dsmWeekly - July 17, 2024

For 15 years as the Des Moines Register’s “Datebook Diner,” Wini Moranville’s byline ran next to a headshot of a smiley-face paper plate to protect her anonymity. With her new memoir, she’s ready to dish. (Photo: Duane Tinkey)

FOOD & DINING

Secrets of a restaurant reviewer
Nobody knows more about local restaurants than Wini Moranville. After decades of reviewing them for dsm, as the Des Moines Register’s “Datebook Diner,” and currently for her own Substack column called “Wini’s Food Stories,” she’s written a new memoir called “Love is My Favorite Flavor: A Midwestern Dining Critic Tells All,” published by the University of Iowa Press.

It hits stores today, but she offered dsm an exclusive preview of the following excerpt from chapter 10, “The Perils of Reviewing Restaurants in a Midsized Midwestern City.”
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One of the pitfalls of being the reviewer in a midsized city is that you’re way too visible. You can’t fade into the mass of millions of people as you can in New York or Chicago or Los Angeles. And if you lived in the city from grade school through high school and then from the age of 31 onward, and if you’ve freelanced for nearly every food editor in this major publishing hub, well, a lot of your readers know who you are. And if they disagree with one of your reviews, they’re going to tell you. And your husband, mother, and mother-in-law.

“You owe me a steak!” said a local food photographer after he visited a steakhouse that I had reviewed but that had fallen short on his visit.

“Your daughter-in-law is a pushover!” said a friend of my mother-in-law’s after I gave a thumbs-up review to a restaurant she likely had a bad experience with 20 years earlier.

“The cheese course at that place Wini recommended was so skimpy!” said my mother’s bridge partner at her biweekly bridge club.

I once got the stink eye when I spotted an acquaintance at a great but undiscovered Vietnamese spot. I interpreted his look to be saying, “Shut your gob about this place, will ya? Let’s keep it our little secret.”

I’d be introduced to people at parties or out and about, and when the conversation came around to my métier, I’d get cornered for long-winded, blow-by-blow accounts of how dreadful a meal was at a place I had recommended.

Or it was the opposite — a place I had given a tepid review was someone else’s favorite place. My husband, Dave, had a friend who read my review of a Vietnamese place that was fine, if nothing to drive across town for.

“Man, she was way off about that place!” he said. “It’s so authentic! When I walked through the back door, there was this faint odor of urine, and it reminded me of some of the best restaurants I dined at in Vietnam!”

How had I missed the urine-y smell — that sure mark of authenticity in a restaurant?

Of course, being known among readers means that in some cases, you’ll be known among restaurateurs, too. Once you’re known in one local restaurant, it won’t be long before you’re known in others.

After a former student of Dave’s worked at Bistro 43, I was outed there. Staff from there moved to other restaurants, where they outed me among an entirely new crew of servers, some of whom invariably moved on to other restaurants, and the network of knowing spiderwebbed out. I also suspect that some acquaintances, attempting to ingratiate themselves with chefs and restaurateurs, would out me if they happened to spot me at a restaurant they were dining at the same night I was.

Did I try to camouflage myself à la Ruth Reichl? In her memoir, “Garlic and Sapphires,” the former New York Times food critic famously wrote about the great lengths she went to disguise herself when reviewing. Readers sometimes asked me if I did the same. No, I did not. Any kind of wig or costumed getup of the sort Ruth Reichl wore would have stuck out like a sore thumb in Des Moines. The staff would’ve known something was up. Or, they would have said, “Good evening, Wini,” and I would have felt ridiculous. I also would have had to devise disguises for Dave, and I simply did not have the time or resources to do all that.

After the third year of reviewing, I knew I’d be recognized in about 25% of the restaurants I went to — mainly among the chef-driven bistros, the downtown hotspots, and the newly emerging polished-casual spots. Because there was little crossover among staff between those kinds of restaurants and the many other styles of venues I reviewed, I could generally go undetected at the other 75% of restaurants — the ethnic spots, the suburban chains, the casual pizzerias, and the burger joints, as well as eateries in the suburbs or nearby rural Iowa.

Hungry for more? Read the rest of the chapter online, then pick up the book at a bookstore near you.

Actors Brittny Rebhuhn, left, and Ethan Seiser were part of last year's production of "Twelfth Night" at the Salisbury House and Gardens. (Photo: Dan Welk, Click! Photography)

BEST BET

Hear ye: A midsummer night's play opens tonight

What better way to spend a midsummer night than enjoying Shakespeare’s play about, well, a midsummer night? You can join the Iowa Stage Theatre Co.’s whimsical production of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” tonight through Sunday on the lawn at the historic Salisbury House and Gardens.

