​A passeggiata is the traditional evening promenade in Italian towns and villages. Though Italian food and restaurants in our area might have a rather undistinguished history in national terms, a meandering, somewhat selective, chronological stroll – or passeggiata – of 100-plus of its significant or interesting particulars can be entertaining, and even informative, especially since Houston is now a top restaurant city. This is due, in part, to substantial contributions from Italians and Italian-Americans. I penned an earlier version of this for My Table magazine back in 2011.
 
1884 – The Houston Directory published for 1884-1885 lists grocers with names like Fenno, Manno, Maretti and Roco. Alexander Bergamini – the owner of the Casino saloon at 72 Congress – is, appropriately, a New Orleans native. There is also a restaurant named Delmonico; it’s not Italian, but rather named after the famous New York establishment.
 
1890s – Veal, popular with Italians and also central Europeans, is a fairly common item in Houston’s many German-owned meat markets in the late 19th century, but eventually became scarce. Years later, restaurateurs Johnny Carrabba and Frankie Mandola don’t recall ever having it at home while growing up here.
 
1905 – Carrabba’s Chicken “Bryan Texas” is the most popular dish across the entire chain, and named after Bryan, 100 miles north of Houston. An Italian emigration official, Adolfo Rossi, reported that 2,500 Sicilian immigrants are working the land there in 1905. Along with two in New Jersey, it is “perhaps the largest Italian agricultural community in the United States” according to a later government report. Initially, Sicilians from different villages settled on either sides of the Brazos River, an example of campanilismo – the extreme provincialism – of most Italians at the time.
 
1906 – A restaurant called IWW French and Italian Restaurant opens downtown at 702 Preston.
 
1911 – Galveston’s oldest restaurant, Gaido’s, opens in 1911. It is named after the founding Sicilian family that still owns and operates it. It is not an Italian restaurant, though.
 
1913 – Houston has two pasta factories: Houston Macaroni Manufacturing Co. and Magnolia Macaroni Manufacturing & Co.
 
1915 – An immigrant from Sicily, Joe Grasso, pioneers the Galveston shrimping industry. Through the 1920s he sold most of it as bait as virtually no locals ate shrimp then.
 
1920 – Houston is home to Chinese and Japanese restaurants, but seemingly no Italian restaurant.
 
1930 – Houston’s first spaghetti house – and seemingly the first full-service, fully Italian restaurant – opens, Del Monico’s.
 
1944 – Like Gaido’s in Galveston, Massa’s in downtown Houston – whose run lasts over seventy years – is also a seafood restaurant rather than an Italian one.
 
1948 – On Park Place an inexpensive Italian restaurant called Big Humphrey’s opens. It is named after owner Joe Vitale’s professional wrestling persona. It later moves to Pearland and is open today.
 
1948 – Along with her husband Mama Ninfa – later the instigator of the nationwide fajita craze – opens a tortilla and pizza dough factory on Navigation east of downtown. The Italian dough part might not have been a surprise since her husband was an Italian-American from the northeast. Much later her offspring open Laurenzo's Italian Bar and Grille that lasts just three months and Bambolino's, a drive-through slice place, one of which still remains on Westheimer.
 
1950 – Frank Sinatra’s scandalous (i.e. adulterous) affair with Ava Gardner is confirmed for the nation in late January at Italian restaurant in Houston, Vincent’s Sorrento. Sinatra is in town for a several week gig at the Shamrock Hotel. A guest of Mayor Oscar Holcombe at the restaurant – whose proprietor is a Vallone – Sinatra accosts a photographer from the Houston Post who is about to capture the couple on film.
 
1953 – Matranga’s opens on Irvington north of downtown. It is an intimate spot with a garrulous, oft-crooning owner, Joe Matranga, who “was a character,” remembered Johnny Carrabba. It quickly becomes the favorite Italian for most Houstonians, and carries on for over 30 years, known for dishes with plenty of “simmering tomato sauce and garlic – lots of garlic” that resonated with customers. Matranga once admitted to a reporter that his sauce contained “onion and garlic and olive oil and salt, pepper and basil” along with tomato paste and was simmered for eight hours.
 
1953 – In November of that year, the Sacred Heart Society of West Little York, Roman Catholic men’s group founded by Sicilian immigrants from in and around Palermo, begins its tradition of a Thursday spaghetti lunch that is inexpensive and open to the public at its home in Whitney Hall on Airline just north of Crosstimbers. With the lunches remaining popular today, the meat balls and tomato sauce still follow the same recipes as when the lunches began. The fresh Italian sausage is made by Society members.
 
1955 – Pizza finally comes to Houston with opening of Valian’s in July. The reason it took so long is that Houston lacked a critical mass of Neapolitan immigrants that were found in New York, New Haven, Boston, Philadelphia and Chicago, each of which had pizza for decades. There are a couple of other contenders for the first pizza place in Houston, but it was certainly Valian’s that made it popular and is remembered as the local pizza pioneer. Near the Shamrock Hotel, the owner of Valian’s – like most new owners capitalizing on the exploding taste for pizza across the country – is not Italian. Armenian-American. The restaurant also serves barbecue and fried chicken.
 
1950s – The most popular place for imported Italian specialties – and about the only one – is Trapolino Import Co. Started by Frank Trapolino, a native of Bisaquino near Corleone in western Sicily. He had previously worked at the Houston Macaroni Co.
 
1960 – Pino’s opens at 3000 Cullen near the University of Houston. It is owned by Pino Farinola from coastal Brindisi in southwestern Italy and his wife. The restaurant is an old house and seats about 50.
 
1965 – Tony Vallone’s Tony’s opens as a casual Italian restaurant, known at the time as a spaghetti house, on Sage Road near where the Galleria would be constructed in a few years. It is later described as, “a place that was fun to visit, with good food and drink, dancing….”  Within a few years it would attract the well-to-do and 
 
1969 – Near the eastern edge of Westheimer in January, Michelangelo opens. Maybe somewhat exotic at first, it continued in business for over four decades later, known for its comfortable Italian-American fare and vaguely romantic setting.
 
1969 – The April 19 issue of Billboard reports, “Tony Bennett Spaghetti House…the first of the restaurants is scheduled to open in Houston in early August. Five additional units will open in the same city before the end of the year, with dozens more planned in other cities for early 1970.” At least one did open, briefly, in Town & Country where, “the food was…was very bland,” recalled a rare patron. Lasting longer is, “Benedetto’s, Texas State Hotel, 720 Fannin…a supper club that features an Italian feast, cheek-to-cheek dance music and name Vegas acts,”  run by the singer’s older brother, John.
 
The songs of the popular Italian-American singers interpreting the Great American Songbook after the Second World War are a requisite part of the ambiance of Italian-themed restaurants in this country. From that group, oddly, more than Tony Bennett had ties to the city. Vic Damone lived here for years after marrying an oil heiress, and two of three of Frank Sinatra’s kids were married to Houstonians (at least briefly). Nancy Sinatra married singer Tommy Sands – who attended Lanier Junior High and then Lamar – in 1960. Frank Sinatra, Jr. married a Houston-area lawyer in 1998. Plus, one of Dean Martin’s very best songs is his 1965 recording of “Houston.”
 
1970 – As the city moves westward, Pino’s follows. It moves to Hilcroft and Westheimer. Its success allows it to eventually grow to four times the capacity of the original.
 
1971 – Antonio’s Flying Pizza opens in 1971 by Sicilian immigrants serving pizza and assertive Italian-American red sauce classics, and proving that this formula with competent hands in the kitchen still works well after 40-plus years.
 
1974 – In their November issue, Texas Monthly reports that "Tony's [is]our nomination for the city's best restaurant… [with] trout Veronique… Chauteaubriand…. Souffle" as it advertises itself as serving the "Poetry of French Food."  Vallone's heart seems to remain with the vibrant culinary verse of Naples and environs, though.

1975 – Cajoled by Houston socialite Maxine Van Dusen, Sergio Ballatori, whose family had run a restaurant in Rome between the main train station and the Trevi Fountain for four decades, moves to the Bayou City to open Ballatori’s at 4215 Leeland in November in a recently occupied bank building east of downtown. Aptly aided by his wife, five children and parents, Ballatori features Roman and Italian dishes like saltimbocca alla Romana, the fresh pasta tonnarelli alla carbonara, and risotto alla Milanese along with sought-after tables set inside a spacious steel bank vault.
 
1976 – In January Star Pizza fires up its pizza oven for the first time. Its thick-crust pizzas – not really the Chicago-style deep dish as advertised – are arguably the best in the city at the time, and quickly become a favorite with the college-age customers.
 
1976 – Jason’s Deli – founded in Beaumont, Texas in 1976 by a Sicilian-American, Joe Tortorice – eventually includes over fifteen Houston area locations. A noticeable part of its success is due to its version of the muffaletta, the sandwich invented in the French Quarter in New Orleans in 1906. The mufffaletta takes its name from a somewhat unusual, dense type of loaf that originated in Piano degli Albanesi, a town about a dozen miles from Palermo and home to a large ethnic Albanian community.
 
1977 – Nash D’Amico – who had recently run an Italian restaurant in Huntsville, and helped significantly by his cousin Damian Mandola – opens “something new and exciting for Houston,” D’Amico’s at 2407 Westheimer east of Kirby. It is known for dishes like frutti di mare salad, fried calamari, and tortellini in a cream sauce. Several years later, still “one of the busiest restaurants in Houston,” Texas Monthly describes it as “the first sumptuous Italian restaurant in Texas.”
 
