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 REWRITING THE MENU
It's happening on the South Side and in Shadyside. Up on Mount Washington and out in Fox Chapel. In Oakland, in the Strip, in Bloomfield, all around town. Each week, it seems, a new restaurant opens. What's going on here? Are we having a Pittsburgh restaurant renaissance? ``That's a good way to describe it,'' says Glenn Hawley, who has just invested an estimated $750,000 to $1 million to open Monterey Bay Fish Grotto - Mount Washington. Whatever you call it, it's good news for people who enjoy eating out. Pittsburgh has long been known as a spaghetti and meatballs town, heavy on the red sauce, and served up in giant portions. Now we're getting more variety and, if you want it, some very fahncy food. His Honor and I had - would you believe it? - wonderful foie gras the other night at Lucca in Oakland. At Pazzo Vino, a new spot in the Strip, the waitress brought a complimentary bowl of tapenade, the trendy ripe olive spread. And it was just as good as any we've had in New York City. We're also getting more contemporary dishes, more fresh fish, simply prepared, and more fresh vegetables. The best new restaurants would not think of serving frozen or canned green beans. Perish the thought! Italian restaurants still abound in Pittsburgh (as in other parts of the country), but we're getting more choices - more Mexican, Chinese, contemporary, even nostalgic old Pittsburgh food. Hardly anyone wants to dress up to go out to dinner any more, so most of the restaurants are casual. At one time, Grandview Avenue on Mount Washington was Pittsburgh's Restaurant Row. Now we have clusters of restaurants on the South Side, Shadyside, the Strip, and in the Cultural District, Downtown. Within a block of each other on Ellsworth Avenue in Shadyside, Soba Lounge, Saybrook Fish House and Fajita Grill have opened in recent months. Still more restaurants are coming. On the South Side, James A. Blandi II of Le Mont is about to open Viaggio on East Carson Street Nov. 7. It won't be a clone of his Mount Washington restaurant, but will specialize in ``Venetian cuisine with a flair of the Mediterranean,'' he says. Viaggio will be an upscale, casual restaurant, Blandi says. Dinners will average $30, and lunches, $15. Franco D'Amico is about to reopen Bravo! Franco, across from Heinz Hall. The DoubleTree Hotel has a big fish restaurant/market in the works. The old Franco's in Scott will soon reopen, under new management. The list goes on. But there's a saying in the restaurant business: ``For every five restaurants that open, three close.'' Indeed, Lucca replaces the old Cafe Azure, Viaggio is in the old Caffe Giovanni building, Taste of China in Fox Chapel replaces Chopsticks (which replaced Anna Kao's), and Monterey Bay-Mount Washington has moved into the old Christopher's space. The new restaurants, though, are not quite like those they replaced. Here are first impressions, just a tasting of several restaurants that have opened recently. Full reviews will follow in the months to come.
Two medical doctors - Frank Costa and Richard Raizman - are in partnership with chef Stephen Malfatti at this European-inspired restaurant. They repainted, installed new carpeting and a new awning, but otherwise it looks a lot like the old Cafe Azure. The food and prices are on the scale of Cafe Allegro and Baum Vivant. Osso bucco at $20 is a big seller on the a la carte menu. Malfatti groupies who liked his food at the Iron Butterfly and the Vista will recognize some of the menu items, such as sweet yellow bell pepper soup ($5). Another appetizer, seared Hudson Valley foie gras, is a must if you like foie gras and can ante up the $14. It's rarely seen on Pittsburgh menus. Malfatti serves a thick piece, rich and silky smooth, atop a bed of thinly sliced Bosc pear. With a currant demi-glace, it's a grand combination of flavors. Lucca has a pastry chef, another rarity in Pittsburgh restaurants. Bridgett Engle came from Bacco, a Brennan restaurant in New Orleans, for the job. Her fiance, Anthony Zallo, who also worked at Bacco, assists Malfatti as co-chef. Engle makes all the desserts but one, and that one is imported from Italy, Malfatti says. You can't go wrong with her creme brulee Bridgette. She spreads the smooth, creamy custard between layers of crisp filo, finishing it off with apricot and kiwi. 317 S. Craig St., Oakland, 682-3310.
