RESTAURANTS: Diners will find YaYas' food is worth the Euros

By Eric E. Harrison

Photo by Chris Dean

Diver Sea Scallops at YaYas Euro Bistro on Chenal Parkway

ADVERSTISMENT

LITTLE ROCK — Elsewhere in the mini-chain, with locations in Denver, Kansas City, Memphis, St. Louis and Wichita, Kansas, the restaurants go by the name "YiaYia's Euro Bistro." Here, for some reason, they've excised a couple of letters from the sign and are calling it "YaYas Euro Bistro." Maybe somebody's hoping to stir distant memories of a long-ago place on Kavanaugh Boulevard called Gumbo YaYa's.

Maybe it's because somebody pictured semi-savvy Arkansans looking at the sign, scratching their heads and saying, "YEEahs, YEE-ahs?"Name notwithstanding, YaYas recently opened in the eastern third of the Promenade at Chenal shopping center (if you get to the IMAX cinema you've gone just a little too far west) with a pretty high level of cuisine and an upper-middlelevel price range.

YaYas Euro Bistro

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YaYas' groined, heavybeamed ceiling and the quasi-stone support pillars give the restaurant an appearance somewhere between a rustic steakhouse and a medieval dungeon.

There are three seating sections:Farthest from the door is an area of booths, hand-upholstered in two basic earth-tone patterns, a sort of prairie-grass backdrop and rows of what might be cocked eyeballs or martini-glass olives.

In the middle is a sort of semi-tiled stone floor with seating at sturdy wood tables and hardwood chairs that have earth-tone-upholstered upper backs.

Nearest the door is the "bistro" area, really bar seating, where the oblong tables could seat as many as three but not comfortably. They're mainly designed as resting spots for drinks, not food, but you can eat there if the rest of the restaurant is full.

Lighting fixtures, which a visiting staff member from one of the Kansas outlets told us were the work of a gnome-like designer who works especially for YiaYias, range from wagonwheel-with-wine-bottle chandeliers to orange-creamsicle-glass wall sconces.

The restaurant, in its opening stages, has been absolutely swarming with staff - localhirees plus a host of trainers and waiters from other restaurants in the chain, there presumably to help ease the opening, but who range about the floor looking for customers to swamp with helpfulness. There were more people hovering than at your average heliport.

For example, on a recent evening we had table visits from our waiter (who moved to YaYas after the closing of Gypsy's Grill); at least two trainers, distinguishable by the quasi-geometric figures embroidered on their shirt fronts; and several members of management, all of whom were constantly making sure everything was OK. Oh, and we had different pairs of food runners (one corporate, one in training) for every course.

That amounted to at least three, and sometimes more, table visits per course. If we had been truly interested in having uninterrupted conversations, we might have gotten a little peeved.

On our first visit, when the restaurant was considerably more crowded and, presumably, there was more for all of these people to do, we had a lot fewer table visits, which gave us spare time to explain our menu choices to envious customers at neighboring tables.

The YaYas people have made some localized tweaks to the corporate menu, including trimming a buck or two off some of the prices. Last week a number of areas were still works in progress, including the wine list, which consists of two pieces of paper, one listing reds, the other whites, sort of crudely glued to a piece of fancy construction paper, and the desserts, the development of which, we were told, had been waiting on the hire of a local pastry chef.

The overall excellence of the food, however, goes a long way to assuage most feathers ruffled by too much attention.

The menu puts a bigger focus on appetizers, which go under the heading "Euro Delights," than on entrees, which are called "Bistro Specials," and the wait staff will tell you up front that the management doesn't mind, and even encourages, diners putting together two or three "Euro Delights" to make a meal.

We've experienced few appetizers as delightful as the Polenta ($9.95), a skillet of slightly soupy cornmeal (about the consistency of grits) half-mooned against a melange of duck confit and crimini mushrooms in a sharp, wine-like (almost portlike) balsamic jus. Spooning a little of the duck-mushroom-jus mixture with the polenta was a little bit of heaven; the portion is large enough to serve two but they'll end up fighting over the scraps.

The Crab Cakes ($11.95) were a little less impressive, two small crisp-fried balls of Maryland blue crab meat with a minimum of filler servedover a tart salad of baby arugula and tomatoes in a lemon vinaigrette.

You'd have to be a real goatcheese fanatic to appreciate the Bruschetta ($9.95), served in a mini-skillet with a fairly light layer of roasted tomatoes and roasted garlic topping a lake of warm, soft goat cheese, which you spread yourself onto garlic butter-grilled baguette slices.

It was messy; the goat cheese is kind of gooey and the tomatoes and garlic don't adhere to it particularly well, sliding off as the cheese oozes over the edges of the baguette slices. Like the polenta, the generous portion will serve two, but since neither of us was that much into goat cheese, we sent about half of it back to the kitchen.

We were grateful that there was actually very little black pepper in the tasty Black Pepper Encrusted Flat Iron Steak ($19.95), served sliced and very tender despite some slices being more medium than medium rare, served over grilled onions, tomatoes and portobello mushroom slices (!) in a rich cabernet butter.

There were only three Diver Sea Scallops ($24.95) on our plate, but they were prepared perfectly, firm but not chewy, and each one delicious. The bed of saffron orzo with vegetables and a few shreds of crabmeat didn't have much flavor, so we didn't eat much of it.

The Provençal Lamb Chops ($27.95) were excellent, four meaty chops that came out a little rarer than medium rare (but it's better to err on that side with lamb than to overcook it), in a very complementary black olive-rosemary-tomato demi-glace. The accompanying eggplant gratin (really eggplant parmesan), fried eggplant slices layered with tomato sauce and topped with cheese, baked in a little mini-skillet, was very nice.

A bottle of 2006 Coppola Claret, fairly reasonably priced at $38, turned out to be a good balance for the steak and the scallops.

Our hefty slice of Frangelico cheesecake ($6.95), more of a torta ricotta than New Yorkstyle, contained just a hint of Frangelico (a hazelnut liqueur) and came topped with a little yellow medallion of caramelized sugar. We made the mistake of biting into it on a dare, then had to adjourn to the restroom because there's no graceful way of prying something like that out of your teeth in public.

Service was at least friendly, and with the proliferation of opening-weeks staff there was always somebody around to answer questions. A little more dining privacy and we would have been able to enjoy ourselves more thoroughly.

YaYas Euro Bistro Address: Promenade at Chenal, 17711 Chenal Parkway, Little Rock Hours: 11 a.m.-10 p.m. Monday-Thursday, 11 a.m.-11 p.m. Friday-Saturday, 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Sunday Cuisine: Eclectic with a slight Mediterranean accent Credit cards: V, MC, AE, D Alcoholic beverages: Full bar Reservations: Yes Wheelchair accessible: Yes Carryout: Yes (501) 821-1144

Weekend, Pages 61 on 02/13/2009