Markets – The Saboscrivner

D’Amico & Sons Italian Market & Bakery

After a long wait (which probably felt much longer for the owners than people like me looking forward to the opening), D’Amico & Sons Italian Market & Bakery (https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100093695793933) has officially soft-opened in the Oviedo Mall. Sometimes I go to the Regal movie theater in that mall, and it desperately needs something else to keep bringing people in. I am pleased to report that D’amico & Sons should flourish there, if the enthusiastic crowds on the second day of its soft opening continue. Its hours are 7 AM to 7 PM, Monday through Saturday, and 7 AM to 3 PM on Sunday.

I am thrilled to have another Italian market in town, especially one that is much closer to me than my beloved Stasio’s and Tornatore’s. It is a much larger space than either, having completely refurbished the old Chamberlin’s health food store, bright and clean and spacious, with plenty of natural light and ample parking. There is even a covered patio with tables under an Italian flag awning, for those who want to enjoy coffee, gelato, pastries, and sandwiches on the premises.

Like any good Italian market, you can order a variety of coffee drinks. I am happy to see any locally owned and operated coffee shops to combat the Starbucks stranglehold.

There is a gelato counter too, although it was too crowded today to get a photo of it. It looked like they might have twelve or 16 different flavors, and I’m sure my wife and I will work our way through them eventually. Of course I like ice cream (who doesn’t?), but I like gelato even better. I prefer the texture, the intensity of the flavors (especially fruity flavors), and somehow, it is even healthier (or less unhealthy, if you will).

When I arrived around 12:30 on its second day open, there was a long line just to get up to the bakery counter. I managed to snap this shot of beautiful macarons and pastries in a glass case, but there were other cases to behold on each side of it, with cakes to the left and cookies to the right:

Here is another vertical refrigerated case full of gorgeous gelato cakes: chocolate raspberry, triple chocolate, and pistachio.

I ended up bringing home two lobster tail pastries that were so flaky and crispy — the top one filled with rich Bavarian cream, and the bottom one filled with cannoli cream and tiny chocolate chips. Below that are two zeppoli, fried pastries dusted in powdered sugar. Those were my wife’s favorites.

They also sell these Italian wedding cookies and black and white cookies, which I highly recommend. I have bought this brand of black and white cookies before (Bakery Boys of New York), but I brought home the Italian wedding cookies because she loves those, and she was really happy with them. I don’t think they sold individual Italian wedding cookies at the cookie counter, but one would not have been enough!

There are plenty of savory foods to choose from too, including golden-brown arancini, rice balls coated in bread crumbs and lightly fried, for a texture that is crispy-crunchy on the outside and soft and yielding inside. If you’ve ever had a papa rellena from a Cuban cafe or bakery, these are similar, but with rice instead of mashed potatoes inside. There are original, cheese, and cheesesteak arancini to tempt you. D’Amico & Sons definitely have a lot of balls.

I brought an original rice ball home for my wife. The thing is the size of a baseball!

A butcher case of fresh sausages was tempting, but I passed on this first visit. I’ll definitely be back to try some.

They also offer pizzelles, which are pizza-like flatbreads, sold by the slice (and possibly also whole). They looked great, but I treated myself to a pizza yesterday and still have leftovers.

You can also get sandwiches made to order, and I took great care to get a legible photo of the hanging menu, since it is not listed on the Facebook page yet. Right-click this image and open it in a new tab for a larger, more legible photo.
I was really surprised they don’t offer a traditional Italian sub with salami, ham, and other deli meats, plus the typical provolone cheese, veggies, and a vinaigrette, so I ordered what seemed like the closest approximation: the Italian Cubano, with Boar’s Head prosciutto Riserva, porchetta, Swiss cheese, pepperoncini peppers, tomato, deli mustard, and Boar’s Head Pepperhouse Gourmaise (a really good mayo-based condiment) on a sub roll. It was ready pretty quickly, despite how slammed they were at the deli counter.

This is the Italian Cubano sandwich, unwrapped back at home. I would have preferred the pepperoncini peppers to be sliced or chopped rather than whole, but at least they removed the stems. The bread, prosciutto, and Pepperhouse Gourmaise really made this sandwich, but it was a little light on ingredients, and the bread was not fully sliced all the way across, so the ends didn’t have any of the good stuff on them. I didn’t get a taste of the porchetta by itself, but at least I saw it in there. I wonder if they would consider getting a sandwich press for more of a traditional Cubano experience.

I would absolutely try other sandwiches from here, even if they’re not going to dethrone Stasio’s (and my favorite sandwich in the city, the namesake Stasio) anytime soon.

There is a separate counter next to the gelato for ordering fresh-baked bread, and I wisely bought two different loaves to bring home. The sub roll was great, but this sesame seed-studded semolina loaf was even better — warm and fluffy inside, crackly crust outside, and so wonderful when spread with some of our room-temperature butter back at home.

I also bought a pull-apart olive batard, which didn’t have a crunchy, crackly outer crust, but was also warm and fluffy and full of salty, chewy, pungent black olives, baked in. I’m not the biggest olive guy in the world, but I like them as olive salad on a muffuletta sandwich, and I liked them in this bread. My wife really loved this one, and olive her.

Over by the pizzelles, there is a refrigerated case brimming with different Italian cheeses, including ricotta, fresh mozzarella, and even some delicious-looking smoked cheeses. I abstained this time, but I’m glad to know they have all this variety.

And since I am infamous for documenting my love of sardines with my ‘Dines List reviews, I could not leave without a can for this Cuoco brand Seasoning for Macaroni with Sardines. I’ve made the Sicilian dish pasta con le sarde before, with fresh fennel, but I look forward to trying this ready-made combination of sardines, oil, fennel, onions, raisins, and salt the next time I cook up some high-quality imported pasta. Of course I will review it in a future installment of The ‘Dines List! Good for Kaley Cuoco for choosing to diversify, selling sardine seasoning while still performing the animated voice of Harley Quinn. Beauty, talent, and business savvy!

While D’Amico & Sons does not have a full-service Italian restaurant next door like Tornatore’s (probably my favorite Italian restaurant in Orlando), and while the sandwiches may not be Stasio’s quality just yet (definitely my favorite sandwiches in Orlando), Central Florida’s newest and most spacious Italian market, bakery, cafe, and deli is already off to a terrific start, and Seminole County residents are lucky to have it. I know I am. I strongly encourage all my regular readers to make a pilgrimage out here ASAP and consider getting Christmas and New Year’s Eve goodies for any entertaining you have planned. Heck, Hanukah celebrators should find a lot to love here too!

Chain Reactions: Eataly (Chicago)

Eataly (https://www.eataly.com/) is like heaven for foodies: a massive Italian food store that contains several restaurants, from sit-down pastarias to wine bars to counter-service bakeries to grab-and-go snack shops. As a result, it is kind of like a massive food hall, with so much to see and do, smell and taste, experience and indulge. But most of all, Eataly feels like a temple to Italian food — truly a place of worship — and well worth a pilgrimage at least once. There are ten Eataly stores in Italy (the first one opened in Torino in 2007), nine in North America, and eight elsewhere in the world. I don’t know how different they all are, since I’ve only been to the Chicago Eataly (https://www.eataly.com/us_en/stores/chicago/) — first with my wife in 2014, and again on a recent business trip to Chicago. I had to venture back there, to make sure that first visit wasn’t just a wonderful dream, but the kind of place where dreams come true.

