Do as I say and no one gets hurt.

Those are words to live by. Seriously. If everybody would simply do what I tell them to do, how I tell them to do it, and when I tell them to do it, everything would work out a whole lot better around here. This simple rule is the law in my kitchen, but it could transform life as we know it. I can think of several examples right off the tips of my tines. For instance . . . Well, I digress.

"So, what the fork does this have to do with the food and fun scene?" you ask. Simple. I sense some level of ennui with the local scene these days. As blessed as we are here to have a pretty good, and ever developing food scene, things could always be better. And, considering that things are always better when people do what I tell them to do, here are a few instructions. So, pay atttention.

1. Decent seafood. If there is a really great place to get seafood here, I haven't found it. Sure, sure, almost all the nicer places in town have some sort of fish selection on the menu. And by that I generally mean one selection. I am talking about a restaurant that wants to specialize in seafood. Good seafood. Not Joey's. Not Red Lobster. I said good. We used to have two restaurants that tried very hard to offer great seafood: The Galley and The Maine Lobster. In this day and age, we should have at least one seafood centered fine dining option in this town.
2. French. A few places flirt with French-like cooking, but no one seems to be willing to take the plunge and go all out. I don't think it would have to be a starched white linens type of place, but I would love to have a place in Sioux Falls that wants to embrace the true art of French cooking.
3. Indian place. The great food tragedy of the last year is the closing of Taste of India. WTF? Who let this happen? Indian cuisine is sublime and Saif did a masterful job preparing it at Taste of India. Tragic. When you need vindaloo, nothing else will do.
4. More wine. I am getting tired of drinking the same crap everywhere I go in town. We have some very good retailers, but I want to sit down somewhere and try about 20 wines by the glass some afternoon. With such a resurgence in wine, why can't we have a really good wine bar.
5. Pass the damned smoking ban. I am soooooo ready for this. My political intuition tells me the voters of SD are going to snuff out smoking in bars. Somebody must be polling and those numbers must be looking good, otherwise it would be absolute jihad between the campaigns by now. I cannot wait to go to some of my favorite watering holes and not have to worry about coming home smelling like I have been at a chain-smoking convention. Breathing is kind of nice, too.
6. Steak. When I say I can cook a steak at home better than anyplace around here, I am NOT exaggerating. Ironically, if I lived in Pierre, I might not be able to make that claim. I swear the Cattleman's Club soaks their steaks in MSG, because I just cannot seem to get a steak anywhere else in SD that has that kind of great flavor. We got bupkus for really good steak options here in Sioux Falls. If your idea of a great steak is a meal at Texas Roadhouse or Outback, you don't get it. And just for the record, Foley's sucks. We produce some of the best beef in the world here, we just refuse to serve it properly, apparently.
7. Tapas. How good would that be?
8. Thai. Ditto.
9. Deep dish Chicago-style pizza. We got thin crust brick oven pizza like Carter has pills. There was a time when we had a small place cranking out respectable Chicago-style pies. Why can't we have one now.

So, if someone would get on this list, pronto, things would be a lot better. Trust me.