review : stelllaaah (stella)

i wonder how many people get the urge to say "stelllllaaaaaaaaaah!" when they come to this restaurant. of course when they do get this urge, they squash it because they're young and hip, and besides, stella, in the south end on washington street, hasn't been open for that long. stella is a scant five minutes from my sister's apartment, and despite the service missteps and a few food mishaps, it's still a place i'd go back to (when they're a little older and have ironed out all their little problems. overall, it's a great place that's not too expensive (a little expensive for college students - entrees are 16-22).

entering the restaurant makes me feel like i should be on cape cod or martha's vineyard. the restaurant is white inside, and the waiters are all wearing white - i felt like there should be sand on the floor. the restaurant has a slightly odd layout because it spans doorways on a corner, so we walked through a passageway, past the kitchen, to get to our table.

one of the things that my sister remarked later in the meal was that she didn't know how the restaurant was going to be able to maintain its prices. i have no idea either. the tables are granite-topped, the silverware is villeroy and boch...let's not even ask where the plates are from (not quite tactless enough to pick up the plate and peer at the label on the underside). even our seating arrangement was awkward - far too much space for a party of five.

we started with the mussels and the caesar salad. the mussels were pretty good - i'm starting to actually like them again - but there was no serving spoon. every time someone took a mussel, they would look longingly at the rich, delicious-looking broth at the bottom of the bowl, and wish they had a spoon. but we didn't have one, and the waitstaff didn't notice, either. on the bright side, the caesar salad is probably the best one i've ever had in my life; the dressing was fantastic, the greens were crunchy and tasted clean, and they were perfectly dressed. my one beef - who serves croutons as a huge thing? the thing i like about salads is the bite-sized aspect of them - for me, a salad includes only pieces that can be stabbed by a fork and easily deposited in my mouth. i have no desire to look like the clumsy oaf who can't help but get salad dressing everywhere. so the crouton was in one piece - how does one cut a crouton that's one piece? how can anyone think that's convenient? food that is beautiful but illogical really bothers me; perhaps it's the engineer in me. the quality of the rest of the salad, though, definitely made up for the crouton blunder. and the crouton, while difficult to eat (and a bit too toasted for my taste), tasted fantastic.

i had a similar mixed reaction to the main course. i had the truffled fettuccine, which had an asparagus cream sauce and a poached egg. i realize now that i should have sent the thing back. i loved the fettuccine, the truffled aspect of it, and the asparagus cream sauce - these were all absolutely outstanding, bold, heady, and perfectly balanced. but the egg was not poached. i don't know who ok'ed sending that thing out with an egregiously over-poached egg on it, but i hope they either fixed their problems or got fired. my mother's pork chop milanese, however, was fantastic, although i don't think it was what she was expecting (it's basically like wienerspaetzle) - the pork chop was great with the tomato sauce, which tasted really fresh. likewise, my sister's mushroom pizza was really good - crust crispier and thinner than an emma's pizza, but not too trendily thin, and the mushrooms were great. it was oversalted - as food often is nowadays, oddly enough - but the mushrooms were very adequately earthy.

for dessert, we split a couple of cannoli and a piece of tiramisu. the tiramisu, i'm happy to note, was real tiramisu, down to the mascarpone cream. it was also pretty well balanced in terms of coffee and rum. the cannoli were a letdown; the cannoli cream was a little runny and too vanilla-y - they just didn't taste italian (whatever that means).

i don't know how this happened - the service was adequate, if spotty, until we wanted the check. all of us were falling asleep and my parents were heading home that night, so we asked for the check. we got it the second time we asked, and we got our server to pick up the check when we finally asked. and then, finally, we left.

all in all, i would go back to stella - the memory of the fettuccine is that good - but by the time i go back, i hope that all of their service problems will have been resolved.