Fish Tales
When it comes to food, I have a lot of guilty pleasures, although I wouldn’t include the bland fried catfish fillets served at The Jumpin’ Catfish (see review). On the other hand, I have been practically giddy while eating the crispier — and greasier — whole catfish at The Gaf Pub & Grill (7116 Wornall) or a flaky blackened fillet with remoulade sauce at the Mango Room (1111 Main Street).
Catfish just isn’t that exciting unless it gets a sexy makeover, like the one created by veteran caterer Robert Salsman, who covers his fish with crushed pecans, sautés it in a pan, and splashes it with a mahogany reduction made from a little root beer and a generous shot of bourbon.
“I also do a catfish fillet stuffed with chorizo,” he says, “and serve it with a fresh mango sauce.”
Salsman has been one of Kansas City’s celebrity caterers for 27 years. He arrived from St. Louis in the late 1960s to work at the now-forgotten but once glamorous Top of the Tower, which occupied the highest two floors of the Commerce Bank Tower at Ninth Street and Main.
Operated by the old Gilbert/Robinson company, Top of the Tower had five distinctly different dining areas, each serving a different ethnic cuisine. “You could have a cocktail at Genghis Khan or a glass of ale at Paddy’s Pub,” Salsman recalls, “then walk over a cobblestone bridge to have flambe dishes in the French restaurant, Tour d’Argent, or take a right and go to the Salzberg Haus for German food. There was also an Italian place called Guiseppe’s Roof.”
I’m sorry I missed this international restaurant-a-rama, because I’ve seen old color postcards of some of the dining rooms and they’re deliciously campy. The Italian joint had fringed canvas chairs and umbrella patio tables. The French room was dripping with crystal chandeliers, swagged draperies and green velvet upholstery.
But Kansas City’s downtown was already starting its slow decline. Salsman later went to the Arrowhead Club and, at the apex of the disco craze, to Biba’s, a hot dance club on the Plaza. He felt like a fish out of water in the middle of that wild scene and left after a year to start his own business.
Salsman turned 69 this year and has no interest in retiring. In fact, he’s more interested in food than ever. “I like going to new restaurants,” he says, before confessing that while he doesn’t like fried foods, he, too, has a couple of guilty pleasures: Twinkies and White Castle hamburgers.
