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    Review: Park Creek Kitchen

    Upper Arlington is an interesting city from a food perspective. The community is large and the population there is affluent, but few restaurants exist within city limits. Whether you want a quick bite to eat, or somewhere to sit down for a nicer meal, you’ve typically got to venture south toward Grandview or outward to Columbus (in any direction). Enter: Park Creek Kitchen.

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    Opened in 2010, Park Creek answers the question of “why aren’t there restaurants like this in Upper Arlington”? One part casual neighborhood bar, one part destination restaurant, Park Creek appears to want to straddle the line between serving the community something it normally can’t find, and also still play nicely within the predetermined rules of a rigid community (sorry late night eaters and drinkers, the doors close at 10pm).

    Largely, the menu reflects those same principles. The fare is American Comfort with twists and updates made standard from the last cycle of restaurant trends. Bar snacks, gourmet burgers and chef specialties that include pan roasted salmon and roasted pork chops are among the items you’ll find on the menu here.

    On my recent visit I started off with an appetizer of the Spiced Popcorn ($5) which is a sharable-sized bowl of traditional popped kernels mixed with asiago cheese, rosemary, truffle oil and sea salt. The combination of flavors used here will be intimately familiar with anyone who’s eaten truffle oil french fries at any number of restaurants that have been serving them over the last few years (minus the house-made ketchup). The aged cheese and truffle oil combination is one that always works well, and large flecks of salt add a bit of elegance to the dish. The popcorn itself was the weakest link in my serving. The taste was not quite stale, but pretty flat on its own, as if it had been popped several hours prior rather than fresh. Letting popcorn sit that long dries it out even further which left little sticking power for the spices applied to it. Most sank to the bottom of the bowl, leaving me wanting a fresher batch.

    Park Creek serves a number of burgers and tacos, so I decided to try their specialty House Burger ($12) which comes topped with a red onion “marmalade”, gorgonzola cheese, smoked bacon, lettuce and tomato. The red onions were caramelized nicely rendering them soft and sweet, though not quite as saucy as I imagined a marmalade to be. The burger tasted fresh, hand pressed and the meat was of high quality. The bun was nothing you couldn’t get from your local grocery store, but I thought the choice of a sesame seed bun was an interesting throwback to yesteryear when they were more prevalent than the more artisan roll variety found these days with $12 burgers. The other toppings were all of decent quality though I found nothing incredibly noteworthy about them individually. Combined all flavors worked well in a fairly safe and traditional fashion. The side of fries that come with sandwiches at Park Creek were seasoned much like the popcorn, if not identically. They were crisp fries cooked fresh with the skin still on making them earthy and rustic while the truffle oil treatment gave them a complex flavor, if not repetitive. Similar to the burger, they’re a safe bet, but well executed.

    The Buttermilk Fried Chicken ($18) is an entree that immediately grabbed my attention when perusing the rest of the menu. Two bone-in pieces of all-white meat are heavily breaded and served with sides of green beans and macaroni and cheese. The chicken was tender and juicy and the breading cooked extra crispy, though the seasoning I felt was a bit on the light side. The macaroni and cheese was unique in that it was coated in a peppercorn honey sauce that subdued the cheese flavors and gave them more of a sweet buttery taste. The sauce worked well with the crisp green beans and I imagine it would work well on mashed potatoes too in a summer picnic type of fashion. Overall this was a very solid plate of food and probably the highlight of my trip to Park Creek.

    For dessert I sampled the Bourbon Bread Pudding ($7), a dense cake topped with a scoop of vanilla ice cream and whipped cream. The bread pudding was rich with the flavors of bourbon (obviously) that played up with notes of cinnamon, vanilla and chocolate throughout. My piece appeared to be from the edge of the pan, making it a little bit hard to cut through with a spoon, though the extra work was justified.

    Overall, Park Creek Kitchen is very much a “what you see is what you get” type of restaurant. For the most part their food delivers on what is promised without a whole lot of surprises or flare. If you’re looking for comfortable American fare, you will find that here in spades. If you’re expecting something a little more inventive or experimental you may end up disappointed. If you live nearby, it’s certainly worthwhile to stop in regularly as there’s few options in the neighborhood that compare to sit-down semi-formal format.

    Park Creek Kitchen is located at 2124 Arlington Avenue in the heart of Upper Arlington. They’re open Monday through Saturday 4pm to 10pm and open for lunch Tuesday through Saturday from 11:30am to 2pm. Closed Sunday. More information can be found online at www.parkcreekkitchen.com.

    Photos by Jennifer René of Jennifer René Photography.

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    Morgan Kelley
    Morgan Kelleyhttps://columbusunderground.com
    I'm the former Restaurant & Food Critic of Columbus Underground. I love all types of food, and I'm not afraid to try anything once. I strive to adhere to the Association of Food Journalists guidelines, which means I don't do special foodie events, I pay for all of my meals in full and I will always share with you my honest and unbiased opinion.
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