I promised an update. And now I deliver. It was a whirlwind week of working my tail off with the occasional stop to grab some sandwiches. So here are the quick details:
No Name Restaurant (Seaport/World Trade Center): At first you think this place is a find. In a stranded-seeming area of the Boston Seaport, you take a quick look at the relatively short menu and think it’s one of those perfect little hole-in-the-walls. Well apparently it has been there too long and is resting on its laurels. I got a fried seafood platter with scrod, oysters, scallops and shrimp. It was terrible. No flavors of the sea. Just fried crumbs. Not even salt. Depressing. Avoid this place.
Pressed (Seaport/World Trade Center): If you’re stuck in Seaport, go to Pressed, the panini shop nearby. It has a pretty decent Cuban, but avoid the sandwiches with prosciutto. They grill them so hot they end up cooking the prosciutto. Maybe ask them to put it on the side for after the press. Also get a bottle of Harpoon Brewery’s root beer, orange cream soda or cream soda.
Taranta (North End): Peruvian-Italian restaurant with homemade pasta. Mixed feelings about this place. I had a bite of my friend’s ravioli and found it way too al dente. The mini-calzones had a dough that tasted way more like empanadas. Bit too sweet, but the fillings were tasty. The pasta with the “sauce from grandma’s recipe” had a slightly underdeveloped flavor and was a bit thin. Not very much like grandma’s. My fusilli with sausage baked in parchment was pretty decent though. I liked the texture of the pasta, but I think it could have used more something… maybe parmesan and salt. I did like the atmosphere.
Birch Bar (Seaport/World Trade Center): Pretty bar inside the Westin Waterfront surrounded by birch trees. Lots of Russian waitresses. I drank here a lot. Mostly beer. Not anything on tap. But pretty. Avoid the sandwiches in the atrium of the hotel. They suck.
Wagamama (Faneuil Hall): Duck gyoza with cherry-hoisin sauce, chili-garlic salt edamame and chili-beef ramen. Duck gyoza had some nice chunks of breast meat and it had a nice twist on the popular pairing with cherries and a slight riff on Peking duck. The hoisin sauce wasn’t overpowering though as I usually find it to be. The edamame was… edamame. Meanwhile, the chili-beef ramen came out with onions, cilantro, bean sprouts and lime. I found myself expecting it to taste like pho, but the broth didn’t have the richness of pho and no matter how much lime juice I squeezed in I couldn’t get it the way I liked it. But the ramen noodles were fresh and tasty.
Border Cafe (Cambridge, Harvard Square): A favorite from my visits to Boston over 10 years ago. The chips and salsa taste exactly the way they did back then. Thin, hot chips with a full-flavored salsa. The beef brisket enchiladas were juicy with a nice bit of cheese. Maybe not authentic, but I still find it tasty.
River Gods (Cambridge, Central Square): A decent burger. The fries with aioli were fantastic. There were big chunks of roasted garlic in the aioli, which really made it better than other aiolis.
Arrow Street Crepes (Cambridge, Central Square): I was looking for sushi. I ended up getting a savory crepe. Smoked salmon, dill creme fraiche, onions and capers. Could have used cucumbers. Crepe not browned. Ugh. Gross.
Toscanini (Cambridge, Central Square): Some of my favorite ice cream. The kulfi flavor – cardamom and pistachio – was darned tasty. Not too strong in cardamom, but the occasional hits made this awesome.
Sunset Grill and Tap (Allston): Holy cow! 112 beers on tap, and many more in bottles. I ordered the Saranac Pomegranate Wheat. It wasn’t too sweet or too fruity since the sourness of the pomegrante helped to balance out some of the other flavors. I definitely need to revisit and try some of their pricier lambics. I bet they’re amazing. This was the highlight of the trip with respect to a true find.
