Poll: What's your favorite restaurant row/cluster?

[Robin Garr]

We haven't used the forum's Poll feature for ages, so let's see if I remember how to work it.

I'm seriously interested in the responses, though, so I hope you'll play. Years after we began to recognize Bardstown Road, then Frankfort Avenue, as the city's first "Restaurant Rows," it seems we now have at least a half-dozen "rows" or "clusters" where a significant number of good, mostly local, eateries live in close, often walkable, proximity and seem to benefit from that neighborly situation.

In addition to Bardstown and Frankfort, I'm thinking of NuLu, Downtown (which I'd take to include everything from I-65 west to Ninth, incorporating Proof and St Charles Exchange over to Wild Rita's in addition to the downtown core), St. Matthews, New Albany and ... what else? I'm sure there are more. Pick your favorite from the poll below, or click "Other" and come back here to talk about it.

That's a difficult question to answer. It's sort of depends on what kind of mood we are in. It would be viewed to answer which one of the clusters is our least favorite, that would differently be NuLu for a variety of reasons which I won't get into here. There is so much variety in the Louisville restaurant scene trying to decide something like which is your favorite is always hard to do and when you get into picking favorite group it gets even harder!

I easily picked Bardstown Rd. Assuming it includes Baxter Ave there is more variety, especially if you are jonesing for pizza , and pretty much something for every budget. I also find it easier to find a parking spot in proximity to where I'm going than other parts of town.

Downtown for me. Just seems like the places I enjoy the most are downtown and they all seem to have something a little special about them.

Proof(bar), St Charles, Doc Crows, Milkwood, Marketplace, ATG, Ruby's, Hillbilly Tea, even BBC and Luigi's.

I have always been fond of Frankfort Avenue, and it's selection....from Italian, to Irish, to French/Vietnamese, Greek, Pizza.....it's all there.

I'm in the other camp. My favorite stuff is all over town, and in the case of food trucks I mean literally all over. Vietnam Kitchen, Las Gorditas, The Grind, Holy Mole, Nam Nam Cafe, Mi Preferida, Taqueria Mexicana, Banh Mi Hero, Pizza Donisi, Louisville is too cool a place to get bogged down in this "Neighborhoodism".

I'm in the other camp. My favorite stuff is all over town, and in the case of food trucks I mean literally all over. Vietnam Kitchen, Las Gorditas, The Grind, Holy Mole, Nam Nam Cafe, Mi Preferida, Taqueria Mexicana, Banh Mi Hero, Pizza Donisi, Louisville is too cool a place to get bogged down in this "Neighborhoodism".

Yeah, I agree. I looked at the poll options, and none of them stood out to me as my favorite. So I then tried to think about where we eat most frequently...and I still couldn't nail one down. Our favorites are pretty evenly distributed across the clusters.

Also, I think you could make a compelling case for adding Germantown/Schnitzelburg to the poll - it includes (among others) Four Pegs, Eiderdown, Hammerheads, Come Back Inn, The Cure, Smoketown USA, Check's, and, depending on how you draw the Highlands/Germantown border, Wiltshire Pantry, Monkey Wrench, and Fish House/Cafe Beignet.

[Robin Garr]

Also, I think you could make a compelling case for adding Germantown/Schnitzelburg to the poll - it includes (among others) Four Pegs, Eiderdown, Hammerheads, Come Back Inn, The Cure, Smoketown USA, Check's, and, depending on how you draw the Highlands/Germantown border, Wiltshire Pantry, Monkey Wrench, and Fish House/Cafe Beignet.

That's fair, Jeff. I didn't put G'town on the list because, in my mind's eye, it's a little more spread out ... walkable at a stretch, but without the urban excitement of having multiple eateries within sight and sound of each other. I'll buy it, though, and will start including Germantown/Schnitzelburg in the mix when I discuss this topic.

(Responding to some others, by the way, I don't think it's either/or at all. My tastes, too, incorporate every end of town, and I have serious favorites from Preston and PRP all the way to Prospect. But I also like the development of restaurant clusters, too. I think both concentrated hubs and a broad spread both testify to the strength of our restaurant community.)

Iroquois Manor/Southside
1) La Esquina Caliente for a Cuban sandwich, coffee and a pastelito
2) Vietnam Kitchen for that crazy E7 pineapple curry
3) Da Lat for a avocado bubble tea and a $3.50 toasted banh mi
4) Bella's place for Somali tea and sambusas
5) Buy a jackfruit at Binh Phuoc, realize that trying to eat jackfruit in your car is one of the worst decisions you've ever made
6) Banh xeo and bun bo hue at Cafe Thuy Van
7) Little Jerusalem for some of the best middle eastern food in the city
Karisimbi for Rwandan brochettes, goat ribs, and ridiculously underpriced beers and dancing
9) End the night at Peppermints
10) Wake up on the tennis court in Iroquois Park, walk down and get the Cuban sandwich and a coconut water at Valu-Market

Alternately, Preston Highway:
1) Get a plate of stewed pork, congris, fried plantains and yuca at Miami Food Mart
2) Mango milkshake at that Mexican heladeria (I heard this place went under -- hopefully that's wrong)
3) Get a cuerno or a concha fresh out of the oven at La Villa bakery (I think that's the name?)
4) Tacos and pupusas at El Chapinlandia
5) Have micheladas at that place La Llona that has that big sign out front advertising micheladas (I haven't been to this one, so no idea if it's actually good).
6) Liquor Barn -- they sell cheese, right?