1977 – In a small house on W. Dallas – a few blocks west of an area once rife with Italian grocers – Vincent Mandola opens Nino’s, which will grow into a two-block compound over the years. Greatly inspired by the cooking of their mother, Grace, the three Mandola brothers, Vincent, Tony and Damian, will go on to open many of Houston’s most popular restaurants: Nino’s (Vincent), Tony Mandola’s Gulf Coast Kitchen (Tony), Damian’s (Damian), Carrabba’s (Damian), Vincent’s (Vincent), Pesce (Damian) and Pronto (Vincent).
 
1978 – Destined to become a favorite of astronauts and other NASA personnel, Frenchie’s in a dumpy strip center in Clear Lake opens by the Camera brothers from the island of Capri. Though misleading, the owners decide to keep the name of the previous establishment. Its counter service at lunch – and usually packed – while full service in the evening.
 
1978 – The faccia di vecchia dish served at Mandola’s Deli that opens near the University of Houston takes its name from its likeness to the gnarled face of an old woman. It is a version of the sfincione, a focaccia-esque dish from the Palermo area, the progenitor of the square Sicilian pizza.
 
1981 – Carmelo’s opens on Memorial near Dairy Ashford in west Houston. Carmelo Mauro, a native of the beautiful resort town of Taormina in Sicily, brings Continental-inflected and well-executed Italian-American dishes that quickly become a hit.
 
1982 – In the March issue of Texas Monthly is an article about Italian dining in Texas. It lists D’Amico’s and Villani at 2907 West Alabama as two of the three best Italian restaurants in the state. The reviewer thought important to add that “it seems that Dallas doesn’t need any more Italian restaurants, it just needs a few good Italian cooks.”
 
1982 – Sonny Bono – an Italian-American singer like Tony Bennett, if without the talent – opens an Italian restaurant called Bono’s on Woodway between Post Oak and Sage. A branch of his West Hollywood original, it lasts for several years.
 
1982 – In the fall of this year Carlo Molinaro, a native of Verona, starts a restaurant called La Trattoria on Westheimer just east of Voss. Serving broadly northern Italian trattoria classics along with a few American-friendly items, the restaurant is maddeningly inconsistent until its close at the end of 2010. Delighting regular patrons – including many ex-pats from Italy – it is too often indifferent in terms of both cooking and service.
 
1982 – Achille Epifani, originally from Taranto in the heel of Italy’s boot, opens Achille’s on Memorial between Wilcrest and Kirkwood. Having once cooked at the famed Giambelli’s on 50th in Manhattan – the first to have broken the $10 mark for a pasta dish in the country – he brings a customer-pleasing sense to his usually full-flavored preparations. It remains a neighborhood favorite for over fifteen years before Epifani decides to down-scale to a fast-casual operation and move west (to Eldgridge).
 
1983 – In the fall, John Flowers, originally from the Chicago area, opens Kenneally’s Irish Pub on Shepherd north of Westheimer. It, surprisingly, serves pizza, excellent pizza – thin-crust and vaguely Neapolitan. This was the original type of pizza served in Chicago, well before the advent of the deep-dish. Its pizza-maker trained at Nick & Vito’s in southwestern Chicago, one of the remaining bastions of this style.
 
1984 – Tony Mandola opens the self-named Gulf Coast Kitchen, his second restaurant at 1602 Shepherd. In early 1988 it moves to the River Oaks Shopping Center on West Gray. Best described as a regional seafood restaurant, it does serve some unique and popular items that combine Italian-American cooking with regional ingredients and flavors.
 
1985 – In their April issue, Texas Monthly notes that, “Joe Matranga, Owner of Texas’ Best Spaghetti Joint, gives out free postcards of himself as a valiant Greek warrior impaled on a bloody spear,” in awarding it the Best Restaurant Postcard.
 
1985 – On Smith Street in what would be called Midtown, Damian, Frankie and Vincent Mandola along with Ciro Lampasas and Johnny Carrabba, Sr. open Damian’s in the fall. It is soon to become one of Houston’s best-loved restaurants.
 
1986 – Ciro Lampasas opens his eponymous restaurant, Ciro’s, on the north side of I-10 at Campbell that becomes a Spring Branch favorite.
 
1986 – Aldo Cantania opens La Strada on a dicey stretch of Westheimer in Montrose. The California-style Italian food never draws raves, but its wild Sunday brunch becomes an institution. A second location opens in 1996 in the Galleria area. A fire shutters the original in 2002. It reopens in 2004, but never regained its former popularity. Both are closed by spring 2009.
 
1986 – With proprietors Damian Mandola and his nephew Johnny Carrabba, Carrabba’s opens in the site of a former adult bookstore on Kirby north of Richmond in December. The most expensive item on the menu is $9.
 
1987 – Backstreet Café’s Tracy Vaught invests in Prego, a failing restaurant in the Rice Village. It was one of the scores of restaurants nationwide that had used Wolfgang Puck’s Spago as its inspiration. The next year it becomes Italian-themed, more competent, and a favorite of the nearby soon-to-be-booming West University and Southampton neighborhoods.
 
1988 – In January, due to the phenomenal success of its Kirby original in the past year, Carrabba’s opens a second location near Briargrove on Voss near San Felipe.
 
1988 – Augie Vasquez, a native of Argentina who had worked with Nash D’Amico, opens Augie’s at 5901 Westheimer at Fountain View. Drawing on his Italian heritage and restaurant experience, he serves dishes found infrequently in Houston, including some of the over thirty pastas and an excellent version of mozzarella in carozza dished from an open kitchen. Though the Chronicle’s review noted that “this is one of those rare Italian restaurants where the meat and fish dishes rival the pastas,” the restaurant does not last but a couple of years.
 
1988 – The November issue of Texas Monthly raves about Damian’s grilled quail on polenta and its “fettuccine in Alfredo sauce adorned with dandelions… [with] moist grilled boned chicken breast.”  It garners two stars (out of three) making it one of the top seven restaurants in the state according to the magazine.
 
1989 – Tony Vallone opens Neapolitan-spiced Grotto in January. The food is excellent; not really authentic, but the execution and ingredients are top-notch. The flavors are properly distinct and vibrant, Italian rather than typically Italian-American. The scene rivals the food. Grotto is named one of the top new restaurants in the country by Esquire magazine in 1990.
 
1991 – On Lovett just off Montrose, Lynette Hawkins opens La Mora, occupying the spot of another Italian restaurant, Villa Borghese. Hawkins had lived in Florence and La Mora is the first of the area’s first Tuscan-themed restaurants that proves to strike a welcome cord among Houston diners.
 
1991 – Pino Luongo, the New York restaurateur that helped introduce and popularize Tuscan food in this country beginning in the 1980s, opens a restaurant in the Galleria area in August. Texas Monthly wrote a few months later that, “the most sophisticated Houston Tuscan restaurant is the largely undiscovered Piccola Cucina.”  Unfortunately, it remained that way and shuttered after a not-too-long tenure.
 
1991 – Tony Vallone opens La Griglia on West Gray just east of River Oaks in the fall. Esquire names it a best new restaurant in the country soon after opening. Less Neapolitan and maybe less Italian than his Grotto, it is similarly boisterous and stylishly casual, and quickly becomes a place for socialites and politicians. The restaurant remarkably remains so, two decades, and a change of ownership later.
 
1992 – In January an unpretentious spot dedicated to well-prepared Neapolitan style pasta dishes and somewhat odd, but popular, baked casserole creations opens a corner of the Pennzoil Building downtown. Called Buca di Bacco until the chain Buca di Beppe paid owner Vittorio Preteroti, a native of Capri and related to the family that runs Frenchie’s, to change. So, it has been known as Perbacco for years.
 
1992 – The first area Romano’s Macaroni Grill from Brinker International opens at 5802 Westheimer and is a hit. The very quaffable jug wines sold on the honor is a big reason. That original location is still open today. The chain began in Leon Springs, outside of San Antonio, in 1988.
 
1992 – In December two chefs from the famed Cipriani Hotel in Venice open Torcello at 2300 Westheimer, east of Kirby. Taking the name of the island where the hotel is located, its Venetian-inspired cuisine – including Harry’s Bar classics – is some of the very best Italian food that has ever been served in Houston, and its interior wins a local design award. The restaurant lasts for about a year-and-a-half, closing in 1994. It could be the address as Armando's, Dish, Two Chefs Bistro, and Beso – to name most of the ones which followed, each having abbreviated tenures.
 
1993 – In April Outback Steakhouse purchased a 50% stake in the cash flows of the two Carrabba's restaurants and entered into a 50-50 joint venture with the founders, Johnny Carrabba and Damian Mandola, to develop new locations. Houston’s version of Italian-American food and hospitality is poised to spread nationally. From soon after this, as most Houston restaurant-goers know, but it bears mentioning, the first two Carrabba’s locations – now just owned by Johnny Carrabba and family – are much better than the nationwide Carrabba’s Grill outposts.
 
1993 – Del Vecchio Foods is founded in Houston and produces a line of fresh Italian sausages that can be found at Spec’s and not enough other local outlets.
 
1994 – Anthony’s reopens at 4007 Westheimer in Highland Village (where Smith & Wollensky now stands), though it is not as Italian as it once was. The oft-decadent Italian-scented veal dishes remain excellent, though.
 
