By Wini Moranville
This month’s lunch is actually a brunch—at
Gateway Market, to be exact. It’s a weekend jeans-and-flannel-shirt affair that everyone should get to know. And judging from the size of the late-morning crowd, it seems like a lot of people already have.
While the breakfast menu (served until 2 p.m. on weekends) offers all kinds of breakfast sandwiches, as well as omelets, eggs any way, French toast and oatmeal, I went there on a mission: to seek out the
biscuit sandwich I’d heard food lovers raving about.
The sandwich comes with scrambled eggs (actually more akin to a delicately folded omelet), thick bacon and processed cheese. Don’t turn your nose up too quickly at the latter; it has its place, and the way it oozily melted over those eggs was perfect. The star of the sandwich, however, was the biscuit—a hearty-yet-flaky beauty crafted by bread-geek and executive chef George Formaro in collaboration with Gateway chef Bill Overdyk.
When I asked Formaro how they hit upon such a great biscuit, he answered, “Lots of sleepless nights and eating biscuits.” He says he went on a mission to research everything he could about biscuits, even looking back as far as the early days before modern baking powder was used. He melded history with modern technique to come up with Gateway’s version.
Overdyk told me the recipe involved Southern biscuit flour, frozen grated butter and a unique folding technique, along with a few more secrets, such as the right oven temp, baking time and cutting method. This is one painstakingly wrought biscuit, and I’m happy to report that yes, it is all that.
PS: Remember that you can morph any brunch here into a Champagne brunch by grabbing a bottle from the adjacent market’s cooler. Better yet, you’ll buy the bottle at retail cost—not dining-out cost. If they don’t have what you want in the cooler, they have a device that can quick-chill any bottle for you.
Gateway is at 2002 Woodland Ave., 515-243-1754;
gatewaymarket.com.
Wini Moranville, who writes about cooking, wine and dining for dsm, is on Facebook at All Things Food DSM.