It had been so long since my first visit, I had to explore everything in the store before deciding on my first bit of food. I made my way to the second floor to a familiar kiosk that beckoned: the land of cured meats and cheeses. I felt like a weary traveler who had finally made it to my destination, yet also feeling like I was home.

Since I was just staying in Chicago for two nights, I couldn’t buy anything fresh or perishable or requiring cooking, but I’m sure some fancy Chicago locals bypass the local supermarkets and buy all their meats at this gleaming butcher’s counter. You can’t see the price labels in this photo, but take it from me: if you have to ask, you probably can’t afford it.

Here’s a shot of huge tomahawk ribeye steaks, slowly dry-aging to perfection in a clear refrigerated case:

The seafood counter was equally sumptuous. On my first visit to Eataly back in 2014, I made an indulgent purchase of bottarga here: the salted, cured, pressed, and dried roe sac of a fish (usually gray mullet, but sometimes tuna). I had read about bottarga before, and it sounded irresistible to me, as a connoisseur of the cured, a scholar of the smoked, and a professor of the pickled. So many cultures created their own versions of this delicacy, and I’ve still never found it in Florida. The bottarga I bought at Eataly made it back in my luggage without any problems, and it lasted months in the fridge, as I finely grated it over so many pasta dishes. It added a salty, savory, umami flavor to everything, and pretty much melted in my mouth. If that sounds good and not gross, I highly recommend it.

But all this browsing made me hungry, so I returned to the restaurant my wife and I dined at on our original trip to Eataly here in Chicago: the creatively named La Pizza & La Pasta. You can’t go to a restaurant like this and not know what you’re getting! They take reservations, but I arrived relatively late in the day, after a long training workshop and an architectural boat tour down the Chicago River, so I had my choice of seats and opted for a solitary barstool, far from any other diners.

The kind server brought out this wonderfully fresh, crusty bread with olive oil that was much sweeter and more flavorful than the kind I keep at home that regularly goes on sale at Publix. I’m not sure if every party gets “table bread,” or if it came with the dish I ordered, but if you’re visiting Eataly, hopefully you’re not obsessed with counting carbs, so you should definitely take advantage and enjoy this brilliant bread.

As a solo diner, I knew I couldn’t justify ordering two entrees, so it was difficult for me to choose. My server helped me break a tie, so I went with a fresh pasta dish, tagliatelle alla Bolognese ($24), topped with real-deal parmigiano Reggiano, not the shaky-can stuff I’ve bought my entire life. The fresh tagliatelle pasta was kind of eggy (not in a bad way, just not exactly what I expected), but the savory Bolognese sauce was awesome, with plenty of chunks of meat. I get that this was a pretty basic choice, and I make “pasta and meat sauce” quite often at home, but it is real comfort food for me, and I wanted to see how Eataly’s kitchen would present such a timeless classic. They knocked it out of the park, needless to say.

As an aside, here’s a photo I found of the dish I ordered here back in 2014, in those pre-Saboscrivner days: my favorite pasta dish anywhere, bucatini all’amatriciana ($21). This thick bucatini pasta (long, hollow tubes) was not fresh like the tagliatelle I had just tried, but there’s nothing wrong with good quality dried pasta. I think I prefer it, in fact. All’amatriciana is served in a spicy tomato sauce with guanciale (cured pork jowl), and this version from La Pizza & La Pasta was perfect in every way, even better than the tagliatelle from this most recent visit.
I make pasta all’amatriciana at home as a treat once or twice a year, but since guanciale is hard to find, I usually substitute cubed pancetta, which you can find at Trader Joe’s, Publix, and even Aldi sometimes. If you’re not into bucatini, pretty much any other pasta works well, except for weirdo choices like tri-color wagon wheels. What is the deal with those, anyway?

After dinner, I wandered around the store a little more and gazed at beautiful Roman-style pizzas on display at the Pizza alla Pala kiosk. I was tempted, but I had just eaten dinner, and I knew they wouldn’t be that great eaten cold in my hotel room the next morning.

But I saw these gorgeous foccaci farcita sandwiches, with cured speck ham, provolone, and arugula on fresh focaccia bread, and I thought “One of those would be awe-inspiring eaten cold in my hotel room the next morning!” Maybe because I got to Eataly relatively late in the day, they charged me a much lower price for the to-go sandwich than what you see pictured, more like the price of an individual slice of pizza.

Here’s an extreme close-up of the lovely sandwich. Speck is very similar to prosciutto. I could tell they brushed some olive oil on the bread, but I thought a tangy vinaigrette of some kind would have really put it over the top. (But I think about that with most sandwiches.)

And to go with my beautiful Italian breakfast, I found an Italian brand of potato chips, San Carlo la Vita e Buona, with a flavor that was too interesting to turn down: mint and chili pepper! If I recall, this bag was under $3. Since I love trying new potato chip flavors and reviewing them in this very blog, I felt obligated. I did it for YOU, stalwart Saboscrivnerinos!

San Carlo was a bit stingy with the flavoring, a marked contrast against many American chip manufacturers that really cake it on there, but they tasted very fresh and potatoey, and the mint subtly shined through. They were barely spicy at all.

I also brought home a salami from the cured meat counter that sounded amazing (elk, pork, and dried blueberries?!), but it wasn’t worth the price I paid. I would have loved to try so many more things at Eataly, but again, I was limited by what I could safely store in my hotel room and bring back in a carry-on bag, with TSA’s continuing rules banning liquids. That said, if you ever find yourself in a city grand and lucky enough to have its own Eataly location, I implore you to make that pilgrimage and try it for yourself. You will be tempted by all sorts of treasures, and it is just a pleasure to wander around and explore, treat yourself in one of the many restaurants, and bring back mouthwatering mementos, succulent souvenirs, and tasty trophies from your travels.

Chain Reactions: Buc-ee’s

We were somewhere around DeLand on the edge of I-4 East when the Beaver Nuggets began to take hold. Luckily, Doctor Professor Ma’am and I didn’t encounter any bats on our drive to or from Daytona Beach, but we shared a truly exhausting, truly American experience at Buc-ee’s (https://buc-ees.com/), the colossal convenience store just off I-95, a unique shopping experience as vast, overwhelming, and occasionally maddening as its home state of Texas.

Imagine Wawa, Cracker Barrel, and Walmart Supercenter twisted into a sweaty, throbbing throuple, and that comes close, but still doesn’t quite capture the sensory overload of Buc-ee’s. I counted 43 locations on the website, but there are only two in Florida, both new: off the highway in Daytona Beach and St. Augustine. We didn’t even bother to fill up the car with gas there, given the surprising crowd at lunchtime on a Friday. Instead, we hustled inside to see what food and snacks awaited us in the sprawling superstore.

They say everything is bigger in Texas: the deserts, the hats, the trucks, the cattle, the churches, the guns, the belt buckles, and unfortunately the intolerance (see recent news for far too many examples). Well, Buc-ee’s goes big in every way as well. Once we made our way through sections of the store devoted to kitschy casual clothing, folksy home décor, and touristy novelties (the “schlock and awe” department), we made it to the the real draws: stacks and stacks of snacks and snacks.

