Cafe Beulah

As anyone who has ever miscalculated a trip home can attest, the success of such visits rests almost entirely on one thing: timing. The same can be said about a trip to Cafe Beulah. Show up when the restaurant is distracted by other things and you'll leave wondering why you bothered; but hit it on the right night and Cafe Beulah will get you right where you live - your stomach. On a good night, Beulah buzzes with positive energy and happy customers glowing almost as cheerfully as the restaurant's lemon-colored walls. On these occasions, music in keeping with the self-described "down home" atmosphere is playing in the background - Dinah Washington or Bessie Smith, not the contemporary rock that can also, unfortunately, be heard there at times - and here the right music makes all the difference. At such moments, you can almost believe that the family photographs hanging on the walls are those of your own kin, or at least of your host's. On a bad night, they look like little more than the none-too-expensive reproductions they actually are.

Cafe Beulah serves up generous portions of what it calls Southern Revival cooking - dishes that have their roots in a Southern tradition but have been refined for today's tastes. Here again, hit it on the right night and they're largely successful. The basket of warm biscuits and corn bread that arrives soon after you order is a good indication of things to come: filling, plentiful food that is comfortingly familiar if occasionally a little bland. Start the meal with the deviled-crab-and-spinach cakes and you'll avoid the latter problem. Composed of two individual patties moistened by a generous serving of tangy onion marmalade, the item is one of the best on the menu. Likewise the peppery (if a little dry) crab cake, served with a tart tomato relish, and the glistening chicken drumstick, whose sweet and tangy barbecue sauce is a startling reminder of what this stuff was supposed to taste like all along.

It's not hard to get in the mood of things at Beulah, and in keeping with some real or imagined idea of Southern hospitality you may well find yourself loading down the table with far more than you're able to eat. One reason for this is the sheer appeal of so many of the side dishes - zesty lemon-whipped yams that taste like they belong in a pie crust, and hominy grits that, after a generous addition of salt, pepper, and butter, win the award for food most likely to comfort. And let's not forget that perennial favorite, macaroni and cheese, which on one visit arrived strangely watery, on the next sublimely gooey - timing is everything.

Unfortunately, not even timing can be blamed for the blandness of most of the entrees: Given a cooking tradition based on fats and seasonings, it's a little disappointing to be served a cream sauce that not even a rigorous application of salt and pepper can bring to life, as happened with the stuffed catfish we ordered. The fried chicken had a more satisfying zing to its crackling exterior, and the pepper-crusted sirloin was pleasantly invigorated by a ginger-flavored brown sauce; but the gumbo plate was more New York City water than Mississippi mud, and the grilled salmon was overcooked to the point of dryness, making the potential for flavor near zero - all problems that are easily addressed if the kitchen is so inclined. Meanwhile it's still possible to end your meal at Beulah on a high note: The banana pudding pie - comprised of layers of sliced banana, lemon pudding, vanilla wafers, and meringue - is rightly described by the staff as a house specialty. Impossibly sweet, it is also impossible to stop eating. Not unlike what happens to most of us when we travel home.

COPYRIGHT 1998 Brant Publications, Inc.
COPYRIGHT 2008 Gale, Cengage Learning