Cover Story: In Indiana, Small Favors Blends Creativity and Hospitality
Noted New Orleans bartender Nick Detrich has returned home to the Hoosier State where his welcoming bar spotlights wine-based cocktails paired with seasonal bites.
Welcome to the weekend! Here’s what we’re writing about in today’s newsletter:
Cover Story: In Bloomington, Indiana, Nick Detrich’s Small Favors serves a clever list of wine-based cocktails.
On the Road: With fall in full swing, we share a favorite spot for maple doughnuts when traveling in New England.
Weekend Reading List: Getting cozy in Upstate New York with
October’s Featured Destination: When visiting Door County, stay at this food-focused inn in the heart of Sister Bay.
October’s Featured Field Guide: Download a complimentary copy of our Field Guide to Door County, a 20-page digital dining guide featuring all our restaurant and bar recommendations for the area.
Creativity and Seasonality at Small Favors
BLOOMINGTON, IND. — When we went to Small Favors, a cozy wine bar and restaurant in Bloomington, we posted up at the bar from open to close. This was a new one for us, but the wine-based cocktails were low in alcohol and the tasty dishes helped keep us upright, while owner Nick Detrich and the team kept us comfortable with warm hospitality.
It had been a few years since we had last seen Detrich, who made his name in the bar world at New Orleans spots Cane & Table, Manolito, and Jewel of the South, all fantastic places. In 2020, the Indianapolis native returned with his wife to the college town of Bloomington, a move “motivated by family.” His folks have a farm 15 miles outside of Bloomington, and Detrich also wanted to take advantage of the space to plant apple trees for an orchard. While waiting for the trees to grow, “We found that we missed some of the amenities, like being able to get a decent bottle of wine,” Detrich says. “So we started looking into a retail shop but found that with liquor laws in the state, it was far easier to open a restaurant.”
So that’s what they did. Initially, the thought was to open a spot like Faubourg Wines in New Orleans, a wine shop that offers cheese and bites along with wines by the glass and bottle. But within the first few months of Small Favors’ January 2022 opening, Detrich says they “realized our guests wanted a little more on the culinary side.” Now, the menu offers snacky items as well as more substantial plates for dinner. The American menu pulls in Southern and international influences and offers plates like pimento cheese with fried Saltines, wagyu beef carpaccio with piparra peppers, and cider-braised ribs with green tomato and sambal chutney. They’re also offering Sicilian-style pizzas, like a Muffuletta-inspired one with pepperoni, mortadella, salami, olive salad, and provolone.
Developing the food menu is a culinary team effort, and Detrich says that it’s highly dependent on what farmers are growing. “Now that we've been open a couple years, farmers come to us at the start of the season and ask us what we’d like. Last year, I said we’d love to have more shiso, so now we’re swimming in shiso.” (As for what they’re doing with that shiso, the menu includes fried green tomatoes with walnut romesco and shiso gribiche.)
Small Favors has a limited liquor license, which allows for a great wine program, and a fun list of wine-based cocktails. In addition to wines, Detrich can obtain sherry, vermouth, madeira, port, rancio sec, and wine-based aperitivos like Cappelletti, which he says helps “scratch that bitter aperitif itch.” The drink list includes not only Champagne cocktails and amontillado sherry sours, but also cocktails like Sazeracs and Negronis — just made with wine-based products. “We work in classic formats as far as sour and vermouth-forward drinks and we lean heavily into bitters,” Detrich says, adding that they also do a lot of shrub cocktails. “We make a raspberry shrub and do a riff on the Roffignac with Pineau des Charentes, seltzer, and raspberry shrub.”
As for what products he misses by not having a full liquor license, “it’s not the tequilas and bourbons, it’s the modifiers,” he says. “A lot of things can stand in as the base spirit, but a crème de menthe is hard to replicate.” So is rye. “We stay away from trying to replicate whiskey drinks,” Detrich says. “We do a Sazerac variation that leans into Cognac territory, with a blend of Pineau des Charentes and a couple rancio secs that have a leathery, tobacco-y oxidative quality. For gin, we infuse manzanilla sherry with juniper, lemon, and anise. Manzanilla is a great stand-in for tequila.”
As for his roles in New Orleans, Detrich is still involved in Manolito and gets back to town every two months. “We’re getting ready to expand Manolito,” he says. “We took over the lease on two apartments behind it, and we’re doing a pretty big remodel. That block dates to 1818, and there are a lot of stringent regulations and red tape. We're working with the architect we worked with on Jewel of the South; she really knows how to navigate the city planning and historic commissions. We’ve got a great courtyard with one of the biggest banana trees I’ve ever seen.”