Here is the wall of jerky, which is the kind of wall Texas should focus on building. There is also a jerky counter, where you can get any of the jerky varieties you want, by the pound. It was easier and faster to grab bags off the wall for $7.99 each.

I chose cherry maple, Bohemian garlic, and sweet and spicy beef jerky. So far, the cherry maple was disappointingly bland, but the Bohemian garlic was packed with strong, garlicky flavor.

Doctor Professor Ma’am is more of a fan of gummy candy, and she was faced with overwhelming options, here at the wall of gummies.

She went with hot cinnamon gummy bears (I think that smell, taste, and texture are all gross, but more for her!) and chamoy-flavored peach rings, pictured below with three different flavors of Rice Krispy Treats she chose (regular, salted caramel, and “Fruity”), plus fried pecans.

I’m not really into nuts. I just buy them for her, and I almost never snack on them myself. But when we busted into these fried pecans back at home, all I could say was “GOOD LORD.” Even with the hell-squirrel armed with a sharp fork on the bag, “GOOD LORD” is the appropriate response. I couldn’t believe how good they were. At $14.99, that was the most expensive single item we bought, but it is a good-sized bag, and they are so rich, they should last quite a while.

As an unabashed fan and collector of condiments, sauces, and preserves, Buc-ee’s had a staggering selection to tease, tantalize, and tempt me.

I went a little mad, but we all go a little mad sometimes. I couldn’t resist (I’m your) huckleberry and blackberry preserves, peach-chipotle and mango-pineapple-habanero salsas, prickly pear cactus jam, candied jalapeños, sweet and spicy ghost pepper hot sauce, and pickled quail eggs!

I fully admit I haven’t tried most of these yet, since our fridge door has only so much space (and it is already stuffed with interesting things in bottles and jars, as one would expect from me). But I did just bust open the pickled quail eggs, after letting the jar chill in the fridge overnight, and I liked it a lot! Very spicy and tangy from the vinegary brine, which includes garlic and jalapeños. “What, you egg?” [I stabbed it.]

It was even hard to choose a soft drink, with dozens of options. This is only one of the three huge soda fountain setups. I grabbed an extra-large cup, avoided anything I could find elsewhere, and sampled sips of the Buc-ee’s-specific flavors. Favorites included pineapple cream soda, piña colada soda, orange Creamsicle soda, sarsaparilla, strawberry lemonade (non-carbonated), and my big winner, the cream soda on the far right, which I ultimately filled our shared cup with for the schlep home. Doctor Professor Ma’am said it tasted like pecan pie filling as a soda, and she wasn’t wrong. It was too sweet to be refreshing, but a very tasty cream soda nonetheless. We also tried the blue cream soda, which I thought tasted like banana-flavored candy. She liked it until the chemically aftertaste hit. We both really wished some of those sodas were sold in bottles or cans, since we would have definitely bought a few different ones to savor later, but alas, they were fountain drinks only.

There were multiple stations to get hot, fresh food, including a station with barbecue sandwiches already wrapped in foil. I grabbed us a pulled pork sandwich that was delicious. Doctor Professor Ma’am was tired and hungry by this point, so we split it in the car in the parking lot on the way out to keep hungry from approaching hangry. Forgive my freestyling, but we savagely ravaged this sandwich, and its richness fixed us from being sad bitches. The barbecue sauce was sweet, but it didn’t overwhelm the smoky savoriness of the pork.

There were also touch-screen kiosks for ordering other food, including tacos, burritos, chicken fingers, and a few other sandwiches that get freshly assembled. I was really hoping to get a pastrami Reuben on a pretzel roll, which came highly recommended, but they weren’t available! I was so disappointed, which is a quintessentially American take, to bemoan the loss of one option in this land of abundance. So I chose a “Chopping Block” sandwich that came with sliced rare roast beef, horseradish, Swiss cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, red onions, and I asked to add jalapeños for a 50-cent upcharge. We had to wait a while for that one, since the sandwich-makers were slammed due to 20 busy touchscreen kiosks all beaming in constant orders, but it was worth the wait. The roast beef was tender, flavorful, and rare, the way I like it, the hoagie roll was nice and soft, and the sandwich was still warm by the time I got it home. To the right is a chopped brisket sandwich that was also really good — pre-wrapped in foil like the pulled pork sandwich, and mixed up with sweet sauce. I liked it even better than the pulled pork.

She was disappointed by the fresh potato chips, but I thought they were fine. Just plain, crispy, salty, slightly greasy chips, as expected.

A fried apple pie was yet another impulse buy. She enjoyed it in the car (eating it over the open bag to catch the cinnamon sugar cascade), and the one bite I took was really good. The flaky fried crust was terrific. We hoped it would be like the bubbly, crackly McDonald’s fried apple pies of our ’80s childhoods, but it turned out to be so much better than those.

Here’s half of the brisket sandwich I saved for Doctor Professor Ma’am back at home, along with a cream cheese kolache (left), a strawberry cheese kolache (right), and a sausage, cheese, and jalapeño kolache (bottom). Kolaches are pastries that Czech immigrants brought to Texas. There are sweet and savory varieties, and as you can see, the sweet ones look a lot like danishes. The sausage inside that bottom one was hot dog-shaped, but much chewier, like a Slim Jim. It was okay. The pastry itself is just like chewy white bread.
I also got a boudin kolache that looked almost exactly like the one on the bottom in this photo, stuffed with the savory Cajun pork-and-rice sausage, but that one didn’t last long enough to get photographed.

They had a fudge counter with nearly 20 different varieties of fudge, all neatly divided into squares. You could buy any combination of four and get two more free, so how could we refuse? My wife chose the different fudge flavors, and there is a chocolate one for sure, a chocolate pecan, a “gooey pecan,” a “tiger butter” in the top left (vanilla, chocolate, and peanut butter), and a blueberry cheesecake fudge (bottom left). The sweet fudge lady would cut off little sample slivers, and I sampled key lime pie and banana pudding fudge. Both were good, but too rich to get entire slices of, on top of everything else. She warned me I might not like the banana pudding fudge, but I sure showed her!

Anyway, these are ridiculously rich, so I know we will make them last. We might even freeze some, forget about them for a while, and then have a pleasant surprise when we rediscover them days or probably weeks later.

The very first thing that tempted Doctor Professor Ma’am was a box of six pecan pralines. I suggested we do one loop around the store first to get the lay of the land before we start grabbing everything, and that’s when she found individual pecan pralines at the fudge counter. She was thrilled to be able to just get one, rather than a six-pack, with all the other stuff we chose. I broke off one little morsel, and it was almost cloyingly sweet and intensely rich.

Since I regularly review chips in my series of Tight Chips features here on The Saboscrivner, I couldn’t resist grabbing a few small bags of classic, barbecue, and hot Buc-ee’s chips. I don’t know how they’ll be, but I got ’em.
A sample guy was giving out samples of the barbecue-flavored Baked Chees-ee Curls, the Buc-ee’s version of Cheetos, and they were good enough to bring home a small bag. I’m surprised Frito-Lay hasn’t come out with a barbecue Cheetos flavor, in all these decades.