They’ll provide lawn chairs, but feel free to bring your own, with blankets and picnic baskets to enjoy the outdoors. You can also buy beer, wine, nonalcoholic drinks and ice cream on site. And if you’re feeling extra fancy, we recommend the charcuterie board, courtesy of Lachele’s Fine Foods.

Keep in mind: Ticket sales close two days before each performance, so snag them now.

The Week Ahead

Tiki Tailgate (6-10 p.m. Friday and Saturday, 11 a.m.-6 p.m. Sunday): Inspired by tropical tiki flavors, local mixologists Nate Evans and Ben Bourland team up for another cocktail pop-up on the patio of Django’s Reinhardt Room, across from the Pappajohn Sculpture Park. Read about their cocktail philosophy in a recent dsm story.

“The Prom” (opening 7 p.m. Friday, with nine more shows through July 28): Four big Broadway stars visit a small-town prom to teach the locals some life lessons and — wouldn’t you know it — they learn a thing or two themselves. See all that and more in the next production from Des Moines Young Artists’ Theatre at the Des Moines Civic Center’s Stoner Theater.

Election Day (9 a.m.-4 p.m. Saturday): No, not that election. It’s time to choose the next mayor of Walnut Hill at Living History Farms. Listen to stump speeches, debate the pros and cons of women’s suffrage, and cast your ballot (according to the 1876 rules). Bonus: Kids can campaign for their favorite candy.

Stars of Tomorrow (2 p.m. Saturday): Catch a glimpse of opera’s future in a concert with the 35 members of the Des Moines Metro Opera's Apprentice Artist Program. To celebrate the program’s 50th anniversary, this year's concert at Drake University’s Sheslow Auditorium is free, but guests should register in advance for a seat.

Beaverdale Bluegrass Festival (3 p.m. Saturday): The free festival showcases local bluegrass groups under the Allen Hazen Water Tower. Beer tents and food trucks will be on-site to wet your whistle and whet your appetite. BYOLC: Bring your own lawn chair.

DSM Tea Festival (9 a.m.-3 p.m. Sunday): Local businesses Yoga & Co., ChaCha's Hiland Bakery and Mayalu Coffee team up for a celebration of the healing beverage at the Des Moines Heritage Center. Sample and purchase tea from nationwide vendors and relax in a soothing sound bath.

Northside Market (noon-6 p.m. Sunday): Support the local businesses, craftspeople and artists of the Highland and Oak Park neighborhoods at this street fair.

We all love filling our baskets with fresh produce from the Des Moines Farmers Market. But what happens to all the food that goes unsold? Volunteers find ways pass it on.

IOWA STOPS HUNGER

Farmers market food rescue fills the gaps

Writer: Mathany Ahmed

At Iowa’s largest farmers market, some 25,000 visitors come to see 300 vendors every Saturday morning from May through October in downtown Des Moines. Over the course of the season, tons of fresh produce, baked goods, artisanal cheeses and locally sourced meats pass hands from producer to consumer.

Just before the market closes, Des Moines Area Religious Council (DMARC) volunteers go from booth to booth, loading up carts with donated food before hauling it to one of the food pantries throughout the metro.

“There are times when those volunteers come back to the tent, needing another wagon because the first one got so full,” said Elizabeth Weyers, who manages the market on behalf of the Greater Des Moines Partnership.

Thanks to the market’s diversity, those wagons often contain culturally specific foods that DMARC usually can’t buy in bulk.

“Food insecurity is more pressing than it’s ever been in our community,” said Blake Willadsen, DMARC's marketing and communications manager, noting that 65,000 people visited a pantry in 2023, a record. “The thing that has been really challenging is that 1 in 3 of those people are visiting a DMARC food pantry for the first time.”

Meals from the Market also helps DMARC provide more nutritious options, which has been a priority for the organization ever since it worked with Iowa State University to study the health impacts of its offerings.

“The donations we receive from this program continue to be such a bright spot every year, for both our food pantries and the folks visiting them,” Willadsen said. “It’s always something we look forward to, and we know that it’s going to make a difference.”

Iowa Stops Hunger is an ongoing Business Publications Corp. initiative to raise awareness about food insecurity in Iowa and inspire action to combat it.