Piccolo (Portland, ME)

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Happy New Year!  Welcome to 2015!

Sorry it has been such a long while since my last post; it has been a busy season, between research papers, traveling to see family, and the holidays, and sadly, this has been the thing pushed to the back of my to-do-list.

But, I did have a couple of really great meals over the last few days of 2014, and Piccolo, a relatively new Portland restaurant, provided the best of them.  I went with a couple of my step-siblings and their father (not my step) and his wife, who very generously included me.  This was actually option B for us, and I am so glad we ended up there, as this was truly a spectacular experience all around.

Piccolo really lives up to its name, squeezed into a tiny space with only about twenty seats (if even that), but it does not feel cramped as you sit at the table, and the decor is simple but attractive.  The servers are all friendly, and we ended up having one of the owners, who is also the pastry chef, for our waitress, which was really great as she knew the menu so well.

We began with the "salumi" plate, which consisted of a couple of cured or salted meats (bresaola included, which was so rich and delicious I could have eaten it all night), some olives, and a few really fantastic pickled vegetables, my favorite of which were the beets.  Additionally, we ordered the "carotta" appetizer, which consisted of roasted carrots and a couple accompaniments, and which was a very good, albeit unspectacular, starter.

The entrees were where things really began to shine.  The six of us ended up ordering three different entrees, with each having two people picking it:  two "pasta fatta in casa;" two "calamarata," and two "del mar."  Everything was homemade, locally sourced if possible, and made with a care and technique that is rare to find.

The pasta (and the name literally means house-made pasta) was cavatelli, served with a lamb neck ragu, eggplant, orange, and pecorino, and other than my own dish, this was what I ate the most of, as one of the two who ordered it could not finish the rather large portion she was served.  The lamb neck was succulent and rich, the cavatelli themselves perfectly formed and cooked, and on the whole the dish was a delightful melange of flavors.

My dish, the calamarata, consisted of squid ink pasta (referred to as maltagliati on the menu, and seeming to be the ends of strips of papardelle) that was literally the best pasta I have ever had, the best cooked squid I have ever had (are we sensing a pattern?), charred tomato, peppers, and olives.  I'll admit, I missed the olives, but everything else was there in delicious abundance.  The pasta was perfectly al dente, the squid not even the littlest bit chewy (and anyone who has ever cooked that particular cephalopod knows how insanely difficult that is to achieve), and the tomatoes in particular was incredibly flavorful.  Everything just worked, so ridiculously well, that it has launched itself into the pantheon of best dishes I have ever had, a list that includes the short ribs I had at Bouchon Bistro in Las Vegas a couple years ago.  I cannot recommend this particularly dish highly enough, even more so than the restaurant as a whole, which I recommend very, very highly.

The last dish was fish, the particular variety of which I cannot recall other than that it was a locally sourced whitefish (I do not think it was hake, but I may be wrong), which was perfectly cooked.  I only had a single bite, so I cannot speak to it more than to say my sister, who has impeccable taste, loved it.

For dessert, we had a funnel cake-like Italian fried dough that was really tasty, with a crunchy exterior and just a little bit of dough inside the thin strands to provide a little chewiness.  We also had a poached pear with chocolate mousse dish that was fine, but a little too rich for me; it was clearly well done in every way, just not my thing.

The wines we had were great (picked by my sister in the case of the white wine we had), and the owner was good enough to suggest a red wine that was significantly cheaper than what had been the previous choice.  That was just the beginning of the great service, and once again, I really cannot speak highly enough of this entire experience.  If you find yourself in Portland, this is a very reasonably priced, very well executed restaurant with spectacular food; just make a reservation, since there are so few seats.  The owners are both veterans of a Daniel Boulud restaurant in NYC, so they have the pedigree to explain their excellence.

I do not think vegetarians would be successful here, though they may be willing to make something special; if they do, I have no doubt it will be delicious.