And we couldn’t go all the way to Buc-ee’s without grabbing a bag of Beaver Nuggets, one of the most famous (infamous?) and recommended snacks from fellow travelers. These things are unbelievably good. Crunchy, toffee-sweet, buttery, salty. Imagine Corn Pops cereal, but a million times better in every possible way. Neither of us had ever tried them before, but I figured she would love them, and I was right. As for me, I can eat a whole bag of chips standing up in my kitchen without even thinking about what I’m doing, but the Beaver Nuggets are so much richer, heavier, and more substantial than chips, I was perfectly content after just crunching on a few of them.
The Buc-ee’s Nug-ees on the right are a “Bold ‘n’ Spicy” version of the sweet, crunchy Beaver Nuggets. Their texture is softer, though — more like puffy Cheez Doodles that you can easily crush between your tongue and the roof of your mouth. They are well-dusted with spicy, cheesy orange powder that is spicier than regular Cheetos or Cheez Doodles, but much less spicy than Flamin’ Hot Cheetos. I can only imagine combining the two varieties in a bowl as some kind of decadent snack mix.

Finally, I grabbed two large boudain [sp] sausage links from a freezer case, and I got the small package of sliced smoked venison sausage at the jerky counter. Those were $5 and $4.40 respectively — cheaper than I expected. I haven’t tried them yet, but my hopes are high.

Our first trip to Buc-ee’s was both physically and mentally draining. It is a lot to process, and if you arrive hungry and like to try new foods and snacks, you can get yourself in a bit of trouble there, as we did. But it’s such an overwhelming experience, somewhere between the food halls in cosmopolitan cities like Philadelphia or Seattle and a Southern Walmart on Black Friday. I suspect that if we ever return, the novelty and mystery will have worn off, so we can quickly grab a few favorites and rush out, without feeling the need to see and try everything, like we did this time. Trader Joe’s definitely feels like that now, after breaking the bank on my first-ever visit so many years ago, but now just running in and out for a few staples while dodging the mobs. Novelty fades. Newness wears off. That’s why I constantly seek it out and share it here, with YOU.

But beyond the novelty of new sandwiches, snacks, and sodas, Buc-ee’s also felt like the kind of roadside attractions that used to line America’s highways and byways — bemusement parks that drew cross-sections of society away from their homes and out of their cars, those in-between places that made the journey so much more interesting (and often weirder) than the destination, before every highway exit started to feature the same corporate fast food restaurants and chain stores.

Being in a new job in academia where I no longer work directly with our diverse student body, and generally avoiding crowds and social situations for the past two years, this was the most people I had been around in a while — and such people! There were exhausted families, bored teenagers, leather-clad bikers, swaggering cowboy types, beachgoers, retirees, active-duty military men and women in uniform, actual Goths (in broad daylight, in Daytona Beach!), a guy who looked like Gung-Ho from G.I. Joe, and so many tattoos, with a particularly large amount of spider webs on elbows. The two of us only noticed one guy in an overtly political T-shirt, and we seemed to be the only two people still wearing masks. Stefon would have had a field day. But everyone was passing through Buc-ee’s on their way somewhere, fueling themselves up before or after they fueled up their cars, or stopping to use the gleaming, spotless restrooms (which are indeed glorious, living up to all the hype).

I wondered where that sea of sweaty people was off to, and how many had made the pilgrimage to Buc-ee’s as their ultimate destination, as we had, rather than just a rest stop along the way to someplace else. Well, stalwart Saboscrivnerinos, I can tell you that Buc-ee’s is definitely worth a stop — at least once — but don’t expect to get any rest there.

La Hacienda

La Hacienda (https://linktr.ee/lahaciendarestaurant) is a Mexican restaurant in Winter Park, on the southwest corner of Semoran Boulevard (State Road 436) and Aloma Avenue. It has its own adjoining grocery store, similar to my old favorite near work, Tortilleria El Progreso. I actually pass both going to and from work every day, but had only ever stopped into La Hacienda to pick up fresh tortillas and Mexican snacks. But after so many years of always being in too much of a hurry, I recently ate at the restaurant for the first time, with my wife — one of our first post-vaccination meals out together.

My sense of blocking sucks, but here are our complimentary chips and salsa, with my large pineapple agua fresca ($2.50) nearly covering my wife’s small horchata agua fresca ($1.49). The pineapple is one of the best aguas frescas I’ve ever had anywhere, with lots of real fruit pulp in it. The horchata was nice and refreshing too. Very cinnamony. These chips desperately needed to be salted, ideally right when they came out of the fryer, as they were pretty bland. But the salsa was terrific. It must have been made fresh, because it was much better than most table salsas I’ve had at similar Mexican restaurants, with a roasted tomato flavor. I would totally buy this salsa by the jar.

My wife suggested we get the Hacienda sampler platter ($7.99), but we were both a little underwhelmed by it. You have more of the unsalted chips, covered with refried beans and molten lava-hot queso to serve as nachos in the middle, two crispy beef flautas (which she usually likes), and then a quesadilla on the right side with seasoned ground beef in a soft flour tortilla. She wasn’t into the quesadilla at all after one bite, so I ate it. She wasn’t really feeling the queso either, so I ate everything it touched. It was kind of bland. Guacamole was okay. I would skip this sampler in the future. The menu is huge, and there are plenty of more interesting offerings to be had here.

Whenever I’m at a new Mexican restaurant that serves traditional tacos on corn tortillas, dressed with only fresh cilantro and diced onions, with multiple meats to choose from, I like to order an assortment of those tacos to sample the different meats. They are usually small and cheap, so I get a nice variety and a chance to gauge what the restaurant does best. From left to right I got birria (shredded and steamed barbecue beef; a real foodie trend of the past two years), lengua (tender braised beef tongue), pescado (fried fish), al pastor (slow-cooked pork marinated with pineapple juice and traditionally shaved off a spit), chorizo (crumbled spicy pork sausage), and carne asada (grilled steak). Each of these beauties was $1.79, except for the fish taco that was $3.49. The plate came garnished with a lime wedge to squirt over each taco, soft marinated carrot slices (delicious), and crispy sliced radishes. I ran out of steam and couldn’t eat the carne asada, but I mostly ordered that one for my wife to try, since that is usually her go-to Mexican meat.

In fact, she ordered two carne asada sopes ($2.99 each), served open-faced on thick, puffy fried corn shells that are much thicker than tortillas, that serve kind of like a shallow cup or bowl. They were topped with shredded iceberg lettuce, tomatoes, and crumbled cotija cheese.She always orders sopes at one of our favorite establishments, Tortas El Rey, and I think those remain the reigning champions for her.

I was so full that I was feeling ill, but my wife wanted dessert, so we ordered the helado frito, or fried ice cream ($4.99). It was a huge portion — a big scoop of rock-hard vanilla ice cream covered in a really nice, crispy fried breading, and served in a fried flour tortilla like the kind taco salads come in. It was drizzled with caramel sauce and served with whipped cream and sprinkles. For some reason, she didn’t like the fried breading around the ice cream, but that was my favorite part, so that worked out well for us.

