I freely admit that I'm a Domenica Macchia stalker. I first encountered this former Redwoods chef at MJ's Martinis and Tapas last year, when she wowed me and the rest of the Bay area food scene with her interesting and precise take on small-plate fine dining. Then, soon after the place opened, Macchia was fired by the owners of MJ's. And yes, I feel a little satisfaction that the jazz lounge/restaurant is now on a possibly permanent "hiatus" while it looks for a new location.
After a few months of looking, and some concern over her mortgage, Macchia hooked up with Dan Soronen — former owner of the Old Northeast Tavern — and concocted a gastropub menu for his soon-to-open Shackleton's Folly in south St. Pete. "Soon" became months, and finally Macchia left to find another new opportunity. Fortuitously, Greg Pugh — owner of Ringside Cafe — was interested in opening a new place. Fast. Diner 437 started slinging hash within a couple of weeks.
I love Macchia for her food, sure, but also for how she lays everything on the table when you talk to her, whether it's for a CL interview or just gabbing with strangers the counter at her new restaurant during a slow moment. She's frets — about herself, about her food, about the past and the future — and she's unabashedly candid about herself and her path to Diner 437. You can read all about it on CL's food blog.
The problem with love — familial and otherwise — is that it comes with expectations. Add in that I criticize food for a living, and you have me entering Diner 437 for the first time like a beauty pagaent mom ready to deconstruct my little baby's baton-twirling. "You need to smile more, darling," I'd chide. "The eggs were overcooked, and I only mention it because I know how good you are at cooking eggs, baby." It was a tough attitude to break.
Once I did, though, I discovered that Diner 437 fits its space, fits its style and fills a desperately needy dining niche pretty damn well. "I'm so proud of you, baby!"
Macchia took the gastropub menu she developed while waiting for Shackleton's and peppered it with diner-style influences for the new spot. It's fine-dining ratcheted back a notch, or low-end ratcheted up. That means that you can have breakfast all day, but hash is dotted with bits of aggressively seasoned salmon or tender hunks of duck alongside cubes of poatato that are nigh-perfect — crackling-crisp outside and creamy in the center. French toast is constructed out of rich slabs of brioche browned a deep gold on the griddle.
Sandwich tropes recieve the same playful treatment, where Macchia transforms egg salad into a few deviled eggs crushed between two slices of toasted brioche, the gooey filling oozing out the sides. Tuna salad is turned into seared tuna layered with avocado and jalapeno dressing on hearty wheatberry bread, while a BLT loaded with sweet bacon and thin slices of plum tomatoes is stacked high with simple, meaty lobster salad.
My biggest criticism of the lunch-time side of Diner 437's menu may also be its genius: although the dishes are elaborated by Macchia, they're all simple. Too simple for me, maybe, but the average person who finds themselves bellying up to the bar to give the place a try might find that these fancified takes on classics are more approachable than they thought.
Diner 437's dinner offerings continue that trend. Chopped Kobe beef steak is a rich man's shepherds pie, the meat exceptionally beefy, tender and doused in a mushroom gravy that adds flavor without hiding the Kobe underneath. Skirt steak, even when ordered medium by one of my guests, melts in your mouth and leaves behind a sensation of sweet citrus glaze without ever losing its caramelized, salty steak flavor.
Macchia's finger foods deserve a return to pagaent-mom nitpicking. Although deep-fried asparagus and green beans coated in crunchy cornmeal are fantastic, house-made pretzels are so dense even the incredible side of house-mustard dotted with whole seeds and laced with beer can't save them. Wings are tasty, but nothing special, and a small loaf of bread doused in creamy gorgonzola sauce is bafflingly annoying to eat.
But then all is forgiven thanks to a plate of french fries cooked in duck fat with a side of incredible garlic aoili. Only available after 4 p.m., Thursday through Saturday, these mottled-brown masterpieces put Diner 437's weekday, pre-fab shoestring fries to shame.
Desserts were never Macchia's strong suit, she freely admits, so she keeps it simple here. Fry some pound cake on the griddle, top with ice cream and douse in thick berry sauce and call it a day. Milkshakes are better, but ideally you downed one of those while waiting for your food, or maybe sampled a Guinness ice cream float drizzled with honey instead of sampling the minimal beer and wine list. Let it melt a bit, and the cream and sugar transforms the bitter stout into both a better beer and a tasty dessert.
So do I judge the performance of Macchia as a loving fan or a straight-up objective critic? In the end it turns out the same, either way. Macchia took an affordable but upscale diner concept and pushed it, but not fare enough to break the envelope. People of all types will find things to like here, and it's likely to get even better as the restaurant stabilizes its staff and finds its footing.
This article appears in Jul 8-14, 2009.