Every once in a while, you find a darling little trattoria, a small, casual, family-friendly cucina Italiana where the chianti flows like water, the marinara is to die for and the cannelloni comes off like a preview of heaven.
This is not that time.From all appearances, I was positive that Caffe Amaretto would be a place I could call home — a place I could stop in regularly for a comforting and fabulous bowl of pasta and gravy. The staff greets you with a chorus of accent-tinged salutations the moment you walk through the door. The entranceway is dominated by a large table spread with cold antipasti and casserole dishes full of tiramisu from which the servers dole out portions for their tables. The body of the restaurant is decorated in Italian restaurant Theme B — framed posters of wine and wine-related activities, epigrams and labels. The ceiling reveals exposed beams painted a cheery brick red, and the rest of the decor is done in warm tones of yellow and brown. Our server arrived at our table instantly, introduced himself with a flourish that can only be pulled off by an Italian waiter, and got me a glass of rich, berry-tinged house chianti. My Italian dining companion and I were very excited about our discovery. "This looks promising," he said.Looks aren't everything.
The best thing to be said about the food at Caffé Amaretto is that it's inoffensive. Even at the most homey little Italian joints, I'd expect some dish, some sauce, some pasta creation to have an underlying sense of finesse, the casual subtlety of flavor that serves as the benchmark of quality for what is, in essence, a peasant's cuisine. This was not to be found at Caffé Amaretto. Halfway through the meal, my dining companion and I got the impression that though all the elements of our favorite cuisine were present at the table, and each dish possessed promising Italian names ending in tini, ese, ella and oli, Caffé Amaretto was simply going through the motions. They have the puttanesca, but not the passion.
We began the meal with one of the antipasti freddi (cold appetizers) we'd seen laid out on the table near the entrance. Our dish of proscuitto, mozzarella and roasted peppers ($9) displayed a generous hand, but the taste was only mediocre. Though the mozz was fresh and the peppers yummy, the Parma ham had an odd flavor that cast a pall over the other elements on the platter. Another appetizer, the similarly large serving of pasta e fagioli ($5) looked like a hearty, filling entry into the genre of Italian bean soups. But the thick broth was rather bland and tasteless, and the soup presented none of the understated hints of herbs and spices one might expect. Our final hope for satisfaction in the appetizer department dwindled with the broccoli salad ($4.75). Perhaps I was expecting something slightly snappier than the large dish of fresh steamed broccoli drizzled with vinegar and oil. On the upside, it was fresh, flavorful broccoli, steamed to the point of softness without losing any of its vivid green coloring. On the downside — well, it was a dish of uninterrupted broccoli.
We rallied for the entrees. I chose the cannelloni pulcinella (veal cannelloni, $12.50), and my dining companion went with the petto di pollo lombarda ($14.50), but no sooner had we taken a bite of our meals than we decided to switch. Though I liked the fresh, homey texture of the thick cannelloni, and the pulverized veal stuffing was perfectly acceptable, the whole dish was drowned in a thick, gummy cheese sauce that was at once overpowering and completely lackluster.
By contrast, the chicken dish was a revelation. Though my dining companion didn't appreciate the strong lemon tang (I believe, "How much Vitamin C does a guy need?" were his exact words), I appreciated the fact that, unlike most of the other dishes we tasted, this one actually had flavors. The mix of parsley and the sharp bite of capers proved an excellent counterpoint to the lemon, and this was the single dish of the bunch that I felt I could actually get behind.
But it was too little, too late. Dessert kept to the pattern. Our homemade cheesecake (a pricey $5/slice) had a good texture and taste but was topped with what amounted to little more than canned raspberry jam. We scraped it off the top, the better to enjoy the actual cake. With each subsequent course, the waiter's flourishes grew more pronounced, his Italian admonition to "enjoy" more vehement. Perhaps he realized that we weren't having the greatest meal. But despite his friendly attentions and the charming surroundings, it wasn't happening. All the trappings were there, but none of the essence. The folks at Café Amaretto have tried very hard to create a wonderful dining experience, but they are missing out on a major element — creating a great meal.
Freelance writer Diana Peterfreund dines anonymously and the Planet pays for her meals. She may be contacted at diana.peterfreund@weeklyplanet.com. Restaurants are chosen for review at the discretion of the writer, and are not related to advertising.
This article appears in Jun 10-16, 2004.