I definitely liked our meal at La Hacienda more than my wife did, but she might have preferred it if she ordered different things. I definitely enjoyed the birria, al pastor, chorizo, and fried fish tacos, the marinated carrots, and the salsa that came with the chips (but the chips themselves, ehhhh, not so much). I would go back, but I think she would take a pass. With Tortilleria El Progreso so close to work, I don’t know if I could wrangle work colleagues to grab lunch here (once we start doing that again), or even drive the extra distance to pick up takeout to eat at work. But it would be a convenient stop to pick up takeout on my way home, now that I know what’s good and what is just so-so. Tortas El Rey is just so far, and our other favorite, Francisco’s Taco Madness, is never open at night or on Sundays, so it could be a nice option to have solid, authentic Mexican food near home in the future.

Thai Halal Grill

Thai Halal Grill (http://thaihalalgrill.com/) is a new fast-casual restaurant located inside the Apna Bazaar, a Halal Indian grocery store in Longwood, north of Orlando. The restaurant just opened recently — I believe in October 2020. When you walk into Apna Bazaar, you can’t miss their round sign lit up on the right of the market.

The menu appears on a large TV monitor above the counter where you order, but they also have the menu on their website and full-color paper menus to take. I was not planning to order food when I got to Apna Bazaar — instead I was looking for ground lamb for a pastitsio recipe. But a friend and co-worker with good taste and opinions I respect raved about Thai Halal Grill after discovering it recently, so I placed an order and shopped around the grocery store while my food was being prepared, picking out some snacks and sweet basil seed drinks. It only took about ten minutes.

I saw they had spicy halal meatballs in chili sauce with fried rice, and I almost order that when I saw the meatballs could also come with stir-fried noodles. Sold! That dish was a very reasonable $10.95 for a huge portion. In fact, everything on the menu is $10.95 except for the stir-fried beef and pepper with white rice, which is $11.95. I might try that next time, or the Thai fried rice, ore even one of the curries. The lady working the counter was so sweet, warm, and welcoming. She gave me a tangerine to take with me, for dessert.

Here’s a close-up photo. I loved this dish. The meatballs were extremely flavorful, with the nice spongy texture you hope for from a meatball. It contained red and green bell peppers, onions, and peas, but luckily no carrots. I can take or leave carrots in dishes like this, as they never seem to add much in the way of flavor. The noodles were soft and delicious. I could have easily gotten two servings from this portion, but I chose not to.

I will totally go back to Thai Halal Grill and try something different next time, plus it was fun browsing around Apna Bazaar. But I didn’t want to wait any longer on this review, since I got a little distracted by all the big news last weekend and never published anything this past week. This is a tiny local restaurant that could use your business. Please stop by and give them a chance, and I guarantee you’ll be tempted to buy some stuff from the market too. Longwood isn’t known as one of Orlando’s super-hip foodie areas, but I’ve also reviewed Oh My Gyro and Pickles Delicatessen in the area, and there are more delicious destinations in Longwood I have plans to revisit and review soon.

CLOSED: Itamae Densho

EDIT: Itamae Densho did not last long, but chef-owner Denni Cha went on to open the very different Uncle Dendog’s.

I just recently learned about the existence of Itamae Densho (https://itamae-densho.square.site/), a Japanese restaurant affiliated with local favorite (and Saboscrivner favorite) Swine & Sons inside The Local Butcher & Market, a gourmet butcher shop and market in Winter Park. Local chef Denni Cha set up there a week ago, creating beautiful donburi, bowls of sushi-seasoned rice topped with stunningly gorgeous arrays of raw fish, fresh and pickled vegetables, actual flowers, and so much more. I’m a huge fan of poke and sushi, but I’m used to very casual build-your-own poke bowl places, and I’ve never done a full-on omakase dinner experience. So even though these donburi look almost too pretty to eat, I wanted to destroy something beautiful.

I placed my online order on the above website late last night and paid in advance with my credit card. The automated e-mail told me my order would be ready after 5:50 PM today, and since I grew up in a home where “Early is on time and on time is late,” I was there right on the dot. I met Denni, who said they would just need some time to assemble everything so it would be at its freshest, and I appreciated that he didn’t have it already made, sitting there waiting for me. I was out the door with three bowls packed in recyclable, dishwasher-safe, microwave-safe containers in about ten minutes.

This is the Salmon Oyako donburi ($16) that my wife ate most of. The website describes it as including “Wild King Salmon Tataki, House Cured Salmon Roe, fresh and pickled veggies, served over sushi rice.”

Note the little yellow flowers and the beautiful green romanesco cauliflower, which has fascinating fractal patterns. It looks like sci-fi food, and I always remember Rey actually eating some in Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens. The salmon roe popped lightly in our mouths like delicate, salty, fishy bubbles, and the salmon was incredibly fresh.

This was the “Tuna x Tuna” donburi ($15), with “Tuna Sashimi, Tuna, Densho-Style Tuna, Yuzu-Kosho Aiolo, Tobiko, fresh and pickled veggies, served over sushi rice.”

I love tuna, so I was in tuna heaven with this one. I also liked the seaweed salad, which had a nice crunch and a subtle saltiness from soy sauce. The leafy green surrounding the roe in the above photo had an interesting bitter taste. But those thin slices of pepper are serrano peppers with the seeds and ribs intact, so they are no joke. I’m used to jalapeños, which are further down the Scoville scale, heat-wise. Plus, I usually remove the seeds and ribs when I prepare jalapeños at home, always while wearing disposable gloves (a lesson learned the hard way, after one horrific incident I won’t go into in this space, in mixed company). Anyway, before too long, we were like a couple of kids: her picking out the serrano slices for me, and me picking the tiny flowers off with my chopsticks for her. (I don’t think they added much in the way of flavor, but damn, were they cute!)

And this was the Densho-Style chirashi donburi ($18), with “Chef’s Selection of sashimi grade fish with various garnished flavor profiles, house-cured salmon roe, unagi, fresh and pickled veggies, served over sushi rice.”

Aside from tuna, salmon, and the roe, I think I recognized hamachi (yellowtail) in this bowl, plus more of the other ingredients. The sushi rice was excellent, and even my wife, who normally doesn’t like the sweet rice vinegar flavor in sushi rice, enjoyed it. My wife was the first one to discover that all three bowls had crispy fried onions near the bottom, underneath the rice. She doesn’t normally like onions at all, but she enjoyed what these brought to the table. As for me, I love onions, so I was very content.

I’m sure there is a grand tradition of this beautiful presentation in Japanese cuisine, but we usually don’t go to those high-end sushi restaurants. However, my wife and I were both reminded of the award-winning restaurant Noma, in Copenhagen, Denmark. No, we’ve never been there either, but it has been featured in many food and travel shows, including the late, great Anthony Bourdain’s Parts Unknown and No Reservations, David Chang’s Ugly Delicious, and Phil Rosenthal’s Somebody Feed Phil. Those are all awesome shows that any Saboscrivner reader would love, if you don’t already. Noma’s chef, René Redzepi, prepares these picturesque plates of fancy food that look like tiny terrariums, or dioramas for fairies and elves to live in. He uses lots of edible flowers and plants to build a little scene, and that’s what Denni Cha’s lovely donburi bowls made us think of. As long as he’s set up at The Local Butcher & Market, preparing these dishes on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Saturdays, and Sundays, I encourage all of you to place some preorders on his website. But do it early, because I have a feeling he may only make so many of these every day, and you don’t want to miss out.

CLOSED: Taglish

EDITOR’S NOTE: Taglish closed its Lotte Plaza Market and East Orlando locations in late October, 2022. Its final location in Sanford closed December 31st, 2022.

