Taste This Tours

-Belle Isle Seafood
-El Paisa
-Angela's Café
-Rincon Limeno
-Rino's
-Rosticeria Cancun

Question - What do the places on this list have in common?

Answer - They're all restaurants located in East Boston that I've been wanting to try, and that I have yet to try.

Actually, the only times I've found myself out in East Boston has been for visits to Logan Airport, that is, until this past Memorial Day weekend! On Saturday, I took the Eastie Eats Tour with the newly inaugurated Taste This Tours, which happened to combine a few of my favorite things - walking, eating, photo taking, all bundled into the opportunity to experience a new (to me) neighborhood!

Our journey began after our 1pm meet up with a pleasant water taxi ride to East Boston, and was followed soon after with the very first taste of the tour, hand delivered by Laura, our tour guide - donuts from Betty Ann's.



Some cool sights along the way...

The various food stops:

Unfortunately, Dough's was closed that day, but Laura had forewarned us of this, and gave us the option of rescheduling, which we declined.

With the last stop to go, a light rain began falling. But that did not dampen our spirits!

Our intrepid and well-prepared tour guide Laura!

By the end of our afternoon's adventures, we were satiated both in tummy and in mind, and astonished to realize that we had covered 5 miles, because it sure didn't feel like it!

If you are looking for something to do, or some new way to entertain some out of town guests, Taste This Tours is a very good option! Check out their Facebook page or their Twitter page to see if there's an active discount.

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Boston-MA/Taste-This-Tours/199534271535?v=wall
http://twitter.com/tastethistours

The Big Night @ Grotto

Curious was how I felt as I descended into the Beacon Hill basement that houses Grotto. I have previously visited this establishment once a number of years ago, so I was aware of its petite size and tasty cuisine. However, I had recently attended my first Big Night feast at La Morra and so I wondered how Grotto's would compare.

Right away, we were offered our choice of the red or white wines of the day. For $70, your meal included all the wine you could wish. However, being the lightweight that I am, I opted for the $50 (post-tax!) wineless option.

A pleasant selection of appetizers were displayed on a table along the wall - Caprese salad, goat cheese crostini, cured meats. It was a nice variety, and tasty to boot! Self-serve, I began with a small portion of each, and enjoyed them along with the lovely bread I found once we settled ourselves at our choice of seats at one of the two long communal tables. It was a savory sort of bread with a pleasantly crisp and salty crust.

I recognized the chef owner, despite his distinct lack of kitchen wear, when he greeted us and suggested that we treat this meal more like a marathon than a sprint. This was then followed by the quick eye catching presentation of the unsliced timpano and a whole roasted pig.

The servers brought out these huge white bowls, which initially caused some trepidation... but no, it turned out they were not overly-whelmingly filled with chicken consomme with carrots and extruded ziti rather than handrolled. Unfortunately, I did not care for this course as the stock was not very fowl flavored despite being strong flavored, the carrots retained a raw taste and texture, and the ziti was on the undercooked side of al dente.

Next were the risottos, served individually from serving platters - shortrib and wild mushroom, seafood (with whole shrimp and lobster chunks, unlike the movie's version with no visible bits), pesto (creamy green). My personal preference were seafood, followed closely by the shortrib, then finally the pesto.

Plates of timpano were served in these huge slices that I declined to finish in order to save room for the remaining courses. The version here was pretty basic, with the pastry shell being filled with tube pasta mixed with a ground meat sauce.

A platter of well-prepared, tasty vegetables were set out one platter per four diners - asparagus, a variety of mushrooms, brussel sprouts, mashed potato, spinach. Then the servers wandered around serving a variety of meats from their full platters: beef tenderloin prepared medium (tender!), prosciutto wrapped duck breast stuffed with apple, salmon, scallop with mushroom, chicken parmesan (thick and tender), and finally the missing pork! Most of the proteins were tender and tasty, but unfortunately, the intended star (in my opinion, the pig) was covered with a rather tough and chewy skin.

Dessert was simple yet tasty and the perfect end to a full and very good meal - whipped cream with berries.

