Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, page E1, 3/4/10

By Eric E. Harrison

LITTLE ROCK — It took months for things to work out, involving a major intervention by a seasoned restaurateur and a complete revision of the service platform. But it now looks like The House, once a destination place when the former Hillcrest residence was Sufficient Grounds, finally has what it takes to become a destination place again.

Thanks are due to Scott McGehee of ZaZa (and formerly of Boulevard Bread), who has taken over as executive chef (with Kitty Vega as his chef de cuisine). His new menu has preserved many of the elements that worked at The House, especially the burgers and the herbed fries, plus an enhanced and more eclectic range of offerings.

And thanks are also due to The House’s owners, who have replaced the incoherent former service set-up. Before, you ordered at the counter and sat yourself, and apparently whoever picked your food up in the kitchen became your waiter, which left nobody to contact if you needed something sooner than that, like adrink refill.

Now you get real sectionbased service, in which a server becomes responsible for meeting your needs from sit-down to check-paying. And the wait staff is trained, friendly, capable and accommodating.

Things aren’t yet perfect; on a busy weeknight, our server got a little swamped, and a recent mob-scene Friday night just seemed to swamp wait staff and kitchen alike.

Seating is still at granitetopped or wooden tables upstairs and downstairs. Eclectic works by local artists enhance the dark-blue walls; a couple of bicycles still perch above the stairway. Bumpty-umpty music - really, “Thriller” at top volume - was loud enough on at least one of our visits to impair conversation.

An outside deck is available for fairer-weather dining, which might have eased the strain on a Friday night when the place was packed to the rafters and there was a long wait for tables. If you’re lucky enough to get a comfy chair in one of the two “conversation pits” - one upstairs, one downstairs - you can wait for a table in comfort and even order appetizers; otherwise there’s very little “wait space” with standees crowding maybe a little too close to tables in service.

There isn’t a clinker among McGehee’s six main-course dishes. And they all give you a pretty decent deal for your entree price.

We were particularly pleased by the “Steak Frittes” ($14.75; the quotation marks are on the menu), a 4-ounce, copper-skillet-seared filet mignon topped with a little tarragon-green peppercorn butter. The steak was near-perfect, almost fork-tender and medium-rare, just the way we ordered it. The portion size was just right, too, if you’re following the advice of a dietitian (they recommend a serving ofmeat be the size of a pack of playing cards or the palm of your hand).

It came with some tasty sauteed baby spinach, a small pile of tiny roasted mushrooms (we thought about ordering a big order of just those next time we’re in) and a huge pile of the crisp, skin-on herb fries we so admired on our first gothrough at the House.

The Diamond Bear Beer Battered Fish and Chips ($12.95) is another winner, three pieces of “sustainably farmed grouper” (!) in a crisp, firm batter with a good hint of beer flavor, topping more herbed fries (so many we had to leave some of them behind). It comes with some tangy tartar sauce (pretty good for tartar sauce, something we’re generally not fans of); malt vinegar, which actually complemented, and didn’t obscure, the flavor of the fish and batter; and Melinda’s Hot Sauce, which we chose not totake advantage of.

Another winner: the Thai Green Curry Bowl ($12.95), almost a tureen, actually, containing a lightly spicy curry and coconut milk broth immersing tomato and eggplant chunks, lots of lemongrass, ginger, basil, cilantro, a lump of sticky rice and plenty of moist chicken chunks (you can add extra eggplant if you’re going vegetarian).

Even carnivores can appreciate the vegetable lasagna ($11.75), a sizable chunk of firm noodles layered with fresh tomatoes, some of those tiny mushrooms, spinach, zucchini, caramelized onions, fresh basil, Fontina and Paremsan cheeses and a Bechamel sauce.

Also in a tureen-size bowl comes the shrimp, crab, chicken and andouille sausage gumbo ($9.75), a smoky concoction with plenty of those ingredients plus okra, green peppers, scallions and rice, with a couple of strips of grilled bread. Intrepid Companion took leftovers home.

Really the only problem with the California Club Sandwich ($9.50) was that between the “roasted, naturally raised chicken breast,” melted Jack cheese, avocado, cucumbers, lettuce, tomato and herb mayonnaise on crisptoasted nine-grain bread, there was just too much sandwich to handle comfortably.

We had another “messy” problem with the otherwise excellent Bruschetta Plate appetizer ($8.25), mostly in keeping the tart, tomato-chunk-andbasil bruschetta on the wedges of bread. It also comes with marinated Mediterranean olives, roasted almonds and Fontina cheese.

The Blue Corn and Black Bean Nachos ($8.75), with chicken, fairly sharp goat cheese,Jack and Cotija cheeses, roasted green chiles, fresh jalapenos, sour cream and cilantro, were only slightly messy, but well worth the adventure. We also had an excellent soup of the day ($5.95), an excellent, nicely spicy Asian noodle.

The Friday night crush may be the reason our Prince Edward Island Mussels ($12.95) didn’t fulfill our expectations. We waited a long, long time for the appetizers we’d ordered in the upstairs conversation pit to make it to our downstairs table, and somehow the kitchen, while including lots of mussels (more than two dozen, actually an entree-size portion) in a white wine, garlic and herb broth, didn’t put in the tomato, fresh basil or lobster beurre. The results were adequate (we ate all the mussels) but not exciting.

The House has increased its beer and wine lists, with more than three-dozen choices of the former, draft, craft, domestic and imported, and 20 of the latter, including some unusual Argentine and Spanish varietals.

• The House Address: 722 N. Palm St., Little Rock
• Hours: 11 a.m.-2 p.m., 5-11 p.m. daily (kitchen usually stays open until at least 10:30)
• Cuisine: Eclectic
• Credit cards: V, MC, AE, D
• Alcoholic beverages: Wine and beer
• Reservations: No [except for parties of six or more]
• Wheelchair accessible: Yes, with a little difficulty, via the outside deck
• Carryout: Yes
• (501) 663-4500
• facebook.com/TheHouseInHillcrest

[from http://www.arkansasonline.com/news/2010/mar/04/finally-we-find-right-house-20100304]