1994 – Using a far cheaper and less competent designer than Anthony’s – the odd Il Dio di Vin’ opens on the 7600 block of the Katy Freeway. The stuccoed interior is meant to resemble a grotto setting, but harkens more to the caves described in Christ Stopped at Eboli. The menu is entirely in some southern Italian dialect – Neapolitan, I believe – and the food is a mix of Italian-American and Neapolitan dishes done a little differently. The wine is inexpensive; the food is moderately priced, robustly flavored and usually terrific, especially the pasta dishes.
 
1994 – Nearby, also on the Katy Freeway, Tony Mandola's Family Table. It served giant Italian-American dishes meant for several, and meant to be like “going to grandma's house for Sunday dinner,” provided she was first- or second-generation southern Italian or Sicilian. The concept did not work for Houston, and it changed into another Blue Oyster Bar, which remained until the freeway expansion chased it north.
 
1994 – If not quite new, at least renewed, Anthony’s is named a top new restaurant in the country by Esquire magazine in October.
 
1995 – In January Johnny Carrabba and Damian Mandola purchased Outback’s shares in the original two Carrabba’s and modified the terms of the expansion agreement. The numerous Carrabba-named outlets grow to over 230 during the next fifteen years while the two initial locations remain amazingly popular.
 
1996 – Thai-born Somchai Rapesak who had cooked for La Strada for nearly a decade opens Crostini in a small house on Shepherd north of Westheimer early in the year. It grows to incorporate the then-trendy Southwestern ingredients and Thai flavors into American Italian cooking that works quite well. The restaurant has a successful dozen year run.
 
1996 – In March, two local Italian restaurant stars, Damian Mandola (Damian’s, Carrabba’s) and Lynette Hawkins (La Mora, Giacomo’s), marry, though the union doesn’t last.
 
1996 – Deep in the heat and humidity of August Arcodoro opens. It quickly becomes regarded as one of the best Sardinian-focused restaurant in the country (not that there are too many). Its Seadas Al Miele dessert – puff pastry filled with sweetened cheese, fried and drizzled with bitter honey – is “perhaps the oldest dessert in the world” according to an Italian food authority.
 
1996 – Villa Capri in Clear Lake – run by the family that owns nearby Frenchie’s – hosts the Italian head of state, President Oscar Luigi Scalfaro.
 
1997 – In an April 11 review in the Houston Chronicle, Alex Truex writes, “Houston is blessed, but also cursed, by its plethora of upscale Italian restaurants,” proving definitively that he is no Robb Walsh or Alison Cook.
 
1997 – The restaurant with a bank vault run by a family from Rome, Ballatori’s, closes after a two decade run.
 
1998 – In April the Jay Leno on “The Tonight Show” pokes fun at the name of the Houston restaurant Crapitto’s. It is the last name of the owner, by the way.
 
1998 – In the summer of 1998 Aldo El Sharif of the extravagant Aldo's – along with Marco Wiles – opens a wine bar called Osteria D'Aldo at 301 Main downtown.
 
1998 – With talented Alberto Baffoni a native of the Marche in central Italy manning the kitchen, Simposio opens on Richmond and Chimney Rock. It is named as one of the top new restaurants in the country by Esquire that fall, being praised by bringing to Houston “authentic Italian cooking.”
 
1999 – In July of 1999 the Houston Chronicle lauds La Griglia in a review, as “Marco Wiles brings glory back to the kitchen.” It is planned as a short time gig.
 
1999 – Arcodoro is awarded three stars out of four by famed Italian journalist Luigi Veronelli and his team in the The Best Italian Restaurants in America. Barely more than twenty other Italian restaurants in the country were rated as high.
 
1999 – Also that year, another Italian publication, the magazine La Cucina Italiana has a feature article about Tony Vallone citing him as one of the Southwest's best-known Italian-food gurus.
 
2000 –In January divino on West Alabama near Dunlavy opens. Though as much a wine bar at first – and a place with intelligently chosen and well-priced wines – it can probably lay claim to being Houston’s first trattoria. It serves basic, proficient cooking that aims for true Italian sensibilities, inspired from Emilia-Romagna.
 
2000 – In March Marco Wiles – who had worked locally for Tony Vallone, Antonio Mingalone and Aldo El Sharif – opens Da Marco, which sports an unusual all-Italian wine list, and is to become the most lauded Italian restaurant in Houston’s dining history.
 
2000 – Both Tony Vallone for Tony’s, and Alberto Baffoni of Simposio have recipes featured in John Mariani’s The Italian-American Cookbook published in 2000 that highlighted Italian-American standards and broadly Italian dishes from chefs like Eric Ripert, Daniel Boulud and Ming Tsai. Vallone’s recipe is Capellini with Calamari and Shrimp (page 146); Baffoni’s is Potato Gnocchi with Wild Mushroom Ragù (page 196), “one of his masterful dishes” according to the author. Future Houston restaurateur Piero Selvaggio also has a recipe, Risotto with Corn (page 217).
 
2001 – In January the restaurant in the Four Seasons hotel downtown with talented Tim Keating heading the kitchen is rechristened Quattro, a contemporary Italian restaurant. Keating’s recent turn at the Four Seasons property in Milan makes this one of the most authentic Italian kitchens in the city.
 
2001 – Damian Mandola and Johnny Carrabba were asked to host the fourth season of the nationally syndicated PBS series “Cucina Amore.”   It spawns the cookbook, Ciao Y’All, possibly the closest tome that describes the Italian-themed cooking here. The hosts’ ebullient and irreverent style are such a hit they film two additional series featuring the cooking of Sicily and Tuscany – and companion cookbooks – in 2003 and 2004.
 
2001 – Just a year after it opens, talented sommelier Antonio Gianola joins Da Marco. He expands and greatly improves the all-Italian wine list to include a diverse, complementary and intriguing array of finds that help make the restaurant even more commendable. Gianola later goes on to Catalan as one of the opening partners helping to turn that into one of the city’s most exciting restaurants.
 
2001 – Nino’s (and Vincent’s, Grappino di Nino and later Pronto) Vincent Mandola is featured preparing his Veal Vincent on “Food Finds” on the Food Network.
 
2002 – Arcodoro’s Ravioli Arcodoro wins an international ravioli competition. Remaining on the menu throughout the restaurant’s tenure, these are good-sized ravioli filled with minced shrimps and scallops and wine must and finished with a flavorful seafood reduction.
 
2003 – Formerly just a wholesaler and a gelato maker to area restaurants, Nundini’s on N. Shepherd become known also as a retail import shop, sandwich purveyor and Houston’s first notable outlet for gelato and sorbetto.
 
2003 – In November Tilman Fertitta’s Landry Group purchases La Griglia and the two Grotto restaurants from Tony Vallone. That deal seems to stipulate that Vallone divest himself all but one restaurant. The Landry organization subsequently preserves these once interesting spots into amber, but these remain popular, if with a likely less discriminating group of patrons.
 
2004 – Distribution Amici Olive Oil – produced in Tuscany and owned by a Houstonian – begins from here. It is found at outlets like Spec’s and Leibman’s plus on-line.
 
2004 – Damian’s caters the All Star game held in Houston providing Italian food for Joe Torre and others while serving Caribbean-style food to the numerous Latin ballplayers on the American League roster.
 
2005 – Appropriately relocated to the former site of Maxim’s (once “the secure haven of the River Oaks plutocracy”) and featuring contemporary artwork from likes of the acclaimed Texas-bred artists Robert Rauschenberg and Jesus Moroles, Tony’s is named among the top new restaurants in the country by Esquire magazine. The French executive chef with the tough-to-pronounce Polish last name, Olivier Ciesielski, directs a kitchen staff that is capable of creating excellent Italian food.
 
2006 – In January Marco Wiles’ Dolce Vita opens on lower Westheimer. Seemingly using Mario Batali’s Otto in Manhattan as a template, Wiles goes far beyond that with his Italian-style pizzas fired in a wood-burning oven using a range of toppings inspired throughout the peninsula. It is easily the best pizzeria in Houston and encounters no serious contenders for years, if ever.
 
2006 – In Damian Mandola founds Mandola Family Winery south of Austin focusing on Italian varietals like Vermentino, Dolcetto and Montepulciano. TABC issues arising because of his ownership in dining or retail establishments – or a fallout with his partners according to another source – cause him to sell out to his partners. He still owns the attractive Trattoria Lisina next door.
 
2006 – Gourmet Sardina, an outlet for high quality Sardinian food products, is launched by Arcodoro’s owners Efisio and Lori Farris. The online shop offers artisanal products from Farris’ homeland that are quite different than those found in the typical Italian-American pantry. Bottarga, bitter honey and saba are a few of the high-end items that also include wine and olive oils.
 
2006 – The October edition of Gourmet listed Da Marco at number 29 among their list of top 50 restaurants in the country. Only three other Italians are placed higher – Babbo in New York, Vetri in Philadelphia, and Bartolotta di Mare in Las Vegas – not bad company, at all.
 
2007 – Sweet Myrtle & Bitter Honey: The Mediterranean Flavors of Sardinia from Efisio Farris of Arcodoro is published. It is likely the first Sardinian cookbook published in English. The New York Times listed it among “25 noteworthy cookbooks published in 2007.’’
 
2007 – Late in the year Ristorante Cavour opens in developer Giorgio Borlenghi’s posh Hotel Granduca. The executive chef is a Frenchman, David Denis. He infuses the flavors similar to his native Provence and Liguria to create a broadly northern Italian array of very well-crafted dishes. He proves that the French culinary tradition of stock-making marries well with Milanese-style risotto. For those that don’t know much about Italian history, the restaurant takes its moniker from Baron Cavour, one of the principal architects of Italian unification in 1861; the conquest of the Kingdom of Two Sicilies and its incorporation into the Turin-based Kingdom of Sardinia.
 
