Eating in Boston

Monday night we went to a place called Papa Razzi, and it was quite good - we split a salad of mostly greens and too little fennel, with a few parmesan shaves on top, and lemon and oil dressing; a tomato bruschetta that would probably have made an Italian cringe (and I pronounced it American when ordering, anyways, brewshetta, not brewsketta) - a big piece of very tasty grilled foucaccia, with a lot of nicely seeded tomato salad with balsamic vinegar and oil piled soggily on top; and a pasta that was whole wheat linguine with scallops and mussels and cream.

Tuesday
Tonight I am not sure what we will do - so far we've had Starbucks and cookies & tea at the museum of fine arts, provided by the ladies auxiliary, nice, but my cookies (and Mark's) are better, and Trader Joes pappadum chips and trail mix ... Ended up at a place called Picco - wood-fired oven pizza, and home made ice cream; pizza and ice cream, what a concept, made me want to open one in my home town. We have never had a place that serves really good, thin crust pizza with interesting toppings, well except one that only sells it by the slice.... Plus it was just a nice place, not very big, counter, and a few tables on banquettes, I was totally charmed by the photos of the remodel job in the single, unisex, handicapped-accessible bathroom. On Tuesday night, a dad with a daughter, a family with 2 boys, several middle aged couples, gay and straight, including us, a trio of 20-somethings, and a big party of 6 all ages arriving as we finished. I had one of the best salads I've had in months, a warm round of breaded goat cheese on nice greens with cubes of roasted beets and balsamic vinaigrette (burned my tongue on the cheese though) and we split a wild mushroom pizza. And the contrast between our over-earnest, callow-youth server at Pappa Razzi, and the tattooed, nerd glasses, heavy-set guy who kind of gave me a quizzical look (right after I burned my tongue) instead of saying "and how is everything?" was fun, too.

Wednesday
After a some email & cell phone back & forth, schedule misunderstandings, cancelled reserves, and plotting our route in the T, we met up with the book designer friend who moved to Boston last winter (and loves it) at a French-Cambodian restaurant in Cambridge, Elephant Walk.

We split a good appetizer from the French side of the menu, Moules Frites steamed mussels with the frites on a side and a really nice white wine butter steaming juices to dip the bread in. I got Cambodian spare ribs, and would have preferred less meat and more noodles and cucumber salad. I also had a cocktail - lemon drop, lemon vodka, and lemon juice, and I am not sure what else, that my bro introduced me to, that I have never been able to recreate at home despite my deck of playing cards with the 52 cocktail recipes on the backs.

Thursday
We finally got tickets for Monty Python's Spamalot after trying since xmas 2004, in Chicago, and xmas 2005 in NYC. Went for apps at Maggiano's after the play, it was just like Chicago, but good anyways, especially the fried zucchini, and I always like the Maggiano's salad, with crispy prosciutto & gorgonzola. The sad story was that the housekeeping at our hotel thought our paper bag of expensive Trader Schmoe's snacks - those pappadum chips & gorp, but also UN-opened Thai Chili Lime Cashews and orange chocolate sticks - was trash and removed it.