LEO's Eats with Louisville HotBytes.comJust about all local foodies can tell you about Louisville's allegedly haunted or cursed restaurant venues, the unlucky spots that can't hold a successful restaurant, housing one failed effort after another.
In at least one notorious situation, the old Parisian Pantry at Bardstown Road and Bonnycastle Avenue was widely believed to be cursed by an angry ghost who remained inconsolable over the removal of an upstairs wall. A dozen short-lived eateries must have come and gone before Café 360 seemed to break the juju - perhaps they replaced the wall?
And so it is at the corner of First and Oak streets in Old Louisville, where a neighborhood market gave way to a series of restaurants in the 1990s. Mai's Thai was there, a tiny treasure tucked into a corner, before it moved on to a successful life in Jeffersonville. Then came The Corner Market and Café, a short-lived sandwich-shop. Major renovations brought in The Chef's Table, a more upscale and innovative eatery that looked good (I gave it an 88-point rating) but didn't last long. Leander's followed with another well-intended effort to supply Old Louisville with upscale comfort food. It too failed, and its successor, Carly Rae's, looked lined up to be the next victim when a management breakup brought it near closure last year.
But the restaurant survived - albeit with a changed phone number and dead website - and with the arrival of Chef David Clancy (late of the still lamented Bistro New Albany), Carly Rae's is emerging as a strong option. Clancy, who jokingly describes himself as the "chef
du jour," has introduced a new menu, an attractive and fairly priced casual-bistro-style mix of lighter fare, a little Cajun, a little Creole, a little Mediterranean and a lot of Clancy.
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Carly Rae's103 W. Oak St.
365-1003
Robin Garr's rating: 88 points