2008 – In an article entitled “The Best U.S. Italian Restaurants” in the April issue of Forbes Traveler, John Mariani names Tony’s among the top dozen or so Italian eateries in the country. He writes, “in its new location, Tony's plays to a younger crowd that comes for rigorously authentic Italian regional cuisine and great wines.”
 
2008 – Also in April, Andrea Pintus, the longtime chef at lower Heights-area Patrenalla’s, and a native of Sardinia, opens his own restaurant with business partner, Luigi Campioni, on Westheimer and Dairy Ashford. Called Andrea’s is serves approachable Italian and Italian-American dishes that are a very good value.
 
2008 – In the heat of the summer, Russo’s Coal-Fired Pizzeria from the folks at the local New York Pizzeria chain opens in northwest Houston. Houstonians can get a taste of more pizzas cooked in the more traditional early New York and New Haven fashion.
 
2009 – Sicilian Village located in Friendswood begins distributing packaged olives from Sicily. These are available at Spec’s, Amazon.com and SicilianVillage.com.
 
2009 – Marco Wiles opens his third truly Italian restaurant along a short stretch of Westheimer, Poscol, in March. It takes its name from the term in dialect used for a main thoroughfare (Via Poscolle) in the northeastern Italian city of Udine, the hometown of Wiles’ family. Featuring small plates and inspiration largely from Veneto and Friuli, it sports another well-chosen all-Italian wine list. Texas Monthly names it and Valentino on its list of best restaurants to open in the state that year.
 
2009 – In September Houston hosts its first Italian Expo produced to highlight products from Italy. It is a boon to wine lovers, maybe too much so. Chicago is the only other city to host a similar event.
 
2009 – Lynette Hawkins gets back into the game in September with her Tuscan- and  Venetian-inspired small plate spot Giacomo’s on Westheimer west of Kirby. From the start, it features a very well-chosen and well-priced all-Italian wine list that seems to cover every corner of that country. It evolves to become one of the city's most reliable and best-value dining destinations, regardless of cuisine.
 
2009 – Legendary Piero Selvaggio – whose Santa Monica eatery Valentino was long regarded as the best Italian restaurant in the country – opens his third branch in Houston’s modern Hotel Derek near the Galleria. The restaurant is a new concept for Houston, an Italian ambition and credibility previously found elsewhere in this country just in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Las Vegas and one spot in Philadelphia. A veteran of Valentino’s Las Vegas operation, the talented Cunninghame West heads the kitchen here, doing an excellent job with an approachable version of Selvaggio’s inspired takes on alta cucina. James Beard Award-winning chef Luciano Pellegrini occasionally comes to town from Sin City to aid with special dinners for some added culinary power.
 
2009 – Stella Sola by one of the city’s top toques, Bryan Caswell, along with partner Bill Floyd opens in the Heights in November 2009. Influenced by the meaty robustness of some northern Italian cooking, its name translates to “Lone Star” (or “Lonely Star”) in English. One of Caswell’s early cooking stints was at Damian’s. He later cooked with the talented Rocco DiSpirito well before DiSpirito’s televised Italian-American restaurant nightmare, “The Restaurant” in 2003.
 
2010 – In April, Tuscan Renato De Pirro, an alumnus of Pierro Selvaggio’s Las Vegas restaurants and previously the Executive Chef at Osteria del Circo, the Maccioni’s family refined and well-regarded trattoria in the Bellagio Hotel and Casino, takes over the kitchen at Ristorante Cavour, bringing a more properly Italian taste to the menu at this upscale establishment.
 
2010 – Ciao Bello, another Vallone enterprise that had opened a year earlier in a space once occupied by La Strada, is named among “11 More Restaurants You Don't Want to Miss” by Esquire in 2010. It will become known for its zesty flavors among Roman-style thin-crust pizzas, pastas, Gulf-oriented seafood and meaty Italian-American-inflected preparations in an attractively casual and comfortable but very stylish setting that has long been a Vallone signature. Also in 2010, Vallone’s Caffe Bello takes over the original address of La Strada in Montrose, but struggles for traction in an evolving neighborhood.
 
2010 – In December Amici in Sugar Land closes. It seems competition from a recently opened Olive Garden nearby might have played a factor. This does not reflect well on Fort Bend residents.

2011 – Pizaro's opens in a strip center on Memorial in west Houston serving Neapolitan style pizza, the most truly Neapolitan that Houston has thus seen. Proprietor Bill Hutchinson puts his “Verace Pizza Napoletana” certification as a  Pizzaiolo to good use, and the bare-bones spots draws customers from around the area including a number of Italian ex-pats.  
 
2011 – In an area deficient in quality fresh Italian sausage, you can purchase it at the two Carrabba's owned by the family, though you will likely have to call ahead. The piquant, flavorful sausage is made by Johnny Carrabba, Sr., and unusual for Italian sausage elsewhere, but consistent with Texas, it contains a fair portion of beef.
 
2012 – Valentino, the best Italian restaurant that ever was in Houston, cannot overcome the very difficult location in the Hotel Derek and shutters. A shame, as proprietor Piero Selvaggio never got to do all he wanted to with the restaurant including becoming more adventurous with the offerings and expanding its wine list to at least a substantial of his Santa Monica original that has one of top handful of wine lists in the country
 
2014 – Inspired by the Italian heritage of executive chef Ryan Pera, Coltivare opens in January on White Oak in the Heights offering seasonal American-Italian fare including distinctively bready pizzas along with pastas and larger preparations in a casual, no reservations setting that seduces most local food critics.
 
2014 – Giancarlo Ferrara, the executive chef at Arcodoro for over a decade, opens Amalfi on Westheimer west of the Galleria in the same strip center as The Palm. Highlighting the dishes and flavors of his native Salerno, down the coast from Naples, that should be familiar to most American diners along with some items and techniques from his stops in the Veneto and at a French restaurant bearing two Michelin stars, the restaurant quickly becomes one of the top Italians in the city.
 
2015 – Now sporting the descriptive phrase, “Naples Influenced. Milan Inspired. Houston Cherished,” Tony’s celebrates its fiftieth year in business.
 
2015 – Pizaro's opens a second location on Montrose and West Gray. It later expands its menu to include New York style and Detroit style pizzas. The latter, a version of the Sicilian pan pizza created in Detroit soon after the Second World War, has been trendy addition to pizza joint menus across the country.

2017 – Across the street from the ballpark, Astros owner opens Potente, an upscale, expensive Italian-themed restaurant that eventually gets the skilled Danny Trace who was the executive chef at Brennan’s, and at the estimable Commander's Palace in New Orleans before that, as its top toque.
 
2017 – Chef Mark Cox of Mark's fame begins consulting at Fratelli's, an Italian-American restaurant in Spring Branch that began as a franchised offshoot of the original Fratelli's on 290. His work improves the food and the restaurant's profile, which becomes a favorite of an older set of west Houston customers.

2017 – After 36 years in business, Carmelo’s closes after Christmas brunch. Owner Carmelo Mauro, a steadfast member of the Houston restaurant community was both the former president of both the Texas Restaurant Association and the Greater Houston Restaurant Association.
 
2018 – Arcodoro, the upscale Sardinian restaurant in the Galleria that drew loyal patronage from ex-pat Italians and other Europeans closes in February after nearly two decades in business.
 
2018 – In April, the Italian wine and food publication Gambero Rosso names Amalfi as the best fine dining Italian restaurant in Houston, Sud Italia, with Maurizio Ferrarese in the kitchen, as tops for traditional cuisine, the Dallas-based chain Cane Rosso for pizza (quite surprisingly, and maybe a bit grudgingly according to the person I spoke with from Gambero Rosso), and Poscol for having the best wine program among local Italian restaurants.
 
2018 – In July, J.J. Watt asked his 5 million-plus followers on Twitter for the best Italian restaurant in Houston. The clear favorite of the 2,000 or so respondents was, very oddly and depressingly, Olive Garden, of which there are over twenty locations in the Houston area, which is also depressing to learn.
 
2018 – Tanglewood’s neighborhood Italian restaurant from Tony Vallone, Ciao Bello, closes rather suddenly in August, a couple of weeks after sibling steakhouse Vallone’s does so in Spring Branch.
 
2018 – In November, chef Maurizio Ferrarese, who won deserved plaudits at Quattro and Sud Italia, is hired to take over the kitchen at Ristorante Cavour.


I’ve got to write that through a coincidence of fate, I was born in the Italian North Beach neighborhood of San Francisco and afterwards belonged to the same parish in Bergen County, New Jersey as the mother of Frank Sinatra, whom I was told reliably purchased kegs for church functions. I was the local editor for the Zagat Survey for several years until Google did away with those positions and, possibly more pertinently, is the author of the ebook From the Antipasto to the Zabaglione: The Story of Italian Restaurants in America that is available on Amazon.

An artistic creation from Ristorante Cavour

​Maybe I shouldn’t have been surprised to learn of a resolutely green cocktail that touted was touted to me the other day at McGonigel’s Mucky Duck.  McGonigel’s, and it was less than a couple of weeks from St. Patrick’s Day, which looms rather large on the calendar at this long-running showcase music club and restaurant-bar in the Upper Kirby District.  The owners and staff had come across the drink at a cocktail bar in San Diego the previous week and were quite impressed.
 