***

Taglish (https://www.taglishfl.com/) just soft-opened a few weeks ago, and it quickly became one of my favorite restaurants in Orlando. “Taglish” is clever shorthand for Tagalog, the main language of the Philippines, and English, and the name fits perfectly, because Chef Michael Collantes envisioned it as a Filipino-American fusion restaurant.

Located in the small-but-bustling food court of one of my new favorite foodie destinations in Orlando, Lotte Plaza Market on West Colonial Drive and John Young Parkway in West Orlando, Taglish has filled a void that many of us didn’t even realize was there — an introduction (for many foodies) to the delicious flavors and textures of Filipino food. Filipino restaurants are still rare in most parts of the country, especially here. But since Taglish announced its soft opening, I’ve been twice so far, a week apart, and I fantasized about returning that whole week in between. On my first visit, knowing Taglish opened at 11 AM and wanting to beat the rush, I arrived around 11:15 and barely had to wait in line at all.

The first thing you might notice upon lining up are the four drinks served in “bubblers”: ube horchata, strawberry hibiscus, cucumber pear, and mango calamansi lemonade. (The lady in front of me in line moved a bag at the exact wrong moment to cover that last sign, but trust me.) Drinks are $2.70, except for the ube horchata, which is $3.95. But you can always make any meal into a combo for $4, which includes a drink (plus a nominal upcharge if you want the ube horchata, which you probably will).

On my first visit, I chose the ube horchata. Ube is a purple yam that is popular in Filipino desserts, and horchata is one of my favorite drinks to order with Mexican food: a rice milk often flavored with cinnamon and vanilla, perfect for cutting the heat of spicy dishes. It was thick and rich and sweet, but not overwhelmingly sweet. Having no experience tasting ube before, it reminded me of the vanilla-scented taro milk tea my wife always orders at Vietnamese restaurants and Asian tea shops, right down to the similar shade of lavender.

Although the dish I ordered wasn’t spicy at all, it was one of the tastiest, most satisfying meals I’ve eaten anywhere, in a long, long time. I asked Barbara, the extraordinarily friendly and welcoming cashier, what she recommended, because everything sounded interesting, and she recommended I try the sisig ($9.50) — a dish of crispy pork pan-seared in garlic, tomato, onion, and jalapeno, served over rice (I opted for garlic rice instead of the regular white rice), topped with a poached egg and a drizzle of garlic mayo. I made it into a combo for an additional $4, to include the above drink and two lumpia, crispy pork-stuffed spring rolls served with sweet chili sauce for dipping (just out of frame).

Constant readers, I can’t sing the praises of this sisig dish nearly enough, or in enough detail to honor the fictional definition of the term Saboscrivner. It exceeded my every expectation in the best possible way. I splashed on a bit of spicy vinegar from a glass bottle in a small condiment area next to the cash register, and that spicy sourness just brought out all the strong, rich flavors even more. The perfectly poached egg ran richly over everything, and the bits of tomato, onion, jalapeno, and garlic added the slightest spice. I would eat this dish every week if I could. I felt like I was floating afterwards, and I surely bored my wife and a few acquaintances raving about it for days after the fact. I even e-mailed Chef Collantes to gush about how much I enjoyed it, and he was kind enough to take time out of his busy schedule to write me back.

By the way, you give them your phone number when you place your order, and they text you to come pick up your food on a tray when it’s ready. This could get precarious later in the day when every seat in the food court is taken, so I encourage you to arrive with friends, or make some once you get there!

Well, after that auspicious first visit, I returned a week later, on another Saturday. Unfortunately I got to Lotte Plaza Market around 1:30 PM that second visit, so there was already a long line at Taglish — great for them, and only the most minor of annoyances for me. But good word has been spreading, and I only hope to spread it further.

Barbara even remembered me from the previous week, and I remembered her second-place recommendation from when she suggested the sisig. As much as I loved it, I had to try something new, for the sake of the Saboscrivner’s subscribers. So I ordered the chicken adobo burrito ($8.95) — a thick burrito stuffed to the bursting point with classic Filipino dish chicken adobo (also served as a bowl over rice), garlic rice, fried potatoes, and stewed mung beans, wrapped in a large flour tortilla and almost defying the laws of physics. It was outstanding! So many flavors, textures, and even colors to appreciate and explore.

This was a perfect example of a fusion dish, and I loved it. My only regret is very minor — I might have been able to analyze each component better and savor the ingredients if I had ordered this as a bowl over rice, instead of wrapped in the lightly grilled tortilla. For example, I’ve never had monggo (stewed mung beans) before, and I still can’t really describe it, since it melded together with everything else in the burrito. But it was all fantastic!

But as long as I was there, I had to try something else that has always caught my eye on the menu: the longaniza burger. Longaniza is a Filipino pork sausage that is a little bit sweet, often eaten as a breakfast meat (if I’m not mistaken). Here, the homemade longaniza sausage was crafted into a burger patty and served on a soft, buttered, grilled bun (possibly a King’s Hawaiian roll), topped with a slice of grilled pineapple, garlic mayo, and a salad of sweet, tangy, vinegary, pickled, shredded papaya called atchara, which I loved. Note the two included lumpia and the serving of crispy seasoned potatoes, which stayed warm and crispy throughout my meal. I got another small cup of sweet chili sauce, but next time I will request banana ketchup for the fried potatoes, just because I love dipping sauces and condiments — especially new and unfamiliar ones.

Close-up on the slaw-like atchara, which I would love to buy a jar of and put on everything. I really like vinegar, and I am drawn to Filipino cuisine because vinegar is such a common and important ingredient. Also dig that wonderful grilled, buttered bun. I wish everyone who served burgers, dogs, and sandwiches would take a lesson from this.

A cross-section. The slight crispiness of the atchara really balanced out the softer ingredients (the bun, grilled sausage patty, and pineapple slice).

On this second visit, I paid $4 for the combo again (dig the lumpia above), and tried the refreshingly tart mango calamansi lemonade. Calamansi, also known as the Philippine lime, is a small citrus fruit used in a lot of Filipino recipes. I had never tasted it before, but my research tells me it’s a hybrid of the kumquat and mandarin orange. Plus, I already love mangoes in anything, and I’ll always drink lemonade when it’s an option.

This time, I was lucky enough to meet the amiable Chef Collantes, shake his hand, and tell him in person how wonderful his food is, and how friendly, patient, and helpful his staff is. He is the former Culinary Director of Bento, a small, local chain of pan-Asian restaurants I have been a big fan of since the first one opened in Gainesville in 2003, the last year I lived there. I’ve eaten countless custom poke bowls, sushi rolls, bento boxes, and udon noodles at Bento’s numerous Orlando locations — even on my wedding day, ten years ago — but this reminded me to make it back there soon to write a Saboscrivner review. The fact that Chef Collantes might have created some of my favorite dishes at Bento before opening Taglish (and subsequently blowing my mind with that sisig) makes all the sense in the world.

I wish him and his staff the best of all things, but they already have a huge hit on their hands. For many, Filipino food will be unfamiliar and novel, but even though people will come in to try something new and different, I’m convinced they will get hooked and become regulars, like I hope to be.

