'inoteca: ridiculously tasty food

It's day five of eating super-healthy, and I'm on a winning streak, so I probably shouldn't regress and show you awesome pics of what I enjoyed back in New York last week on vacay. But I will, simply because it was so divine.

I met my dear friends G and R (let's call them G n' R in a subtle homage to Guns and Roses) at the newest 'inoteca, curiously located in Gramercy. Although I'm very familiar with 'inoteca on the Lower East Side and sister restaurant 'ino in the West Village, I'd only perched on their bar stools to enjoy heavy pours of white wine on dates. Never once have I plopped down to feast on the restaurants' cheesy, oily, garlicky, zipper-busting fare. (It always smelled good, though.)

'inoteca's Gramercy location doesn't capture the same din as the LES location or the secluded feel of 'ino, but the ambiance isn't the main course. This stuff is.



Their grilled calamari salad was so brilliantly flavored, I honestly didn't care that the calamari wasn't fried. (Is that totally fat to prefer fried calamari? Don't answer.)



I present you with bruschetta smeared with creamy mascarpone and topped with a juicy fig. This was a personal recommendation from G's twin sister D, who unfortunately could not join us that evening. We all were blown away by this bruschetta. It was sort of like a dessert that sneaked its way into our dinner. (Thanks for the rec, D!)



If the gods ate baked ziti, it would taste like this aromatic, nutty and decadent version. I'm not even sure what was in it (definitely pesto, though), but sometimes, you don't question greatness. We savored every spoonful.



Like vegetable lasagna? Like eggplant parm? Then you'd die over this. This "lasagnette di melanzane" was a tiny tower of delicate sheets of fried eggplant and strips of baked zucchini. It was so not heavy.



Most who are closest to me know about me and the hunt for scarmoza, a smoky delicious cheese I can only liken to gouda but better. In Florence, while traveling with G n' R (and D!), we ate at this place called The Golden View, right on the river by the Ponte Vecchio.

The Golden View had this baked vegetable dish topped with melted scarmoza cheese, as well as the most magnificent pizza with truffles and scarmoza. We went their twice, and both times, I had these two dishes. When I returned to New York, I headed straight to Murray's Cheese Shop to purchase my own hunk of scarmoza, and the guy at Murray's said that he wished they had it, looking as bummed out as I did.

So when I saw my old flame on the menu at 'inoteca, I was insistent that we order it for the table. I took one triangle of the zucchini, eggplant pesto and scarmoza panini, and in one bite, and I was back in Florence, looking out over the Arno River as the sun set. Proust had his madeline, I have my scarmoza.