The Brick Oven Bistro: 25 Years…But Who’s Counting?

Not long ago I was standing in line at the Brick Oven Bistro, contemplating the splendors of crawfish etouffe, when I overheard the gentleman next to me asking one of the staff about the Brick Oven Bistro’s bread pudding.  I gave him my unsolicited opinion that it was nothing less than the gold standard by which I judge that particular dessert.  He smiled and told me that the best bread pudding he’d ever had came from a place in New Orleans.  “That wouldn’t happen to be Brennan’s, would it?” I asked.  “Yeah,” he replied.  “How did you know?

As God is my witness, I hadn’t known that particular bit of culinary trivia until less than ten minutes earlier, after wrapping up a Behind the Menu interview with Stephanie Telesco and Jeff Nee, the Brick Oven’s owners.  During the interview I learned that Brennans was the source of Steph and Jeff’s bread pudding recipe, to which they’ve added their own little tweaks.

“It’s nice to have a culinary heritage; you’re helping to preserve a tradition of food that people are comforted by.”

If you think that trading on the best recipes of renowned restaurants is culinary plagiarism, Stephanie Telesco beg to differ.  From her and Jeff’s perspective, when it comes to good food, imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.  But it actually goes deeper than that…and closer to the heart of what the Brick Oven Bistro is all about.  As Stephanie puts it, “It’s nice to have a culinary heritage; you’re helping to preserve a tradition of food that people are comforted by.”

It’s hard to believe, but 2009 marks the 25th year that the Brick Oven Bistro has upheld its comfort food traditions.  For its efforts, Boiseans have taken the restaurant into their hearts…as well as their tummies.  At its creation, the Brick Oven Bistro concept was simply to, in Jeff’s words, “take advantage of the fast food generation in terms of convenience and consistency, but with more eatable food.”  To this day, a hallmark of the Brick Oven has been its insistence on preparing its dishes “from scratch”.  Says Jeff, “we probably have the smallest freezers of any restaurant in Boise.”

Exhibit “A” in the Brick Oven’s case for “slow food served quickly” is its turkey dinner, a classic comfort food ensemble of turkey breast with hand mashed potatoes, sage nut dressing, country corn gravy, baby carrots, salad, and fresh baked bread (hungry yet?).  The Brick Oven’s way of cooking its turkey caught the attention of Foster Farms, who contracted with Jeff and Steph to provide what they now market as “Brick Oven Turkey”.  With a foundation of slow cooked turkey breast, it’s just a hop, skip and a jump to a hot open-faced turkey sandwich.  And with the slight addition of sausage to the gravy, you get that sandwich’s “country” cousin.

While the core of the Brick Oven’s concept has remained the same for a quarter of a century, the number of soups, stews and desserts it offers has “expanded exponentially”.  Says Stephanie, “we moved away from the simplicity of our earlier menu by taking on greater culinary challenges”.

It was, in fact, its turkey breast that led to another Brick Oven Bistro classic, and its most popular sandwich: the Brick Oven Turkey Club.  In its search for a thick, slab cut bacon, the Brick Oven contracted with a small meat packing company in Minnesota owned by Hormel – a collaboration that resulted in what today has been popularized as Applewood Smoked Bacon.  “We’ve done a lot of product development with producers,” Jeff observes.

While the core of the Brick Oven’s concept has remained the same for a quarter of a century, the number of soups, stews and desserts it offers has “expanded exponentially”.  Says Stephanie, “we moved away from the simplicity of our earlier menu by taking on greater culinary challenges”.  These challenges came naturally enough to Steph and Jeff, self-described “cookbook readers” who cook almost every night when they get home from the restaurant.  Following their culinary muse has led to menu additions such as sweet potato star anise soup.  I’ll bet mom never set a bowl of that in front of you.

I’ve come to think of the Brick Oven Bistro’s culinary mission as “new adventures in comfort food”.  Stephanie, however, thinks of it a bit differently.  “We do regional American food, which can encompass a lot of things.”  These things include a gumbo recipe (donated by another New Orleans restaurant icon, Dooky Chases’), Yankee pot roast, and, of course, the crawfish etouffe so dear to my heart.  Even the Brick Oven desserts have a culinary pedigree: the triple fudge nut brownie is based on a recipe from Denver food diva, Pat Miller.

In a restaurant market filled with “killer concepts”, the culinary mission of the Brick Oven Bistro has stayed the course for 25 years: prepare simple and wholesome meals that people once had time (if not the culinary skill or inclination) to prepare for their families…and to serve this food in an environment as unpretentious as the kitchen table.  “We used to say that we cooked food the way your mother did,” says Jeff, “but these days it probably more closely resembles your grandmother’s cooking.”  I’d have to agree — but then, I never recall my grandmother making a killer Hungarian goulash.