Zinis

I went to Zinis in Bantam last night with friends. Most restaurants I go to are through recommendations of friends, acquaintances or from Facebook conversations. There is always an added burden when the recommendation involves friends, especially when you are eating with them. Whenever someone makes a restaurant recommendation to friends, they take ownership of the place that is recommend. It is no longer just the chefs cooking skills on the line, it the personal tastes of the friend. It’s hard enough recommending a place only to find out your friend doesn’t like it, but then to have them announce that to the world in the form of a review is so much worse. Surprisingly, people are still willing to dine with me. I guess I haven’t piled up enough bad reviews yet. But I fear my days are numbered. Thankfully, I dodged another bullet as Zinis is good.

Bantam Upswing

I must have been past Zinis hundreds of times in my treks through Litchfield without it registering with me, and as much as Litchfield may deny it Bantam is part of Litchfield. This was made abundantly clear to me when I was going to there for dinner and I had no idea where it was. I mean beyond it being in Bantam, which means one of two roads, Route 202 or Route 209. My GPS revealed it to be 202 just south of the area where Arethusa is single-handedly making Bantam trendy and Litchfield proper ready to reclaim its poorer relative. The building is small, set back a little off the road and is easy to miss. Although once turning into the parking lot it commands your attention in a quaint Lord of the Rings sort of a way. The building looks the size of a house in the front, but the stone gives it a feeling that you might upon entering encounter a hobbit, a dwarf and elf enjoying a meal before traveling on the journey to Mordor or New York City, although that might be redundant. Unfortunately, there were no hobbits or such, but then there were no orcs either so that was a plus. Despite the lack of mythical creatures inside, it still had an air of quaint charm with its round dark wood tables and an old-world flair if not a Middle Earth one.

Garlic Bread

I was the last to arrive, which is unusual as I am usually first and like to scope out the bar. No bar tonight, just right to the table where my friends were waiting. I would like to point out that I was not late, but a good ten minutes early. Apparently, my friends practiced Lombardi Time, where the legendary coach told his players if you showed up on time you were 15 minutes late. So, I guess by Lombardi time I was 5 minutes late. Zinis immediately scored points with me as they already had a basket of thin slices of warm, garlicky bread on the table. Something that Buon Appetito could learn from (no I haven’t stopped beating that dead horse).

Artichoke Hearts

One of my friends highly recommended the Artichoke Hearts and it is listed on their menu as “Our Signature Artichoke Hearts.” I am a firm believer in taking recommendations from people that are familiar with a restaurant and the restaurant staff themselves if they will give it. They have eaten there many times and in the case of the staff certainly are familiar with people’s responses. They will know much better than I will what’s good there. Now having said that there are sometimes things you learn about yourself by doing that. I learned that although I have eaten artichokes in many dishes as ingredients, I do not think I have ever eaten them where they were “the” ingredient to carry the dish. I realize now that I do not like artichokes enough to expect that of them. It is not that I don’t like them or that they weren’t good here. It is just that as an ingredient I find them a nice contribution to a dish, but they need to know their place and that is not as the star. I could tell that this was a very good appetizer if you like artichokes, and a decent one if you are ok with them. This was a decent one to me. It is like if a big fan of basketball and someone that wants to do something, and basketball is something go to a great game. Both teams play great, the score is close and goes back and forth, the games is decided by a buzzer beater after countless spectacular plays. The basketball lover, looks over at his friend, completely breathless and exhilarated from one of the best games he has ever seen and manages to get out in his almost completely lost voice “wasn’t that amazing?” The friend who was glad for a night out, but not a basketball fan and not able to appreciate everything in the way his friend did, just utters “that was a close game, wasn’t it?” I unfortunately was that friend with the artichoke hearts. I know the artichokes were flawless, I know they were perfectly, lightly breaded to maximize the flavor of those flawless artichokes and the lemon sauce was also light enough to enhance without hiding the artichokes. In short to “wasn’t it amazing?” which I am sure it was, all I can say is “that was a close game, wasn’t it?” Now another friend had the fried calamari. They give you a big plate of those enough for him to share with the whole table, which he did. Now calamari you don’t have to be gentle with. It doesn’t have all that much flavor and what it has isn’t delicate. You can fry it up in thicker breading and serve it with marinara sauce and not worry about hiding the calamari, just make sure it isn’t chewy and rubbery. Zinis did all those things that would make me say “wasn’t it amazing?” only to hear the non-calamari lover beat me over the ears with my own words “that was a close game, wasn’t it?” Zinis knows how to make appetizers. By the way I do not want this in anyway way to discourage people from recommended dishes to me. I find that some of the best things I have eaten of late have been through other’s recommendations and without those I tend to fall back into ruts that do not expand to that new dish that I may find I absolutely love. So, recommend away, if I don’t like it, it is still worth it, if I find it alright even better, and if I find a new favorite, well that is what it is all about.

