A Taste of Rome in NYC
A night of food, the Italian language, and connection
An article can spark an adventure even in your hometown. I read the article “For Italian Tennis Stars, a Little Corner of Rome in the East Village,” and decided that would be a nice little adventure.
As I read I thought, if the Italian tennis stars feel the food is as good as in Rome, I’m sure I will as well. I hadn’t heard of the place before, but the article gave me a bit of the history—a fire in the original restaurant forced its move to 87 East 4th Street.
I entered to a distinctly rustic air—wood tables and chairs, wood everywhere. The tables were well-spaced for conversation and close enough to meet someone at a neighboring table, evoking a little corner of Rome, so aptly put in the article’s title. The walls were lined with the memorabilia of an old establishment with its roots in Italy and pictures galore.
As the place began to fill up, an affable waiter brought over menus. I pulled out The New York Times article. The waiter smiled. I’m guessing we weren’t the only ones. He said the Italian players had made the restaurant a bit of a home away from home during the U.S. Open.
“A few of the players bonded over their favorite soccer teams, and from then, well, they came in, and we became a spot for friends,” he said.
My mind flew back to my days of tennis. In my teens, I loved watching tennis on TV. Billie Jean King, Chris Evert, and Martina Navratilova were the idols of the time. As a young adult, I learned from a former professional tennis player who played briefly on the ATP Tour. He helped me develop a mean left-handed backhand. I had fun doing it; I lost some college weight, and forty-plus years later, I still have the racquet. Even during my various apartment cleanouts, I couldn’t let go of it.
But tonight, we had no matches; we had dinner to order, and I was curious about the portion size and how this restaurant would prepare the meal.
The menu immediately evokes the Italian spirit. The first page quotes The New York Times: “When Italians chat, hands and fingers do the talking.” The menu also provides a translation of English into Italian, so we didn’t need to worry about that.
Another good quote follows immediately: “You know, we speak with our mouths and with our hands, we move them continuously because the voice alone is not enough. This is how our ‘gesticulario’ is born, a menu with an extra ingredient: the Italian gestuality.”
After all that, I wanted to turn the page, and it asked me, “Che voi manga?”
The choices on the page include “bruschette” and “fritti.”
“Would you share the bruschetta?” Phil asked, which made me shake my head and smile because as long as we’ve been married he'll ask me the same question. And the answer is always the same—of course. It’s a sweet nod to share. We are not perfect, but sharing is a good idea in a marriage. This is just a personal view, but generosity toward each other has boded us well.
Tonight, we shared the bruschetta. And I thought, why not try the fried rice balls with mushroom, black truffle, and fontina cheese?
He agreed, knowing I was going to crack it open and only eat the inside and encourage him to do the same.
The menu guided us on. It said, “Daje.”
Sure, let’s go we thought, and check out the antipasti (appetizers), insalate (salads), and pinsa romana (Roman flatbread pizza).
I ordered a Caesar salad with dressing on the side, essential for healthy eating. You can’t have a mass of dressing over the lettuce. Usually, you don’t know what ingredients have gone into it other than that it looks and tastes like Caesar dressing.
Turning the page of this trusty menu, it reminded us we can’t go wrong: “Ndo cojo cojo.”
And with pasta, we wouldn’t. It all looked delicious.
The next page said, “Ok, sto a scapoccia.”
We weren’t getting crazy as the menu had said but would have gone crazy ordering the Secondi Piatti (main courses) and Contorni (sides). We were hungry, and everything looked so good.
Dessert.
We had ordered a good bit by now and passed on dessert. I try not to get into any habit of eating desserts. Sometimes, I bend on that when it feels like the meal is not done yet or I want to taste just a bite (immediately getting me into trouble with Phil, who will naturally eat more of it).
Flipping the menu around, it asked “Che voi beve?”
We looked at the following pages of wines, non-alcoholic drinks, beers, spritz, negroni, and cocktails.
Easy, just water.
“Look, this page says they have an Italian grocery store,” I told Phil. “It’s at 60 E. 4th Street. Put that on the list.”
Before we could get into a new topic, the food arrived. The salad was colorful, the interior of the fried rice balls was tasty, and the eggplant I ordered was excellent. It fit on a plate and was not so large that I was uncomfortable with it. Phil’s meal was balanced, reminding me of our plate size at home, even if we leaned more heavily on the vegetables.
We chatted, and soon enough—because that’s what tables in proximity lend themselves to—we got into a conversation with the most delightful people. They were Hungarian, so we immediately had something to discuss, given my long-standing interest in Hungarian culture, which resulted in a book I subsequently wrote.
They had art preservation backgrounds and shared some of that with us. Somewhere in the conversation, I asked, “How did you end up here?”
“We read about it in The New York Times,” they said.
That’s it—Italian food, culture, and tennis, an irresistible draw!