With a 'pizza by the slice" sign posted on the front window, D'Amico Pasta Grill masquerades as just another neighborhood eatery tucked into an ordinary shopping plaza. That's until you taste the fare. Then, it's clear that you're not sitting in any ordinary hash house, but a soulful, sophisticated restaurant that produces food as good as many of the much more expensive venues, minus the snoot.
Tony Amico, owner of D'Amico, put his little restaurant on the map when two highly respected bay area chefs joined him as partners in the business on Sept. 1. Ralph Sitero is originally from Tampa, but did a two-year apprenticeship in Rome, then he cooked in Perugia, Italy, and at one of the nation's finest restaurants, Le Bec Fin, in Philadelphia, before moving via a couple of Radisson hotels to his current gig. The aptly named Steve Cook is originally from Chicago but got his culinary stars at Tampa Bay Downs, Mise en Place and Eighth Avenue Grill.
They almost immediately attracted a lot of attention, along with foodies, some of whom commute from afar to patronize the restaurant. The place also draws a mixed crowd of local regulars from the big companies that sit along Roosevelt Boulevard and residents of the massive tracts of new condos and apartment complexes at the edge of Tampa Bay near the Gandy Bridge.
There are young couples dressed up for a fancy meal out, older couples bearing coupons and wearing shorts, families with teens, single moms who wheel into the special "take-out only" parking places to order hefty, hearty and homemade pizza (Margherita $9.99 medium, $13.99 large). Or, they might order pizza for the kids and treat themselves to an elegant Gorgonzola salad ($5), complete with blue cheese, walnuts, tomato and red onion tossed with balsamic basil vinaigrette.
The single dining room sports shiny, bare wood tables and simple, solid wooden chairs in front and overstuffed booths in back. The floor is clean ochre tile, and the soothing sound of Italian arias wafts through as the hostess leads you to your table.
The restaurant has a nice selection of 25 wines and 14 beers, including a lovely Italian sparkling wine called Mionetto ($5 per glass), tingly with the flavor of unripe apple, hints of acacia and wisteria. If organdy were liquid, it might taste like Mionetto. You can even get Samuel Smith's Oatmeal Stout, an import from Yorkshire, England.
There is a regular menu, featuring favorites like pizza and calzones, but also a blackboard listing some exotic "specials" such as herb-grilled pork loin served with pumpkin ravioli and ladled with sage cream; or asparagus agnolotti with shrimp and thyme sauce, both priced very reasonably at $14.
Start with an outlandishly good appetizer, the stuffed portobello mushroom ($6), herb roasted portobello stuffed with fontina cheese, verdant with freshly chopped spinach, speckled with sun-dried tomatoes and lounging in a moat of subtle, lemon-caper sauce.
The Caesar salad ($2 small side, $5 large) is as good as I've eaten anywhere, the greens perfectly crisp, sleek beneath just enough rich, creamy dressing and brown, crusty croutons. Still, you wouldn't want to miss Tony's Salad ($2.50), squiggles of toasted vermicelli providing a little crunch and a finely-cut assortment of radicchio, red peppers, toasted almonds and savoy cabbage that looked like edible confetti, glistening beneath an accomplished Lambrusco vinaigrette.
The pasta dishes were equally well done, a tender fettucine lathered with a classic, creamy Alfredo sauce and huge chunks of moist, grilled chicken ($10), or a perfect three-cheese, home-style tortellini, swimming in a flavorful red sauce. Light eaters might choose a small salad and a serving of shrimp scampi Venezia ($6), melt-in-your-mouth angel hair pasta bathed in cheesy sauce and carrying the tiniest, freshest shrimp.
The entrée all Chef Sitero groupies crave is seafood tiramisu ($15), a soufflé of lobster, jumbo lump crab and shrimp set upon a risotto cake and glamorized with corn sauce. It is a truly beautiful, unique and spectacular dish that has changed just slightly during his stints in other restaurants — for the better.
Order a perfect cappuccino ($2.50) and wait for dessert because the last course is just as fab as the first. There's an amazing Godiva chocolate mousse terrine with raspberry sauce ($5), sort of like an earthy, chocolatey paté; and a coltish fruit tart with a sponge-cake base layered with custard and strewn with fresh currents, blueberries and raspberries ($5).
The food was nearly perfect, the service less so, exhibiting a friendly sloppiness that struck us as mildly endearing. One night we ordered Italian Mascarpone cheesecake with wild baby strawberries ($4), and got another dish entirely. Another night, when the bill arrived, I was surprised to see that the chirpy server had penciled in the tip I would give her. At 18 percent, it was less than I normally tip, but I went along, anyway.
Still, the place blew me out, the same way racecars, when they exceed their top speed, dramatically blow the gaskets for release. I guess my verdict on the place might be this: It was sssmmmokin'.
Food Editor Sara Kennedy dines anonymously, and Weekly Planet pays for her meals. She can be reached at sara.kennedy@weeklyplanet.com or 813-248-8888 ext. 116.
This article appears in Apr 23-29, 2003.