Captivating Cold Cuts at Coppa - Boston

Upon entering and taking a seat at one of the few tables, you will find yourself consorting in the cozy-but-not-too-crowded Coppa. You sip your water, munch on the mixed fruit (a brilliant alternative to bread!), and place your order from the brunch menu, which includes at least one of the myriad meats. After you order, you furtively scan your surroundings, bathing your eyes in the atmosphere of relaxation that only accompanies Sunday brunch, and your eyes rest on the decorative head of a boar that protrudes above the doorframe. From its lofty perch, this omniscient mascot overlooks the entire dining area and ogles your table as you and your fellow diners eagerly devour its delectable body. If that doesn’t creep you out, I don’t know what does…

We started with two cured meats – the Duck Proscuitto was too cool a concept to pass up, and why not try the Coppa, the neckmeat of the boar after which the restaurant was named? The duck was impossibly melt-away light, just ignore (and savor!) the huge ring of fat around it…The coppa carries a lingering sweetness, which the server described perfectly, and these thinly-sliced treats were enough to convince me that you could close your eyes and point to the cold cut menu and fall in love with wherever your finger lands.

Unfortunately, Coppa lost major star-points due to the fact that everything was doused in olive oil. Cured meats do NOT need to be topped with oil. There was clearly plenty of fat in the meat already, and the greasiness coats your savory receptors to wash away the lingering savor the meats leave on your tongue.

Our next indulgence arrived in the form of fantastically fresh filets with little circles of radish that added an appetizing splash of color. The Fluke Crudo was a beautifully prepared dish that tasted like…well…nothing…I awaited the apocalypse while eating this dish because I actually had to ask for extra sea salt. I never ask for extra salt. I could be dying of salt-wasting CAH, and I still wouldn’t add it to my food! I don’t even like IV saline! Major points lost. Oh, and where was that chili vinegar? Clearly still in the bottle and not on my food…

My friend and I figured that man (and woman!) was not made to live on cured meats and antipasti alone so we shared the coolest-looking main dish. The Orecchiette con Trippa was a delectable dish with al dente orecchiette containing a perfectly even coating of cream combined with chewy tripe, bulky beef tongue, and a pinch of pork belly. This was my friend’s fave dish, and IMHO, second to none except Via Matta.

So when it comes down to grading, Coppa is just not Toro. For now, I’ll give a tentative 4 stars for incredible selection of cured meats and consider the fluke crudo a mere fluke, but I’ll need to come back for dinner to fairly judge the cooked food. But if everything is like the orecchiette, Coppa, there just might be a way to atone for the fluke.

Bare Bukhara – Jamaica Plain

Random Hindi lesson: The “a” is pronounced more like a “u”, analogous to the way the “x” is pronounced more like an “s” in Chinese. Therefore, mango lassi is pronounced more like mango “lussi”, which rhymes with fussy and pussy; pussy, as in the colloquialism for purulent, not the fabulous feline in fashionable footwear…what were YOU thinking? Anyway, you should get one. And if you really can’t pronounce it either way, point.

We started with the Paneer Pakora and the Bhel. The pakora was good – fried cheese really can’t be bad, but the breading was a little heavier than I’m used to for pakora. The Bhel was refreshing – add a little extra mint chutney and voila, perfect palate cleanser. If you add enough mint and eat it between bites of cream-laden entrée, you can pretend you’re eating toothpaste…

One major gripe about the side chutneys is that the mango chutney was absolutely painful.  It would have been nice if they had warned us about the 30-minute, desquamating burn, though it’s a great way to make you fussy enough to order multiple lussis…

The Shahi Paneer had nothing tangibly wrong with it, but then again, neither did Miley Cyrus’s photoshoot…nonetheless the tangy flavor of tomato still left an uncomfortable sting, blunted by smart public statements in the form of cupfuls of cream. I’m wondering if the paneer died of drowning in the cream…I just hope it didn’t share my lactose intolerance…(Yes, I’m well aware that paneer is a form of cheese, that’s the joke). I feel bad calling Bukhara out, but the blatant use of cream was as bare as Miley was in the photoshoot…

Unfortunately the Lamb Korma requires further baring…The lamb was barely tender as it could have been, though it was by no means overcooked. Plus the cream obscured the characteristic nutty flavor of the korma and sadly suppressed the spices. Sorry Bukhara, but any chef who would obscure korma has to be nuts.

