When we first moved to Covington things were so different here. In the old train station downtown Joel Dondis had a great fast casual restaurant which was also the base of his catering operation. A few years after our move, he moved as well, back to the southshore, where his operation and venues are ever more successful. But it was too bad that the old train station would not be a cool restaurant space.
That didn’t last long. A young couple from the southshore with an A-list resume moved in at the other end with a place they called Lola. Keith and Neely Frentz offered sandwiches and plate lunch specials and everything was a cut above what you usually see with casual food like this. It is also a fast-casual style of service.
Lola became an instant hit with us. Tom, who always recognized excellence, was particularly happy to have it so close to the house. We became regulars.
Some time after they moved in, an old junk of a train car showed up on the tracks that had remained behind the restaurant. It sat for years. And about eight years ago it was fully restored glamorously, with interesting wallpaper and a sumptuous booth at the end of the car. The original space where food is ordered was always pretty glamorous, with its exposed brick walls and wooden tables. And now there were two eclectic dining rooms separated by an outdoor deck, making it one of the most interesting-looking and just plain interesting (and delicious) restaurants in our experience.
But in all that time, we only very occasionally visited Lola in the evening. During the day it is a lunch-only spot, and at night they return to their roots serving gourmet food. The first few times we did have dinner there, it was extraordinary. I remember a particular crab arancini that I still think about even now, years later.
ML went recently for a tennis ladies evening, and raved about it for weeks after. That prompted Tom and me to go back for dinner. I remember not being as thrilled with it as the last time we went, but that was years ago.
We went again this week and I had a similar experience. We sat outside on the deck and it seemed weird to be sitting in the same place where we eat lunch and then to eat the kind of food (with commensurate prices) served at dinner. I don’t know how this is different from any other place serving lunch and dinner, but it seemed to be. Perhaps it’s that Lola only serves dinner on Fridays and Saturdays?
There was a lot on the menu I wanted. They had boudin empanadas and a crab cake, and they were doing something their neighbor Del Porto made famous, the white bean purée.. For entrees we chose fried green tomatoes (technically an app) and a pork Piccata. We had a bit of trouble deciding on entrees, and I wish I had gotten the Eggplant Parm with roasted spaghetti squash. The Parmesan risotto was an attraction in this dish, but the Piccata was deep fried, as the word "crispy" clearly implied on the menu. (My careless menu perusal comes back to haunt me again.)
The crab cake arrived buried under a pile of ‘stuff.” Keith Frentz is the king of “stuff.” I have often gushed about his slaw that increases the height of all his sandwiches by at least two inches, perched precariously between the buns until it explodes onto the plate in a wonderfully piquant and tasty mess. Here was another pile atop the crab cake, and I was a little suspicious of it. I heard pineapple in the waiter’s description of this special and I thought I saw mango amidst the slaw ingredients. I love both pineapple and mango but I feel very protective of the delicate flavors of crabmeat. It seemed wrong. But it was me that was wrong. This was a delicious bite of food, even if the crab flavor was subsumed by the “stuff.” And we both loved the sauce it sat in.
The crab cake sauce was what we used for the empanadas because the empanada sauce was too thin. I have had these empanadas before at lunch and I love them. They are perfectly formed and flaky with the exact right amount of stuffing. The boudin seemed bereft of rice, but no one objected to this. There were three little ones, and they were gone quickly.
Both of us were disappointed in the white bean hummus. It was served with the housemade focaccia which I have never liked. It was sliced thin and made into crostini, an improvement, but not enough to interest me. I wasn’t crazy about the toppings for this, which was similar to the Mediterranean hummus at Zea. There was feta and basil, smoked tomato and pesto in this.
It wasn’t bad, but it did not have the heft of the one at Del Porto, nor the complexity of the one at Zea. It came with fried calamari on top but I asked them to leave that off. Maybe the consistency would have worked better with the calamari. That's on me. And if I never eat another smoked tomato, I’m good.
The fried green tomato app was large enough for an entree. It had a lot going on. Burrata, basil walnut pesto, EVOO and balsamic vinegar were there in such quantities that the fried green tomato was invisible. ML gets some version of fried green tomato whenever she sees it. I think she prefers the simpler preparations of the tomatoes and a Remoulade sauce.
I was also disappointed in the pork Piccata. I love this dish, but this seemed to be more a paneed pork or a schnitzel. It was heavily breaded seemed deep-fried after a pan-searing. My image of Piccata is a light flour dusting before pan-searing, then ladled with a butter sauce with capers. What was before me had little to do with any of this. The risotto was very creamy and had shavings of Parmesan, contrasting nicely with the crispy pork. There was spinach between these two and fresh arugula everywhere. A lot of olive oil settled on the edges of the risotto.
Even though this was not the image I had in my mind, it was fine. The spinach was wilted from braising it with bacon, and I didn’t see any capers because the flavor was imparted through a charred lemon caper butter. I did like this rich lemon flavor, but it’s not a dish I would get again.
fter now two evening visits to Lola, I think I’m happy to return there time and again for their simply outstanding lunch, as we have done for quite a few years now.
