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All the new stuff mentioned by the early posters sounds great, the public market seems very doable for Louisville one like the indoor farmer's market in ATL would be great! Here is a link to it>> Your Dekalb Farmers Market - A World Market
A national sports team, more national chains & trendy restaurants would be nice too *smile* (sorry, going through a little super big city withdrawal wishful thinking -former resident to 3 super big cities- where is my Chipotle?!!)
All the new stuff mentioned by the early posters sounds great, the public market seems very doable for Louisville one like the indoor farmer's market in ATL would be great! Here is a link to it>> Your Dekalb Farmers Market - A World Market
A national sports team, more national chains & trendy restaurants would be nice too *smile* (sorry, going through a little super big city withdrawal wishful thinking -former resident to 3 super big cities- where is my Chipotle?!!)
I agree on the farmer's market. It will come soon enough. I also hear you on pro sports, but wait until that new arena opens.
But on food, I can't disagree more. What you probably have not figured out yet is that Louisville lacks some of the big national chains because it's locally owned restaurants are that much better. You speak of Atlanta--after doing lots of business in that city I can tell you that Louisville restaurant scene ranks right there with Atlanta, even though ATL is 4 times larger. If you think Louisville has a shortage of trendy eateries, well, you must live in the burbs or have not explored much. get on the food forum I link below and ask for advice.
Chipotle...blah. If you like this kind of food Qdoba is the same thing. Bazo's is a better local version. Salsarita's is not bad.
I agree on the farmer's market. It will come soon enough. I also hear you on pro sports, but wait until that new arena opens.
But on food, I can't disagree more. What you probably have not figured out yet is that Louisville lacks some of the big national chains because it's locally owned restaurants are that much better. You speak of Atlanta--after doing lots of business in that city I can tell you that Louisville restaurant scene ranks right there with Atlanta, even though ATL is 4 times larger. If you think Louisville has a shortage of trendy eateries, well, you must live in the burbs or have not explored much. get on the food forum I link below and ask for advice.
Chipotle...blah. If you like this kind of food Qdoba is the same thing. Bazo's is a better local version. Salsarita's is not bad.
There were wonderful - I mean WONDERFUL local trendy restaurants in ATL, they were pretty easy to spot though. In fact, their local food scene is so "wonderful" that Atlanta officials worried that a great restaurant scene might be all they had to offer, hence the whole Opening Day in Atlanta campaign, aquarium and all. But being newer less exposed to Louisville we have been kind of stuck in national chain restaurant "dining hades" because the good locally owned restaurants don't seem as easy to spot here. For instance, I looked up a couple of Thai places on hotbytes and found some that have great ratings but the food was pretty bad, like one over near Preston Hwy. (Smile 5?) which we won't be returning to. If there are any all time local favorite restaurants we'd love to hear about them. Thanks for the encouraging word that the restaurant scene here might have many more hidden gems than we've seen, finding & patronizing them would be great.
FYI - the Chipotle vs. Q'Doba preference is because Chipotle uses free range meat where Q'Doba doesn't, some inside info. on the restaurant industry causes us to prefer healthier options like restaurants that still cook, i.e. Moby Dick hand breads their fish every day, so does King Fish, Cracker Barrel cooks EVERYTHING from scratch everyday, so does Texas Roadhouse where as MANY other places basically boil a frozen bag of food & serve it to you on a plate fresh from the bag Bazo's, I'm familiar with but after living in L.A. the Bazo's warm powdered version of Horchata and the Bazo's hard rice doesn't work so well for me (the rice isn't supposed to be hard but 3 out of 4 visits it has been). I guess you pick up some of what you like with each place you live & it's hard to leave those well liked things behind. I absolutely love 'Fresh Mex" neither Q'doba nor Chipotle is exactly Fresh Mex though. Bazo's gives Cali style fresh mex a decent try, but they still need to learn a few more things from the West, like real horchata. The owners are nice though, I like both of them, I hope they get it together, I'd like to patronize their business more often. As a businessperson, I also simply can't believe that Chipotle lets Q'doba just monopolize the whole city of Louisville like this, that just doesn't make sense Louisville is a major city and they just the whole market to Q'doba?? *sigh* oh well.
