|
|
TASTE OF ITALY: ITALIAN CENTER, 1620 NEWFIELD AVE., STAMFORD
10/27/2010
Tony Cardillo wants you to come to the Italian Center tonight at 7 for the “Taste of Italy” event. It’s always smart to do what Tony says.
Plus, he’s right; you get to try regional specialties from all the area Italian clubs, including the crab and lobster sauce from the Minturnese Social Club (my personal favorite).
–CP
JACKIES TO GO DELI AND GRILLE: 27 RYAN STREET, STAMFOD
10/27/2010
Jackies is just a neighborhood deli, popular among tradesmen and locals in Springdale, tucked behind Twin Rinks. Nothing special, really.
But I love the club sandwich for all of it’s ordinariness…mostly because of the copious amount of mayo.
I’m usually at Enzo’s for lunch when working at The Advocate, but you gotta switch it up sometimes.
–CP
10/20/2010
Word on the street is an application for a new a Dunkin Donuts has been filed for a lot on West Broad and Mill River streets formerly occupied by a fence-installation company.
The thing about Dunkin Donuts is that, well, it kinda sucks. The coffee’s bad and so are the donuts.
Please don’t put Stamford’s 12th DD franchise next door to my apartment building.
Stamford’s Planning Board will take up the matter on October 21, and I hope this proposal gets nixed. Traffic is already heavy on this stretch of West Broad, which connects the much of the West Side and Hubbard Heights with downtown. With only one forward travel lane at the intersection, which is often backed up going either way during peak hours, this could be a nightmare.
I’d hate to see a situation, like with the Donut Delight on Hope, where caffeine-seeking patrons are backing up traffic trying to turn into the parking lot.
The truth is the lot is positioned so awkwardly in relationship to the intersection that I’m not sure what could possibly work here. Certainly not a Dunkin Donuts.
–CP
10/19/2010
Everybody likes chili, right?
Head over to the 2010 Pro-Am Charity Chili Cook-Off this weekend and vote for the best chili in Stamford.
The annual event held at the Unitarian Universalist Society in Stamford (20 Forest St.), runs from 12-3 on Saturday and this year will feature more entries from amateur chefs going head to head with local restaurants.
Proceeds benefit the Food Bank of Lower Fairfield County.
–CP
TAPPO RESTAURANT: 51 BANK STREET, STAMFORD, 203-588-9870
10/18/2010
When I walked into Tappo the day after their grand opening, the lunch service was a little slow, but at a table in the center of the narrow dining room I found a couple of familiar faces. When Gerardo Mascolo, the pizzaiolo from Campana, came over to talk to them about their meal, it was all in Italian.
I could follow the conversation just well enough to understand all the “tutto benes” and “troppo bounos” meant these guys liked the food.
Nino Antonelli, one of the businessmen at the table, is from southern Lazio and he’s serious about Italian food.* As they were finishing up their margherita with mozzarella di bufala, the waitress delivered the pasta; garganelli with pesto and string beans and the taglionini with a San Marzano tomato sauce. Both of these pasta dishes feature beautifully hand-made pastas and fresh ingredients.
“That’s what this restaurant is about…we use the best ingredients and we don’t mix too many of them,” said Mascolo, who oversees the pizza while Chef Massimo Stecchi concentrates on everything else. It’s simple. Take the Calabrese olive oil, “you don’t need to infuse it with anything, it’s amazing.”
Mascolo came over from Nick’s Pizza in Glenbrook, which is also owned by Joseph and Aldo Criscuolo — but comparing the two is utterly pointless. Tappo serves traditional Napolitana-style pizza, very light with only fresh ingredients like house-made sausage, creamy mozzarella and prosciutto di San Daniele.
While his experience at Nick’s was with American-style pizza, Mascolo came up in the business slinging pizza in Naples, so he’s comfortable overseeing the staff at the brick oven in Stamford.
What stands out here is the crust which is superbly delicate and chewy, with just the right amount of char and bubbling.
When I asked Mascolo about the sauce, he reiterated the restaurant’s philosophy about simplicity. The ingredient list is short: San Marzano tomatoes seeded and crushed by hand, salt and maybe a little olive oil.
Anybody can tell you, you can size up a pizzaiolo by their margherita, it is the undefended layup of pizza making. If you screw this up, you might as well pack up your pizza peel and go home, yet so many places don’t get it right.
To Tappo’s credit, their margherita was nearly as good as the two I had near Naples this summer, though the mozzarella di bufala, which was ultra-fresh in Italy, must be imported here. But if you ask Mascolo, he’ll tell you he goes for the sausage and broccoli rabe, another classic combination. The pies get a little more exotic from there, but I like to keep it simple.
Don’t let my obsession with pizza stop you from trying the pasta, the antipasto, the salumi, or the secondi courses. I’m leaving these for my next visit, which will be very soon.
As I was leaving the restaurant I whipped out my iPhone and broadcast a bold statement; that in my opinion, Tappo just served me the best pizza I’d ever had in Stamford. It may have been the Sambuca talking, but looking back on my meal I steadfastly stand by my words — as controversial as they may be in a pizza-obsessed town like Stamford.
Actually, they may be in for a downtown pizza fight as we recently reported the owners of Napa & Co. will soon open Bar Rosso, featuring wood-fired brick oven pizzas in the location Bennett’s is vacating. It appears Stamford is ready to jump on a trend that’s been raging in New York for some time.
In New York, real Napolitana-style pizza has been very much in vogue with places like Motorino and Co. garnering nearly universal praise. So when Tarry Lodge, the Batali/Bastianich venture in Port Chester, brought the trend up the line — enticingly close to Connecticut — it had to be a matter of time before Stamford got in the game.
These restaurants, particularly Motorino, are in a class of their own (I’m not completely delusional) but Tappo is taking this very seriously. So just when you thought the last thing downtown Stamford needed was yet another Italian restaurant, Tappo proves it’s exactly what we needed.
–CP
* Nino tipped me off last year to Zero Otto Nove on Arthur Ave., which also serves an amazing Napolitana-style pizza as well as some amazing pastas and fish.
BREAKING BURGER NEWS: New York’s Shake Shack has announced they are bringing their celebrated burgers and frozen custard — and probably the insanely long lines that go with them — to “the idyllic coastal town of Westport.”
Anyone who’s waited in line for a half-hour at the original Madison Square Park location in Manhattan will appreciate an announcement of this magnitude.
This is huge.
Danny Meyer’s Union Square Hospitality Group has been continually expanding their empire over the last few years with additional Shake Shack and Blue Smoke locations (even talk of one in Greenwich at one point), but this will by the first shack in Connecticut.
According to the company, the restaurant will setup shop at 1849 Post Road East, just off I-95 in the second half of 2011.
Westport is apparently a draw in the burger world, with Five Guys, a Virginia-based chain with similarly fervent fans, opening a restaurant in town about a year ago.
Stay tuned burger fans…
BELOW: Shake Shack in Madison Square Park. (Photo/Mad Czech via Flickr)
Copyright © 2013 Hearst Communications Inc.
10/28/2010