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A meal at Zarletti is like a mini-celebration of
lively Italian food
By Dennis R.
Getto
Journal Sentinel dining critic
Published: July 15, 2005
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Photo/Benny Sieu Osso buco is a Zarletti house specialty and definitely worth a try. The dish comes with a small spoon to sample the shanks' marrow, an Italian delicacy. |
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Photo/Benny Sieu Lunch-time diners grab a bite at Zarletti, 741 N. Milwaukee St., which opened in October. In his new classy, casual restaurant, chef Brian Zarletti whips up food that rivals dishes served in Italy, where he was inspired. |
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Photo/Benny Sieu William Meredith mixes a drink at Zarletti, a new restaurant in the former Crescent City Beignets location, 741 N. Milwaukee St. Italian fare is the focus. |
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Restaurant Details |
One
way to tell an exceptional restaurant is by the quality of food and service you
receive when the owner is not in the dining room.
Using that measuring stick, I can
safely say that Zarletti is an exceptional restaurant.
I’ve visited Zarletti four times
over the last two months. On three occasions, owners Brian Zarletti and his
wife, Mari R. Cucunato Zarletti, were on duty in the dining room, watching over
the service and food, greeting and seating customers. They even set tables when
they needed to.
I watched as they circulated
around the tables, talking to their guests. Their friendliness, the restaurant’s
professional servers and its fresh, lively Italian food made those meals
mini-celebrations. On the fourth visit, the Zarlettis were not there. But the
food and service were just as good as they had been under the bosses’ watchful
eyes.
I guess I shouldn’t have been
surprised. Brian and Mari are a remarkable couple. More than four years ago,
they took over a floral shop at 1021 N. Milwaukee St. in South Milwaukee and
transformed it into the charming Italian-style Café Zarletti, where diners put in
their orders for soups, salads and pastas at the counter, then take their seats
in the dining room and wait for meals to be delivered.
In 2004, the couple started a
second operation on the southwest corner of Mason and Milwaukee streets. That
operation simply bears the couple’s last name.
They decorated the new restaurant
simply, painting its walls and ceilings the color of dark coffee and installing
trendy ceiling lights that hang from stiff cords twisted in all directions like
aerial spaghetti. The restaurant’s chairs are simple dark wood, and each table
is decorated with a small cluster of fresh flowers.
In summer, diners can sit at
tables out on Mason St. and feel the verve of nearby Milwaukee St., which has
become one of Milwaukee’s hottest restaurant rows in recent years.
First-rate offerings
The restaurant’s
dishes are all Brian’s creations. And whether diners choose an authentic
chicken breast panini with pesto, roasted tomatoes and Asiago cheese ($8.95) at
lunch or a lively entrée like lemon veal ($27.95) at dinner, they’re likely to
enjoy some of the best Italian food being served in Milwaukee these days.
Take that lemon veal, for
example. The combination of veal (or chicken) and fresh lemon is
quintessentially Italian, a marriage of flavors that transcends either single
ingredient. In this case, the Zarletti chefs had started with thick, tender
cutlets of Strauss veal, pounded them flat for even cooking and extra
tenderness, and then breaded them lightly in seasoned crumbs.
Those cutlets were sautéed in a
hot pan to completely brown the crumb crust and give it a toasty flavor. The
pan juices then were reduced with fresh lemon to create a silky sauce that sang
with citrusy freshness.
I’m a big fan of fresh garlic, so
Zarletti’s grilled pork tenderloin ($22.95) was especially delightful. The
tenderloin tasted as if it had been marinated in garlic and olive oil before
grilling. Once cooked, the pork had been sliced and then topped with a garlicky
mustard-leek sauce. Just enough of the milder Dijon-style mustard had been
added to enhance the neutral pork flavor. My only comment was that the sauce
had way too much garlic for most American palates.
And then there was a salmon
fillet ($18.95), thick, meaty and perfectly seared so its exterior crunched in
our mouths while its interior remained creamy and moist. Lemon olive oil gave
the fish a distinctive Italian note.
All three entrees came with Brian
Zarletti’s own pesto potatoes — simple roasted chunks of potatoes that had been
brushed with a lively basil-garlic sauce.
Half of Zarletti’s dinner menu is
devoted to pasta, and it was from that noodle list that we chose Tortelloni
Prosciutto e Piselli ($18.95) and Pasta with Sausage and Marsala wine ($17.95).
Both were hearty dishes with cream sauce and other ingredients typical of
Northern Italy.
The tortelloni were small
doughnut-shaped dumplings filled with cheese, then boiled. Once cooked, those
tender little dumplings were coated with a fresh tomato sauce made with
prosciutto (unsmoked Italian ham), peas and onions. Both The prosciutto and
onions lent their heavier flavors to the fresh tomatoes, while the peas
provided pearls of sweetness. That sauce was so good that we wiped the bowl
with a piece of bread after the final dumpling was gone.
In the sausage pasta, the
combination of flavors kept us enthralled to the last noodle. The spicy sausage
had been sautéed with onions, mushrooms and chopped walnuts (a common
ingredient in Northern Italian cooking). Once they had browned together, cream
and Marsala were added and the sauce was cooked just long enough to thicken
slightly. The sauce beautifully coated the pasta quills on which it was served,
turning each into a rich delight.
At lunch, my companions and I
favored those pressed, corrugated sandwiches the Italians call panini. I’ve
already mentioned one of my favorites — the chicken pesto with baked tomato and
Asiago cheese. Baking the tomato toned down the acidity, allowing the chicken,
basil sauce and cheese flavors to shine through. Pressed and grilled to an
attractive rust color, the sandwich satisfied with rich, authentic Italian
flavors.
The same was true of a Portobello
panini ($7.95), which laid a meaty, grilled mushroom on Italian bread, then
covered it with pleasantly salty herbed goat cheese and sweet, roasted red
peppers. And for a different combination of flavors, I recommend a Parma panini
($6.95), which has only three ingredients — prosciutto, fresh mozzarella cheese
and fresh arugula. That crunchy fresh green with its odd, peppery taste really
brought the sandwich to life.
For appetizers, a grilled
Portobello mushroom with more goat cheese and peppers ($7.95) was already
familiar (we’d tasted the same combination in a panini), but grilled eggplant
Parmesan ($10.95) was better than most versions I’ve enjoyed elsewhere. The
only appetizer that disappointed was something called Three Beginnings ($9.95)
— toasted Italian bread with three spreads. While I liked the goat cheese and
the tomato sauce, the olive tapenade was way too tart for my taste.
In my book, there are two other
courses that are vital to enjoying a meal at Zarletti: soup ($2.95 a cup, $4.95
a bowl) and dessert. Having eaten both minestrone and Italian white bean, both
of which brimmed with vegetables in lively broth, I’m hard-pressed to say which
I liked more. The white bean had been made with pancetta for extra heartiness,
and the minestrone (which I ordered three times) was an ever-changing palette
of carrots, zucchini, onions and other vegetables.
Don’t forget dessert
And no meal at
Zarletti should be eaten without dessert. Even a pastry as fundamental as a
cannoli ($3.95) presented us with a not-too-sweet ricotta filling inside a
freshly fried shell that crunched and crackled beneath our dessert forks. But
that pastry paled when put up against panna cotta ($7), a cold custard with a
creamy texture, a rich milky flavor and a sweet mango-orange glaze. That
dessert alone makes me want to return tomorrow.
Service at all four meals was
outstanding, with one small exception: I’d have liked grated Parmesan cheese on
my minestrone.
But that’s a minor point, and no
reason not to visit this vibrant Italian restaurant on the new restaurant row.
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