Relearning my love for food, and re-re-revisiting El Basque
This is not to some 'Poor Little Restaurant Critic' story.
In 2014, I wrote a 35th anniversary tribute to “Jean Le Boeuf,” the restaurant critic pen name under which I wrote from 2006 to 2021. For the project, I interviewed past JLBs and asked them the same questions.
What do you miss?
What don’t you miss?
My Le Boeuf predecessors missed the free meals. They missed dining out on The News-Press’s dime and getting to call it work. They missed their colleagues, their readers.
They did not miss the ever-looming sense of dread that is a deadline. Nor did they miss the pressure; the pressure to write well and factually and grammatically and quickly. But also the pressure to go out to eat two, three, four times a week.
Eating was a big part of that job, arguably the best part. But it can also become exhausting. As the brilliant Karen Feldman, another former JLB, told me:
“People go, ‘Oh my gosh, what a great job. I'd love that job!’ And it is a good job, but there are nights when I want to get in my pajamas and have a tuna sandwich.”
When I interviewed Karen in 2014, I nodded along to her words but didn’t fully understand their sentiment. Back then, I was still enamored of the work, still so unbelievably honored to be a working restaurant critic (!!!), I thought nothing of the many (MANY, MANY) days and nights spent driving from my home in Fort Myers to restaurants in Naples, Captiva, Punta Gorda, Pine Island, LaBelle.
I thought nothing of ordering last, always getting whatever everyone else at the table hadn’t, always considering balance (one seafood dish, one beef, one vegetarian; something spicy and something mild; something hot, something cold), rarely considering what I actually wanted to eat.
This is not to some Poor Little Restaurant Critic story. But 15 years of anything — even eating for free at nice restaurants — can warp things in your mind.
Two months removed from The News-Press, the hardest habit I’ve had to break is relearning how to behave while dining out. I still tend to over-analyze menus, to take too many food photos, to ask my friends what they’ll be eating so I don’t dare duplicate.
Two months removed from The News-Press, I’m learning to love food in new ways. I’m understanding the joy of becoming a regular, of going back to places not because my schedule says so but because I sincerely want to. Of ordering the same beautifully consistent things over and over and over. Why can’t we both have the laab?
Instead of seeking out new places hours from my house, I’m vetting and re-vetting the restaurants in my immediate radius. Learning which cooks work which nights and which dishes they do best. And I’m cooking more. Not as much as I used to. Not as much as I’d like to. But more.
Oh, and that ever-looming daily deadline dread? That’s mostly gone. Although I do still wake up in mild terror thinking “Oh f#!k it’s (insert weekday) and you don’t have any story files started!!” That too, I’m sure, will change. I will relearn and readjust.
And when I do, I will not miss it. Not one bit.
Restaurant of the Week: El Basque, Bonita Springs
Speaking of visiting and revisiting, I made my fourth trip to El Basque earlier this month. It’s not that this pintxos spot is close to home, it’s that it’s a nice midway point for meeting friends from Naples. It’s that it’s so damn good. It’s that it’s finally attracting the crowds it deserves.
I first went to El Basque almost a year ago, a few months after its January 2022 launch. I was bowled over that visit. By the subtle chicness, the gracious service, the way each bite balanced salt and sweet, brine and tang, chew and crunch.
I’ve dreamed of finally getting a good Spanish restaurant in this area. An incredible Basque one like this is blowing my mind. On my earliest visits to El Basque, the place was all but empty. This recent visit, it was packed. Joyously so.
We drank cava and bone-dry ciders and spritzy sangrias mixed with Sprite. We ate wine-cured figs atop salty squares of aged goat cheese, and crackling croquetas, and a burnt cheesecake with near-ethereal floof.
El Basque is the sort of place where one dish leads to another, then another, then some more. Where dessert isn’t a question but a fact. Where hours and drinks stretch on and on, as do conversations and friendships and good times.
This is where I used to say, “I hope to one day get back to El Basque.”
This is where I can now say, “El Basque, I’ll see you again soon.”
I had to eat vomitous pizza last night for work.