If you've been to Hawley's other restaurant, the Monterey Bay Fish Grotto in Monroeville, you know exactly what to expect from the new one on Mount Washington. The menu, the prices and the $10-above-cost wine list are identical. If you had been to Christopher's in its heyday, you know how spectacular the view is, too. The restaurant space has been extensively remodeled (it took 7 1/2 months), and now has a tropical look. When you go, be sure to check out the lounge on the floor below the dining room and the stunning wine room, if it's not in use. The Monterey Bay concept is based on fresh fish - about 22 varieties every day, five of them from Hawaii. The fish is charcoal-grilled 70 percent of the time; the rest is sauteed. With it you get a salad or soup, and a choice of the fresh vegetable of the day, a wild rice blend or red-skinned potatoes. Dinner prices range from $10.95 to $22.95. Michael Fischetti, formerly of the DoubleTree, is chef. Hawley, who opened his first Pittsburgh restaurant six years ago, is enthusiastic about the concept he has developed. ``It could go to any city, just like Morton's and Ruth's Chris,'' he says. His Mount Washington business so far has surpassed expectations, he says, and the inceased traffic on Grandview Avenue should help other restaurants there. 1411 Grandview Ave, Mount Washington, 481-4414.
James A. Frye founded the Italian Oven chain, saw it grow to 110 restaurants in 17 states and Australia, then was deposed when it slid into Chapter 11 bankruptcy. Now he's ready to try it again. With money from local and out-of-town investors, plus the backing of Jules Troiani of Papa J's, Frye has opened Rome on the Range. The big (225 seats) steak and pasta restaurant takes up four bays in the old produce building that was all Papa J's Mercato at this time last year. The Mercato, a concept that never really caught on, is still there, but reduced in size. Frye won't say how much was spent in refurbishing his end of the building, but it's impressive. A Peter Calaboyias sculpture, Remington sculptures depicting the old West, black and white cowhide-covered booths in one area, with bleached long horn steer skulls on the wall, and a room with clouds on the ceiling. A lounge and cigar room on the second floor, a room where youngsters can eat and watch television, a cafe along the street side with rosemary and basil growing in boxes on the railing. Every area is different. The food is pretty much what you would expect from the name - several pasta dinners, for $8.99 to $11.99, some seafood, and big cuts of beef and other meats, $13.99 to $19.99. At lunch, lower-priced sandwiches, salads and pizzas are featured. Pasta with marinara sauce comes in a big bowl, coffee in huge cups. Frye himself is the chef. The biggest hit on the menu, he says, is the spuds sundae. Ingredients are a secret until it's delivered to your table. This much he'll reveal: there are no spuds in the spuds sundae, and he dreamed the whole concoction up himself. Frye says he was intent on giving Pitttsburgh something the city has never had before, and wanted the setting to be entertaining and a little whimsical. He chose the Strip because he believes it is one of the hippest places in town, and the spaces in the old buildings are big. Rome on the Range, 1900 Smallman St., the Strip, 434-7607.
Another corner of the Papa J's Mercato building has become Pazzo Vino, a place where you can walk in for a glass of vino, maybe have something from the raw bar, or stay for dinner. The list of wines by the glass is long and inviting. His Honor and I stopped by one warm evening, sipped glasses of Montinore, a pleasant Oregon pinot noir, and hated to leave. The wine was $5.75 for a generous pour. The server brought a selection of chunks of bread, white and dark, and a bowl of that good tapenade to have with it. Pazzo Vino - or crazy wine - is run by the Troiano family. 20th and Smallman St., the Strip, 261-7272.
