Brighton bistro now boasts cuisine as enticing as its wines
Type: Bistro
Prices: Appetizers and salads, $5.75-$8.25; pastas, $9.50- $14.75; other entrees, $15.75- $21.50; desserts, $5.75-$6.25. Good choices: Appetizers: gnocchi with braised duck and wild mushrooms; winter vegetable minestra with braised lobster and couscous; watercress salad with bleu cheese, beets, and walnuts in a vinaigrette. Entrees: Rare grilled tuna tenderloins with a port wine glaze; trout filets with shrimp and spinach stuffing; lamb shoulder in a caramelized tomato sauce; Chilean sea bass in a rosemary-scented brown butter. Desserts: banana tart with ginger ice cream; chocolate mousse and bread pudding with chocolate ice cream and mocha creme anglaise.
Restaurant reviewed 01/16/98 by Walter V. Robinson
Driving Commonwealth Avenue in Brighton is risky, what with the need to avoid striking pedestrians, streetcars, and potholes. So but for the valet parking sign, you would probably miss Uva, with its unassuming facade tucked away between Harvard Avenue and Washington Street.
Which is fine with its loyal local clientele, who have helped nurse Uva along since it opened as a hole-in-the-wall in 1993; and its more far-flung audience of wine connoisseurs, who know just where to find Uva, lured as by an extraordinary list of fine wines served in expensive stemware at rock-bottom prices.
Uva - Italian for ``grape'' - has long since expanded into a full-sized restaurant. But a menu that once played just a supporting role to the great wines uncorked by owner Chris Campbell is now vying for recognition on its own, as Campbell and his wife, Diane, are raising the quality of the kitchen to that of the 4,000-bottle wine cellar.
Three years ago, half of Uva's diners opted for standard pasta and pizza entrees. But for over a year now, a talented chef, Al Soto, formerly an assistant at the Gotham Bar & Grill in New York City, has brought ingenuity, sophistication, and some risk-taking to Uva's menu. And that, combined with extraordinary presentation and consistently good service, has made the harrowing journey out Comm. Ave. worth taking.
The result: Many, though not all, of Soto's creations challenge and delight the palate in much the same way that wine lovers are challenged by the nuances of one of the rare white Burgundy wines that Campbell offers - with all his wines priced at just $10 above his wholesale cost.
To be sure, the menu retains some basic pasta choices, just as Uva clings, for now at least, to its label as a ``Tuscan Pastaria and Grill'' - and to a warm bistro decor that includes rattan chairs, paper tablecloths, and waiters in jeans. But Soto has added some creative pasta options, including cavatelli with curried lamb and fresh thyme, rosemary, and tarragon; and capellini with rock shrimp, sun-dried tomatoes, and basil pesto.
Gradually, the Italian influence has given way to some contemporary, and distinctly American, influences: appealing appetizers that beckon, like braised beef oxtails with black truffles in a port wine sauce; entrees that include trout filets with a shrimp and spinach stuffing over wild rice; and a fine dessert menu that includes a luxuriant warm banana tart with ginger ice cream.
Uva remains a special place for wine lovers, including amateurs: Many of us, who occasionally order a $30 bottle of wine with dinner knowing it retails for $10 or so, would seldom pay $30 for a bottle at a retail outlet. But at Uva, the $30 wine at retail is $30 on the menu: Campbell pays about $20 for it wholesale, and adds just the $10 markup.
Higher quality wines can be had at Uva's at less than retail price, all of them served in Riedel wine goblets from Austria.
And if you cannot bring a wine expert with you - like the Globe's Doug Bailey, whom I coaxed along - then fear not. There's none of the off-putting pretentiousness many restaurants bring to the process of ordering wine, only enthusiasm; novices won't feel intimidated asking basic questions about the wines. Campbell, a burly presence in a polo shirt who looks more like a bouncer than a downtown sommelier, learned his wines during a three-year youthful adventure living in Burgundy, where he worked as a crew member on a hot air balloon.
Very often, Chef Soto's menu also soars: An appetizer of gnocchi with braised duck, wild mushrooms, and caramelized onions in a sage mushroom jus was exceptional. So too, on a cold winter night, was his winter vegetable minestra, a flavorful soup served with large Israeli couscous and perfectly cooked lobster chunks, with a hint of marjoram. Another excellent choice, masterfully presented, is a lightly dressed watercress salad atop a patty formed of bleu cheese, roasted beets, and walnuts.
For the main course, rare grilled tuna tournedos with a relish and port wine glaze were exceptional, as was the herb-crusted Chilean sea bass. During three visits over three weeks, we came to the conclusion that Uva's kitchen achieves its greatest consistency and success with its fish entrees.
Yet this is not a menu without peril: Several dishes tasted too salty, and Soto's imaginative approach sometimes leaves the diner tasting one too many ingredients and wishing for more simplicity. But conversely, other dishes are simply exceptional: A lamb shoulder was lean and cooked to perfection, flavorful in a caramelized tomato sauce. So too was a baked cod with herbs cooked in a veal jus. During one visit, a friend, Richard, thought the warm tuna tartare appetizer with sesame oil dressing so extraordinary he nearly asked for seconds. But after a menu change, it became ``crispy'' tartare, seared on one side. Fiona was excited by the prospect, but somewhat deflated by the experience: The searing, she thought, robbed the dish of its simplicity.
A salt cod and lobster shepherd's pie with chorizo, at first bite, had a marvelous taste. But after that, it seemed too salty, and the pie too mushy. But the roasted salmon, on two occasions with different underpinnings, was delicious.
The dessert menu is without flaws: Upside down pineapple cake with vanilla ice cream and cinnamon glaze was my favorite. And - no surprise - Campbell offers, by the glass, wonderful sauternes, port, and madeira.
If you take wines seriously, or want to, Uva also offers special wine tastings with dinner on Wednesday nights - expanding their by-the-glass list so diners can sample several wines in half portions; and on some other weeknights, premium wines from selected vineyards are featured with a fixed price dinner.
But even if you prefer bottled water to wine, the innovative menu by itself makes the visit worthwhile.
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