North to South - The Best Italian Around

This past weekend, I tagged along with my roommate to visit her college friend who lives in Boston. Since I've never been to Boston before, I jumped at the chance to see what the city was all about. I was excited for the long weekend and then I heard that Boston has some of the greatest Italian food - and I got even more excited.

After a long bus ride and some walking around Newbury Street (a great shopping street if any of you plan on visiting soon) we got ready and headed to our first dinner in Beantown. Lindsey's friend picked out a great place, Giacamos in the South End because you can make reservations there. At first glance, the place is small and homey. The menu had way too many choices that looked great and all at such good prices! Even a good bottle of wine was $20, something that would never happen in NYC. We decided on the fried calamari and a caprese salad as appetizers and for the main course, Lindsey and I shared our waiters favorite, the butternut squash ravioli and a special of the night. Home made pappardelle pasta with shrimps and scallops in a garlicky, redish cream sauce. Obviously I don't remember what the sauce was but it was really yum. The scallops were on the small size but there was enough seafood for both Lindsey and I to get our fare share. The butternut squash ravioli was great also. A big portion and the raviolis were filled with only butternut squash which was good. The dish was on the sweeter side so I'm glad I had it second because it was kind of like dessert!
Over all it was a great dinner at such a good price! If you're in the Boston area you should make sure you go to the South End Giacamos where there are no lines to get in and the prices and food are awesome.

However, not as awesome as our meal on Sunday night. New to living in Boston, Jenna didn't know exactly where the day was going to lead us in the food area. We did the touristy attractions, Faneuil Hall and the Freedom Trail and walked our way to the North End, which is the Little Italy of Boston. There are two major streets lined with Italian restaurant after Italian restaurant, it was hard to choose which one to go to. Being that Italian is my favorite meal (even before Sushi), I didn't care where we went as long as there was a Zagat sign in the window. We were drawn into this small corner restaurant by a guy named Michael and decided that this was the place. Definitely a family owned restaurant, every table was filled and it was only 6:30 pm. Al Dente is known for their famous spinach crepes so we had to order one of those and the lobster raviolis to start. The crepes were amazing. A big ravioli filled with spinach souffle on top of the greatest sauce you will ever taste. I have no idea what was it in but it was creamy and bad for you. The lobster ravioli came with chunks of lobster in each bite and it was hard not to want to eat the whole plate.

For the main course, our waitress told us that the Veal melts in your mouth, so two people ordered different kinds of veal. I shared with Lindsey again and we got the eggplant lasagna with a side of meatball and she got the most amazing pasta I have ever eaten. I wish I took a picture but you'll have to use your imagination. Home made fusilli pasta with scallops and shrimps (again) with a vodka sauce. I know you're thinking what's so special about that - but it was just awesome. Sometimes it's hard to tell the different between pasta out of the box and pasta that's home made but you could definitely tell the difference in this dish. The shrimps and scallops were huge and the portion itself was HUGE. Every entree we ordered was so big we could have gotten 2 for 5 people instead of 5. And again, the prices were great. At first they seem kind of like NYC prices but then you see the portion size and you are walking away with bags of leftovers - you know you got a deal.

I hope Jenna and Justin enjoyed those leftovers because I am craving that pasta right now.
If you love Italian food as much as I do, please visit these two restaurants and you will not be disappointed. And how could I forget! Even though you'll be so full from an amazing meal in the North End, you MUST visit Mike's Pastry for dessert. Anything you order from there will be mouth watering and you'll be in a food coma for the rest of the night. We got two of their famous cannolis, a home made peanut butter cup, a chocolate peanut butter cookie and some rainbow cookies to go and didn't make it out that night.

Eating my way through Boston was very enjoyable and now I can't stop thinking about pasta, chocolate and peanut butter - hope you can't too!