Being a huge from of The Clash, the name immediately made me think of one of the many enjoyable songs on the iconic, proto-punk first album.  Its name, from an ancient nursery rhyme about the Great Fire of London of 1666, has the opening lines:
 
All across the town, all across the night
Everybody's driving with full headlights
Black or white, you turn it on, you face the new religion
Everybody's sitting 'round watching television
London's burning with boredom now
London's burning dial nine-nine-nine-nine-nine
 
It turns out that this song has, unquestionably, no connection to the cocktail.  Or any cocktail, or any food-related item, at all.  Even so, exhorted by Rusty and Teresa, the owners of The Duck whom I’ve gotten to know in recent years, and knowing that the bar does a very good job with cocktails, I ordered it.  Just reading the list of ingredients, I could tell that it had absolutely nothing to do with the song nor London, nor any place near London.  It begins in the kitchen with a puree of jalapeños, that have been seeded and roasted, along with avocado, cilantro and lime juice.  Then at the bar when ordered, some of the puree on hand is mixed with some syrup and lemon juice.  The result is green with flecks of dark cilantro scattered about.  I would never consider ordering a drink that looked like that if I hadn’t been strongly touted on it.  Avocado in cocktail, too.  I don’t believe that I’ve ever had a drink featuring an avocado.
 
When it arrived in front of me, I thought it looked like the product of an aggressive cleanse recipe from a juicer.  I loved it.  The taste of the roasted jalapeños shown through providing a bit of smoke and spice that was nicely muted and complemented by the avocado and sugar.  It wasn’t a sweet drink, more on the piquant side, but balanced, with the gin working well in a subtle alcoholic concert with the verdant ingredients for very pleasant long taste and was easily drinkable.  Maybe too easily.
 
Teresa told me that the name comes, in part, from the London Dry gin that gives it is alcoholic interest.  The ‘Burning’ from the jalapeños, I assume.  OK, the moniker does actually make some sense.  The name could change in the near future as she mentioned they are thinking about replacing the London dry gin with Hendrick’s.  Its prominent cucumber notes could make this different-looking cocktail even more enjoyable in the future. 
 
McGonigel’s Mucky Duck
2425 Norfolk (a couple of blocks east of Kirby), 77098, (713) 528-5999
mcgonigels.com

​I finally made it Segari’s the other day.  Segari’s, in its current on Shepherd between I-10 and Washington and in previous incarnations, has been serving its brand of regional Gulf Coast seafood and more since 1971.  The esteemed Robb Walsh rang high praises about Segari’s shrimp and gumbo for years, giving some credence to the restaurant’s tagline of “World Famous Gumbo and Fried Shrimp.”
 
I’m sorry I waited so long.  The Grilled Bacon Wrapped Shrimp preparation I had featured absolutely terrific shrimp, impeccably high quality, large and perfectly cooked.  These were moist, and with an excellent texture that was tender enough – properly not soft and definitely no hint of toughness that might indicate too much time on the heat – and nicely assembled with the thin pieces of the affixed bacon, that stayed affixed, nicely complementing rather overwhelming the flavor of the shrimp. These were best grilled shrimp I’ve had in memory and it was one of the top shrimp dishes I’ve had in quite a while, up there with the barbecue shrimp at Mr. B’s in New Orleans earlier this year.
 
Unfortunately, there were only five shrimp to my order.  I could have eaten several more, as delicious as they were.  Also unfortunately, the shrimp came with an order of the worst onion rings I might have ever had and the worst garlic bread I’ve ever had.  The onion rings had an odd and odd-tasting breading.  A friend thought it looked like breading that was old.  It didn’t seem like that to me.  Rather, it was just dull-looking, not flavorful and bland, at best.  An odd complement of horseradish-spiked cocktail sauce was necessary with them.  Next time, I’ll go for the fries or Rosemary New Potatoes as my choice of a side.  The very dry garlic bread that prefaced my order seemed like two length-wise halves of what appeared to be supermarket-purchased bolillo bread without much in the way of discernible butter or olive oil, nor garlic, and that was left in the oven to affect the consistency of two misshapen croutons. 
 
And annoyingly, there are no prices on the menu.  Your bill’s total seems to be dependent on the price of the seafood and the whim of the restaurant.  My order which didn’t feature a ton of food was $27.95, quite expensive for me for lunch.  There’s not a lunch menu.  But I’ll be back to this quirky, homey little bungalow-set spot – just nine tables and about the same number of seats at the bar – for some of its succulent shrimp, at the very least.
 
Segari’s
1503 Shepherd (between I-10 and the railroad tracks), 77007, (713) 880-2470
segarisrestaurant.com

​I finished a terrific meal this summer at Parizzi, the only Michelin-starred restaurant in Parma, with three ages of Parmesan, well, Parmigiano-Reggiano: 24, 30 and 36 months.  Each version was quite enjoyable, each with a distinct flavor and textures.  Moving from the more familiar and nuttier to saltier, more intense, more complex, drier and so more crumbly and crunchier as I moved to the 30- and 36-month pieces.  I found I a very appropriate way to end a rich dinner in Parma, one that had included grated Parmigiano to great effect atop a couple of previous dishes. 
 
A booth at the Taste of Italy event a couple of weeks ago reminded of that dinner, the conclusion, at least.  Cantarelli, a cheese producer in the province of Reggia Emilia in operation since 1876, had samples of their Parmigiano-Reggiano aged 24, 30 and 36 months, which I greedily devoured.  The representative explained the differences among the ages and how 36 months might be the peak of aged Parmigiano as the flavors considerably break down by 48 months in his opinion.
 
In addition to the quality of the cheeses I sampled, I was impressed with the packaging.  The company sells these three ages along with a few others including Parmigiano made from the milk of the famed red cows, Vacche Rosse, and another from the Bruna Alpina breed, in opaque 3-ply aluminum packets that helps the cheese retain its proper flavor after opening and guarantee a shelf life of one year.  It certainly seems much better than the shrink-wrapped plastic used by Costco, Spec’s and Murray’s Cheeses, the places where I usually pick up Parmigiano and its brethren.  Cantarelli, being an Italian company, also made its packets much more attractive than the typical domestic packaging. 
 
I don’t believe that Cantarelli is available in Texas, or even in the US, but it is certainly worth keeping an eye out for it if you are a fan of Italian food and might enjoy an occasional deeply savory coda to dinner.

​Though proprietor Justin Vann declaimed to me in the past that Public Services isn’t a cocktail bar, they have served terrific cocktails since they’ve opened doors, usually smartly updated and refined takes on classics.  One of these that I rediscovered at Public Services is the Tom Collins, which has been around for maybe 150 years.
 
Refreshing, maybe too much so, Public Services makes it with old style Old Tom Gin – the sweeter gin that predates the London dry gins and that was popular in the 19th century – lemon juice, raw sugar and the sparkling Top Chico all in expert proportions and attractively garnished with a lemon wedge and an unctuous Maraschino cherry from Luxardo.  And, served on ice in a tall Collins glass, of course.  Both slightly sweet and slightly tart, it’s balanced, cooling and lightly delicious.  I haven’t really tasted any of the two ounces of gin in it when, which is a very good sign to me.  As quickly as I have consumed them on balmy evenings, I’ve thought it best to limit myself to just one before moving to something more contemplative, i.e. more slowly drinking.
 
The Tom Collins is $10 regularly and just $6 during happy hour, which agreeably runs from 4:00 to 6:30 Monday through Saturday.
 
Public Services
202 Travis (at Franklin), (713) 516-8897
publicservicesbar.com

​When I was younger, thirstier, and certainly much cheaper – thinner, too, to be honest – I relished finding a bar here that served its beers in the traditional British imperial pint glasses.  At 568 ml versus 473 ml for the far, far more common American pint glasses, which were actually created to shake cocktails, I also was very happy to receive an additional 20% more malted and fermented goodness for a price that usually erred on the side of the imbiber.  The larger imperial pint glasses are what are used in the pubs in the U.K. and Ireland.  The domestic bars aiming to create a more traditional British or Irish pub atmosphere often opted for these, almost always to my enjoyment.  My old regular haunt, The Brewery Tap downtown, with a succession of owners from Ireland and England cheerfully carried on the welcome tradition until its Harvey-induced demise a year-and-a-half ago.
 
Now, the number of establishments in Houston using these bigger beer glasses has dwindled to just a trio.  While many places do use the imperial pint glasses for pours of Guinness – only for Guinness in only Guinness glasses, of course – the three bars that serve the vast majority of their beers in imperial pint glasses have a certifiable British or Irish heritage: The Richmond Arms, McGonigel’s Mucky Duck and The Red Lion.  I certainly do enjoy imbibing at these places, as I have over the years, but I cannot begrudge other establishments for not following their lead.
 
It really makes sense not use imperial pint glasses here.  This country does not have the tradition of the larger imperial pint glasses; there is absolutely no demand for them outside of British- and Irish-themed bars that have been using them for years.  There are financial factors, too: larger imperial glasses are more expensive than the American pint glasses and more difficult to replace; and the extra size that should necessitate an additional cost might be tough to fully pass off to customers, as pint prices could approach the $10 mark.  With mad growth in the number of breweries around the country in the past decade, many beer bars have been turning away from even the 16-ounce shaker glasses, as many of the small brewery beers are highly alcoholic – even 16-ounces can easily be seen as too much for a single serving – and the beers that they brew taste better in other, smaller glasses.
 
