OK, we've been gone a while. A trip to the Jersey shore with lots of yummy clambakes. Now we're back in LA-LA land, and decided to go out to dinner tonight to the newest restaurant in our neighborhood. Anything with the name "Positano" in the title, where the owners are from Florence, and everything is supposed to be fresh-fresh-fresh, sign us up!
Locanda Positano opened 3 months ago in a tiny space that used to be a dingy Mexican restaurant. It's on a less-than scenic strip of Lincoln Blvd. in Marina del Rey, a few doors down from Walgreen's. (In fact, we recommend parking in the Walgreen's lot, because parking in their lot is dodgy at best.) Make a reservation on
opentable.com, because there are only 10 tables in the restaurant. The inside is decorated in shades of pale yellow and cream. It's quite charming, but the tables are very close together. You'll be greeted with a hearty "Buona Sera" when you walk through the door, and it seems like everyone working in the restaurant speaks Italian better than English. There are a few nightly specials written on a small chalkboard. We had to try the melone prosciutto with fresh mozzarella. In fact, we ate it so quickly, Laura forgot to take a picture! The melon was succulent, and the mozzarella was perfect.
We don't know our way around Italian wines as well as we do around California wines, so we asked our server for a recommendation. We love a big Amarone, but their least expensive Amarone was $88 on the wine menu. The server really didn't know what she was talking about, but recommended a Brunello that she said was similar to the Amarone. It was $60.
We weren't blown away by the wine...it was too licorice-tasting and acidic, but you can't win them all. This wine was also available but the glass, so we would have been better served by being offered a taste first before committing to the full bottle.
For our second appetizer, Laura ordered the artichoke salad and Mike ordered the simple insalata mista. Mike thought his salad was over-salted, and Laura didn't like the fact that they put red onions on the salad, because she is allergic to red onion. However, the artichoke salad -- in Italian the
Carciofini Con Scaglie di Parmigiano e Arugola di Campo-- ($11.50) did not disappoint. It was quite unique and delicious. It was dressed with olive oil, lemon, salt, pepper and parmesan. It also came with a little bit of rocket (arugula) and some purple cherry tomatoes. Yum! Laura ate every bit of it as well.
For our entrees, we stuck with our favorites. Laura ordered the linguine con vongole ($18), because as she has said before, she can tell a good Italian restaurant from a bad one based on how they make either linguine vongole or a veal piccata. Mike got the seafood risotto -- the Risotto Positano -- for $20. Both our our seafood was a little disappointing. We both had a few soft and gritty pieces of clams or mussels.
The risotto was not cooked to perfection. It tasted a little bit like a rice pudding! So, both our entrees missed the mark a bit.
We were full after meal, so didn't have room for dessert. Still, dinner was $150 plus tip. Not cheap.
We couldn't help but compare Locanda Positano to
Mosto Enoteca, which is right at the end of our street in an incredibly unimpressive strip mall. If anyone reading this has ever come to visit us, we have taken them to Mosto, and have never had a bad meal there. While we are always in favor of supporting local businesses, I think the next time we're craving Italian, we're going to blow our $150 at Mosto....
Our meal deserved a killer wine. We paired it with the Mesa Reserve Syrah from Zaca Mesa, an incredible central coast winery on Foxen Canyon Road in Los Olivos. This particular vintage ... 100% syrah, ...726 cases produced ... 93 points from Wine Enthusiast .... delicious and smooth as silk. Deep and dark in color with flavors of blackberries and smoky oak, it retails for $42 a bottle and can be enjoyed now or over the next 10 - 12 years.