Thanks again for the encouraging word about the food scene here. We will try Salsarita's & look for some more of the local favorites.
p.s. the national chain plea also applies to retail & recreation, i.e. Nordstrom's
Last edited by likeitis; 08-21-2009 at 03:34 PM..
Reason: typo
Keeping with the original theme (what's good for Louisville), it helps to go straight to the source and although potential private business are not at these meetings, public agencies are represented well: http://www.city-data.com/forum/louis...ersations.html
For example, if a local park needs some adjustments, cleanup, whatever, the parks dept has a SENIOR rep there. For MSD, they have Bud Schardein "answer the mail".
Louisville could use friendlier people. No offense to anybody who lives there and likes it. Maybe as Louisville continues to grow it will infuse a more positive attitude and defuse the sour depression that is incumbent in many of its residents.
There were wonderful - I mean WONDERFUL local trendy restaurants in ATL, they were pretty easy to spot though. In fact, their local food scene is so "wonderful" that Atlanta officials worried that a great restaurant scene might be all they had to offer, hence the whole Opening Day in Atlanta campaign, aquarium and all. But being newer less exposed to Louisville we have been kind of stuck in national chain restaurant "dining hades" because the good locally owned restaurants don't seem as easy to spot here. For instance, I looked up a couple of Thai places on hotbytes and found some that have great ratings but the food was pretty bad, like one over near Preston Hwy. (Smile 5?) which we won't be returning to. If there are any all time local favorite restaurants we'd love to hear about them. Thanks for the encouraging word that the restaurant scene here might have many more hidden gems than we've seen, finding & patronizing them would be great.
FYI - the Chipotle vs. Q'Doba preference is because Chipotle uses free range meat where Q'Doba doesn't, some inside info. on the restaurant industry causes us to prefer healthier options like restaurants that still cook, i.e. Moby Dick hand breads their fish every day, so does King Fish, Cracker Barrel cooks EVERYTHING from scratch everyday, so does Texas Roadhouse where as MANY other places basically boil a frozen bag of food & serve it to you on a plate fresh from the bag Bazo's, I'm familiar with but after living in L.A. the Bazo's warm powdered version of Horchata and the Bazo's hard rice doesn't work so well for me (the rice isn't supposed to be hard but 3 out of 4 visits it has been). I guess you pick up some of what you like with each place you live & it's hard to leave those well liked things behind. I absolutely love 'Fresh Mex" neither Q'doba nor Chipotle is exactly Fresh Mex though. Bazo's gives Cali style fresh mex a decent try, but they still need to learn a few more things from the West, like real horchata. The owners are nice though, I like both of them, I hope they get it together, I'd like to patronize their business more often. As a businessperson, I also simply can't believe that Chipotle lets Q'doba just monopolize the whole city of Louisville like this, that just doesn't make sense Louisville is a major city and they just the whole market to Q'doba?? *sigh* oh well.
Thanks again for the encouraging word about the food scene here. We will try Salsarita's & look for some more of the local favorites.
p.s. the national chain plea also applies to retail & recreation, i.e. Nordstrom's
Qdoba has a stronghold in Louisville. Their store in the Highlands is the number one grossing store in the chain. Chipotle will enter the market I am sure. They are even in Lexington. There are MUCH better authentic Mexican eateries. Try La Rosita in New Albany for one. you need to get on the FORUM at Commentary | LouisvilleHotBytes.com
Preston Highway is only good for mexican restaurants and thats about it.
Furthermore, I am not convinced you know too much about good restaurants when every single restaurant you have mentioned so far is crap. I agree, Bazo's is average....but so is Chipotle. And bazo's is locally own and does average food better than average Chipotle.
