Late Harvest Kitchen

I really enjoy it when foods that are typically sweet are made as a savory dish. The rich, umami flavor of the parmigiano and the raw beef was balanced perfectly with the peppery greens. Fantastic!

A gifted chef can make a dish look simple when it is anything but. Case in point: these skillet-formed hash browns.

Featuring a sentimental favorite: the pecan ball at Pipers Restaurant.

Pork and beans gets elevated to gastropub elegance at 10-01 Food & Drink, plus five more fantastic entrees.

The staff of Late Harvest Kitchen holds a late-night lunch once a month.

When Late Harvest Kitchen chef-owner Ryan Nelson saw his chance to snag the 4,000-square-foot former Cafe Nora, he pounced on it, hatching plans to launch a barbecue joint celebrating different regions and styles.

As we embarked on our own food-driven adventures for the October cover story on Destination Dinner, we couldn’t help asking a couple of pros for their favorite meals worth the drive.

Wine advice from Trad Ireland at Fleming’s, Late Harvest Kitchen’s Ryan Nelson, and Denis Lynch at Vine & Table Gourmet Market.

That third course and others over the course of the night, as well as the prior tasting time, saw delectable plates of food paired with choice wines, beers, and cocktails.

From The Libertine to Recess and Oakleys to Bluebeard, Korean to Latin and sushi to steak, our critics chose the cream of Indy’s dining crop,. Who’s at the head of the table? Read on to find out.

1. A piping-hot skillet of potato-and-bacon gratin at Noah Grant’s Grill House & Oyster Bar (65 S. 1st St., Zionsville, 317-732-2233).
2. Caviar pie at Late Harvest Kitchen (8605 River Crossing, 317-663-8063), a DIY starter that combines bite-size toasts with a soft wedge of roe-topped cheese. Doll it up with chopped egg, red onion, and capers.
3. Sweetly potent caffe alla at Delicia (5215 N. College Ave., 317-925-0677), a stratified coffee with layers redolent of cinnamon and orange liqueur.
4. Crisp-fried Brussels sprouts from Puzzle’s Restaurant (118 N Pendleton Ave., Pendleton 765-778-1944)
5. Eggs over-easy from Charlie Brown’s Pancake and Steak House in Speedway (1*038 Main St, 317-243-2502*). The diner’s short-order cooks have perfected the delicate art of getting the whites chewy while leaving the golden yolks runny enough to sop up with a biscuit or toast.

Hunky strips of General Tso’s Pork Belly laid atop a gingery stir-fry at Late Harvest Kitchen (8605 River Crossing, 317-663-8063). DIY blackened fish tacos at City Cafe (443 N. Pennsylvania St., 317-833-2233), served with

Fans of pitch-perfect surf and turf always have the fallback lushness of Peterson’s (7690 E. 96th St., Fishers, 598-8863, petersonsrestaurant.com), especially in its tender osso buco, and row of seared Maine Diver scallops with alternating disks of apple tuille on a bed of risotto > Sporting dark paneling and Germanic robustness, The Rathskeller (401 E. Michigan St., 636-0396, rathskeller.com) pioneered the civilized rustic theme. Oxtail is listed among the soups, and the sides include spaetzle, red cabbage, and warm potato salad.

For three nights, their every public move lit up the Twittersphere, with sightings at all of the well-trodden downtown haunts and as far north as Geist, where Madonna was spotted jogging.

If you had followed Ryan Nelson’s career from the beginning, you might have predicted the scene: Just 10 days after he opened Late Harvest Kitchen in the former Smith & Hawken storefront near The Fashion Mall, Nelson strolled from table to table in the packed, candlelit dining room of his first solo enterprise, talking to customers with the ease of a seasoned restaurant professional. But in many ways, he was still the guy from Minneapolis, the onetime English major and avid hockey fan a tad uncomfortable in his chef’s whites, humbly hoping you enjoyed the food he had cooked for you. Only now he was not answering to the corporate offices of The Oceanaire Seafood Room, where he established himself as both team player and rising star, garnering an invitation to cook at the revered James Beard House in New York City at age 26.