Though I really do believe that these are good trends, my inner cheapskate – I mean, as an intermittent Anglophile and certifiably longtime CAMRA-sympathizer – does miss the more frequent imperial pint sightings. 

​I had made the trek out to Maine-ly Sandwiches on I-10 that’s in the same shopping center as the Edwards Marq’E 23 movie theater for a late lunch with a lobster roll in mind.  As $28 for the Whole Lobster Roll seemed excessive for a midday meal during the work week, I ordered a ½ lobster roll and felt that I would likely need some more sustenance.  A half Italian Sandwich, available in a variety of choices, is just $4.50, so I ordered one after asking the cashier which one she thought was the best.  Chicken Salad, maybe seeming unusual under the banner of “Italian Sandwiches,” but that proved to be a very enjoyable recommendation.
 
Though I ate chicken salad sandwiches often during my second year of business school – cheap, convenient and something that the cafeteria didn’t screw up – that was a number of years ago.  I’ve rarely eaten them since, so this order would be a nice change of pace, at least.  Served on a buttered and toasted split-top roll, a soft, industrially produced hot dog roll, I got the sandwich with everything: the chicken salad, slivers of apples, bits of walnuts, chopped onions, iceberg lettuce, slices of tomato, pieces of bell pepper, pickles, black olives, pickled and jalapeños along with salt and pepper.  It was a rather odd and unsightly concoction, but it was quite tasty, mayonnaise-heavy, with a lot more going on than the typical chicken salad sandwich.  The laundry list of sandwich toppings all played well together for me, even the black olives, and there was welcome textural diversity with the walnuts and pickles.  I’m glad that I took the cashier’s suggestion.  I’ll likely do so again in the future.
 
Also, the lobster roll, properly buttery and fairly rich, was quite good, too.  The drive was worth it.
 
Maine-ly Sandwiches
7620 Katy Freeway (just east of Silber, near the Edwards Marq’E 23), 77024, (713) 677-0771
mainelysandwiches.com

​I just read something in the New York Times about the opening of new restaurant in Midtown Manhattan that was described as a “traditional Northern Italian restaurant, which serves dishes like linguine with white clams and chicken scarpariello.”  The former is a classic Neapolitan dish and chicken scapariello is an Italian-American dish, also with roots in Naples.  The writer, Florence Fabricant, is quite experienced and quite a good food writer so I assume that the above reference was done tongue-in-cheek.  And that phrase “Northern Italian” still gets bandied about on restaurant signage and websites, if less so these days. 
 
This piece is adapted from my eBook, From the Antipasto to the Zabaglione: The Story of Italian Restaurants in America.  I care more about the semantics of this than most.
 
“Northern Italian” became a buzz-phrase.  It got diners excited.  Immensely enjoyable, distinctive regional cuisines have long existed in northern Italy.  As an amalgamation, it started being promoted, if not delivered, by at least 1970 in New York.  “Where is the grand tradition of the North? I have two years searching for it and my exploration weaves a trail of mournful disillusion,” a lament at the top of Greene’s lengthy article.   Some of the first press about the food of northern Italy came from Craig Claiborne, who introduced and championed Marcella Hazan in his space in the New York Times in 1970.   A native of Emilia-Romagna, she was conducting cooking classes in her tiny Manhattan apartment at the time.  The big boost came with the success of Hazan's first cookbook Classic Italian Cooking in 1973.  “Hazan's effort to convey authenticity elbowed aside the older efforts,” concerning Italian food, according to Nach Waxman, the owner of Kitchen Arts & Letters, a Manhattan bookstore dedicated to culinary matters.   That and subsequent volumes were influential both for cooks and diners.  “Northern Italian” was not only something fresh, but something that was more seemingly more genuine.  Soft pastas made with egg by hand, something Hazan championed, certainly appeared to be more authentic than spaghetti from a box that had been the pasta staple for decades. 
 
A few years after Hazan’s success, in 1977 Giuliano Bugialli’s, The Fine Art of Italian Cooking was published and sold well, helping establish Bugialli as respected instructor and popular author.  It focused on the cooking of Florence and Tuscany under the heading of “Italian.”   A contributing subtext in these books – seemingly somewhat intentional based on the title – was the belief that northern Italian food was more advanced and sophisticated.  Those northern regions were more prosperous and were home to the highlights of the Renaissance, after all.  And, its cooks were not quite the swarthy immigrants of yesteryear, towards whom there might have still been a bias in some quarters.
 
There was, and even still remains, a lot of confusion among the food writers and dining public as to what “Northern Italian” means.  Geographically, it meant the areas north of Rome, excluding Abruzzo to its northeast (that region had been part of the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies whose capital was Naples).  Florence Fabricant of the New York Times gave the widespread understanding in 1977 as, “by local definition, ‘northern Italian’ signifies restaurants of some elegance that go lightly on the marinara, serve fettuccine, tortellini and scampi and do not feature meatball or pizza.”   This is what these restaurants portrayed, and what the public was to believe, but it was not really northern Italian.  In the 1990s this still meant in practice, “very little more than fresh pasta made with eggs, appearing in place of…commercial pasta, and cream and butter substituting for olive oil and tomato in the sauces.”   A few dishes were usually done in this heavier fashion, but the biggest effort for a restaurant in transforming itself a “Northern Italian” one was the cost for new signage and menus advertising the billing. 
Mimi Sheraton, the New York Times restaurant critic in 1981, reviewed Salta in Bocca, a “pleasant north Italian restaurant” that nearly garnered three stars in which the “recommended dishes” are almost a greatest hits collection of the southern Italian-American restaurant kitchen:
 
“Baked clams, mussels Riviera, roast peppers with mozzarella cheese, minestrone, pasta e fagioli, fettuccine casalinga, spaghetti carbonara, spaghetti al sugo, capelli d'angelo with seafood, linguine with white clam sauce, tortellini gratinati, fettuccine all'Amatriciana, fried squid, red snapper Livornese, scampi fra diavolo, chicken piccata, chicken scarpara, veal Genovese, veal paillard, osso buco, veal cutlet Milanese, veal cutlet Fiorentina, grilled veal chop, fried zucchini, sauteed escarole, zucchini with tomatoes, rugola salad, cheesecake, zabaglione, cheese and fruit platter.”
 
Though the veal cutlet sported the “Milanese” and “Fiorentina” modifiers, the tortellini and osso buco were probably the only preparations to be found anywhere north of Rome.  This lack of understanding was typical, and continued for a couple decades even among avid diners in the biggest markets.  But, patrons and reviewers, too, liked the new dishes.  These were something different and even novel, though “Northern Italian” also seemed to mean “more expensive,” that was good for the restaurateur.
Authentic northern Italian food was actually to be found in New York by the 1960s, at the reinvigorated Barbetta featuring a refined version of the robust cooking of Piedmont.  This was a singular and upscale anomaly.  Located in the theater district in Manhattan, it was founded in 1906 and given a makeover by the daughter of the founder.  In “1962, she was determined to make Barbetta more Piemontese than ever, adding such typical dishes as fonduta, carne cruda, bagna cauda, bue al Barolo, and introducing white truffles and Piemonte's traditional white truffle dishes,” according to the century-old restaurant’s website.   Other, and truly northern Italian restaurants, were to join Barbetta in Manhattan in the 1980s. 
Though much of it was marketing or misinformation, there was some truth to this “Northern Italian” fare advertised beyond Barbetta.  Fior d’Italia in San Francisco had been serving it even two decades longer than Barbetta.  As mentioned above, some of these Manhattan-based restaurateurs were from northern Italy, some, like Giambelli had actually worked in restaurants in the north of Italy.  They did serve some dishes from their home areas, if often in a richer fashion than at home.  The majority of the menu – and certainly the overall style – was still better described as Italian-American, albeit sometimes immensely enjoyable Italian-American.

Guinea hen at La Subida in Cormons, Italy, one of the best restaurants in northern Italy.  This dish was terrific.

​Barbera is not the wine that I grew to really enjoy some years ago with food, mostly Italian-themed food.  The wine now is different: it’s bigger, bolder, and more alcoholic.  The food that pairs well with it with more than a little different, too.
 
Years ago, Barbera wines – made entirely from the Barbera grape and mostly all in the region of Piedmont northwestern Italy – were made in very high quantities and drank in copious amounts in northern Italy.  It was a fairly light-bodied wine with a bit of cherry fruit, very low tannins, a bit of Italian earthiness, and a plentiful amount of acidity, its more noticeable characteristic.  Barbera was a wine that screamed out for food.  In fact, I rarely enjoyed the wines without something to eat.
 
In the past quarter century or so, Barbera has seen a number of changes, driven by the desire to improve the quality, most notably for the Barberas in the Asti area.  Many of the growers began lowering yields to do that.  Clones from a university in nearby Turin during the 1980s added more ripeness, lower acidity, and more phenols (these include flavonoids that can affect the mouthfeel and color of the wine; tannins are one).  Malolactic fermentation began to be used that drove down the acidity.  Then oak aging grew, though much less new oak is used now than 10-15 years ago, much better to highlight the distinct character of Barbera, and welcome improvement in my mind.  In the field, locations for the vineyards got better.  This was much more the case in the Asti region, as for Barbera d’Alba, the best vineyards go to Nebbiolo, mostly for Barolo and Barberesco.
 