La Fiorentina (Northampton, MA)

I have discussed a few of the cafes in Northampton before, including recent posts on The Roost and The Foundry, but nothing comes close to the quality of La Fiorentina.  With three locations now (the others are in Springfield and the newly opened East Longmeadow shop), La Fiorentina presents perfect coffee, delicious pastries, ice cream and other sweets.  Most items are, of course, Italian, though they have other pastries, including my personal favorite croissant.  While I cannot speak to the authenticity of their coffees and sweets, having never been to Italy, I suspect that much of what they offer is true to its heritage, as they seem to have an attention to detail and quality that makes me think that anything less than doing things exactly right would not be acceptable.

"Banana" Marzipan; the cell phone camera does not do the beauty of it justice

I have been going to La Fiorentina since I was a little kid, getting hot chocolate, made with real steamed milk, which is really just so much better than the stuff you get elsewhere, and of course, the greatest treat of all, real marzipan.  Made with almond paste and a lot of sugar, it is slightly sticky, very sweet, and just all in all delicious; as a kid it was my favorite, and today it is a treat that I cannot resist every time I find myself on Armory St.  The marzipan is hand painted and absolutely beautiful, with bright, vibrant colors, shaped and colored to resemble various fruits and objects.  I got a couple of the "banana" treats today, which were so perfectly painted that they looked just like miniature versions of the real thing.  I am sorry to say that my new phone's camera, while pretty good, did not properly capture the colors, because these little treats really are a work of art.  If you have never had marzipan and live or work in the Northampton area, you really need to stop in and try some; if you have tried it and like it, La Fiorentina's will take that to another level.

Beyond the marzipan, they have great fruit tarts, croissant, cheesecake that is to die for, and a lot of really good Italian desserts, including the classic cannoli.  All of their cakes that I have tried are tremendous, and I look forward to trying more, despite my general aversion to very sweet desserts, because they just do such an incredibly good job with all of their food.

The coffee is, as I said, spectacular; it being a rather warm day today (47 degrees is warm in December), I went for an iced latte, and as I took my first long sip of it, all I could think was "if everyone tried this, no one would drink flavored coffee."  The espresso is amazing, rich and flavorful, perfectly roasted, and the milk mixes perfectly with just the right ratio to the coffee.  Their regular coffee is great as well; when I had a few trainings last year in Northampton, their hot coffee was the perfect thing to warm me, and as I struggled to stay awake through 24 hours of boring-ness over three days it kept me awake.  After drinking La Fiorentina coffee I cannot drink Dunkin Donuts' swill for at least a week.

All in all,  I cannot recommend La Fiorentina highly enough, and they are truly my favorite cafe in not just Northampton, but anywhere.  If anyone has a place they think could challenge it, please let me know, but it is a long shot that I will find somewhere that I love more.  FYI, though, their hours suck, not opening until 9am Sunday through Friday, and 8am on Saturday.  I want coffee at 6am, dammit!

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Boston Trip (Boston and Cambridge, MA)

Regina Pizzeria is, by all accounts, a Boston landmark, a restaurant famous enough to have its own page on Wikipedia, and a real icon in the predominately Italian North End neighborhood.  With 21 locations ranging throughout greater Boston, this is a still-growing business serving the same great pizza they have since 1926.

I met an old college friend at the restaurant for dinner a little after 8:00pm on Wednesday, having just started to recover my appetite from my trip to Tacos Lupita, and having done a fair bit of walking already that day (from Allston to Cambridge, then from Quincy Market, where I had a couple beers with another friend, to the North End), I was ready for some pizza.  My friend had a coupon for a couple different pizzas, which is good, because the place is not cheap; their "gourmet" pizzas, as they refer to them, are around $20 for a large.  We ended up going with the Classico, which consists of tomato sauce, pepperoni, artichoke hearts, fresh mushrooms, mozzarella and parmesan.  It was really good, with a crispy exterior and a thin crust in the middle, which could not hold the weight of the toppings.  The sauce was nothing particularly special, though it had a nice sweetness to it.  The pepperoni was mild, with almost no spice to it, but I wasn't expecting it to be the star; that honor fell to the artichoke hearts, which were delicious, but not quite what I expected.  When I think of being served artichoke hearts, I think of just the heart itself, that meaty, delicious chunk of buttery flesh in the center of all those leaves, but in this case, they left some of the more tender inner leaves attached.  This wasn't exactly a problem, but it wasn't what I expected, and it's certainly not how I would have gone about making it; then again, they're the ones who have been open for almost 90 years, so who am I to talk? 

Overall, the food was solid, though not as amazing as I expected, and it was a fun place to grab some pizza.  We had a few slices left over that my friend took home, and they were huge slices.  I would say it's a good place to go, but also that there are better options in the North End.

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Mr. Bartley's Gourmet Burgers identifies itself as being a Boston landmark as well, but that is just a flat out lie; after all, they're not even in Boston!  Located in the Harvard Square section of Cambridge, this is a really good place to get a burger, offering thirty cleverly named burgers, mostly political or sports related, that range from "The (Sexy) Rexy Ryan," a chicken burger with blue cheese, hot sauce and french fries, to "The Chara," listed as "'wicked good' w/ bbq sauce, bacon, jalapeno pineapple relish and grilled onions w/ baked beans."  I met another old friend from college there on Thursday for lunch, and it was pretty well packed still at almost 1:30pm, but we got squeezed in immediately.  The atmosphere is fun, with the waitresses screaming the orders to the cooks and a lively crowd of mostly college aged people eating there, though by no means was the crowd limited to twenty-somethings.

I went with "The Mark Zuckerberg," described as "(Richest geek in America) with boursin cheese, bacon, and sweet potato fries."  It was delicious.  Cooked perfectly rare (so hard to get people to do that these days!), it was a hefty patty, seemingly larger than the 7oz the website claims, on a delicious sesame bun with a mound of delicious, creamy boursin and a pile of super crispy bacon on top.  The fries were actually reasonably crispy (awesome!) and had that strong, sweet flavor indicative of fresh sweet potato, and they provided so many that even as hungry as I was, I ended up giving my friend the last two because I was unable to stuff them into my already overfilled gut.

Since I walked about 12 miles in two days, I felt it was completely acceptable for me to also get a root beer float, and I felt completely vindicated when it arrived; it was absolutely delicious, with good root beer and delicious vanilla ice cream.  This is just one of many specialty drinks, including lime rickeys, egg creams, and a number of frappes.   My friend went with "The Michelle Obama" burger, "(she's hot & spicy) blue cheese burger with cajun seasoning and french fries," and she swapped out the fries for sweet potato fries of her own.  She enjoyed it, and also her raspberry lime rickey.

I would definitely recommend this; the burgers are better than the nearby Charlie's Kitchen, with more variety and options.  Unless you are going for the booze, I would definitely say Mr. Bartley's is the better choice if you don't mind spending a few dollars more.  After tip, we were in the $40 range between the burgers and drinks, so it isn't cheap, but I really enjoyed it.

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I went to Crema Cafe twice in my two days in the Boston area, once on Wednesday to waste a little time before meeting for drinks at Quincy Market, and again on Thursday to waste some time after lunch.  Located just off Harvard Square, this is a moderately sized cafe, offering seating on the main level and also in a small loft section.  Offering gourmet coffee and a variety of food, this is a great, albeit expensive place to hang out and read a book, or just grab a coffee on the way to work.  I had iced coffee on Wednesday since it was beautiful out, though they were out of their cold brewed coffee unfortunately, and it was good, much better than some crappy Dunkin' Donuts or Starbucks (both of which are in the area) coffee.  Thursday was a bit chilly, so I ended up with a hot coffee, which was one of the best I'd ever had; it was strong, but not bitter, and after 16oz of it I didn't feel like I'd been bowled over with caffeine, nor did I feel like I needed more; rather, it was just right.  I also grabbed a couple macaroons with my hot coffee, and they were ridiculously good.  Light, moist, slightly but not too sweet, with a crisp exterior, they were as good as I've ever had, and I had to struggle to convince myself that I didn't need more than the original two.

Sandwiches, soups, salads and sundry other foods are also offered, so this is a really good option if you are looking to just hang out and grab lunch, and while I cannot speak to the quality of that food, if it is anything like what I had you will not be remotely disappointed.  My friend Joe goes there when he is not at the library at the Kennedy School, and he spoke highly of it as well.  This is definitely a highly recommended spot.

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