Washington D.C. Part 4: Union Market, Red Apron, Neopol Savory Smokery

There’s nothing I love more than exploring a good food market or food hall, and I’ve been to a lot of the greatest ones in the country. Philadelphia’s Reading Terminal Market and Seattle’s Pike Place Market are my two all-time favorites, but I’ve also had way too much fun at Baltimore’s Lexington Market (home of Faidley’s Seafood, which I have reviewed right here!), San Francisco’s Ferry Building, and Columbus, Ohio’s North Market. You can keep your fine dining experiences, with chefs who decide what you’re going to eat and obsequious waiters who hover behind you. Not my idea of a good time! Give me a sprawling maze of food stalls with local luxuries, exotic eats, stunning sandwiches, and gorgeous groceries, and I’m in Saboscrivner heaven.

On my trip to D.C., one of my frolleagues (a professional colleague who became a friend) invited me to the Union Market (https://unionmarketdc.com/), figuring I would have a great time. She knows me well, because she was spot-on. She and her husband, former D.C. denizens, were kind enough to pick me up, and we met another D.C.-based frolleague there. I was so grateful to the three of them for hanging out with me, showing me around, and indulging me as I tried this and that, as I probably would not have made it to the market or even known about it, if left to my own devices. Originally founded as the Centre Market in 1871, the Union Market has gone through many iterations over the decades, always changing to stay current and relevant, until it evolved into the hip foodie destination it is today. I’d kill to have something similar here in Orlando!

I was first drawn to a sign that said Neopol Savory Smokery (http://neopolsmokery.com/), with a picture of a fish.

Regular readers know I love my fish smoked, cured, and/or pickled (the food of my people), so my one friend and I headed straight to Neopol. It was almost impossible to choose, but my seasoned friend (the D.C. local) chose a smoked salmon BLT with avocado ($10):
I went with a smoked whitefish salad sandwich ($10) on really nice, fresh, sliced white bread, adorned with lettuce, tomato, and onion. I love cool, creamy, smoky whitefish salad, and it’s really hard to come by here in Orlando. I’ve made it myself before, but even finding the golden smoked whitefish (sometimes called “chubs”) is a difficult task around here, and then you have to pick out hundreds of needle-thin, plastic-like bones. This whitefish salad sandwich was excellent, and a heck of a lot easier than attempting to duplicate it at home.

One super-cool thing I noticed about Neopol was a sign that said several of their employees are deaf, so patrons should make sure their have someone’s full attention and make eye contact before placing their order. This made all the sense in the world, because I noticed the Union Market is very close to Gallaudet University, the largest university for deaf and hard-of-hearing students in the United States. The entire market is very deaf-friendly, with deaf employees and interpreters who can speak and understand American Sign Language (ASL), plus lots of deaf patrons, many of whom are affiliated with Gallaudet. This article from Gallaudet’s website has more information.

These major urban food markets usually have a butcher shop displaying beautiful steaks, chops, sausages, and seafood that I wish I could take home to prepare, except I’m usually far from home. So I couldn’t believe it when I saw a gleaming glass case full of my absolute favorite: cured meats. This was Red Apron Butcher (https://redapronbutchery.com/), a place you have to see to believe!

Here’s a screen shot from Red Apron Butcher’s website with everything they offer. We desperately need this place back home! Well, maybe my wallet and my cholesterol don’t need it. This is the stuff that dreams are made of:

Luckily for me, Red Apron also offers tempting and very reasonably-priced sandwiches:

I knew I had to sample their Italian sandwich ($12), which comes with “4 meats” (I checked, and they were hot cotto, pork cotto, cappicola, and bologna), sharp provolone, pickled peppers, iceberg lettuce, onion, and an herb vinaigrette. It was a top-notch Italian, as you might guess. I liked how finely-shredded the lettuce and onions were, and how the dressing held it all in place, so it was less likely to slide off the soft roll.

But figuring I would bring leftovers back to my hotel room for a quiet dinner that evening, I decided to pick a second sandwich. That’s my classic go-to plan, to eat half of each sandwich at the market (or wherever I am) and save the other halves for later. It was so hard to choose, since everything on the menu looked so good. But a chorizo burger or a meatball sub wouldn’t be quite as good back in my room later, without a microwave to heat them up. So I eventually went with a simple grilled cheese with spicy smoked pimento cheese (so not such a simple grilled cheese after all!) on toasted white Pullman bread ($7). I love pimento cheese, and I’m getting to the point where I’ll usually order it wherever I can find it, since everyone’s version is a little different — kind of like how I am with onion rings, chili, and Italian subs. However, I prefer the bread in my grilled cheese a little more buttery and a little less toasty.

Meanwhile, my other friend got an Indian dosa from DC Dosa (I passed due to having a fantastic dosa relatively recently), and her husband went to TaKorean Korean Taco Grill. A place like the Union Market is so perfect for hanging out with family or friends because everyone can get whatever they want, and then you just reconvene at the communal tables to eat together. It’s also a fantastic place for sharing your meals and trying new things.

Finally, I took a deep dive into the world of falooda, the sweet Indian dessert drink that can be layered with a variety of interesting ingredients. My friend was raving about her cool, refreshing falooda from the Toli Moli Burmese Bodega (https://www.tolimolidc.com/), and on this ridiculously humid day, after a huge lunch, I easily succumbed to peer pressure and ordered one for myself. According to the website, “Toli Moli” translates to “a little of this and a little of that,” which is a perfect way to describe the falooda drinks.

I am pretty sure she ordered the Royal, which contains pomegranate-ginger jellies and basil seeds suspended in paprika-infused milk, vanilla ice cream, and housemade rosewater syrup. I almost ordered that too, but the guy at the counter suggested the Mango Mogul, which contains layers of mango jellies and basil seeds floating in turmeric-infused almond & coconut milk, mango sorbet from Washington D.C.’s own Ruby Scoops Ice Cream and Sorbet, and housemade rosewater syrup. I was a little skeptical about the almond and coconut milk, but I do love mango, so I went for it. It reminded me a bit of the sweet boba tea slushes I’ve had at Orlando Vietnamese restaurants and teahouses, only with the chewy stuff in a thicker milkshake. (And I tend to hold the chewy stuff, but when in Rome — or D.C. — do what the locals do!) Falooda might be the next trend to hit Orlando, so you heard it here first.

Once again, I would probably have never discovered the falooda on my own, much less ordered it, so I was grateful to these fellow foodie frolleagues for broadening my horizons this day, and for showing me what has to be one of the most delicious destinations in D.C. I loved the Union Market so much, and this lunch with these friends was definitely one of the highlights of my conference. I never would have made it there without them, or even known to seek it out, but I’m so glad I did, and when you’re in D.C., you should too.

Tortilleria El Progreso

Orlando is full of hidden treasures, and my latest discovery is Tortilleria El Progreso (https://www.tortilleriaelprogreso.com/), nestled in a nondescript strip shopping center in the shadow of a Home Depot, along a busy, industrial stretch of East Colonial Drive, west of the 417 and east of Semoran Boulevard. It is a bustling Mexican restaurant and a full Mexican grocery store with a butcher shop, a bakery, an ice cream counter, and more. This is real Mexican food, authentic and pure — the kind of place that makes its own tortillas, chips, and everything else from scratch. The menu is huge, the service is friendly, the prices are cheap, the portions are large, and the colorful, welcoming dining room with hand-painted chairs makes you feel transported away from Orlando, to a vacation destination south of the border.