And, very significantly, “everyone has to worry about global warming and its effect on alcohol levels,” which was a common refrain I heard in my several days around Asti on a trip sponsored in part by consortium for the wines of Barbera dAsti a couple of months ago.  The impact of the increasingly hotter planet has especially been felt in the the past 15 to 20 years, and Barbera, seemingly more so than other varietals, is especially susceptible to the growing alcohol levels.  In fact, of the all the Barberas I sampled there and since returning home, the lowest alcohol level I’ve had has been 13.5% and that was just once or twice.  As much wine, I like to enjoy several glasses, and the difference between a wine that’s 12.5% and 15% can be felt a little too much for my taste.
 
Though the alcohol levels have risen appreciably, Barbera has made incredible strides in the last 10-15 years to paraphrase one of the speakers during my recent sojourn to Barbera-land.  The wines are more serious, richer and some can age quite nicely.  I still find that Barbera is more readily enjoyable in both of their major styles than Nebbiolo.  Barolos take time, Barberesco and even the Nebbiolo di Langhe, do, too.  The two different styles for Barbera d’Asti and for Barbera throughout is aging in stainless steel and aging in oak.  The former produces lighter wines with more fruit and more noticeable acidity; these are the wines reminiscent of the way the most Barbera used to be produced, just with higher quality – and more alcohol.  The oak-aged ones will often have a tannic bite and a bigger body.  These are wines that can age and might need four or five years to really enjoy.  Both can exhibit the ripe fruit of raspberry and blackberry, and plum in hot vintages, cooking spices, and underbrush, and also leather with oak-aging.
 
As for foods, is more than an easy pairing for pizza and simple pasta dishes, and the oak-aged ones, Barbera d’Asti Superiore, will be too big for my tastes for most pizzas.  Both styles wines go well with the classic agnolotti del plin, with or without shaved fresh white truffles, and the Superiore went better with their Piedmontese version of pot roast that was the main course for most of the meals.  Back home, there is more eating and drinking that I need to do.  While Barberas and the lighter versions still are not hefty enough to pair enjoyable with steak or lamb, the Superiores might do a good job.  These might even be a great pairing for the classic Texas beef brisket.  We’ll see.
 
But, in any case, Barberas remain very good values.  You can find a wine, which will be invariably well-made, usually for under $20 while the Superiores will run a few dollars more but rarely over $30.  These are definitely well worth picking up if you drink wine primarily as accompaniment to dinner, though Superiores, with a generally more rounded taste, can often be enjoyed solo, and so more appealing to non-Italians.  And, the USA is the biggest export market for the wines of Barbera d’Asti, so we are enjoying them in profusion. 

​For years my friend Jack had raved about the Friday lunch at Galatoire’s, the famed Creole restaurant that’s resided on Bourbon Street for over a hundred years, that he had visit often in the past when a case at the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals would bring him to the Crescent City.  He described it has “the best bar in New Orleans” when dining downstairs on a Friday afternoon.  Providing not only a very lively setting for an enjoyably boozy afternoon, Galatorie’s, most importantly, serves excellent, classic French-Creole fare with an emphasis on the fish and shellfish from the Gulf that they do an more-than-adept job in procuring and preparing, with no shyness in utilizing butter and cream.  I finally got to have a Friday lunch downstairs last week.  It lived up to expectations.
 
The best way I can think to describe a Friday lunch at Galatoire’s is that it’s like the best reception that you’ll ever go to, albeit with a more nattily attired and boisterous group of fellow guests who all seem to be in a great mood eating far better food than you’ve ever had a reception served with much more attention and promptness; and those waiters bringing the alcoholic and caloric joy are the only ones who’ve consumed fewer than a half-dozen drinks.
 
We had reservations upstairs at 1:30 but upon arrival asked if we could be seated in the main dining room.  It wasn’t a problem if our large group didn’t mind waiting for an hour or so, and we could while away the time at their bar next door.  Several cocktails later our table was ready in the still-full, mostly rectangular room that is the main dining room.  Another cocktail then wine.  Galatoire’s has an excellent wine list and I was very happy to find a Semillon-heavy white Bordeaux from Petite Sirene that was wonderful for just $40 a bottle.  It more than aptly complemented the Crab Maison – subtly decadent jumbo lump crabmeat in a Creole aioli studded with capers – shrimp remoulade and fried oysters en brochette start along with their lighter version of turtle soup and then the terrific Lemon Fish (or cobia or ling) lightly dusted in flour and then sautéed in a surfeit of butter and topped with a fair amount of impeccably fresh crabmeat.  The meal was absolutely delicious, the highlight for me was the cobia from the Gulf, which was clean-tasting, mild yet flavorful, delicate and delightful, with the butter going very well with the fish.  A white Sancerre from Pascal Jolivet for just over $50 and a trio of American Cabernets did well for others, as did their dishes.  Everything was very much enjoyed.  The loud conversions were only interrupted by bites and sips.  I don’t believe that we left the restaurant before 5:30. 
 
Snaring a table in the main dining room on the first floor is not an easy thing to do, especially when traveling that day from out of town.  No reservations are taken.  You have to wait in line for a table.  Or, you can pay someone to wait in line for you, as many regulars seem to do.  When heading to New Orleans last year I made an early flight just so I could wait in line at Galatoire’s.  My Lyft driver got hit when heading to the airport, so I missed my flight and we had to fall back on the reservations I made for upstairs.  Lunch upstairs was great, if like a normal, if excellent upscale restaurant with a great pedigree.  But, when walking out at 4:00 past the still-full downstairs dining room, we could see the party that we were missing.  We were very happy that it worked out this time.
 
Galatoire’s
209 Bourbon Street (a block-and-a-half east of Canal), New Orleans, (504) 525-2021
galatoires.com

​I first enjoyed the Bavarian-style beers at the Crescent City Brewhouse not too long after it opened in 1991 in the French Quarter, and enjoyed them over the years when traveling to New Orleans.  I had a couple last year, my first trip back to the city in a number of years, and was pleasantly surprised that this brewpub on busy, touristy Decatur Street was still open.  I was even more surprised at the quality of the beers, which seemed even much better than I remembered.  The two beers that I had were terrific.  They were again last weekend.
 
The pilsner I ordered was properly crisp, clean-tasting and quite flavorful with a light, Germanic hop aroma.  It tasted better than the Munich pilsners that I remembered from there (I like the broadly similar Helles, style more in Munich; the Czechs do those delicately perfumed and nuanced pilsners much better in my opinion).  The pilsner was excellent, and perfect after traipsing around the Quarter for the previous hour.  After finishing the half-liter pour – the only size they serve it seems – I had their version of the Vienna-style lager, the Red Stallion.  Medium-bodied with its copper color denoting a good malt presence, lightly hopped, it was a very pleasant pint-plus.  I didn’t enjoy it as much as the pilsner, but still a nice beer that was obviously very well made. All of the beers are made in house utilizing the large, attractive copper vessel set behind the bar and according to the Reinheitsgebot, the German purity law of 1516.  Only malt, hops, yeast and water are used in the beers, helping ensure some level of clarity of flavors.
 
In addition to the Pilsner and Red Stallion, the Crescent City Brewhouse always has a Weiss, a Bavarian-style hefe-weizen, and the Black Forest on tap, plus a seasonal beer in a range of styles.  I tasted my brother’s Weiss.  With prominent aromas of banana, it did not taste like one of the sweeter hefe-weizens that I expected, but was a bit drier and more balanced and an excellent version of the style and perfect for those many warm and humid months in New Orleans.  I didn’t sample the Black Forest, which is described as a beer that’s “rich…malty…sparsely hopped, in the traditional Munich style” which sounds a lot like the Dunkel style that’s a feature of all of the Munich breweries.
 
I find it amazing that a brewpub in the French Quarter, just a couple of blocks from Jackson Square, serves such top-quality beer.  The beers are a good deal better than they need to be.  As people seem to especially enjoy beers made on site, brewpubs can usually get by with mediocre or even awful beers, the buzz of the pub, and the alcoholic beers, helps to obscure the handiwork of less-than-skilled brewmasters.  And, that the Crescent City Brewhouse is doing it with lagers is even more impressive, as lagers, especially lighter-bodied and light-colored are very difficult to brew well on a consistent basis.  There are not too many small breweries in this country that are doing it well.  Few, are doing it as well as is done in the French Quarter.
 
The Crescent City Brewhouse is definitely worth a detour for fans of Bavarian-style lagers.  Easy to drop in and out, there is often a jazz band playing near the entrance and bar.  The quartet featuring an alto sax, bass, drums and, somewhat oddly, an electric guitar, was first-rate last weekend with a fresh, if mid-century sound well removed from Dixieland.  If you don’t have time to sit for pint, you can always get a cup to go dispensed at a counter facing the sidewalk.  And, you’ll likely be drinking something better – certainly more pure – than those other tourists with their plastic cups.
 
Crescent City Brewhouse
527 Decatur Street (two blocks southwest of Jackson Square in the French Quarter)
New Orleans, Louisiana 70130, (504) 522-0571
crescentcitybrewhouse.com

​A few hours before flying out from New Orleans last weekend, I did what I usually do before departing the Crescent City, I joined the queue of tourists in the old Central Grocery on Decatur Street in the French Quarter to purchase a muffuletta (or muffaletta in the more common spelling) to take home for dinner that night and a meal the next day.  One of the two great Italian-American cold sandwiches along with the sub or hoagie, I’ve long enjoyed the muffuletta from where it was created over a century ago.  Still largely a local and somewhat regional treat, it might be the most enjoyable and significant contribution to New Orleans’s culinary legacy from its Sicilian immigrants. 
 
