to St. Louis, and Louie’s has adapted the recipe from its birthplace by swapping out beef tenderloin for a flatiron cut. The herb and garlic–based de burgo sauce was originally concocted to supercharge tenderloin’s comparatively mild beef flavor, so it works equally well, if not better, with the flatiron.
BLT is a recurring motif on the appetizer menu: In the BLT deviled eggs, arugula is substituted for the lettuce, adding a peppery note. Bacon jam sliders— available only during happy hour and sometimes as an off-menu item—incorporate a blander lettuce that provides more of a crunch than anything else, but that’s all that’s needed for the bacon-laced tomato jam. Note that during happy hour—which is all evening on Mondays—the prices on some of the small plates are cut by about a third and several choices are added, providing an excellent opportunity for getting enough to eat if you want to drop $26 for a glass of that ’04 Barolo.
Me, I’m saving up for a $70 glass of Sassicaia.
