Walking into La Masseria, you instantly feel the vibe the owners were going for...a vacation from the hustle and bustle of midtown to a peaceful farmhouse. The decor is so quaint you barely realize the busy dining room. (Nota Bene - La Masseria means farmhouse in Italian so it didn't exactly take a genius to figure out what they were going for).
Our waiter was a friendly Italian guy, who as soon as we asked his feelings on dishes, rhapsodically chimed in with his opinions (which by the way all turned out to be very justified opinions!). We selected a Ravenswood Cabernet for our wine of the evening and started with the Burrata special as our appetizer. While we awaited our appetizer, they brought over a beautiful bread basket with three choices - foccacia, italian bread, and a cheesy breadstick that didn't taste unlike a delicious cheezit. The burrata arrived and with great fanfare the waiter cut open this beautiful homemade cheese that was surrounded by melt in your mouth tomatoes. It oozed onto the plate slowly and he poured some olive oil on this wonderfully creamy mozzarella. This was gone in no time and whetted my appetite for the pastas that were to arrive.
I'm a huge food sharer, so I love going out to eat with a group because it means you get to try more dishes! The only downside with this is that it often leads to the highly disappointing "order envy". I loved my dish, but I certainly had order envy...for pretty much half of my friend's orders. Going around the table clockwise, there was a tagliatelle bolognese, a gnocchi with taleggio cheese and radicchio, linguine with white clam sauce, orchiette with broccoli rabe and sausage, and my dish of thick fettucine with eggplant and smoked mozzarella. I know you're thinking "Jen didn't order a meat sauce" but the truth is I'm a sucker for smoked cheese.
Okay, so the best place to start is with the pastas themselves. I love homemade pasta and was happy to find that all were homemade. I would have to say my favorite dish was the gnocchi, which just melted in your mouth and were covered in a slightly sweet cheese sauce. Honestly, these were addictive, so for my friend's sake it was good that I was separated by a seat from these little bites of heaven. My fettuccine was wonderful. The texture of the fettuccine was perfectly al dente but still managed to have this silky soft texture. The eggplant was cut into the ideal size pieces and cooked until tender, the tomato sauce on the pasta was a bright fresh-tasting sauce, and the mozzarella was sprinkled throughout giving a nice smokey hint to the dish. The linguine with clam sauce and the bolognese were both dishes I would contemplate ordering WHEN I return to La Masseria. They were seasoned and cooked to perfection. The only dish that I was not overwhelmed with was the Orchiette with broccoli rabe and sausage. My sample bite was very strong on the broccoli and just a little too bitter tasting because of that. But the pasta and sauce still had a very nice flavor.
Well, since we were celebrating birthdays, we had to order dessert! We went with the special chocolate lava cake, although the hostess was trying to sway us towards the her favorite cheesecake from the sidelines.
Our dessert arrived and came with on the house shots of limoncello (yum!) and a slice of cheesecake and a wink from the hostess. The chocolate lava cake was pretty good, but I have to say, I am beyond glad that they sent over the cheesecake. I am personally not a huge cheesecake fan, but this wasn't your typical cheesecake. If you've ever wondered what would happen if you crossed vanilla jello pudding with a NY cheesecake, look no further just go to La Masseria and order this. I could not get enough of this airy, pudding-like version of cheesecake.
Overall, the food was fantastic. Whats more, you can't ignore the fantastic service at La Masseria. For my friends and I, they made us feel like cherished regulars and provided that perfect balance between too much and not enough presence. And come on people, how can you not love a place that brings you free drinks and dessert!
What a wonderful restaurant! I will no longer worry about where to eat before a show...I'll instantly make a reservation at La Masseria.
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