I kind of miss doing half assed reviews of Italian Restaurants the way we did for the Refrigerator. I use the past tense “did” because that project became overwhelming. It was a hobby that spun out of control. To update it or add content is a nightmare. So many of the primary pages were done in the days before CSS an it is just begging to to MySQL or at least have php includes so I can update and add to the navigation as we continue to build without ripping apart thousands of pages. I have reworked it in my mind. I just need a little time to tidy it up.
But that isn’t even the real reason I stopped. Peggi is controlling her cholesterol with diet but to do so we have pretty much cut out cheese and butter which brings me to Henry B’s in downtown Rochester. The four salads in the “Insalata” all have mozzarella, Caesar dressing with parmesan reggiano, goat cheese, toasted pine nuts and Gorgonzola cheese.
We asked the manager which of the entrees didn’t include cheese or butter and recommended the “Pasta e Pollo” (Chunks of roasted chicken breast in a shitake mushroom and Marsala sauce. Tossed with rigatoni and finished with Parmesan Reggiano. “It only has a slight amount of butter” and parm. It was pretty amazing. We started with their flash fried “Calamari Fritti” which was tender, meaty and not as spectacular as Mario’s grilled calamari. We ordered a second pasta dish, “Gnocchi alla Mamma” (Homemade gnocchi tossed with tomato basil sauce and Parmesan Reggiano) that was delicious but there wasn’t enough sauce. And the “tomato basil sauce” looked and tasted creamy. Enough! This dish packed a wallop. We were with Peggi’s mom and only she had room for dessert. The portions are HUGE and we brought home enough for two addition meals.
I asked our server whether the three photos on the wall at the end of the room were all the same because I desperately wanted to find some difference in them because one didn’t bear the the decorator’s touch of repetition. They are all the new owner’s grandfather and they were all exactly the same. So this dude is competing with Henry B (on the door in photo above) who I gather was the original owner’s grandfather. And what’s with the painful smooth jazz with drum machine music? We heard the satellite station dj and we heard him back announce a David Sanborn track. My dentist has better music than that. We reviewed the former location and incarnation of this place few years back. I remember l liking it quite a bit.
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