This isn't just another Chinese restaurant. It has some different items, like minced chicken with pine nuts and ginger chicken. It's also entirely smoke-free, has a modest wine list with prices just $10 above cost, and nightly entertainment. What it didn't have the night we dropped in was chopsticks at the place settings. You have to ask for them. (The color of the chopsticks package clashed with the dark green napkins, owner Tom Ng says. As soon as he gets some new pink napkins, chopsticks will be at the place settings.) Taste of China is doing a thriving take-out business, judging from the number of people who came to pick up their orders what night while we were waiting for my ``whole crispy fish'' to be prepared to order. We had crabmeat dumplings to munch on while we waited, too. They were crisp and tasty, but with a cream cheese/crab filling, didn't seem really Chinese. The whole fish, a sea bass, arrived in 20 minutes, with a tangy sweet sauce all over the top. The translucent flesh fell off the bones as the waitress did a superb boning job. For this dish, the fish must be really fresh, and it was. All this and ``Tea for Two'' from the keyboard, too - another Americanization that's easy to accept. Ng has another restaurant, Jaya in Shadyside. Business there has been ``up and down,'' he says. But he has high hopes for this location. 1038 Freeport Road, Fox Chapel, 782-3010.
Since 1989, Fajita Grill was known as possibly the best Mexican restaurant around. But it was in Pleasant Hills. Nice for the people in Pleasant Hills, but for the rest of us . . . Owner Shahrokh Nevisi closed the restaurant last November and reopened in recent weeks in a former, two-story antiques store in Shadyside. He's not surprised to notice that his first customers had familiar faces. ``An old survey told us that 55 to 60 percent of our customers in Pleasant Hills were coming from the Shadyside, Squirrel Hill and Bloomfield area,'' he says. Those old customers are finding an expanded menu, but including many of the dishes they knew and loved, and higher prices. Costs are higher in the city, Nevisi says. His wife, Mirthia, who is Mexican, is the chef. Other cooks who worked with them in Pleasant Hills are returning. More of the sauces made at the old restaurant will soon be back on the menu. I'm particularly fond of Mirthia's mole, a smooth, rich, dark reddish-brown sauce that has a little chocolate as well as chilies, is medium-hot but not sweet. It's great with chicken dishes on the menu. Fajita Grill has dishes from various parts of Mexico. 5865 Ellsworth Ave., Shadyside, 362-3030.
You can also get mole at this new, tiny Mexican restaurant. Mago Latino's version is a little redder, a little hotter, and is served over shredded chicken. Take your choice. The menu is here is a little simpler, but has all those dishes we expect in a Mexican restaurant. Typical is the generous five-enchilada dinner. Each enchilada has a different filling, but with all the sauce, sour cream, etc. on top, it all blends into one. The staff is Mexican and most accommodating. The restaurant has been open only four months but is so good owner Oscar Bermudez is getting ready to break down a wall and expand into the room next door. 4627 Liberty Ave., Bloomfield, 681-5065.
Owner Lou Bucci is the first to admit it: The food at the Temperanceville Tavern is not ambitious. But he's enthusiastic about the possibilities of the West End, and he thinks ``the market is ready for some new stuff.'' If you go, take your sense of humor. Specialties range from a chipped ham barbecue ``sammich,'' bigger and sloppier than I remember them, to black bean chili. Try to eat at one of the tables in the bar, facing the elaborately decorated big back bar. It's 34 feet long, and contains a lot of things Bucci rescued from other people's garbage. The shark, however, is from the original Temperanceville Tavern on this spot. Bucci added the cigar and the legs sticking out of the wall. The mannequin in the window is West End Wendy, named for a legendary regular customer in the old days. There is also a refurbished dining room. The best dish we've had is an appetizer, the peel-and-eat shrimp. We devoured the hot shrimp, then finished off all the broth by dipping pieces of bread into it. The broth is really Iron City beer and Old Bay seasoning; no wonder it is so good! 424 S. Main St., West End, 920-1300. -- Review by Woodene Merriman, Post-Gazette Dining Critic
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Lucca