- Michael Gebert
- Meatballs, sausage, and neck-bone gravy
About the time three of us were munching on the house-made braunschweiger (pork liver) at Tete Charcuterie, we were talking about Formento’s, the upcoming Italian-American throwback/tribute place coming in December from the team behind the Bristol, which also partners (with the Boka Group) in Balena. For some guys who’ve been fairly cutting-edge, throwback Italian-American seems a funny move, but sitting on Randolph Street, the logic of it gets pretty clear. Here’s a dining neighborhood close to downtown, certainly drawing both business-dinner and prebasketball traffic, yet among the top-level places there’s almost nothing that’s normal dinner for business diners. Randolph to Fulton is foodie row, full of organ meats and weird fusions, from kimchi Reubens at Little Goat to headcheese at Tete to grilled sardines at Vera to moqueca at La Sirena to whatever’s going on at Next or G.E.B. In the midst of all that, comfy old-school Italian-American sounds like cranking money out of a pasta roller.
- Michael Gebert
- Caesar salad
I loved this supper-club part of the meal, clean flavors and presentation that showed off what American kitchens could do with first-class ingredients before chefs had to put their own stamp on everything. This is what James Beard was talking about, back in the day. But we hadn’t gotten to the grandma part of the meal yet.
