Francesco's Hole in the Wall

My family and I went to Francesco's Hole in the Wall restaurant in Northbrook, IL last night. I've never been too impressed with Italian food in greaterland Chicago, but this place is pretty for real. It's one of the smallest sit-down restaurants I've ever been to, which is quite interesting considering this is in the suburbs. It only has 16 small tables and has a very homey rustic charm. Normally they don't take reservations, but for whatever reason, they allowed my family and I to make a reservation last night. It's a good thing because the wait for everyone else around 7pm was a 45 minute to an hour wait.

To drink, I settled with a glass of Ruffino chianti red wine, which was very smooth and medium-bodied. For my entree, I decided on the osso buco served with a little bit of risotto on the side. As anyone familiar with Italian food knows, osso buco is typically of gigantic portions and is a very heavy and hearty dish. This was no different. I think I would've liked to have more bone marrow in mine, but the meat itself was cooked perfectly tender. The sauce had a natural strong flavor. It may have been on the salty side for me, but definitely not shockingly so.

I didn't get to try a lot of everything else, but the rest of my family ordered chicken vesuvio (supposedly one of their best dishes), linguine with shrimp arrabiata, lamb chops, and fried calamari. The fried calamari was probably among the best and most tender I've ever had, so I would definitely recommend that as an appetizer.

I'd definitely like to return to this restaurant and try one of their pastas. For anyone looking for solid food at a restaurant with character and atmosphere in the suburbs, I would definitely recommend Francesco's Hole in the Wall.

Francesco's Hole in the Wall
254 Skokie Boulevard
(between Frontage Rd & Lake Cook Rd)
Northbrook, IL 60062
(847) 272-0155

Da Andrea

When strolling in the West Village last week, Gabe and I decided to eat at Da Andrea on a whim. I had heard about this place on Chowhound, and I've seen it get compared to Bianca, a little Italian restaurant we went to way back in the day.

Da Andrea is very much a cute, little neighborhood restaurant with a very Italian rustic feel. From the moment I stepped in, I felt like I was transported back to my previous trips to Italy, minus the fact that I don't think anyone who worked there was actually Italian. But I was definitely feelin' the homey, rustic vibe.

After we decided what to order, we were given a basket of focaccia bread served with black olives in olive oil, which I enjoyed.



I got the Cavatelli with Fresh Salmon and Shrimp and in Light Pesto Sauce ($12.50). What I did not know when ordering this is that cavatelli is similar to gnocchi and that they look like mealworms. Aside from that, this was a really good dish. I was surprised by the amount of shrimp I got. There must have been around 10 well-sized shrimps that were cooked perfectly. I've never been a fan of fish in pasta, so I was actually happy that there wasn't much salmon in this pasta. The pesto sauce was slightly thicker than what I'm used to, but it was very good and not too heavy. Perhaps the only downside is that once the pasta started to cool towards the end, it started to taste very starchy which was sort of weird to me.


Gabe got the Squid Ink Tagliolini with Fresh Clams, Cherry Tomatoes, and White Wine ($12.50). I felt that this was the better pasta of the two. The pasta was perfectly fresh and al dente, there was a generous serving of clams, and the white wine sauce was quite tasty.

As you can see, the food here is very affordable. Our two pastas were the most expensive, believe it or not. I don't think I would go out of my way for this restaurant, especially since it's a bit far in the West Village, but it's definitely a great neighborhood restaurant that's affordable and reliable.

Da Andrea
557 Hudson St
New York, NY

Lupa

Gabe and I went to Lupa for our "Christmas Dinner." It's a Mario Batali restaurant, and Babbo (his most famed restaurant) is our favorite, so it was about time to try Lupa, which gets great reviews as well. It's much more casual than Babbo and is more of a trattoria specializing in Roman dishes. It is also much cheaper than Babbo, most likely due to the simpler food.

We settled on a bottle of medium-bodied red wine from Piemonte. I forgot to copy down the whole name, but I believe it's a 2004 Boroli Quattro Fratelli Barbera d'Alli. It was definitely a good recommendation by our waiter. The nice thing about Lupa is that they have a pretty good amount of wines under $40 which is considered relatively "cheap" in NYC restaurants. Our bottle was somewhere around $35. We were also given really tasty and moist foccacia bread with olive oil.

For our antipasti, we decided to have the Baccala with Potatoes&Lovage ($10). I'm assuming the lovage is the greens garnishing the baccala. Gabe and I love baccala, so that's why we picked this. This was a really enjoyable, tasty, and fresh antipasti served at room temperature. Lupa seems to have a great selection of antipasti. I think I'd be happy just sharing a few of them with someone as my whole meal.

I got the Ricotta Gnocchi with Sausage&Fennel ($15) for my primi. The serving is actually bigger than what many pictures indicate because it's served in such a huge bowl. I got this because it seems to be the favorite primi at Lupa, and it definitely lived up to its hype! The gnocchi was so soft and pillowy, not chewy or super heavy like other gnocchi. The sauce was perfect as well, though maybe I would have liked more sausage. This one was definitely a winner.


