Zinc Brasserie

For the 26,000 residents of Sandusky, Ohio, the city is more than just “America’s Roller Coast,” as its flagship employer, Cedar Point, likes to tout. It’s home. Thrill-seekers flock here in droves May through October, mobbing the hotels and clogging the roads. But underneath all the hustle and bustle lies a waterfront town featuring a quaint main street and lakeside parks. The one thing it was lacking, says chef Cesare Avallone, was a restaurant that embraced locally sourced, farm-to-table ingredients in a fine-dining setting. So he built his own and opened Zinc Brasserie to almost instant success in May 2007.

Photo credit: Courtesy Zinc Brasserie

“It was a dream,” he says. “It was really refreshing and surprising to see the response we got.”

The original plan for Zinc was to take a former bakery and turn it into a breakfast and lunch spot. Avallone acted as general contractor on the space, and once he got in, he says, he just couldn’t help himself.

“We got a liquor license, and there was no turning back,” he says. “What started out as a little lunch counter turned into a full-blown, multicourse tasting menu with wine.”

Avallone and his wife-general manager, Andrea, scotch-taped a dinner menu to the front window and propped open the door. People came, and they’ve been coming back ever since.

A cucumber-cool breeze wafts from Zinc’s door as we arrive. Inside, high, stamped-tin ceilings and muted walls the color of an ocean storm provide a backdrop for the kind of young, groovy wait staff that reigns supreme at big-city hotspots. Avallone worked his way westward slowly, starting out in New Jersey and New York City kitchens before cooking his way through the Hudson Valley. He returned to his familial roots on the shores of Lake Erie in 2005, having learned how to create the coveted blend of high-end and hipster that marks so many successful restaurant ventures these days. But his heart remains with the art on the plate.

“I want the food to be as ingredient-driven as possible,” he explains. “We go to the farmers markets, establish the relationships with them early in the season. We try to source the best ingredients possible, and don’t mess with them too much.”

The place hums with energy, and the news at the host stand isn’t good. The restaurant is booked solid. Undeterred, we grab two seats at the bar (made, of course, out of zinc, a surface common in European pubs). The paper menu is short and sweet, a handful of appetizers and a few well-curated entrée selections — joined by almost as many daily specials.

We see bowl after bowl of the lobster bisque coming out of the kitchen. Topped with a pile of bread, it’s a visual treat — but we’re drawn to the Prince Edward Island mussels, promising coconut-red curry and cilantro. It’s an unusual presentation for mussels — light tasting, with a heady aroma.

A salad of roasted local beets offers a more-pleasing combination — pistachio-crusted cambozola cheese with Valencia oranges and a lemon vinaigrette. Likewise, the butterhead lettuce salad offers garden-fresh, perky greens and a divine buttermilk dressing.

Entrées are delicate but punchy. The duo of duck features a confit duck leg expertly prepared and juicy with fat, and a generous portion of white breast meat paired with a sour cherry glaze. “The stone fruit sauce cuts the richness of the fat of the duck,” Avallone later explains. Risotto pops up here, as it does elsewhere on the menu. Avallone would serve it on its own if he could.

“I think risotto is almost like fried rice,” he says — an entrée unto itself, not something to be relegated to the side. He tried it out, but the concept wasn’t popular enough to make it onto the all-star menu.

Vegetarians and pescatarians will find much to their liking as well. The goat-cheese ravioli is one of the best dishes of the night. Avallone has cultivated his relationships with seafood suppliers from Alaska to Boston to Honolulu, resulting in an impressive display of oceanic fare.

Zinc’s popularity led Avallone to debut Crush in mid-2010, a wine bar just across the street that’s larger and caters to the tapas crowd with a menu of under-$10 plates. He’s got plans for a brewery and sausage-making factory in the works.

His recipe for success is simple. He offers his customers high-quality, fresh food. “If you start with diamonds,” he says, “you’re gonna get diamonds.”