I went for lunch with a professional colleague who trusts my restaurant-choosing judgment and was kind enough to treat. We started out with complimentary chips and salsa, and we could tell the chips were fresh, made from actual tortillas not long before our arrival:

Whenever I see tortas on a menu, I go for it. If there’s one thing I love more than a good taco, it’s a good sandwich, and tortas are the best of both worlds: Mexican ingredients on a soft bolillo or telera roll, with meat, a schmear of refried beans, avocado, shredded lettuce, tomato, onions, sometimes peppers, and a dab of mayo or sour cream. I got a barbacoa torta, with tender, oven-braised beef. It even came with unexpected fries, but the fries weren’t anything special, and I didn’t dare fill up on them.

But I couldn’t visit a new Mexican restaurant and not sample two of my favorite meats, so I got a chorizo (spicy crumbled sausage) taco on a flour tortilla and an al pastor (marinated pork) taco on a corn tortilla, so I could try both kinds of tortillas too. All the tacos came simply garnished with diced raw onions and chopped cilantro, with lime wedges on the side. I am pleased to say everything was delicious.

My colleague ordered three tacos: shredded chicken and sauteed beef, hold the onions.

We were also offered a choice of red or green salsas for the table, so of course I asked for both. The green tomatillo salsa was medium-spicy, and the red had quite a bit of heat. These were homemade as well:

We also decided to try a side order of the Mexican rice, which was soft, fluffy, even a little buttery. I have a rice cooker at home because my rice never comes out right from a pot, but I still never get it as perfect as all the restaurant rice I enjoy. I stirred a little of the salsas into the rice, to make a good thing even better.

I was overjoyed to see aguas frescas on the menu, which is one of my tests for how authentic and good a Mexican restaurant is going to be. These refreshing drinks are sweet, but not as sweet as high fructose corn syrup-laden sodas, they aren’t carbonated, and they’re ideal for cutting the heat of spicy Mexican food. I ordered a piña agua fresca because I will always try anything pineappley, and I recommended another one of my favorites to my colleague: horchata, which is a sweet rice milk flavored with cinnamon and vanilla. I didn’t snap photos of those, but they were both terrific.

I can’t wait to return to Tortilleria El Progreso and try some more menu items, including some of those other aguas frescas, and some of the paletas (popsicles) and helados (ice creams) in the big case at the front of the restaurant. It looked like the market side had bolillo rolls in the bakery section for tortas, fresh tortillas, sodas, snacks, and other groceries worth exploring. I love grocery shopping at new places almost as much as I love trying new restaurants, so I will definitely be back to this newly-discovered hidden treasure that plenty of other people surely already knew about.

Stasio’s Italian Deli & Market: Opening Day review!

Well, after tracking its progress for what seems like a year, Orlando’s first Italian deli and market, Stasio’s, finally opened for business today, as a soft opening. (https://www.facebook.com/Stasios-Italian-deli-194418224503776/) I love Italian delis and markets — Mazzaro’s Market in St. Petersburg is one of my favorite destinations in all of Florida (and I don’t just mean restaurants), and DeLaurenti inside Pike Place Market in Seattle and Eataly in Chicago are two of the coolest places I’ve ever been. Needless to say, I had to make a pilgrimage to Stasio’s on its opening day, and I’m so glad I did, because they are filling a void in Orlando’s burgeoning culinary scene. The family that owns Stasio’s also founded the venerable and much-missed Louie and Maria’s Italian restaurant, as well as the Pizzeria Valdiano location in Waterford Lakes, so they aren’t new to Orlando or to delicious Italian food.

My co-worker and I arrived around 1 PM, and I was glad to see the place busy and bustling. We immediately got in line to order sandwiches at the deli counter, where we were presented with a laminated menu. For me, choosing the Stasio sandwich was an easy choice: prosciutto, hot capicola, mild soppressata, fresh mozzarella, roasted red peppers, red onion, and white balsamic vinaigrette on a sub roll, for $11. That’s my idea of a good time! My vegetarian co-worker ordered the Melenzani sandwich, with eggplant, spinach, roasted red peppers, marinated tomatoes, fresh mozzarella, and balsamic reduction, which only came as a panini, for $11. (Editor’s note: she e-mailed and said it came on a sub roll after all, despite the menu saying it would be a panini.)

They were slammed on their first day, so it gave us time to browse around. At the deli, I ordered some sliced Italian beef brisket and porchetta, both made in-house, while my co-worker picked up some beautiful fresh sfogliatelle (flaky, shell-shaped pastries) from their bakery counter. They had plenty of other meats and cheeses, huge square slices of pizza ($4.95 for a gigantic slice), deli salads and vegetables, including broccoli rabe, multicolored roasted peppers, stuffed cherry peppers, and sundried tomatoes glistening in oil, marinated imported anchovies that looked like actual silvery fish and not the salty brown fillets that everyone except me dreads on their pizza, and prepared Italian meatballs and sausage. Shelf-stable groceries included all kinds of fancy pasta you will NOT find at Publix, and plenty of cans, jars, and bottles of delicious Italian delicacies.

Stasio’s does not have tables, but the store is lined with a long counter for people to enjoy their food while sitting on stools. We brought ours back to work, though. They also have an espresso counter near the cash registers at the front, and it looks like you can also order wine by the glass there, but I could be wrong. (Don’t drink, wasn’t paying that close attention.)

Upon returning to work, I couldn’t be more pleased to say how great the sub was. The melange of meats worked together in perfect harmony with the fresh “mutsadell” (I promise I’ll never do that again), and roasted red peppers are a welcome addition to almost any sandwich. I’m sure someone is wondering how the sub roll was, and I’m happy to report it was the perfect amount of chewy with an exterior that wasn’t too crusty — just how I like them. The rolls were also baked in-house, of course. I would have liked more toppings on the sub — lettuce, tomato, maybe some of the long hot peppers they advertised on other sandwiches — but ordering was a bit of sensory overload today, and I didn’t even ask. Next time!

Here’s a much better photo of a different Stasio sandwich from a later visit:

I also impulse-bought a Manhattan Special espresso soda in a glass bottle, because even though I’m not much of a coffee drinker, I sure love trying new and interesting soda flavors. It was good, although I think a cappuccino/latte version with some creaminess would have been much better. All they had were regular and diet version of the espresso soda, though.

Well, I am very happy Stasio’s is finally open, and so close to my work! I’ll definitely add it to my regular restaurant rotation, and I suggest my dozens of loyal readers (bakers’ dozens?) give it a try at your earliest convenience. I wish them the best and welcome them to the neighborhood!

ADDENDUM: My co-worker gave me one of her shell-shaped sfogliatelle pastries, and it was delicious. The crispy outer dough is very flaky and fragile, able to be peeled apart in thin, spiral-like layers. The inside is kind of like a thick, lightly-sweetened cheese (not creamy or runny at all, more like the filling of a cheese danish but not nearly as sweet), speckled with tiny, chewy bits of candied lemon for a subtle fresh citrus taste and scent.

ADDENDUM 2: If you go on a weekday afternoon, Stasio’s will often have huge rectangular slices of Sicilian-style pizza, which I just love. I highly recommend seeking one of these big baddies out.