Scala's Bistro Review

Scala's Bistro ( http://www.scalasbistro.com/ ) served us innocuous European-inspired food (e.g., French, Italian). By innocuous, I mean that nearly every dish was decent, but practically none received significant praise or complaints.

We had 

• "Earth and surf": breaded and fried calamari, shrimp, and onion, served with a spicy orange-colored aioli. Some people preferred the onion slices to the seafood. O complained the squid was overcooked and chewy. The aioli didn't add much, if anything.

• Roasted beet salad with gorgonzola. Made from small cubes of beets, it didn't look like we expected.

• "Bianca pizzetta": a pizza with lots of cheese of a few different types (including blue), topped with chili flakes. I liked the effect of the chili flakes. Two of us complained about the prominence of the blue cheese. I passed on my second slice.

• Butter lettuce salad with green beans (they may be some other skinny green vegetable such as asparagus; I didn't taste any so I don't recall) and cherry tomatoes, tossed in a mustard vinaigrette. Whereas J really liked it, thinking everything came together well, the rest of us thought it was just okay.

• Pesto and ricotta ravioli in tomato sauce. The ricotta was obvious; I didn't notice the pesto though it was mentioned on the menu. Nothing notable.

• Rigatoni with ground duck, olives, and parmesan. A basic dish. The waitress correctly remarked that if one didn't know the ground meat was duck, one wouldn't guess it from the taste.

• Steak frites. A standard steak, competently done though not exceptional. We enjoyed the accompanying large pile of thin fries.

• Panna cotta, served in a small sundae-type glass. Because it had a middle layer of gelatin, it was certainly most interesting dish of the meal. Some said it was the best.

• Bostini cream pie: custard topped with a cakey cube, all coated with a hard chocolate coating. The custard wasn't particularly good quality. The cakey bread thing worked when its texture is balanced with the custard and the chocolate.

We shared a bottle of wine from the "interesting reds" category of the menu. It had a complex smell and a slightly sour taste. I don't recall the name. Some people also had sparkling water.

The decor is old world and sophisticated. Perhaps that's why, with some of the people at the restaurant wearing jackets and with us not as well dressed, they placed us in a noisy, not very visible corner by the bar.

The restaurant's restroom is, oddly, on a different floor, a floor only accessible by elevator. It seems as if the only purpose of the other floor was the restroom--there are only two elevator buttons, one labeled restaurant and the other labeled restrooms. (Clearly, that's not the sole purpose of the other floor: we observed a large party hall on the floor with the restrooms. Nevertheless, it's an amusing thought.)

The total was $65/person, including tax, tip, and the shared bottles of wine and sparkling water.

Comments from Other Attendees

I neither researched nor selected this restaurant, instead leaving it in J's capable hands. She came with a short list of suggested dishes; we followed her advice. -mark

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