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Location: 2512 N. Main Ave., 210-966-0404, peripherysa.com
Hours: 5-10 p.m. Tuesday-Thursday; 5-11 p.m. Friday-Saturday.
On the menu: Starters, $6-$8; small plates, $7-$13; main courses, $13-$18; dessert, $7.
Fast facts: In the weeks leading to the opening of Periphery this week in the Monte Vista neighborhood, chef and owner Mark Weaver said that anybody who worked with him at Tre Trattoria knows why he called his new place “Periphery.”
“I always tell my people, ‘You can’t just have tunnel vision. Watch your periphery. Always look at the whole picture,’ ” he said. Now he’s putting that ethos to the test at his own place, directing his sharp waitstaff like a field marshal from the window of the kitchen pass.
Periphery’s small space has thwarted former tenants The Old Main Assoc., Beat Street Coffee Co. Bistro and Justin’s Ice Cream in quick succession. But Weaver has re-cast the room, the wood-cased bar, the adjoining courtyard and especially the booths by the window looking out onto Main Avenue as an intimate showcase for his short menu of variations on Italian, Southern and smoke-infused cooking.
Impressions: Nobody gets into the restaurant business to win a beauty contest, but the fact remains that we eat with our eyes first. And while Periphery wins points for talent, congeniality and intelligence, it must pay attention to appearances or forever be the runner-up to the winner who rocks the gown and tiara harder.
For example: Weaver’s heirloom bean and carnaroli rice risotto elevates rice and beans to a smoky and texturally satisfying place. But in its 50 shades of beige, it looks like food from a M*A*S*H rerun. Rather than pooled on a plate, it might look better in a bowl with a touch of green.
The same is true of an ungarnished pasta Bolognese. It’s sweet and lightly acidic, with spices like a fall pantry and iron-rich umami from chicken livers. But it’s an unflattering mottle of red and brown in the bistro’s low twilight glow, further complicated by pasta that was dense and tough.
Periphery’s polenta-crusted pimento cheese wore the pageant sash better, seared like two neat crabcakes with microgreens and a swirl of sweet bacon jam. It was the night’s best dish, in close competition with pearlescent catfish spiced and seared New Orleans-style with a dress of green tomato relish and grilled onions.
For openers, Weaver’s buttermilk cornbread was caramelized outside and soft as its sidecar of ranch butter on the inside, but it brought a broader issue into sharp relief: Most every dish at Periphery would be better with bread of some kind. I’m not talking about full-on bread service; I’m talking about a few crackers with the pimento cheese, a slice of grilled Italian bread with the Bolognese, a piece of cornbread with the risotto. It would balance the value and decoration equations, yes, but bread also performs scooping and sopping functions that help us, in turn, absorb and appreciate complex cooking.
Most of these issues are easy fixes, symptoms of the shakedown cruise of a promising restaurant’s first week.
Dinner finished strongly with custom-roasted Periphery coffee from a French press and a dessert somewhere between French toast and poundcake, infused with peanut butter, seared on the grill and served with salted caramel and poached pears.
Periphery is BYOB with a service charge until its liquor license comes through, a fact not lost on an opening-week crowd with a bottle, or two, at every table.
msutter@express-news.net
Twitter: @fedmanwalking
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