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Latuff's Pizzeria
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| An Italian Original | When in Rome – Run like Hell! | |
| It was Monday, a popular
day for restaurateurs to take off and so we usually avoid it. But I was
headed out of town for the rest of the week ... nowhere exotic, unless
you consider boarded-up downtown buildings and a greater-than-one ratio
of panhandlers-to-pedestrians exotic. Yes, I was in Detroit, my first
experience of downtown Motor City. I felt sorry for it. Downtown Detroit
looks as if it once was gracious. Old, architecturally interesting
buildings, wide boulevards, public art installations ... but decrepitude
has set in. I did, incidentally, find one excellent restaurant that, if
you happen to be in the area, I strongly recommend, a French place
called Cuisine.
B and I had settled on a Malaysian restaurant Rasa Sayang in Golden Valley (to the best of my knowledge the only Malaysian restaurant in town, although Singapore in Maplewood also offers some Malaysian fare). Sayang turned out to be closed on Mondays ... we found out the hard way by showing up at the empty parking lot. Our next attempt was a Mexican grill I had driven by on my way, called Panchero's. This turned out to be a national chain, in its first wave of expansion. But we just don't do national chains, so I suggested Latuff's, an old-style mom-and-pop Italian place on Highway 55, a mile or two west of Highway 169, that I know from having worked in the area some years ago. Fortunately it was open, although it was ironic that here we were at exactly the sort of place I was disparaging in my review last week. And, wouldn't you know it, I ended up taken in by its quaint charm. Latuff's is an eponymous family-run restaurant. Mr. and Mrs. Latuff started it in the early 1970s. I wouldn't be surprised if the woman seated at the cash register as we entered was the Mrs. herself. Our waitress was probably an original as well. No young whipper-snappers on the staff, but the place was run with the efficiency that comes with years—make that decades—of daily practice. The décor has been updated and the interior is generally clean and inviting. The whole package is quite a draw and the restaurant was packed, no mean feat for a Monday, and especially since we'd just had a few inches of snow that morning. The clientele seemed to be a combination of professionals and homemakers. In today's restaurant scene, Italian seems synonymous with designer pizzas, exotic carpaccios, and types of pasta that you won't find in the supermarket. That's not the kind of Italian that Latuff's represents. Here we're talking red sauce, pizzas that are quite good but that don't even come in single-person sizes, and spaghetti, rigatoni, ravioli, maybe grudgingly penne as pasta choices. An honest meal for the honest professional or homemaker. No surprise, the wine list was brief, simple, and inexpensive. I forget what I went with, but at I think $4 a glass I didn't complain. B had a Lambrusco ... I can't even remember when I last saw that on a menu locally. I got the lasagna for my main dish. It came in an individual serving baking dish, piping hot with the cheese bubbling. The sauce was spicy with garlic and oregano. I didn't notice a vegetarian version on the menu; mine had crumbled up meatballs that, while a bit rubbery, were flavorful. B ordered the pasta sampler, which consisted of, yes, spaghetti, rigatoni, and ravioli. The presentation in his case left something to be desired, with the red sauce on one side of the plate and the pasty-white pasta sitting undressed and looking rather unappetizing on the other side. Apparently it didn't taste so great either, but can you trust the judgement of anyone who eats spaghetti with knife and fork? When you're tired of the designer Italian restaurants around town, craving for spaghetti and meat balls or lasagna that doesn’t come as a free-standing vertical construction, Latuff's is worth checking out. A |
When travelling in a
foreign country two things can tell you a lot about that country, the
ubiquitous Chinese restaurant, and the equally ubiquitous Toyota Corolla
car. Chinese restaurants are like little culinary sponges, sucking in
local flavor and produce to customize their offerings to the local
palate—this means the Peking duck that you eat in Minneapolis is only
going to have a passing similarity to a Peking duck in say Bratislava.
The Toyota Corolla, like the Chinese restaurant, is highly adaptable to
the local environment, they look alike, but the engine that powers them
vary in size from a pip-squeakish 1.1 L to a robust 2.0 L depending upon
the strength of the local economy and prevailing automobile culture. In
sharp contrast the red sauce Italian restaurant that verges upon the
greasy spoon is pretty universal, whether it be in Plymouth, