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Two years ago, I reviewed a restaurant called Pastini Pastaria at Cedar Hills Crossing. As you’ll see at http://onjamesplate.blogspot.com/2008/12/pastini-pastaria.html, I gave the place a B-/C+ for sloppy service and skimpy portions of sauce. Well, mother and I went back yesterday.
Even though it was noon on Sunday, and the restaurant was more than half full, we were seated immediately, and our drink orders were taken correctly. Thus, vast improvements in service were already evident.
As before, I ordered the SPAGHETTI CARBONARA $9.95 (Classic, creamy Parmesan sauce with bacon, green peas and cracked black pepper), but didn’t request a substitution of pasta. While I’m certain the replacement of pancetta with bacon was motivated by the current fiscal situation, the bacon gave the sauce a pleasant smoky undertone. I was also pleased to find enough of the garlicky smoky sauce to wet & flavor my Ciabatta bread.
Mother had the HAM & FONTINA PANINI $8.25 (Hardwood-smoked ham with buttery Fontina and Provolone cheeses, fresh tomato) with a cup of vegetable/sausage soup. I tasted the soup and ate a forth of the sandwich. The ham was salty & delicious, the cheeses were nice & creamy, the tomato had a sweet flavor, and the sandwich was grilled without any burned spots. The soup was a rich savory vegetable soup. However, neither of us detected any of the promised sausage, which MAY have been added in pieces too small to perceive, simply to flavor the broth.
All in all, Pastini Pastaria has used the last two years to get their act together, and take some big steps forward. A-
I am not a professional chef, nor have I been classically trained in the field of cuisine. I AM, however, a writer and a well read food & wine enthusiast, who lives to eat and knows what he likes. In this blog, you'll read my views on cheese, wine, restaurants, cooking, food trends, and more.
Monday, November 29, 2010
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
Review: Anthony Bourdain’s Medium Raw: A Bloody Valentine to the World of Food and the People Who Cook
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A month ago, I reviewed Anthony Bourdain’s Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly. After confessing to a major bias in favor of the author, I gave the book a fairly good review. At the end of the piece, I promised to review Medium Raw: A Bloody Valentine to the World of Food and the People Who Cook as well. Well, I finally finished it.
Medium Raw: A Bloody Valentine to the World of Food and the People Who Cook was written ten years after its mate. Unlike its forerunner, which was written from the point of view of an insider struggling to find his place within the epicurean realm, this book was written from the perspective of a well known and respected culinary commentator with a virtual backstage pass to the world of cuisine. The contrast in perspectives, gives the reader an entirely different reading experience.
There are interesting and useful tidbits in this new work. The chapter on how the fiscal crisis has transformed the gourmet world of cuisine into an industry which has been forced to use more sustainable ingredients and offer discount specials to survive, was especially interesting. Plus, the chapter on hamburger was like reading something out of Sinclair’s The Jungle. I was determined to avoid ground beef, after reading his description of ammonia soaked animal scraps, until I was reminded that Whoppers haven’t killed me yet; fast-food is what’s for dinner in suburbia after all. I agree that all children, boys and girls, should learn the basics of cooking in school. My proverbial juices began to flow as I read his exhaustive descriptions of Phở and other Vietnamese fair. Likewise I found his take on tasting menus to be insightful.
While such gems were informative and entertaining, they were surrounded by a multitude of stories either about him hobnobbing with affluent members of society, rich folk, or about people who have teed him off. It was interesting to note that when he compared rich people to more common people, he put himself in the latter category.
Granted, anyone who would go to post-Katrina New Orleans to write negative reviews of restaurants which were barely hanging on, is unquestionably a “douche bag.” I’ll even agree that Terrance Brennan qualifies as a hero for introducing cheese, good cheese, to the American diner by doing the cheese course the way it should be done. Yet, I couldn’t care less about his take on the lives of the rich and famous.
I don’t care what cocktail parties he goes to with celebrities from Food Network. A Michelin ranked chef eats in his own restaurant for the first time. That’s nice. A chef bounces back from a miscalculation with Asian Burritos to become “the most important chef in the world.” OK, why is he “the most important chef in the world?” His adventure with a coke whore in St. Barth’s did include a warning about how snooty chefs can rip the public off. Yet, the warning was a tiny part of a much more pointless tale.
I will say, even with the various tales of shoulder rubbing, and shots at people who’ve irked him over the years, there are quite a few morsels of gastronomic wisdom for the eager foodie to devour. He ends the book by updating readers on the whereabouts of characters from Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly, and corrects tips from the first book, which are no longer accurate. Thus, even though Medium Raw: A Bloody Valentine to the World of Food and the People Who Cook pales in comparison to its predecessor, it’s still definitely worth reading.
A month ago, I reviewed Anthony Bourdain’s Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly. After confessing to a major bias in favor of the author, I gave the book a fairly good review. At the end of the piece, I promised to review Medium Raw: A Bloody Valentine to the World of Food and the People Who Cook as well. Well, I finally finished it.
Medium Raw: A Bloody Valentine to the World of Food and the People Who Cook was written ten years after its mate. Unlike its forerunner, which was written from the point of view of an insider struggling to find his place within the epicurean realm, this book was written from the perspective of a well known and respected culinary commentator with a virtual backstage pass to the world of cuisine. The contrast in perspectives, gives the reader an entirely different reading experience.
There are interesting and useful tidbits in this new work. The chapter on how the fiscal crisis has transformed the gourmet world of cuisine into an industry which has been forced to use more sustainable ingredients and offer discount specials to survive, was especially interesting. Plus, the chapter on hamburger was like reading something out of Sinclair’s The Jungle. I was determined to avoid ground beef, after reading his description of ammonia soaked animal scraps, until I was reminded that Whoppers haven’t killed me yet; fast-food is what’s for dinner in suburbia after all. I agree that all children, boys and girls, should learn the basics of cooking in school. My proverbial juices began to flow as I read his exhaustive descriptions of Phở and other Vietnamese fair. Likewise I found his take on tasting menus to be insightful.
While such gems were informative and entertaining, they were surrounded by a multitude of stories either about him hobnobbing with affluent members of society, rich folk, or about people who have teed him off. It was interesting to note that when he compared rich people to more common people, he put himself in the latter category.
Granted, anyone who would go to post-Katrina New Orleans to write negative reviews of restaurants which were barely hanging on, is unquestionably a “douche bag.” I’ll even agree that Terrance Brennan qualifies as a hero for introducing cheese, good cheese, to the American diner by doing the cheese course the way it should be done. Yet, I couldn’t care less about his take on the lives of the rich and famous.
I don’t care what cocktail parties he goes to with celebrities from Food Network. A Michelin ranked chef eats in his own restaurant for the first time. That’s nice. A chef bounces back from a miscalculation with Asian Burritos to become “the most important chef in the world.” OK, why is he “the most important chef in the world?” His adventure with a coke whore in St. Barth’s did include a warning about how snooty chefs can rip the public off. Yet, the warning was a tiny part of a much more pointless tale.
I will say, even with the various tales of shoulder rubbing, and shots at people who’ve irked him over the years, there are quite a few morsels of gastronomic wisdom for the eager foodie to devour. He ends the book by updating readers on the whereabouts of characters from Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly, and corrects tips from the first book, which are no longer accurate. Thus, even though Medium Raw: A Bloody Valentine to the World of Food and the People Who Cook pales in comparison to its predecessor, it’s still definitely worth reading.
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