Eating in Italy

Well, it's better than London, but we did find mediocre food in Naples.

Our first night we ate at a nearby restaurant that got reasonable online reviews, but we both had pretty hohum meals. The calmaretti we started with were good -- these  were squid that were about 1-2" long that had been deep fried. I had a pesto pasta with prawns, and there were a total of two prawns and the pesto was unlike any other pesto I have had -- no idea what it was based on, but not really very green at all and somewhat slimy.  Jay had a cacio and pepe with clams, and the clams were good, but it had about four times the cheese as any cacio and pepe I have ever eaten.  The next day we had pizza for lunch, at a place near the Archeological Museum, and the pizza (buffalo mozzarella, cherry tomatoes and basil) was watery.  We weren't off to a great start.  We stopped in the afternoon for a well-known Naples pastry treat, sfogliatella, which is very crispy, probably fried, croissant-like outer layers with a lemon cream center.  We both found it way too rich.

But things are now picking up.  We had much better pasta last night.  I had a simple tomato sauce and Jay had spaghetti vongole (clams).  Both were excellent, both the pasta and the sauces.  And today at lunch we shared a whole grain pizza with roasted veges that was quite good -- both the toppings and the crust. And for tonight, Jay had a fresh pasta and I had risotto, each with seafood (we are at the ocean after all), and both were delicious (and we both had salads, me arugula and parmesan, Jay a mixed salad, and it's so great to have veges/produce again).

Apparently in Italy one has dessert for breakfast (and also for Sunday dinner, as we saw some elaborate cakes at our lunch time restaurant).  There were sfogliatella, chocolate almond cake, babas au rhum, and a bunch of other pastries and cakes (but no pain au chocolat, my favorite breakfast treat).  But there were also VEGETABLES for breakfast -- there was a green bean and carrot saute one morning, with a gnocchi dish that had chicken and broccoli, and the other morning it was a seafood and vegetable stew.  Since I'm really tired of steam table scrambled eggs, but I do need some protein to get through the morning, this was great on two grounds.  It's been hard to find vegetables this entire trip (except when I was doing the cooking), so I'm a happier camper.