Vespaio Enoteca. South Congress. Austin. Texas.
This place is a great, little, noisy, casual, ItalyItalian (I'm just going to start calling things ItalyItalian and NYItalian to differentiate between the simple style and ingredients of true Italian cooking and the fantasticinitsownright red sauce cooking of the American northeast) Italian joint right in the heart of South Congress.
Want to know why I went there the first time?
Lardo Pizza
Not often that you find lardo on a menu down here in Texas, probably because most people steer away from it given what it is, which is pure fat from the back of a pig, cured and seasoned with simple italian herbs and spices. Yeah, that's right, just fat. Old Italian guys eat it on a little bread. If you heat it, it melts and disappears, which is what starts to happen when you put it on top of a hot pizza, where it imparts its piglicious flavor throughout. I know what you neophytes (|ˈnēəˌfīt| - noun - a person who is new to a subject, skill, or belief; note: we did not have this word growing up in Indiana) are thinking, just fat? Yes, just fat. Good, clean fat from the top of the pig, which, as Sir Isaac Newton might explain to you, is cleaner than the fat in the belly because as the low point of the pig the belly catches everything that the fatback and the rest of the pig drops, like blood and anything else. So what you're left with up there is a good, clean fat, which can be used to cook, or which can be cured and eaten like it is as lardo.
Anyway, I saw the Lardo Pizza on the menu months ago and decided I had to give it a go. Good, thin Italian crust, house cured lardo, garlic, rosemary, arugula and shaved reggiano. No red sauce. It was awesome. Crisp, fresh, with a beautiful pork flavor.
But on this latest trip I decided to go with a special available that night, roasted redfish with spaghetti puttanesca. Now, I make a mean puttanesca (http://thefatartery.blogspot.com/2011/03/last-nights-dinner.html), so I was interested in seeing how mine compared with this one.
First, my amateurish, dimly lit, flashbulb ruined picture of this doesn't do it any favors. This was a great dish and to me felt like it was taken straight from a kitchen on the Italian coast. Wait, need to back up a second. This was absolutely the hottest pasta and/or fish dish I've ever had, from a temperature standpoint, and worried that the fish would overcook on the plate, I had to walk that dicey line of eating it fast and burning my tongue, but I managed it without serious injury. I did cry though, which did nothing to impress the ladies at the bar next to me, but which was absolutely necessary and warranted.
The puttanesca was great, and made me feel great about my cooking abilities, as they shared very similar flavors and ratios of flavor. They used fresh pasta here as opposed to my dried, which did well to soak in some of the sauce, and all in all, the pasta turned out great. The fish was also excellent. Not for those who want zero fish flavor, as this tasted like it was from the sea. Not fishy, just with that fresh from the ocean flavor which is the way fish is served in Italy that can seem "fishy" to those not used to that kind of fish, or to those who don't appreciate that kind of flavor. This was well cooked, with a very thin crust on the outside, hot, tender, and flakey on the inside. I enjoyed taking bites of this with the sharp sauce of the pasta, it worked perfectly.
I had a couple of glasses of wine at the bar while I ate, which is a great spot to have a drink and a bite if you're alone, as I was that night. They've got great, affordable, Italian wines by the glass and the bottle, and know there stuff as to what is pouring well and what goes well with what you've ordered.
I'm glad to have a place of this quality...of food, drink, atmosphere and clientele...down in Austin, as it's a place I'll got to often if I'm craving Italian in any form...pizza, pasta, panini, secondi, you call it. It's a go to.
Summary
Atmosphere: casual Italian enoteca, a little trendy, bar seating, good for a date, good wine list, good place to meet people both new or old
Food: Italian, pizza, pasta
Dog Friendly: no
When to Go: dinner
Crowd: upscale, 20somethings, 30somethings, hotchicks, awkward first dates, couples, groups of girls
What to Order for the First Timer: pizza, pasta
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