Louisville Magazine

JUL 2017

Louisville Magazine is Louisville's city magazine, covering Louisville people, lifestyles, politics, sports, restaurants, entertainment and homes. Includes a monthly calendar of events.

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54 LOUISVILLE MAGAZINE 7.17 RC RC A deep magenta spreads across the prep table in the kitchen as I grate juicy beets into a slaw, my fingers curled back to avoid the bite of sharp steel. "The woman who showed me how to do this yesterday really, really loved beets," a fellow volunteer at The Table says to me as she peels a container of them. Her teenage son portions a big package of sliced cheese into con- tainers for the menu's grilled cheese sandwiches. The Table, a nonprofit, has been serving weekday lunch since opening in Portland in 2015, giving customers the option to pay with volunteer hours or whatever they can afford. As I drop bacon into containers, two teens run food from the kitchen to the diners. We started our shifts at the same time, the teens climbing out of a van stamped with a city seal and escorted by a correc- tions officer with Alternative Placement Services, the youth detention center downtown. Chef Laura Rountree, who previously worked at the Brown Hotel's English Grill, describes the dishes to us — a salad with strawberries, the greens from a Portland farmer; a cheese-topped meatloaf sandwich; and the beet slaw I just prepped. The two kids listen intently and finish their two-hour shift as I mix a batch of buttermilk ranch dressing from scratch. While I use a lever to force whole pota- toes through a grid that slices them into thick fries, a family arrives to help wash dishes. The three of them take their sta- tions, where they are greeted by name. They come here every day, Rountree tells me. "I don't know what their cir- cumstances are, but this is a stop in their day before they head to the park or the library," she says. For many volunteers (there were 900 in their first year alone), The Table provides their only depend- able meal Monday through Friday. "This project came about when they" — the Church of the Promise, which has been in the building for 10 years — "were ask- ing the question, 'What does Portland need? What does it really need?' (The problem was) food insecurity: people who just don't really know exactly where they're going to eat the next day. There's a lot of people who just eat once a day. "That's intense, seeing those meals go out, once you realize that's all that person's gonna eat all day." As I emerge from the kitchen after my shift, the preacher's wife/volunteer coordinator Kathie Stoess says, "I hope you're ordering food. You certainly earned it." I sit in the dining room and place my order — meatloaf sandwich topped with beet slaw, with a side salad dressed in buttermilk ranch. The fruits of my labor. (1800 Portland Ave.) — Michelle Eigenheer THE TABLE BEST WEST END RESTAURANT DOO WOP SHOP BEST MUSIC EQUIPMENT "You know 'Keep Louisville Weird'?" John Metcalf says, leaning over the front count- er at the Doo Wop Shop. "We keep Louisville loud." There are enough guitars hanging around him to build a boat out of them, enough sound equipment in this place to win a war — and, apparently, some of us are trying. Metcalf, a longtime Doo Wop Shop employee, says the business rents out upwards of 24 PA systems every day. Last May, Doo Wop had a space across the street renovated and started teach- ing one-on-one lessons there; Metcalf estimates that a dozen instructors with 100-plus students keep the building singing. If you're one of those rockers renting a PA system, test it with one of these songs, chosen by Doo Wop Shop employees. (1587 Bardstown Road) — DJ "The Next Episode (Instrumental)," Dr. Dre "All I Have," Kartell feat. J-Rican "Angels/Your Love," Mr. Jukes fest. BJ the Chicago Kid "Waterfalls," TLC "More Bounce to the Ounce," Zapp and Roger "Klapp Klapp," Little Dragon "Burning," The Whitest Boy Alive "What Is Life?" Black Uhuru "Fragments of Time," Daft Punk feat. Todd Edwards "Workin' Day and Night," Michael Jackson

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