accessAtlanta

THERE'S THE ROAD less traveled, and then there's the circuitous route life puts before us. How does, for instance, a Vietnamese chef end up cooking at an American bistro in McDonough?

For the Pham family, the path may have been a fortuitous combination of both — beginning in Saigon with layovers in Arkansas, Atlanta and Stone Mountain.

Elissa Eubanks/Staff (ENLARGE)
That's a blueberry sauce atop the luscious rosemary roasted pork that comes with jade rice and green beans (top). Exposed brick, hardwood floors and cavernous space help create a swanky, sophisticated environment.
Elissa Eubanks/Staff (ENLARGE)
Elissa Eubanks/Staff (ENLARGE)
Seasons Bistro in McDonough serves a masterful vichyssoise that's full of potato flavor.
MOST POPULAR STORIES Police: Jeffrey Donovan arrested, suspected of DUI Report: Abdul's return to 'American Idol' doubtful Beastie Boy Adam Yauch has 'very treatable' cancer Fallon's '7th Floor West' is a silly, soapy treat Chris Brown apologizes for Rihanna beating
EMAIL THIS PRINT THIS MOST POPULAR

This is the family that owned Cha Gio, now part of Wild Curry and Rice on 10th Street. Son Trung Pham and his wife, Lynn Loggins, opened their own place, Seasons Bistro, last year with Trung's brother, Tin Pham, as chef. They moved from Stone Mountain to the Southside when a friend from McDonough told them of a restaurant opportunity in a tidy spot just off the downtown square (formerly Bistro 41).

Well, that's simple enough, now isn't it? Hardly.

Downtown McDonough is as pretty as a picture. The edges of the town's square are lined with burgeoning gardens of geraniums and bustling with businesses, especially restaurants (and a particularly good bakery called Koffee Klutch).

Ga. 81, a straight shot to downtown, is lined with construction cones and highway dividers; strip malls are emerging in what were once open fields — a certain sign of suburban "progress." Even my tried-and-true city-dwelling companion was tempted by the "for sale" sign on a big white mansion as we drove by.

Charm and availability aside, there's some reconciliation needed to connect the invisible line between Vietnam and McDonough. While Seasons Bistro is most definitely not Vietnamese, its chef is.

So while this hip eatery's menu gets inspiration from Asian influences, especially Vietnamese and Thai, as well as the French traditions that come with both cuisines, there are a couple of disconnects. The layered, bold flavors I expect in Vietnamese and Thai foods and the subtleties that mark truly great French cooking are missing, or at least scaled down to an absolute minimum. Worse, the quality of ingredients, at least in some dishes, is lacking what it takes to put this talented chef's food over the top.

Dishes that could be stellar fall flat simply because the ingredients just don't pass muster — prefab chicken in a lunch sandwich; a funky, cold offering of soft-shell crab; sauces that have the glossy, sweet look and flavor of too much modified food starch and not enough elbow grease.

That's not to say there's nothing to enjoy here. There's plenty, especially in the way of hospitality. Loggins is a born pleaser and loves to bring her customers rounds of new things to try — Cuervo's newest, a black tequila, was brought to us between courses. Loggins' purveyor had suggested mixing the aged spirit with Coke, like rum, but it's much too smooth for that. Like a good scotch or whiskey, it should be sipped.

Our waitress loved having us taste a giggly glass of sparkling Shiraz Cabernet Franc called "Vixen" from South Australia's Fox Creek Wines. She couldn't tell us much about it, but had fun serving it with some cubed cheese.

Pham's best offering is a superb vichyssoise with full-on potato flavor, a bit of chive and a pleasantly smooth — though not velvety — texture, which gave it more pith. He serves it chilled, but not cold.

Vietnamese-inspired zesty minced pork salad with lots of ginger and hints of lemongrass is a perfect foil to the soup's subtleness. And the fragrant juiciness of rosemary-roasted pork tenderloin blanketed with a sweet blueberry sauce is proof positive that there is a strong pulse of talent in this kitchen.

The restaurant is seductive in its trimmings — what was once the town's Buggy Works makes for a sexy scene. Exposed brick, hardwood floors and a bold cavernous space create sophisticated surroundings. The bathrooms have more accoutrements than the Ritz-Carlton.

One evening I finished a meal as a gaggle of girls sat at the bar watching another finalist get kicked off "American Idol," feeling a little like the much maligned Simon.

"If I'm being ahhhnest ..." I could hear him drone.

Whatever the issues are in this restaurant's kitchen, this place has pluck. And if I'm being honest, I'd like to see it make it to the next round.