Mike Shannons Steaks & Seafood

STL Today/Post-Dispatch
April 13, 2006 - By: Joe Bonwich

There was a lovely moon over downtown as we left Mike Shannon's. I tell you, I wish my neighbors in Chesterfield could have seen that moon.

If you don't fully grasp the joke, you probably don't fully grasp the charm of Mike Shannon as a Cardinals broadcaster. And Shannon himself - at least artistic renditions of his persona and of those with whom he's shared the baseball spotlight - provides much of the charm of the new location of his restaurant, recently relocated from its longtime home across Kiener Plaza from the new site.

The glass is clear on the wrap-around windows at Mike's new place, and if you sit in the table at the northwest corner, you can glimpse the new stadium out one window and the Old Courthouse and Arch out the other. If those views ever get boring, or if you have other priorities, several big-screen TVs are on that side of the restaurant, which has the bar area and several cafe tables at its center.

You can see the new stadium from the northeast corner as well, and that side of the restaurant is more sedate, although the whole place always has potential for rowdiness, either from the noise from folks watching the game filtering throughout the restaurant, or from the multiple parties of 10, 12 or more - some in Cardinals gear, some in dresses and jackets - that we observed on our visits. The arc-shaped booths on the north side of the restaurant cradle you in ballglove-style brown leather while you're seated beneath a remarkable collection of autographed baseballs. At the rear of that side is a smaller room, with its own big-screen TV, dedicated to Stan Musial; and tucked in behind the host's station are some additional booths that provide the most privacy in the place.

So one color commentary on the new Shannon's is: Let the reservation-taker (if you can talk to a live one) know what kind of experience you'd like. We sat adjacent to the bar and on the east side, and both atmospheres were vibrant, but I was glad for the more intimate environment away from all the TVs on the second visit.

The second insider's insight is: Bring lots of money. Shannon's set an informal record in my unscientific survey of highest entree price in St. Louis, weighing in at an out-of-the-ballpark $79.95 for twin lobster tails (listed as "market price" on the menu, but I had to ask - and we couldn't afford it). A filet-and-lobster-tail combo had a market price of $69.95, but even some of the regular menu items carry Pujolsian pricetags: a 14-ounce veal chop for $49.95, for example, and a 12-ounce filet for $41.95 - a la carte.

As is typical with very-high-end steakhouses, there's a chopped sirloin entree, as well as three chicken entrees and a tray of steamed and grilled vegetables, that come in under $20, and the 200-plus wine choices include a sizeable selection of bottles under $40, so it's quite conceiveable that a couple could could make an evening out of it for under 100 bucks. (A separate, less-expensive menu is offered on game days on the outdoor patio.) But Shannon's is known for its steaks, with secondary emphasis on seafood, so we let them play to those strengths on our visits.

The steaks are, by the way, prime grade and 21-day-aged, so the prices are pretty much in line with local steakhouses that use that quality of beef. We tried the 16-ounce boneless rib-eye and the 24-ounce porterhouse, both of which were home runs - a little more marbling on the rib-eye, as expected, but in both cases trimmed such that only a touch of fat remained at the edges. A knife met with just the right resistance when slicing through the medium-rare ribeye, while the inside of the rare porterhouse went from seared at the face to red and cool at the center, just as described on the menu. Both had the rich, extra-beefy flavor that comes from aging, but the rib-eye was especially succulent, a truly memorable slab of beef.

We hadn't seen coquilles St. Jacques on a menu for sometime, so we chose that from among the two regular-menu seafood choices that didn't include lobster. (Other seafood entrees change daily, but this happened to be a Sunday, and the only fresh-fish special was Norwegian salmon.) In the classic preparation, full-sized scallops are sliced and placed in a mellowed-garlic sauce, but at Shannon's, six large sea scallops were used intact, resulting in a slightly spongy texture as they sat almost covered by the high-temperature sauce. I didn't think the garlic in the sauce had mellowed enough, either, so overall the dish struck out with me.

An additional category on the menu, located and priced in between the chicken and the beef, is "plates with accompaniments," and from this we tried the duck confit with cheesy polenta, the duck augmented with the unusual approach (for a confit) of a hoisin glaze. Two quarter pieces of duck provided a more-than-generous portion of meat, and the hoisin glaze was applied lightly enough that it didn't intrude upon the fat-richened flavor of the duck, with the polenta formed into bars and served on the side.

Both the calamari appetizer and "Mike's Fabulous Onion Strings" were most notable for their sheer portion size, which was more in the "serves two" or "serves three" category. The onion strings were simply individual rings of purple onion straightened out and breaded, very thin but still crisp. The calamari was oddly irregular, with many uniform rings, but also with folded-over end pieces more than an inch in length, resulting in some pieces having a nice al dente snap but others ranging into gumminess. The Cajun shrimp were of the New Orleans style that sometimes has the odd designation of "barbecued shrimp," and the six medium-large shrimp were in a lingering, spicy, butter-based sauce, but $13.95 for six of them reinforced our ongoing perception of very high prices.

Overall service was attentive and brisk, but wine service (and staff knowledge of wines) could afford improvement. Despite the presence of two white Zins on the by-the-glass list, for example, the sole sparkling choice was a 187ml bottle of Cristalina Brut, an unimpressive screw-top sparkler from Spain (for $9.50). And there's sloppy categorization on the main list, such as the Hewitson GSM and the Joseph Phelps Le Mistral, both of which are Grenache-Syrah blends, being grouped under "Meritage/Claret/Cabernet Franc."

As a sports shrine, then, Mike Shannon's is its own little Hall of Fame, rich with both big-time memorabilia and "geez, I'd forgotten that" tidbits, such as the shot of Bob Gibson with Mike in catcher's gear, which he wore in just five of his 882 major-league games. And it competes well in the local prime-steak race. But as an overall high-end restaurant, you end up adding a premium for the privilege of looking at the elite athletes - not unlike the new building that just opened up about two blocks away.

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