Jonathan Parker painted his shop’s facade a deep Tuscan yellow the other day, causing many stares from the ladies in Lexus SUVs. Parker, proprietor of Parker’s Table in Clayton, is a guy always in search of something different.
He does pretty well at finding it, too. For one thing, he’s selling Italian artisanal pastas in bulk. This is a particularly good idea for the single cook who may only want a quarter of a pound, but it’s high-quality stuff for anyone. We muse over the calimaretto nero, fat short pasta tubes flavored with enough squid ink to make them a dark purplish-gray, which makes us want to sauce them with nuggets of salmon whose cooking juices have been tickled with olive oil, garlic, parsley and lemon.
Also investigate the balsamic vinegar glaze from Modena, the home of the only real balsamico. Parker reports using it on a pork loin, which sounds tasty. But where we’d really like to see it used is on is roasted chunks of autumn vegetables, like squash, turnips or sweet potatoes.
Parker’s Table
8137 Maryland Ave, Clayton
314-863-4090