Powell: Nearing 80, Cousino's remains a classic

On a dinner visit to Cousino’s Steakhouse on Woodville Road in East Toledo, it was good to see that old favored traditions are alive and well.

But it was equally gratifying to see the Cousino family also features new dining out trends.

Traditions not only include several cuts of steak, but the individual potato casseroles that have been a dinner highlight since I can remember. The potatoes, baked and served in individual casseroles with a sour cream sauce, are said to be one of the Cousino’s heirloom recipes.

The eight ounce sirloin, which is promoted as the house steak for $25, was served medium rare as requested.

A 24 ounce porterhouse costs $58. A 16 ounce New York strip, and a filet mignon are also available.

Beef fanciers can order a home-style English beef roast dinner with mashed potatoes and carrots or baby beef liver with grilled onions. Burgers also play a big part on the menu, seven choices are listed. In addition to the seven burgers an Impossible burger is listed. FYI, impossible burgers are plant based with meat flavor contributed by heme.

A generous portion of salmon was served with a lemon caper sauce. At $35.95, it was good that there was plenty of salmon to bring home.

This is the season when we often have a choice of asparagus as a side, but don’t order it for fear of being over or under cooked. At Cousino’s, the asparagus was just perfect and we could have eaten more.

Cousino’s has been a Toledo treasure since the late Earl Cousino entered the business in 1945 at the corner of Miami and Fassett streets. The purchase of the restaurant was an unexpected business adventure that has lasted nearly 80 years.

At the time, the buyer of the house that Cousino was selling was short $1,100. Cousino took the restaurant in payment.

They operated the White House until 1958 when the steakhouse was opened on Woodville Road. Cousino was inspired to feature steaks after a visit to George Diamond’s Steakhouse in Chicago.

Tom Cousino speaks lovingly of his dad and the early restaurant days. He says he never wanted to do anything else but to be in the restaurant business. After a long and illustrious career, he turned the restaurant over to son, Cory Cousino. Tom expresses his pride in Cory’s management abilities.

Eileen Cousino, Tom’s wife who is known as a wine expert, is making plans to open a wine program including tastings which are coming soon to the steakhouse.

Cousino’s refers to all appetizers as shareables. That tells the diner the portion is generous enough for two or more. The shareable choices prove that the Cousinos have kept pace with trends. Baked brie and spinach artichoke dip are examples of the appetizers.

We bypassed prepared escargot and went all out for the jumbo shrimp cocktail.

Ordering the shrimp was not a quick decision, but one that ended delightfully. Was I willing to spend $17 for four shrimp said to be very large? They were the largest shrimp I have ever seen. Indeed they were colossal. Furthermore, the presentation was outstanding with two shrimp on each end of a long narrow dish that also included a lemon half and cocktail sauce.

You know the saying. We foodies say that we don’t mind the price if it’s quality. It was indeed.

This brings us to the dessert. Next time, I’ll have the cheesecake that the waitress recommended instead of the bread pudding.

Cousino’s is open every day at 3 p.m.

Mary Alice Powell is a retired Blade food editor. Contact her at poseypowell@aol.com.