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 OUTDOING GRANDMA
Driving north from Pittsburgh on Route 79 was easy enough. But after we took exit 28 I started to wonder. We saw cows in pastures, drove through a golf course and a deeply wooded stretch of a narrow road, passed a log house, saw cottages along Connoquenessing Creek. It's a lovely drive on a summer evening, but surely we've made a wrong turn. We've seen no signs. Could there possibly be a restaurant 'way out here? Indeed there is. A good restaurant, too, one well worth the drive. Clifford's is a family restaurant run by Valerie and Clifford Clyde Enslen, and their sons, Jesse and John. It's "way out here" because it's on the family farm. The Enslens had been in the catering business for 15 years before they decided to open a restaurant. Friends told them not to worry about the remoteness of the location, saying: "If you have good food, people will come." And so far, they have. What they get is home-style cooking with a few ethnic and contemporary twists. Real mashed potatoes. Homemade dinner rolls, fresh from the oven. Salads that are crisp, green and made to order. And, surprise, grape pie. But it's not quite like eating at your grandmother's house. Yes, pierogies are on the menu - but some of them are stuffed with a spinach and feta combination, others have broccoli and cheese. Good old-fashioned roast pork has a Chinese-like plum sauce on top. Lamb chops come with a Dijon mustard glaze. The most popular soup is garlic and onion, served with a homemade Parmesan cheese dumpling. The menu is influenced by their heritage, Valerie Enslen says. She has an Eastern European background, her husband has German ancestors. Both sons studied in France. The restaurant - small, tables close together - is much like the restaurants they admired there. No one in the family has formal culinary training. Dad (Clifford) and Jesse do the cooking. Mom (Valerie) greets guests, takes them to their tables and recites the night's specials with such detail and enthusiasm you want to order it all. John helps in the dining room and takes care of the books. "We all do what we have to do," Valerie says. His Honor and I have enjoyed all the entrees we've had at Clifford's - lamb chops, roast pork, grilled tuna with a homemade dill sauce. But the best was a lemon-pepper baked cod. The fish was a glistening white, topped with a buttery spread of lemon-pepper and bread crumbs. The cod flaked at the touch of a fork. Dinner salads are as good as you'll find around Pittsburgh. Clifford, who shops for produce at the Butler farm market, has a reputation for being particular. So the salad will have whatever greens are freshest (but never any iceberg). Salad dressings are homemade. We're fond of the blue cheese, with its touch of onion, and the raspberry walnut vinaigrette. Crumbled blue cheese routinely is sprinkled on salads, and it goes surprising well with the raspberry walnut vinaigrette. Every night there is a choice of potato - baked, mashed, fries or baked yam. The cooks try to estimate how many potatoes they need to peel, depending on reservations. When they run out, that's it. Every night there is one vegetable. Sometimes that leads to odd flavor combinations that don't work - like beets with pork. Soups show a lot of imagination. We particularly liked the blush cauliflower soup. It had tiny bits of bacon, cauliflower, broccoli, and a bit of zing from the cayenne pepper, which also gave it the blush. And oh yes, the grape pie. It's one of several choices from a list that varies each night. It's made from fresh Thompson seedless grapes, and has an old-fashioned, homemade flavor. We thought the pie baker was a little heavy with the pastry for the crust, although the flavor was good. We like the homey, personal touches of Clifford's. One night the waiter brought us each a wedge of cornbread. It was part of an appetizer special for the evening, something we hadn't ordered, but there was extra, so he thought we might like to try it. He had already endeared himself to us over the forks. When he brought our salads, he placed a fork to the side of each salad plate, saying: "I'll bring you another fork for your entree." He was true to his word. You'll have to take your own wine; Connoquenessing is a dry township. But that's OK; it reduces the cost of the evening. A bottle of wine at a restaurant routinely costs about twice what it costs at the liquor store. We noticed most tables did have wine. Clifford's tries so hard to do everything right that the dinner rolls are puzzling. They're excellent, made-from-scratch rolls, baked throughout the evening so they are warm from the oven. But they serve them on a plate, so they cool off quickly. The rolls should be loosely wrapped in a cloth napkin, to preserve their heat.
Clifford's Restaurant
-- Review by Woodene Merriman, Post-Gazette Dining Critic
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Hours:
Wednesday-Saturday, 4-10 p.m; Sunday 3-9 p.m.