Thursday, January 29, 2009

E cammino, cammino…

  • Camino, 3917 Grand Ave., Oakland CA; tel. 510.547.5035

  • Eastside Road, Healdsburg, January 28, 2009
    THAT'S WHAT I always hear singing in my head when I think of Camino, opened six months ago or so. Well, etymologically it's excusable: Camino, with one "m", is Italian for "hearth"; camminare means "to walk," and I'm a walker. E cammino, cammino: And I walk, I walk…

    Yesterday we drove, did not walk, to the East Bay, there among other things to dine at Camino. Wednesday is the slow night, they said as we entered for our six o'clock reservation, but the place looked comfortably full when we left three hours later. We were able to have a comfortable conversation with our friends throughout; the food was tasty and enterprising; the wine list very interesting. Still a little off my feed I was content with two appetizers: a slice or two of duck breast with blood orange, frisée, and beets (I'd have been content without the beets); then a nice onion panade, rich and slow-simmered. Lindsey had the pork entrée: slices of roast leg, a rib, and an absolutely delicious sausage. We shared a complex and thoroughly satisfying vanilla-flavored rice pudding that sat on a bed of rich stewed-prune purée.
    Barbera del Monferrato, "La Casaccia", 2006

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