Caiola's in the West End is a cozy little neighborhood joint with a devoted following. Fortunately Portland is sleepy enough in the winter that getting an 8:15 reservation on a weeknight is no problem. Certainly my companion and I could have strolled in tonight with bothering to make a reservation, although I doubt you would want to try that in the summer.
The decor is rustic with bare knotty pine table tops that give the impression of mis-matched casualness, although the place is on a second glance more carefully thought out than thrown together, and the chairs and silverware do match.
On both my first and second runs through the menu nothing really leapt out at me. The types of dishes that tempt my particular pallette were not in evidence. And yet, I could tell that anything I ordered would be well executed. The current menu takes a giddy spin though both major and minor European ladmarks: a Bouillabaisse and Nicoise here, a Paella and Cacciatore there, and then settles down into various combinations of pasta, tomatoes and shellfish, none of which particularly excite me. Often when too many cuisines are represented one suspects an overreach of the grasp.
The specials offered were raw oysters mignonette and a fluke with a lemon butter sauce. Now I'm sure it was a lovely little piece of fish, so lovely in fact that the chef thought the best way to treat it was as simply as possible, but for myself -- finicky and demanding eater that I am -- there is just no point in my culinary explorations that calls for a lemon butter sauce. I had a noteworthy lemon butter sauce on a tender, trembling piece of veal in Rome once (longer ago than I care to admit) and it was so devine, so perfect in it's simplicity, that there is simply no more room for any other lemon butter sauce in my world. Now to be fair to Caiola's the chicken I ordered reminded me of that same piece of veal for it's astonishing tenderness, but more on that later.
We began with two glasses of a serviceable pinot noir. Then a black plasitic bowl was placed on the table. It contained four smallish cubes of bread, that looked a bit lost in the bowl. The bread was fresh, but not warm and accompnied by some whipped chive butter. Caiola's might have seemed cozy on a busier night, but most of the other diners were finishing up and leaving as we began. With fewer bodies to absorb the sound, the one really loud, drunk guy at the bar had an unfortunate effect on the atmosphere. I found myself wondering why the bartender didn't reign him in at all, and had my answer when he finally left and the background noise switched from raucus gaffawing to the bartender booming out his opinions and stories.
~~~ Okay, cranky. So you were hoping for something a little more relaxed, and weren't enjoying the feeling that you'd accidentally stumbled in to a frat house. Fine, fine, we get it, no points for atmosphere but tell us already, how about the food??
My companion's first course was a Shrimp Stuffed Piquillo Pepper with Smoked Paprika Cream and Pickled Cauliflower. He's usually not a fan of the cauli, but liked it very much here. The portion was small, one floppy little pepper with the minced creamy shrimp mixture inside, but he was very pleased with it, and that's the important thing. My Little Gem Salad with Bacon, Apple, Gorgonzola and Black Pepper Croutons was serviceable, if insipid. The bacon existed only in a meager flicker here and there, the apple was a few thin slices of what may have been a granny smith, the gorgonzola was nice enough, but while these three items are favorites of mine and potentially bursting with flavor, here they were lost in a creamy dressing that robbed each ingredient of the opportunity to disitinguish itself. The overall effect was disappointingly bland. A mysterious mound of goo on the salad plate tasted beatlike at first but later revealed itself to be a sun-dried tomato puree. I have no idea what it was doing there, and I don't think it did either.
We fared much better with the entrees. This is where we could feel the love in the kitchen. Hearty, homey, comforting, satisfying -- these were the words in my head on our way there, and we were not disapointed. Drew's Roasted Lamb Shank arrived looking beautiful on the plate, falling tenderly off the bone. The crispness of the haricot vert was just right, the half head of roasted garlic an extra treat. A large enough portion to make him wish he'd skipped the app. Everything on that plate was just right and as good as could be. My Chicken Marsala with Toasted Angel Hair was equally delicious, and worth going back for more. Never have I tasted a more tender piece of chicken.