But Detrich is also firmly part of Bloomington life, and visits spots like Blockhouse Bar, a basement beer bar that hosts a Honky Tonk event on Tuesdays, where local musicians play country standards, and the Orbit Room, “a funky little listening room” with natural wines and hot dogs. He says: “It’s what I want after a shift, to drink a pilsner and eat a hot dog.”
402 1/2 W 6th St, Bloomington, IN 47404
Finding Fall Flavors at Donut Dip
WEST SPRINGFIELD, MASS. — Old-school doughnut shops are the best doughnut shops, and Donut Dip is a must-visit if you’re in Western Massachusetts. The tiny shop has been open since Charles Shields founded it in 1957; it’s now on the fourth generation in the same family. It’s a regional favorite, and known for its great doughnuts, neon sign, and the slogan on the wax bags and boxes — “What foods these morsels be!”
Donut Dip offers 49 flavors, from the signature honey dip (that’s a glazed doughnut for those of you from outside New England) to black raspberry-filled to coconut custard. Most are yeast-raised doughnuts, but a few cake ones are on offer, like blueberry and pumpkin. Our favorite is the maple frosted, with a thick layer of icing spread onto a raised doughnut and optional seasonal sprinkles (harvest colors in fall, Christmas colors in winter). It’s available in a maple bacon version with crumbled bacon, in addition to maple cream and maple-apple varieties.
Donut Dip is located at the crossroads of Route 91 and Route 90, so even if you’re just driving through, it’s an easy stop. The hours — it opens at 3am Thursdays to Sundays and 5am Mondays to Wednesdays, and closes at 9:45pm each day — can accommodate any schedule.
1305 Riverdale St, West Springfield, MA 01089
That’s Our ’Cue: Robert Moss, Southern Living's contributing barbecue editor, has put together the magazine’s annual list of the Top 50 BBQ Joints in the South. Included are some of our favorites like Helen’s Bar B Q and Cozy Corner in Tennessee, Arthur Bryant's Barbeque in Missouri, and Lewis Barbecue in South Carolina (which we wrote about here).
Sauna Saturdays:
has gathered some unique upstate New York getaways for folks looking to get Nordic this fall and spend a quiet afternoon in a sauna. “With its mountainous landscapes, colorful fall foliage and bonfire-opportunities-aplenty, Upstate lends itself well to the season, and the return of all things ‘cozy.’ And what’s cozier than a sauna?”Island Time: Writing for The New York Times, Christine Chitnis explores the back roads of Rhode Island where she finds farm stands, a cider producer, a family-run fish market, and more. She also recommends Hunky Dory, which she says highlights the area’s coastal “ocean-to-plate” sensibility. “My roots are Lowcountry cuisine and Appalachian cooking,” says the restaurant’s chef and co-owner Sam Duling. “The kind of food that relies on what’s in season.” Sounds like my kind of place.
— Compiled by Kenney Marlatt
Roots Inn & Kitchen: A Sister Bay Hideaway
SISTER BAY, WIS. — The past few times we’ve visited Door County, we’ve stayed at Roots Inn & Kitchen, Collin and Sara Doherty’s bed-and-breakfast. The location is pretty ideal — it’s right behind Husby’s (a local staple where you can get a Spotted Cow alongside some fried cheese curds) and it’s walkable to everything on the main Sister Bay drag, including Al Johnson’s and Sister Bay Bowl. Also, the six rooms are nicely updated (the building dates to 1902), there’s a guest fridge stocked with complimentary Wisconsin beers and sodas, and the breakfast in the morning is excellent. Collin makes breakfast for guests each day, and it changes with the seasons and his whims, so it might be vegetable hash or a scrambled egg sandwich with bacon. But even if you’re not staying at the inn, you can stop by for lunch. There’s a weekday menu featuring vegan dishes like tacos and rice bowls alongside bratwursts (yes, vegan bratwursts are available) served on pretzel buns.
2378 Maple Dr, Sister Bay, WI 54234
Download Your Free Door County Field Guide
Roots Inn & Kitchen is just one of our Door County favorites. You can find all of our picks in our Field Guide to Door County, a 20-page digital dining guide formatted for your phone. During the month of October, paid subscribers can snag a complimentary download on our website — just use the code CHERRYPIE at checkout.
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