What are you supposed to think about a place where the main entrée is overcooked, the dessert is undercooked and everything else on the fixed menu is hit or miss? When it comes to Anteprima’s annual “Summer in Puglia” $95-a-head party, you call it a thoroughly enjoyable experience; even though the food didn’t turn out to be the success it deserved to be.
The Andersonville restaurant, despite its spotty record on delivering consistently satisfying meals, has proven its staying power. Dining establishments along its restaurant strewn strip of Clark St. come and go in microseconds. Anteprima’s not only been around for a least a decade, it’s also weathered a withering pandemic. Locals like the place and are loyal. Long, narrow and dark, the main dining room is also known for being very loud. So loud, that the noise sometimes feels like a physical assault. Nobody appears to mind. You get acclimated to the cacophony and, when considering the “Summer in Puglia” event, there are compensating considerations.
Even though Puglia sounds like the name of a quaint little town, it’s a substantial region in Italy that runs extensively along the back side of the country’s famous heel. Acclaimed for its natural beauty, blessed with year-round sunshine and praised for its culinary contributions, the region’s also a famed producer of wine. One of Anteprima’s principal’s hails from the area. A visit from one of his sister’s six years ago prompted the annual seven course with wine event. Two representatives from competing Puglia wine distributors functioned as the evening’s sommeliers; feeding diners dabs of grape history as they made their way through the menu.
If you’ve ever dined at high end restaurants offering wine pairing with their meals, you know how precision rules when it comes to wine pours. Servers expertly dispense the allocated 3 to 4 ounces per glass and wait until the next course to serve the next wine. Rarely are you asked if you would like more of what you’re currently drinking.
Beginning with the Polpettine di Zucchini (zucchini meatballs) and the sparkling rosé that joined them, it became clear very early that Anteprima wasn’t playing by such stringent rules. Oddly enough, the waitstaff was much more frugal in serving the meatless meatballs than it was the rosé that can now officially be dubbed a prosecco. Light on the zucchini and heavy on the salt, the meatballs didn’t have much to recommend them. The prosecco on the other hand was like finding a fistful of rubies in the pocket of a pair of beat up gym shorts. Not only was it a surprise of the first magnitude, the wine was also available for sale that night at an astonishingly approachable price.
Three of the courses had enough redeeming highlights to hint at the joys of dining in a faraway place like Puglia. What says Italy or summer more than basil and tomato? Rounded out with cucumber, red onion and oversized herbed croutons, the tomato salad was a quiet love song to seasonal bounty. Dressed in a light coat of olive oil and juiced lemon, its simplicity was its beauty. With deep rich tones garnered from slow cooked tomatoes, the Eggplant Parmigiana conquered differently. Like a lasagna but thinly layered, it was absent of any of the texture or moistness you’d associate with eggplant; emphasizing instead the depth of flavor from slow roasting tomatoes. It turned out to be a winning approach and one that was followed by something signaling the sea. Served salad style, octopus, shrimp, fingerling potatoes and green beans were tied together with an(other) herbed dressing that proved an ideal bond with a light bite.
Everything else that followed, the rapini and orecchiette, the lamb shoulder and the dessert of roasted peaches and whipped cream were made superfluous because they all lacked lustre and because most appetites were sated after the eggplant.
Regarding wine, only the Vespa Rosso 2016, served with the lamb and presented slightly chilled, matched the high mark set by the prosecco at the opening of the festivities.
With Chicago on the brink of again imposing mask wearing indoors, this year’s “Summer in Puglia” dinner felt like it existed in a world that had never heard of the words pandemics or coronavirus. Masks were nowhere to be seen, even though ventilation was poor and the dining room was close to capacity. Something felt amiss and out of kilter. More likely, people simply wanted a reason to leave their cares at the door and enjoy a night of earned indulgence.
It was the nature of the hospitality that also won everyone over. Anteprima’s waitstaff has never seemed blind to the color of their diners skin; often causing a noticeable imbalance in service. The show of equity on display during the Puglia event helped make this visit to the restaurant one of the most pleasant in memory.
Anteprima
5316 N. Clark Street
Chicago, IL 60640
773-506-9990