Authentic Italian

Even though the main goal of my blog is to share my own personal cooking and baking experiences, I thought sharing my own dining experiences would be fun as well, because, let's face it, I love eating.

Recently, my husband surprised me and took me to a new restaurant for Sweetest Day a couple of weeks ago. We went to this great little place called Angelina's, which specializes in authentic Italian food. The owner, who is from Italy naturally, started the restaurant because she was appalled at what Americans thought Italian food was. The restaurant itself probably only has about 10 seats in the main dining room with a banquet area upstairs, but it is filled with Italian charm and has a cozy atmosphere. The waitress we had was amazing and helped explain the menu to us, since it's not organized the same way American menus are with categories such as appetizers, sandwiches, dinners, desserts, etc. There is a section titled "Course 1" and another titled "Course 2." She informed us that if we wanted the full authentic Italian experience, we should eat that way too. All the dishes in Course 1 are pasta dishes and are meant to be split and shared as a sort of "appetizer." Course 2 dishes are all meat based, which you can either choose to split or each person can order their own, depending on how hungry they are. My husband and I decided to take her advice and eat the authentic way.

We started with the traditional carbonara made with eggs, cream, and wonderfully salty pieces of pancetta, which were a nice contrast to the peppery cream sauce. I was surprised at how light the dish was compared to the American version, which tends to be a lot heavier and saucier. The pasta was perfectly cooked al dente and the pancetta was some of the best I've had.

For our second course we chose a salmon dish, which the waitress also recommended to us, which was sauteed in a lemon/citrus based sauce. It had a little bit of red pepper in it, which gave the fish a nice kick of flavor. The second course was also served with a Mediterranean salad, which had homemade mozzarella balls which literally melted in your mouth (Yum!).

Overall, I was really impressed with the small restaurant that I usually would have missed if I was just walking past. I would highly recommend it if you are in the area and looking to try something a little different! Check out the link to see the menu!

http://www.angelinarestaurant.com/