Monday, February 19, 2007

Escosazio


So this is when I usually update ya’ll on the weekend. Friday night was pretty good so let’s start there. After working out I had dinner with friends from the gym, Umberto (coach), Stefano, Francesco, and Francesco. We went to the “Escosazio” which is translated as “Leave satisfied” and it IS correctly named. I love this restaurant but I can only stomach it once in a while. Here’s why…
The restaurant consists of a butcher’s meat counter, a grill, and about 7 tables that can seat 28 comfortably (usually there’s about 35 people). It’s so simple, you go up to the meat counter and pick out the meat you want then they grill it up and bring it out. There aren’t a lot of BIG cuts of meat like in the States. Their specialty is “bolpette”, “gnummeriddu”, and sausage. I think bolpette is a variation of polpetta (meatball) because I would describe them as one chunk of meat wrapped in another and they are usually about the size of big meatball. Imagine things like a chunk of beef wrapped in thin slice of pork (the pork was cut so thin and cooked crispy so it seemed like bacon, oooohh, bacon). To me “gnummeriddu” is the worst, it’s chunks of liver wrapped in goats’ intestines. I hate liver and intestines, well…. That reminds me of the other specialty they have, sausage. We picked out 3 different types of sausage then about 3 types of bolpette and some gnummeriddu (I did have one, because my dad always says that liver is good for you, now eat it!) I looked at the size of the pile of meat and the size of our collective stomachs and I thought this is going to be a good struggle. Can we eat all that?
I forgot one thing as we sat down they brought out the appetizer. They only have one appetizer (that I know of) and that’s French fries and fried meatballs. There’s no menu so I can’t say exactly what they have. To drink with the meal they have red wine, coke, and water, that’s it. Umberto was the only one that dared to drink coke instead of wine. In the end the meat won by just a little bit. One maybe two bolpette and a little of the spicy sausage just wouldn’t fit as we finally lowered our utensils and raised the white flag. After the meat you can have a salad but we passed on that. Instead all we needed was a good amaro or limoncello to finish off the meal just right. All this came to just under 15 euros a person so this is a great deal. I waddled over to Goblins for music but others all work on Saturday so they went home. Saturday morning I was still full so for lunch I just had some minestrone soup to kind of balance it all out.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

allora jeffo...ti devo chiarire un pò le idee:
1)non si dice bolpette...si dice bombette...like little bombs...ok?

2)non si dice gnumeriddu...si dovrebbe dire gnummarieddu(a lecce), invece si dice turcinieddu(a brindisi)...

adesso non sbagliare più... :)

Jeff Gromen said...

Grazie Marco!!

Aradu said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Aradu said...

I had some problems posting it, so I try again. I wanted to recommend you an aromatic plant named "cerfoglio" in Italian (in English I found it as "french parsley"). It's marvelous in a spring salad with boiled, sliced eggs, green onion, maybe some sliced potatoes (optional) and, of course, vinegar (better made from apples), olive oil and salt. In my area this a traditional Easter dish. Bon appetit!

Jeff Gromen said...

Alina,
I'll ask about that at the market next week. I'm sure Cosimo will have it.

Jeff

Aradu said...

The correct term in English is "chervil", I just found the word, associated to the image of the plant I know. "Anthriscus cerefolium" in Latin.