Go to Vietnam Kitchen, 610 Magnolia, Le relais, Proof, 732 Social, Jeff Rub's, Seviche, varanese, Mojitos, Havana Rumba, El Mundo, Sapporo, and La Rosita to start. This is a mix of ethnic and uscale. If you think those restaurants suck or can't compare to Atlanta, we will have to respectfully disagree. After you finish those, let me know. I will fire 12 more recs that are just as good. And then again. And again. Louisville is a foodie town. The best Thai right now is probaly Mai's Thai in Jeffersonville or Simply Thai in St Matthews, but there are lots others.
Last edited by Peter1948; 08-24-2009 at 11:05 PM..
How strange to see this moribund thread revived! When I started it two years ago, it looked as though Louisville was about to make a grand leap forward... and then, the crash. Despite it all, though, the city is doing wonderful things and I am still proud to bring out-of-town friends here and impress them.
My wife and I had dinner at one of the jewels in NuLu -732 Social - Monday night and had - truly - a world-class meal. The food life in Louisville is rich. We can all argue about who or where is better, but by any fair measure, Louisville has an amazing array of quality restaurants, well beyond its size.
When the Arena is finished, we should see a flurry of development surrounding it. The O'Shea's reworking of part of the "Iron Quarter" should lead to finishing off - and saving - that potentially beautiful block.
Two forces are right now doing more than anyone to create a livable but forward-looking sense of place here: Gil Holland and 21C Hotel. Tonight, as a matter of fact, 21C is hosting 502 Ignite (http://ignite.oreilly.com/502/ - broken link) , a very exciting sounding world-wide program with local foci.
Those movements run counter to the other Futurama/ Robert Moses vision embodied in the Cordish projects and the Four Bridges Project. It will be interesting to see if the best side wins: the small, smart, and connected vision of Jane Jacobs, 8664, NuLu, etc or the big, brutal, and entangled vision of Robert Moses, Cordish, Four Bridges.
we suffer from that makes us want what the big guys have. We are not validated without a Nordstrom or an Urban Outfitters.
Can't we have both? Personally I like the Apple Store, Borders Books... just as much as the mom & pop places - and I patronize both, for different reasons. I am multi-dimensional, and do not need to be shielded by big brother.
I wrote that a long time ago. I still wrestle with the question. Deep down inside there are big name stores I would like to have in town. I guess the question is the balance. What about big names can crush the small? What is lost when they do? Is there some way in which the indie and the Big help each other, or can at least live with each other? If we build a strong indie base, do the Bigs come? What happens if the Cordish-style Big comes as a single large package bought wholesale?
I guess one vision that comes to mind is how the more real a place, the more we go there for that reality: Does one travel to San Francisco or (the old perhaps) New Orleans or to Austin to shop at Ikea or Nordstrom? I don't think so. We run up to Indianapolis or Cincy for that, but are we going to a Place? Doesn't Louisville want to be a Place?
I don't think it's a matter of Big Brother. No one here is going to stop Big from coming. But some are going to raise questions like mine, and that's a good thing.
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Bazo's, I'm familiar with but after living in L.A. the Bazo's warm powdered version of Horchata and the Bazo's hard rice doesn't work so well for me (the rice isn't supposed to be hard but 3 out of 4 visits it has been). I guess you pick up some of what you like with each place you live & it's hard to leave those well liked things behind. I absolutely love 'Fresh Mex" neither Q'doba nor Chipotle is exactly Fresh Mex though. Bazo's gives Cali style fresh mex a decent try, but they still need to learn a few more things from the West, like real horchata. The owners are nice though, I like both of them, I hope they get it together, I'd like to patronize their business more often. As a businessperson, I also simply can't believe that Chipotle lets Q'doba just monopolize the whole city of Louisville like this, that just doesn't make sense Louisville is a major city and they just the whole market to Q'doba?? *sigh* oh well.
