Haute Dogs and Hotties

My colleague Trent Steele ["How to Be Famous in Ten Easy Steps," April 27, 2004] and I found a couple of empty bar stools as soon as we walked in the front door. We ordered a bowl of mussels and a couple of glasses of white wine to start off. Trent was sitting on the very corner of the bar. I was to his left. To his right, an elderly man and his wife sat on either side of an attractive young woman. The young woman beamed at Trent and struck up a conversation. It seems they had met some years ago. The older woman turned out to be her mother. Soon, Mom got up and traded stools with the daughter so that the young woman could be closer to Trent. They talked incessantly.

He barely noticed when our mussels arrived. "Lone Star mussels" at Max's are steamed in Lone Star beer, with fresh lime juice, garlic, shallots and fresh serrano slices. The mussels are tasty enough, but it's the butter and cream they add to the broth that makes you want to pick up the bowl and drink it. The mussels came with several slices of Texas toast, cut on the diagonal. We dunked all those and sent the bartender back for more.

With Trent distracted, I got the lion's share of the mussels. This was working out perfectly.

Trent was drinking "Four Bears" Sauvignon blanc, which the wine list described as "crisp, dry, with citrus fruit and a hint of lemongrass." It wasn't nearly as tart as a good fish wine should be, but it was a decent aperitif. I got a glass of Luna Miel Albarino that was sensational. The wine was high in acidity, so it cut through the shellfish and cream flavors brilliantly

Last December, when I asked the manager of Oceanaire Seafood to recommend an oyster wine ["Half Shell Face-Off, December 26], he poured me a glass of another Albarino, this one from the Nora vineyard in Spain. I can't say I remember the Nora well enough to compare it to the Luna Miel, but I can say that Spanish Albarino is one of my new favorite white wines.

When our glasses were empty, the bartender sold me on a bottle of an unoaked Australian chardonnay which he claimed was as tart as the Albarino. It wasn't. But we drank it anyway.

Our entrées were a bit of a letdown. "Redfish, shrimp and grits" featured some cornmeal-coated fried shrimp and a nice chunk of fried redfish, but the grits, which were hardened and cut into a square like polenta, were sadly tasteless. Or maybe I've been spoiled by the shrimp and highly seasoned grits I have eaten at upscale Southern eateries like Central Grocery in Oxford, Mississippi.

The "fettuccine and fungus" entrée suffered from an identity crisis. The pasta sauce was timid, with a little tomato and a little cheese and a little butter, but no dominant flavor. It wasn't terrible, but I wouldn't order it again. And I love mushrooms.

It was a little embarrassing to eat a lot of messy food in front of so many people. There were some entrées, like chili cheese fries topped with fried eggs, which I wouldn't even attempt to eat at the bar. I wish I could get some of this food at a diner, or somewhere I could eat it without inhibitions.

Executive chef Jonathan Jones has put together a terrific Texas "dive" menu, and wine buyer Michael Housewright has assembled a collection of cutting-edge wines that's light years ahead of most wine lists in the rest of the city. Unfortunately, these two exemplary efforts aren't entirely in synch with each other. I love venison chili and pickled jalapeños, and I love wine, but together?

I would have asked Trent for his thoughts on how well the menu harmonized with the wine list, but he was preoccupied. The rest of the throng at Max's Wine Dive didn't seem very worried about it either. Mostly they were drinking wine and socializing. And judging by the plates I saw passing by, the few who ate anything got hamburgers.

Before we left, Trent and the young woman entered each other's phone numbers into their cell phones. He said he liked the place a lot.