I won! I won?

It was with trepidation that I greeted the news that I had won a pair of general admission tickets to the Great American Food and Music Fest, "a one-day event celebrating the rich traditions of classic American fare and music" that will be held at the Gillette Stadium in Foxborough on Saturday, June 26, 2010.

I had done some searching on the web in the meantime, and had discovered how poorly run and unfortunate the first Fest had been out in California last year, with massive lines of folk waiting hours (yes, that plural "s" was intentional) before the limited number of food purveyors, while the wristband payment system crashed, and food supplies dwindled much too fast.

Not to mention that the VIP All Access Tickets (the only tickets for the 2010 East Coast event that was inclusive of food) cost $1,200. Yes, that is no typo - this was the price noted on both the Fest's own webpage (www.greatamericanfoodandmusicfest.com/) and at their TicketMaster webpage (www.ticketmaster.com/event/010044A70C86B329). So my freebie tickets (valued at $32.50 (supposedly), $42.50 (Advance), or $52.50 (Day of Show) depending on how you look at it) did not actually include any food at this food and music fest. Yeah, I was sort of bummed.

What I had won was:
Admission to the Fest including all performances, demos and seminars and entertainment (except Grand Tasting & All Access areas) - Parking Included.

Restaurants participating (listed alphabetically) are:
All Star Sandwich Bar - Cambridge, MA
Al's Beef - Chicago, IL
Goldie's Churros - Los Angeles, CA
Hell's Kitchen - Minneapolis, MN
Jim's Steaks - Philadelphia, PA
Johnson's Boucaniere - Lafayette, LA
Junior's Cheesecake - Brooklyn, NY
Maine Diner - Wells, ME
Neely's BBQ - Memphis, TN
Southside Market BBQ - Elgin, TX
Ted Drewes Custard - St. Louis, MO
Tony Lukes - Philadelphia, PA
Tucson Tamale Company - Tucson, AZ
Turtle Alley - Gloucester, MA
UNO Chicago Grill - Chicago, IL
Willie Mae's Scotch House - New Orleans, LA
Windy City Eats - East Weymouth, MA
Zoe's Cupcake Cafe - Teaneck, NJ

Performers as currently scheduled:
Tom Colicchio - Top Chef, Bravo
Buckwheat Zydeco
Paula Deen - Food Network
Melinda Doolittle - Season 6 American Idol Finalist
EepyBird - Diet Coke™ & Mentos™ geyser
Duff Goldman - Ace of Cakes, Food Network
Tony Luke -Tony Luke's, Phildelphia, PA
Southside Johnny & The Asbury Jukes
The Neelys - Food Network
The Stompers
Michael & Jane Stern - RoadFood.com
Gary Vaynerchuk - WineLibrary.com

To go or not to go? Well, it is a bit early to decide, after all it is a month away, and I still have to wait for the tickets to come in the mail first...

Prime Service!

I just wanted to give props to two wonderful waiters that I had the pleasure of being served by recently.

The first was at Sensing at 3 Battery Street in Boston in November 2009 - a special occassion restaurant located in a hotel, where entrees range from $26-36, where fresh utensils are provided with every course, where I was personally guided to the restroom (and what a restroom it was!). The highlight of the meal (outside of the swoon inducing pecan financiers, that is...) was the outstanding service provided by Isa, who treats all his customers as friends.

The second was at Not Your Average Joe's in Watertown in March 2010 - a creative casual restaurant located in the town center, where entrees are mainly American or Italian, but hint at Asian influences, where there's a kids menu, as well as a half-price happy hour in the bar area. There, we enjoyed the recommended tomato basil soup, and were provided with super attentive service by Anthony with the dark curly beard.

Two totally different dining experiences, yet each lifted up by outstanding service.

*** 6/2010 addition ***

At Aegean Restaurant in Framingham, we were waited on by the unfailingly patient, pleasant, and polite Marcie, who was responsive to the needs of our multi-aged party, and super-helpful in her recommendations at our request.