Indian, Chinese, Indian. You may think this is a slightly scandalous (but not bare!) photo of me with friends at a club appropriately called Guilt, but it’s really my representation of this particular block of Centre Street in JP. From left to right, it’s Ghazal, Chiang’s, and Bukhara. Bukhara happens to be advantageously located around a corner, and its protruding awning adds a bit of flash and a cryptic promise of something grand inside. It’s visible, it’s right there, and it’s the first thing you see when you look to satisfy your craving for Indian. But patience is a virtue, in this case, as in life, patience will take you far. So when that Indian craving hits, go to the nearest bar and wait for the handsome banker instead of grabbing the first nerd you see. Despite its heavy reliance on cream to enhance the food, Bukhara is not la crème de la crème. So there’s a lot of Indian in this city and there’s a lot of restaurants in this town. I tried to pick the right one, and it looks like Ghazal’s curry will hold me down.

A City Girl in City Girl Café – Cambridge

Inman Square, which I nicknamed No-man Square due to my aversion for venturing past the borders of my beloved Boston, has forever altered my view of brunch. I think they were thinking of City Girl when they were wrote this quote: Some restaurants come into our lives and quickly go. Others stay a while and leave foodprints in our palates and we are never the same. Before I met City Girl, brunch was a glorified breakfast for lunch, consumed because you’re too hung over to eat before that and often doubles as your excuse to have an eye-opener before it’s socially acceptable to do so.

When I first entered I had no idea what I was getting into. I gingerly squeezed into the doorway sideways to avoid crushing the couple waiting behind it and found myself face-to-face with a dining room the size of my bedroom with seating for 20 people max. And every table was full. My first question was, is City Girl full because it’s good or because not that many people actually fit inside?  We were seated after a suspenseful 15-minute wait, after which I received my first preview of what was to come. The Rosemary Lemonade was amazing. With just enough sugar to take away the eyebrow-wrinkling sting and a lingering taste of rosemary, this concoction is probably the best legal herbal remedy to stimulate your appetite and prevent the common cold.

Like many excellent restaurants, City Girl has a theme. Masa’s theme is good food at a great price, Las Ventas covers everything in aioli, and I soon found that City Girl’s theme is the clever legal use of herbs and spices.

The French Toast soaked all the flavor of the vanilla custard and anise without becoming soggy, and the bread was, for once, not obscured by a shaggy layer of egg. I hate black licorice, the scent of Sambuca makes me ill, and anise is something I will only tolerate in pho. But pho sure, this hint of anise gave the toast a refreshing hint of sharpness, yet another legal herbal appetite stimulator. The red bliss potatoes were as blissful as their name, so heavily herbed that ketchup was a sin, and I insisted on eating every last one long after I got full. A little rosemary goes a long way…

Green means go and the Verde was no exception to that rule. Those scrumptious scrambled eggs laced with pesto shine like a green left-turn signal at the world’s longest intersection...I don’t know where that is, but I’m guessing it’s somewhere on Mass Ave.  Clever use of basil (yes, it’s an herb) to remind you of the Italian theme, and the two slices of Italian bread are where all carbs go to heaven.

The food is impossibly well-priced, and I’ve paid double for food half this good! There’s a lot of good cafes in this city, but there should be more city girls in this café. The food was so good I forgot to take pics before devouring it. Guess I’ll HAVE TO go back for pics…

My Baking - Cake Balls

Cake balls for Amrita's birthday...balls because I can't find popsicle sticks anywhere in this city! Besides, everyone needs a good pair of cake balls...

Mysterious Marliave – Boston

  

Imagine the sulky sultry mysterious young stranger on a barstool, cane in hand, black fedora pulled over his eyes, sipping 3 finger-breadths of the bar’s smokiest scotch, both a toast and an answer to the binding edicts of prohibition. You know nothing about him, but you know you him every night in your dreams. If you’ve spent your life searching for this man, look no further – such a man would only go to Marliave, and Marliave is where you belong.

Marliave stands proud with a modest, invisible-to-the-untrained-eye front and an unassuming entrance, reminiscent of the obscurity of the prohibition-era speakeasy. The upstairs is a lovely place to dine – it’s quietly tucked away from the touristic hustle and bustle (read: euphemism for slow-walking crowds who make a lot of unnecessary noise) of DTX. The full-length windows are luxurious, and ambiance is ideal for a girl’s night dinner with your 3 closest friends, especially the ones who possess flower rings that match yours. This versatile tranquility is simultaneously suitable for a pretend-its-casual-but-your-job-actually-depends-on-it business dinner. Just bear in mind that the quiet fails to drown out friends with no filter, and the ample lighting is a no-go for dates who look better with the lights off.