The sandwich takes its name from the distinctive, dense circular loaf about 9--inches in diameter also called a muffuletta. The loaf is sliced horizontally and filled with deli ham, mortadella, salami, slices of provolone and the olive salad that sets it apart that has pieces of Kalamata and green olives, bits of carrots and tiny tops of cauliflower soaked in olive oil.  The ingredients are nothing special, supermarket-quality at best, aside from the bread, but the muffuletta from the Central Grocery is more than the sum of its parts, especially after a few hours when the olive oil seeps well into the loaf and the diverse and complementary component flavors began to meld some and the sandwich warms.
 
The muffuletta is one of the minority of popular American preparations where the creator is clearly known.  It was created at the Central Grocery sometime after it opened in 1906 by owner Salvatore Lupo.  Located near the French Market and the wharves, it was a popular stop for the immigrant Sicilian dock workers and truck farmers to make their lunch.  His customers would purchase the meats, cheese, olive salad, which is traditional in much of Sicily, and bread.  They ate these separately, in the Italian style.  Without much in the way of space to eat in the small store, Lupo, seemingly taking a cue from the American habit, introduced these typically purchased group of items combined as a sandwich. Customers quickly took to the creation, which was named after its bread, which is originally from Piana degli Albanesi – or Piana degli Greci until 1941 – an ethnic Albanian community that is fifteen miles from Palermo, where this bread also popular, especially as a treat on the Day of the Dead on November 2.  Interestingly, the sandwich is always cut in quarters and since the loaf is fairly large, a normal order is two quarters. A full order is half a muffuletta, something in line with the welcome quirkiness of New Orleans, alcohol-fueled or otherwise.
 
Central Grocery
923 Decatur, New Orleans, Louisiana 70116
(504) 523-1620
centralgrocery.com

​One of the many famous dishes originating in New Orleans is Barbecue Shrimp; in my opinion, also one of the very tastiest ever created in an Italian-themed restaurant in this country.  Barbecue Shrimp were first cooked at Pascal’s Manale, a restaurant in business since 1913.  Its heritage is Italian – Manale, after all – and it still advertises itself as “Italian-Creole.”  But, like most Italian-named eateries in the New Orleans area, the Creole is far more prevalent than the Italian.
 
I had it this past weekend at Mr. B’s Bistro, the long-standing Brennan family restaurant in the French Quarter that I had not visited in years.  Though service was something less than prompt and professional, surprising at a Brennan restaurant, the barbecue shrimp were terrific, and terrifically messy.  Thankfully, plastic bibs are provided, an unsightly necessity. 
 
A few things about this garlickly and buttery preparation are unusual when remembering that it was devised at an Italian restaurant.  Though delicious, it hardly registers as Italian or even Italian-American, to be honest.  It is Creole.  “Barbecue” is a complete misnomer.  The shrimp are not barbecued, or even grilled.  The shrimp are actually baked.  Also, it takes its inspiration from Chicago.  It was created at the restaurant in the 1950s after a customer raved about recently having the well-known Shrimps de Jonghe in Chicago.  Yes, Chicago once had a renowned shrimp dish.
 
As flavorful as the dish is, it is also surprisingly easy, and great for parties, since most of the work is done beforehand.  It can be a little, or a lot, messy, which can make it fun for informal get-togethers.  The recipe below is from The Guide to Ridiculously Easy Entertaining.   It comes from my co-author, Michael Wells, who is originally from New Orleans. 
 
New Orleans-Style Barbecue Shrimp
 
Serves – 8 to 10
 
Ingredients: 
Large shrimp (uncooked & heads-on) – 4 to 6 pounds
Butter – 3 sticks (24 tablespoons)
Olive Oil – ½ cup (4 ounces)
Garlic – 4 cloves, finely chopped
Bay Leaves – 2, crumbled
Lemon Juice – 4 tablespoons; use juice from freshly squeezed lemons
Worcestershire sauce – 2 tablespoons
Flat-Leaf Parley – 1 tablespoon, finely chopped
Oregano, dried – 2 teaspoons
Paprika – 2 teaspoons
Cayenne Pepper – 2 teaspoons
Louisiana-style Hot Sauce – 1 teaspoon
Black Pepper, freshly ground – 2 teaspoons
Chili Sauce – ½ cup (4 ounces)
Lemons – 2, thinly sliced
 
Cooking Steps: 

1. Melt the butter in a large saucepan over medium-low heat.  When butter is melted stir in all of the contents, except for the shrimp.  Simmer for 10 minutes.
2. Place the shrimp in a large baking dish and then pour the butter mixture over it.  Cover it with plastic wrap and then store in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours.  The longer the better.
3. Preheat the oven to 300°F (149°C).
4. When nearly ready for your guests, put in the oven at 300°F (149°C) and cook for 20 to 30 minutes.

 
To Serve: 
Serve with steamed rice and crusty French or Italian bread.  For more casual settings, the bread alone will suffice.


A side of the delicious barbecue shrimp at Mr. B's Bistro in New Orleans

​Last week my brother texted that he had just spotted the Austin-brewed Celis Raspberry at his local HEB in Katy for the first time, but did not see their Grand Cru.  I responded that I hadn’t seen it in the area since I had it just over a year ago at an event at The Hay Merchant with owner Christine Celis to publicize the introduction of the relaunched brewery’s products into the Houston market.  The Grand Cru was absolutely delicious that evening, even better than I had remembered during the Celis’s initial go-round in the last decade of the last century.
 
I was surprised to happen across Celis Grand Cru in cans yesterday at the Spec’s flagship store on Smith Street, the first time I had seen the beer in Houston, either in stores or on in bars or restaurants since that release party.  I had to pick up a six-pack. 
 
I’m especially glad that I did, as I ended up having few friends over in the afternoon.  Along with the Grand Cru, I had several beers from other small breweries to share.  The Grand Cru was wide favorite among all four of us, and clearly also the best made beer to me.  Fittingly described by the brewery as featuring “a combination of full rich taste with fruity and spicy accents,” it tasted like a true and delicious Belgian tripel, with a hint of citrus and tropical fruitiness and a welcome subtleness and complexity, finishing with a long, smooth aftertaste.  Made with plenty of light malts to bring it to a substantial 8.6% alcohol, in line with the style, but it nicely doesn’t taste nearly as hefty.  The combination of Saaz and Cascade hops add some aroma and spicy bitterness – it’s only around 20 IBUs – and the ground coriander seeds and dried orange peel add to the fruit notes.  It’s also “made with the same special yeast strain used in the original 1965 recipe,” helping it retain some of the character of its predecessor, Hoegaarden Grand Cru, that Christine Celis’s father, the legendary brewer Pierre Celis, created a half-century ago.  Famed beer writer Michael Jackson called that beer “outstanding” and “a liqueur of the beer world,” which might well apply to its newest incarnation that’s now available in Houston.
 
Celis Grand Cru
$9.78 per six-pack at Spec’s   

​As with many Houstonians, my first taste of chimichurri sauce was at Churrascos, where the bright green, oily salsa was a wonderful accompaniment to the long, thin plantain chips that were a great way to start a meal there.  But for a more traditionally South American and complex version, in Houston it’s tough to beat the chimichurri sauce at Saldivia’s that is placed on every table and complements nearly everything that I order there.
 
After too long of an absence, I had dinner last weekend at Saldivia’s where I ladled heaping amounts of their nearly addictive, rustic-style chimicurri sauce – a mixture of mostly olive oil, vinegar, bits of garlic, parsley leaves and short stems, oregano, I believe, and scattered red pepper flakes – over the fresh, crusty rolls to start, trying vainly not to eat too many slices before what would invariably be a big steak dinner.  Then it found its way over the sweetbreads, which were terrific that night, the blood sausage, chorizo and a couple of different types of empanadas that had started the procession from the kitchen.  When my main course featuring an entraña arrived with its smattering a chimichurri sauce, I instinctively had to apply some more to the always delicious grilled skirt steak, making it more to my tastes.  And the chimichurri sauce made the accompanying grilled vegetables that much better, of course.  I ended up leaving a few small puddles of sauce on the table as much and as greedily as I was using it. 
 
The ability for this sauce to make nearly everything tastier has certainly been noticed by others.  I read on a couple different sites proclaiming the incredible versatility of chimichurri sauce, including one that claimed it might be the most versatile sauce, period.  I can’t think of another one that matches its utility off the top of my head.
 
Contrasting the chimichurri sauce at Saldivia’s versus the one at Churrascos, Saldivia’s hues toward the traditional recipe that is found in Argentina and Uruguay, where the proprietors of Saldivia’s hail, while Churrascos founders are from Nicaragua, and those restaurants use a simpler version that is used there, which seems to be an adaption of what originated in Argentina and Uruguay.  The differences in the chimichurris are that the Uruguayan / Argentine recipe calls for the tastier flat-leaf parsley versus the curly parsley, uses red wine vinegar instead of white, and includes oregano and red pepper flakes, and probably more garlic, than the sauce at Churrascos.  Those additional and different ingredients, plus a lifelong familiarity with the sauce, give the version at Saldivia’s a greater depth of flavor and versality.  It’s just better at Saldivia’s.
 
Saldivia’s South American Grill
10850 Westheimer (between Walnut Bend and Westheimer), Houston, 77042, (713) 782-9494
saldivias.com