It Was a Very Good Year

It wasn't. Well, it was fine, but it's the song, not the sentiment I want to write about. Frank Sinatra's song, "It Was a Very Good Year," as my mom pointed out years ago, is really quite sad. Frank sings about periods of his life that have passed, decade by decade, that make him reminisce and pine for the memories gone by, while taking some solace in the fact that he still remembers them.

Overdramatically, this is where I am tonight, and much recount food memories of nights past to carry me into the future. My sage city newspaper tells me on its online headline: "Snowfall Continues, May Turn to Ice Overnight." I've been well aware of this fact since I went running this morning and chunks of my hair froze. We've had snow, freezing rain, and unstocked stores all day. I sought to come home early today (I didn't) to graut Mexican tile on my pressed wood Target TV stand, butFedex didn't deliver my tiles anyway and Target didn't have the requisite graut. So, my evening consisted of defeatedly driving home in spitting mini-hails and buying snacks at Target, because I felt compelled to buy something or the 40 minutes of my life I spent going there would be wasted. So I purchased the below:

This is what budding crazy cat ladies buy at Target.

Anyway, getting to it, I want to write retrospectively about two recent dinners, because memories are all I have to console myself with on this dreary night. So, I hearken back to a fine meal I had a few weeks ago with my friend Tammy and her lovely new husband, Bob. New because they are newlyweds, not because she marries as often as I blog. This dinner was one of the best I've had in a while. She proposed the three of us go to Geranio or A La Lucia, and after I mentioned the blog (and that I had already visited and written about Geranio), she kindly said we could go to A La Lucia, though she in fact prefers Geranio. Tammy is a true culinary kindred spirit.

A La Lucia is just up the road but since it was bitterly cold, Tammy and Bob picked me up in the their taxi and we rode 3 minutes until we reached the urbanly isolated restaurant. We had lovely glasses of wine at the bar and I recounted my couch saga (it's been weeks of this), chatted with Tammy about all nature of lovely girl things, and learned a bit of history about the Marines from Bob.

Then, the feast began. Tammy is an extremely able orderer (which is rare), so I was completely at ease and didn't fret as I normally do, considering every item on the menu.

We started with an appetizer: salami with goat cheese and olives. It was beautiful, simple, colorful and tasted fantastic. Plus the bread was good, the olive oil was green, the wine was rich and tasted like Mediterraea, and my dinner companions were both charming and amusing.

Then our dinners came. I have such lovely friends: they all indulge me in my little writing project and this night, let me even take pictures of their food. Here's Bob's penne alla puttanesca, with tomatoes, anchovies, black olives and capers:


Here's Bob eating it:

Tammy ordered seafood ravioli and before either she or I had taken a bite, I had one of her raviolis on my plate, and it was just delicious. Flavorful but not too fishy, and with the chewy but not sticky consistency of freshly-made pasta.


I ordered a fascinating dinner: butternut squash ravioli with amaretti cookies sprinkled on top. It was one of the most inventive Italian dinners I've ever had (who knows, it could be the EasyMac of the pasta world, but I was very impressed).

I know it's not much to look at, but look how happy I was to have it before me. So happy, in fact, my eyes disappeared and the guy behind me tried to raise the roof in empathetic glee.

It was a treat. Then we had dessert. Tammy adeptly ordered well again, getting the cheese plate, with a sweet sundried tomato chutney (?) and toasted bread.

It was delicious and a lovely evening with a charming couple. Much better than my dates with my Blackberry, like last night.

I went to Raw Silk, a North Indian restaurant half a block from my house and that opened two weeks ago. The service was horrible. I ordered a glass of Malbec (I don't really know what it is myself, but I wanted it). The waitress squinted at my menu and said, "red? ok." I asked what kind of lamb dish I should get. She encouraged one because it came with rice; I then noticed they all came with rice. I changed my tack: lamb vindaloo or lamb paneer? She said lamb paneer came with those green things. "Spinach?" I asked, having the luxury of reading that as well on the menu. "Yes," she said. But surprisingly, it didn't matter. The glass of wine was huge, Malbec or not, and my seat was at the front, but tucked away in a corner so I could look out the window and not be bothered.


I ordered lamb vindaloo in the end; it was delicious, really, and the naan was fresh and soft. After I finished dinner, the owner came and talked to me She and her husband both work full-time jobs and run the restaurant, but her in-laws are currently working there during the day. There is no sophistication in the decor or service; I appreciate the charm of run-down hole in the wall ethnic places (my favorite place in college was a 5 dollar Indian buffet run by a woman and her daughter, who wore LA Lights shoes), but it doesn't quite work when you don't know whether you're offering ethnic comfort food or a loungey-type atmosphere for young professionals (which had more an air of a hastily thrown together festiveness, like an After Prom). I'd go back; the food was delicious and the service, though spotty (I had to get up to ask for the check, which is the peak of bad service), was friendly and curious about my perception of the food.

Plus, I felt like it was a neighborhood place in my neighborhood: I saw bristly mustached Irishman walk by (he parallel parked right in front of Raw Silk) and the questionably tranvestite woman from whom I bought Sonia's picture frame for her birthday, who works at a card store chain on King Street. Just another day on my block, or... on the block of my mind's culinary memory?