Seafood Fra Diavolo

Speaking of ruts, I have been in a Seafood Fra Diavolo, and Paella rut lately. I have had a few of each of these dishes that are some of my favorite dishes around. The problem with both is that apparently if not prepared perfectly they are just slightly above average. I say apparently because my rut has led me to try many of these lately searching for the illusive great Fra Diavolo and Paella, only to find that they are average or just to above average. At that point I find myself either wishing I ordered something else or just being content with a decent dinner. Last night was the latter. First of all, Fra Diavolo is a spicy sauce, usually using chili peppers. Most places seem to miss the spicy part. That is why I always tell the wait staff that I want my Fra Diavolo extra spicy. One of these days I am going to get one that actually does it right to begin with and I might regret my request, but it hasn’t happened yet. This wasn’t going to be the night. My expectations went down hill immediately when along with my plate of seafood covered pasta, they brought me out a small plate of dried red pepper flakes. Those work fine to spice up pizza or an ordinary pasta sauce, but to enhance the heat of a Fra Diavolo sauce? Needless to say like Ahab searching for his white whale my search for that elusive great Fra Diavolo goes on. This is a shame because the seafood was top quality, big round perfectly cooked scallops, sweat and moist, large shrimp, just as filled with flavor and perfectly juicy. Even better, unlike Briccos salt infused shrimp these although not spicy, at least were not over-spiced in the wrong way. They were just good tasty sauce covered shrimp. Finally, the clams were tasty open morsels still dressed in their shell. If only they were dressed like spicy little hot numbers, they would have been perfect. The pasta and sauce were both good, the seafood was fresh and very good. It just wasn’t spiced well enough to qualify as great Fra Diavolo to me, and no red pepper flakes can alter that. A good seafood over pasta dish? Yes, just not enough Diavolo in the Fra Diavolo for me. The other diners stuck mainly to chicken, with two ordering parmesan and one ordering saltimbocca. A fifth ordered the Strawberry Salad as their main course. All seemed to enjoy their meals. I didn’t solicit opinions, nor where any offered. But if smiles count as good reviews, I saw 4 of them out of 4.

Chocolate Lava Cake

There were two many good sounding desserts not to partake and we ended up getting three different ones. I opted for the chocolate lava cake, while others tried the carrot cake and cheesecake. The coconut crème brulee was calling to me too, just not as loudly as the lava. The chocolate was deep rich chocolate as was the lava. It came with vanilla ice cream and whipped cream, which was a perfect ying to the chocolate’s yang. This seemed like a perfect ending to the meal. Although the carrot cake, cheesecake and at least the sound of the coconut brulee, could all have completed that sentence as well. Zinis knows desserts too.

Zinis is Good

In reviewing this review before posting it, I am afraid it has more of a negative sound than it is meant too. Zinis is a good Italian restaurant. The ingredients were uniformly good quality. The preparation of every dish was done well, albeit in a couple instances a little milder than I prefer. If you like mild tastes that lock in on the core ingredient or ingredients and let you experience them if not naked then let’s say in a shear negligee you will love Zinis. If you like those ingredients dressed to the nines, spiced up and hot, you may find it a little tame for your tastes.