Dapper Ray Karr, Cafe Caspian's co-owner and resident James Woods look-alike, is a natural born schmoozer who enjoys touting fesenjan's thousand-year-old legacy and recounting the provenance of India's tandoori oven (it arrived in the form of Persia's clay tantour during an ancient military campaign, he maintains). Lurking in his speech patterns is a clue to the way Iranian emigrants market their businesses in the post-Ayatollah era. "Ira..." Karr is wont to begin, cutting himself short and substituting the more neutral-sounding "Persia."
Karr, who for years has run the valet parking operation for caterer-to-the-stars Jackson Hicks, clearly has uptown aspirations. Courtly (if overextended) waiters, white-shirted and necktied; allusions to antiquity in the form of classical-style statuary and becolumned arches backlit in red; and a mock-barrel vault sculpted out of acoustical tile all strive for the tone of a tablecloth restaurant. Never mind that the tables wear murky-pink oilcloth topped by Persian-motif photos under glass. Glad-handing his prosperous clientele, Karr is a man well-pleased. "I kept saying, 'There aren't any nice Persian restaurants in Houston,'" he offers. "So..." He trails off, shrugging eloquently.
Two blocks south at the Garson Restaurant, one of Houston's earliest Persian places, those would be fighting words. Garson (the name is a takeoff on the French for "waiter," believe it or not) may be a bit worn around the edges, but its faux-high-tech-on-a-shoestring look is understated and fresh, its patrons dressed-up, its stews alluring and its grilled meats the best in Little Persia.
Granted that Garson's stale-ish pita can't hold a candle to Cafe Caspian's magnificent taftoon. And that Garson's free garden plate seems less dewy, its eggplant dip less riveting than its rival's. However, the brisk spinach-and-garlic yogurt dip suggests a sure-footed kitchen; succulent little grilled quail and perfectly cooked kebabs confirm it. Best option: the Garson Special, twin skewers of rosy beef filet and wonderfully moist, charcoaly chicken breast with a lemon tang and a saffron sheen. Big, charbroiled shrimp would be great if not for their harsh iodine flavor (maybe a new supplier is in order). The only irredeemable clunker was the shishleek, a chewy beef slab reminiscent of minute steak.
Do I need to tell you that Garson's rice is fabulous? Or that their beef-and-eggplant stew, fetchingly decorated with fried potato sticks, is particularly vibrant? Beef fares better in stew-form here than it does at Cafe Caspian: big, tender chunks inhabit the green-vegetable sabzi, which is deliciously strange and astringent. Fesenjan is just plain strange, as usual, desiccated Cornish hen and all.
There are plenty of small pleasures at Garson. Big pitchers of ice water on every table. A quirky Iranian chicken salad, bound with mayonnaise and mined with canned green peas, that is really more of a picnic-worthy potato salad. Complimentary bowls of a peppery tomato-and-rice broth that grows on you. Eager-to-please waiters (the garsons, if you will) in crisp, snowy shirts and formal ties. Vintage cross-cultural people watching. A festive and sophisticatedly late buzz on weekend nights.
Weekdays, many of these revelers travel south on Hillcroft to partake of homelier amenities. In the 3300 block, they might duck into the starkly dubbed Bread & Pizza shop (or "Bread & Pzz," as its inscrutable sign would have it) to purchase enormous lengths of freshly baked barbari bread from a cheerful fellow named Mahsoud. Further south, just over the railroad tracks in the 5600 block of Hillcroft, the Iranian community shops the modest Super Vanak market for foodstuffs, fresh breads, surprisingly good pastries and such essential seasonings as sumac -- a lemony, crystalline spice that deserves to be better-known.
Sumac is what lends a haunting note to the irresistible ground-beef kebabs at the nearby Darband Kabobi, a chipper spot that's the quick-and-cheap equivalent of an Iranian sandwich shop. Well, not that quick: you'll have to wait for your kebab to finish its stint on the Lazy-Man grill, by which time it's often slightly overcooked. But the seasoning is so deft I never seem to mind.
Overgrilling does not afflict the ground-beef koubideh, which bursts with the flavor of its onion marinade and that tart, deep-red sumac. It sits on an oblong of Arab bread, dripping juice, crowded by lush, grilled tomato halves and bushy sprigs of basil, or even mint. The side dishes are dicier here: while there is a compelling species of slightly fermented vegetable pickle known as torshi to be had, the hummus is bitter and the cucumber-and-tomato Persian salad bland. But do sample the radically refreshing beverage called dough: pronounced "doog," this concoction of minted, iced yogurt splashed with lots of seltzer is a fine antidote to the Houston heat.
It tastes even better to the unexpected tune of a plashing indoor fountain (strewn with pennies, of course), which lends an oddball, gardenlike air to the streamlined blue-and-white interior. Ceiling fans suspended from a vaulted ceiling cool this clean, breezy room, which is presided over by a friendly Iranian proprietor who's apt to offer a complimentary pot of cardamom-perfumed tea while you wait. It is soothing, seductive stuff, to be sipped at leisure from clear glass cups. The regulars take it with cubes of sugar, as do the bearded gentlemen in towering, antique hats who populate the Persian tearoom depicted in a hanging print. Look around the restaurant -- Darband Kabobi's tables full of male tea-drinkers may be wearing designer denim and mustaches, but not much has really changed.
