desmoinesisnotboring.com

Please find the Friday Guest Blog below. This was written by Shawn Harrington

It seemed like a simple question to ask when moving into a new town, I just wanted to know.. “where do I eat around here?”.  Ask anyone else from Rochester or Buffalo that same question, and they’ll provide more food destinations than you could make the time or meals in a month for.  In this town, there never seemed to be an answer though that Iowans could give out with confidence.

One thing noticeable was plenty of chain restaurants from West Des Moines and up through Ankeny.  I did take comfort in having Wild Wings and the mongolian grill of HuHot, but those alone could not be enough!  Let’s face it, no one’s going to leave Des Moines after a business trip talking about how great our Cheesecake Factory is.

Local Favorite

Now, with the dedication of local chefs and entrepreneurs, much of that is changing.  After becoming active with the Impact Downtown Committee, I noticed the downtown restaurant scene started changing dramatically with the 2007-08 additions of Alba, the Grand Piano Bistro, Dos Rios and Django.  Jethro’s has also established itself in the Drake neighborhood with its heavy portions and own style of BBQ.

Without the flair of the chain restaurants and media exposure that comes along with a new opening,  it takes a little digging to find the existing restaurants that have continually been bringing their own for years.  When my family comes to town searching for old-style Italian Cuisine, we’ve found that Tumea & Son’s fills this niche.  While the west side of town remains heavy with chain restaurants, you can find Phat Chef’s on 50th street in West Des Moines serving up lunch, dinner and its own catering services.

The individuals behind these businesses have brought us the flavors we need to help make Des Moines that much more unique for ourselves and our guests.  I’ve gotten to know chefs like Jason Simon and Hal Jasa who could easily go back to being top chefs in larger cities, however they’ve chosen to run their businesses here because they, too, believe in Des Moines.  Now, it’s up to us to keep them here, so let’s try to remember that the next time we’re ready to go out.  I’m sure we can all apreciate better options than ordering our dinners through drive-through windows.