Gabe got the Bucatini All'Amatriciana ($15). Since we used Batali's recipe to make this dish ourselves for my birthday, it was interesting to compare our version to Lupa's. Lupa's was definitely better. The tomatoes were pureed, while ours were diced, but even so, somehow their tomato sauce was much tastier, most likely due to better/fresher/riper tomatoes rather than canned tomatoes haha. And of course the guanciale added a great flavor.


(Sorry, got a little excited and forgot to take a picture before we started eating it)
We shared the Saltimbocca ($17) for our secondi. According to the glossary, it's veal, prosciutto, and sage. This was such a flavorful dish, and the portion was really big. It shouldn't be for one person. It's definitely a unique dish - I recommend it for a secondi.

We were so full from our food that we didn't bother getting dessert. Overall, this is such a great restaurant with very simple Italian/Roman fare. I've read that their spaghetti al pomodoro is quite exceptional, and I think that's really saying a lot. That's the simplest dish ever, yet Lupa manages to make it stand out somehow with quality ingredients and cooking. Considering the quality of the food, really warm service/atmosphere, and even the reputation, the food really isn't expensive. You can spend the same amount on mediocre pasta at blah and even commercial/chain restaurants, so it's totally worth the trip to Lupa.

Please go to Lupa (as well as Babbo and Otto...I<3mario>

My 22nd birthday dinner with Gabe

Instead of going out to eat for my 22nd birthday, Gabe and I decided to cook a nice dinner for two. Since it was almost MCAT time, I think I was really just in the mood to do something low key. We decided on Bucatini All'Amatriciana and Garlic and Herb Crusted Lamb Chops. This was probably one of the more complex dinners we've done, but everything turned out really well. I think this is also one of the times I actually followed a recipe completely. If I did anything different than what the recipes said, it was probably just slight measurement adjustments.

We used this recipe for the bucatini - another Batali recipe. It was really quite a challenge to find guanciale, but I finally found it at a tiny Italian deli in the west 30's. I'm glad we used that instead of pancetta or regular bacon because it definitely made a big difference and added a really unique flavor. Normally I hate really fatty meat, but this was the one exception. Gabe and I were really pleased with the way this turned out - perhaps the best thing we've made together thus far.


We also followed this for the lamb chops. I had never cooked with lamb before, so this was fun. It turned out better than I thought it would, and it was very tasty. The only thing is that one of my chops was extremely rare. Normally, I do like rare meat, but if I were to make this again, I would keep it in the oven for a few minutes longer. The flash was a bit bright, but I think you can tell from the picture that it was quite rare.

We had a great bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon (La Tour de By, Medoc, 2003, France) to accompany the food.

scialatielli ai gamberetti

This is perhaps one of my most successful attempts in the kitchen. Especially when I'm home in Chicago with my family, I never follow a recipe completely because sometimes I think it's annoying to measure everything and to keep looking at the recipe after every step. Plus, cooking is all about experimenting with what works for you and what doesn't!

I followed this recipe. Mario Batali is perhaps my favorite chef. I made some changes/modifications to this recipe. First of all, I didn't make my own pasta noodles because that's too much unnecessary work. I also didn't make basic marinara sauce prior.

1. Heated MORE than 6tbs of olive oil and 6 cloves of garlic (minced) in a wok. (My dad, who helped me cook this, likes to put a lot of olive oil in anything)
2. Added shallots (not in recipe, but we like shallots) and zucchini pieces. (I should've bought a bigger zucchini)
3. Added a lot of red chili flakes. (Recipe called for 1tsp, but we definitely added way more than that...pasta ended up being spicier than what Batali probably wanted, but it was spicy in a good way)
4. Added MORE than 1 cup of dry white wine (Recipe called for 1 cup, but my dad and I like to go overboard with alcohol when cooking haha)
5. Added 2 cans (28oz) of diced tomatoes. Added regular medium shrimp (about 1lb uncooked. I couldn't find rock shrimp at the grocery).

NOTE: So this is where I sort of messed up. Since I didn't make the basic tomato sauce prior to everything else, the sauce ended up being extremely soupy in the wok, so I had to keep it going on the stove for like half an hour until it reduced to about half of what it was upon adding the tomatoes.

6. During this reduction time, I added salt and pepper to taste, a tiny bit more red chili flakes, and probably a couple of tablespoons of SUGAR (Not in the recipe, but that was a good call by my Dad. It balanced the spiciness from the chili flakes).
7. When it reduced to a thicker and grainier texture, that's when it was time to finally add the spaghetti (used one box).
8. Chopped up a whole bunch of fresh parsley (i'm sure this ended up being at least a whole cup instead of 1/4cup) and mixed it in.

Using that much parsley really added a ton of GOOD flavor. I need to use more fresh parsley in my pasta from now on.

We made this when two of my cousins, aunt, and uncle came over for dinner a couple of days befor Christmas. Because of all the red and green in the pasta, it was good timing too haha. Everyone loved it, so I definitely have to make this pasta again.