From the Mouth of Tampa Bay: Big news, eaters! A while back I wrote about Dan Soronen’s new project, Shackleton’s Folly. Previously the owner of St. Petersburg’s Old Northeast Tavern, Dan was venturing south to the Coquina Key Shopping Plaza (4300 6th St. S) for this new project, named for the Antarctic explorer, Ernest Shackleton.He’s hired a chef. A good one. Domenica Macchia, former chef at MJ’s Martini Jazz and Tapas Lounge (see my rave review of her food
here) and at Redwood’s before that, will head the kitchen, bringing Pinellas County its first gastropub (a concept popularized in England, it’s a pub with ambitious culinary aims, often involving house-cured meats and charcuterie). She says they’ll be open the first week in March, and she says the menu will feature dishes like roasted chicken au poivre, chocolate stout beef stew and sweet Guinness crepes with caramelized bananas and pecans.Yeah! I’ve been dying to know where she would land, and the duo seems like a dynamic one. This promises to be a 2009 highlight.
