WILMINGTON—After months of renovations and menu testing, Rolled and Baked is ready to open on Castle Street.
Related story: Top Chef contestant brings ‘biscuits for the bold’ to Castle Street
Owners Bill and Anna Ward and Chef Micah Edelstein have spent the time turning the restaurant space, initially planned to be a brewery, into a fitting home for culinary experimentation.
“The last two weeks, almost everything has finally fallen into place,” Bill Ward said. “All the right ingredients, the right plating, the space looks the way we want.”
Biscuits for the bold
As promised, Rolled and Baked offers more than your traditional southern breakfast, although southern flavors and ingredients are everywhere. Edelstein is still keeping the final menu under wraps, but a few ideas snuck out in conversation, like a “southern Caprese salad’ with fried green tomato.
The menu will feature biscuit-based breakfast sandwiches, which can also be served on fried grit cakes, which are gluten-free. It will also feature soups and sandwiches, as well as “friskets,” essentially a donut based on a biscuit dough. Edelstein’s most recent frisket has a chocolate ganache filling, a coffee glaze and crushed graham crackers — but customers can expect a lot of variations.
“We’ll have three (frisket) flavors daily, based on what seems right seasonally,” Edelstein said. “They’re really the perfect thing, with coffee, you can’t go wrong.”
Many of the dishes are simple classics, elevated by sourcing and execution.
Take Edelstein’s version of the Monte Cristo, essentially a sweet-and-savory ham and cheese on French toast. Edelstein uses speck and Haverti, topped with a house-made IPA beer mustard and crispy chives. But what sets Edelstein’s Monte Cristo apart is the “bread” for this classic sandwich.
Edelstein’s Monte Cristo starts, appropriately, with biscuits — which she then turns into a biscuit bread pudding. That bread pudding, with a deep pocket sliced in it, in turn, becomes the French toast for the sandwich. You might expect the result to be dense but, judging from a family tasting, that was not the case.
“The biscuits are so thirsty, there is the potential for it to get very heavy,” Edelstein said. “I like to get things right the first time, but I did go back for a second version of this, just to make sure the pudding with light and airy.”
Another example is the classic meatball, which – in Edelstein’s kitchen – becomes a pulled-pork meatball served with a roasted garlic, parmesan, and basil biscuit. The process involves blending basil into lard, resulting in a “magic green sauce” that would probably find favor with cooks in the American South or Italy.
Even the basics get serious consideration — take bacon, for one thing.
Edelstein sourced a variety of pork providers, before settling on Lady Edison. Edelstein does her bacon in-house, with a chili and coffee rub. Even the length of a slice was subjected to study; Edelstein turned to social media to find out the ideal length. The people voted for 14 inches.
Behind the bar
Rolled and Baked will serve wine and beer, as well as a cocktail selection. Highlights, according to Edelstein, are the Nigori sake-based “snowmosas,” mimosas made with cloudy rice wine and fruit juices like white peach and lychee.
There’s also breakfast beer, a list of brews curated by Edelstein.
“A breakfast beer is anything I taste where I think, ‘oh, that’s something I’d drink at breakfast,'” Edelstein said.
Candidates for “breakfast beer” include ‘Dreamsicle,” an orange peel and vanilla Kolsch from MadTree brewing, “Mule Kick,” an alcoholic ginger beer from New City Brewery, and an “India Pale Radler,” a mix of IPA and sparkling grapefruit soda from Red Hare Brewing Company, which recently opened a new branch in Brunswick County.
Biscuit Twister?
Rolled and Baked also has a game room, complete with foosball and Edelstein’s own take on Twister.
“Up front (of the restaurant), we expect families, people stopping by for a quick frisket and coffee. But we also wanted someplace that people could come, relax, have a few drinks, and have some fun,” Edelstein said.
The Wards hope to open within the several weeks. Rolled and Baked is located at 509 Castle St. in downtown Wilmington. You can get updates on the upcoming opening on Rolled and Baked’s Facebook page.
Send comments and tips to Benjamin Schachtman at ben@localvoicemedia.com, @pcdben on Twitter, and (910) 538-2001.
