Cacio e Vino

[weinoo]

The other night my wife and I dined with hathor & mr. hathor at this new-ish east village spot located at 80 2nd Avenue. It was my third trip, so it must be pretty good, otherwise I wouldn't have gone back!

They have a beautiful wood-burning tiled oven, and the pizza chef is well schooled in his flatbreads. A nice, charred flatbread is offered as a starter, along with a dip of tomatoes, roasted peppers, basil and olive oil - it disappeared rather quickly, I must say, along with a fruity Montepulciano D'Abruzzo.

The menu offers lots of varieties of pizza, farciti (Sicilian calzone), and schiacciate (Sicilian flatbread sandwiches). We had a warm schiacciate stuffed with sausage, tomatoes, peppers and primo sale, a Sicilian cheese - enough for four to share easily.

Along with the flatbread, we had a delicious, light fennel and blood orange salad with black olives, polipo alle herbe - perfectly cooked and tender octopus somewhat overwhelmed by it's herb sauce and calamari arrostiti - grilled, tender squid over a frisee salad with shaved pecorino - perhaps the winner amongst the four starters.

Enough - no way! Hathor ordered an off-the-menu pasta - chittara with bottarga - a great choice as this was devoured by all four of us! Mr. hathor - (in the one miscue of the evening, as skirt steak had been ordered) had a nice shredded fillet of beef in a very tasty sauce. My sweet and sour tuna fillet came rare, just as ordered, and was surprisingly good and the final main of the evening was my wife's bucatini with anchovies and sausage - also devoured.

Of the 2 desserts, hathor's cannelloni was the winner, though the shell could have been a bit crisper. We also had a couple of glasses of dessert wine and were comped four glasses of a light, lively Moscato d'Asti.

Bill for the evening came to around $60 pp, including 2 bottles of wine. This is a nice, neighborhood place, with friendly service (even better if you speak Italian!) and, imo, good food (dessets are sketchy, however), some of which really isn't being done better anywhere in the city.

[hathor]

Wait, you forgot Mrs. Weinoo's pasta! She had the buccatini, si? I just remember it as being light and flavorful.

All in all, a good place to have a comfortable, tasty meal, and to be able to actually hear your dining companions talk.