As for the menu…Tangential is one of my favorite words in the English language. It is concrete but obtuse, and it sounds simultaneously boxy yet unrestrictive. Tangential is a great word. It embodies the French concept of “le mot juste” and serves as a diplomatic term for that friend who can never focus on one thing, whose mind is in a million places at once and never really comes back. Oh wait, I AM that friend…Unfortunately, tangential not a flattering word with which to describe one’s meal.

Fortunately for Marliave, we chose to eat family style. We ordered four dishes and passed them around the table, which helped us overlook the rather random, or tangential, way with which the food was plated. If you ask me, the combination of items on some of the plates was as mysterious as that sulky stranger at the bar…

The Mussels were an incredible starter – the mussels were plump and juicy, chewy but not hard, clearly cooked but not yet victim to the hazards of oversteam. The sauce is too salty, even for dipping bread, but it actually represents an insightful decision on the part of the chef – mussels lack the innate ability to absorb sauce so a stronger sauce is necessary to compensate, especially if it’s a soupy sauce that lacks the sharp tang and cling of marinera. A sizable appetizer for two, a palate-whetter for four.

My least favorite dish was ironically the one I was most excited about. (Yes, English majors, I know the definition of irony, and I know this isn’t it. Instead, I’m consciously misusing it in the same way as Alanis Morisette). I can’t help but feel like the Rabbit was made by a team of three squabbling top chef contestants – the three components lacked unity to that extent. The first chef was clearly the worst; the rabbit wrapped in prosciutto was hard and dry. Funny because the prosciutto is supposed to seal in the flavor…I didn’t even finish my piece because it just wasn’t sliding down. The second chef’s interwoven chicken sausage was just plain random and pretty unremarkable – the only thing they had in common was that sausage and prosciutto are both Italian and I guess there’s the running joke that rabbit tastes like chicken…The polenta, in stark contrast, would have accompanied any dish well, even this one. A perfect creamy grain with sweet caramelized onions, it was easily the best part of this dish and clearly stole the show. My advice: if no one orders a dish that comes with polenta, order it yourself.

The Diver Scallops were perfectly seared and memorably plated – each scallop was topped with a sunburst of pea ravioli. Who decided that pea ravioli was a logical companion to scallops? But still, the aesthetics were impressive and the ravioli were incredible. I don’t even like peas, and I dove right in. The wild mushrooms were a side surfeit of salt, but the unusual texture and the unique flavor of the chewy yet tender strips wasn’t quite lost.

The Chicken was the only dish that was completely coherent. The bed of risotto made sense, and though it’s more watery than risotto should be and lacked the expected bitterness of parmesean, it was probably a good move to tone it down so that it didn’t interfere with the chicken. The chicken was tender and the skin was perfectly crispy, but the meat was lacking in real flavor. As I always say, the way a chef makes chicken can be a very accurate way to assess his/her talent, and this chicken was consistent with my overall assessment of the food at Marliave; It’s pretty good, maybe even quite good, but it’s a ways from exceptional, and the salt should be taken out of the mushrooms and transferred to the chicken.

The Sunday Gravy was probably my favorite dish. Other than the chicken, it was the only one that made sense. To be fair, it was also the only item on the plate. Under that sheath of regularly-irregular red sauce lies a plethora of savory meats that kept you guessing – your teeth never knew what they’d chew next! I’m not sure beef, lamb, and pork were necessary – it makes for indecisive bites of furtive flavor. Then again, I’m not a fan of spontaneity, and I just don’t do surprises, but I liked that this deceptively uniform dish kept me guessing. But if you think I wouldn’t order it a second time, guess again.

Overall, Marliave does win major points for polish. The old school metal covers with etched silver heart rings stay on your dish until the servers lift them off to simultaneously unveil your well-protected meal, which adds a little flourish to your fine dining and as a bonus, allows you to rest assured that no one sneezed into your food between the kitchen and your table.

In my mind, Marliave earns at least a 4-star rating based solely on how much I like the place. I actually like Marliave more than some of its higher-rated competitors. I’d readily return for the serene setting and the polished, old-school glamour. Sadly, the food earned significant deductions based on my internal rating system, and you know I’m all about the food. Each dish was presented to beautifully with clear organization and clever aesthetics, how is it possible that each dish was so disjointed within? Then again, despite the tangentiality, there is a reason Marliave is one of Boston’s oldest restaurants, and I dare you to find it for yourself.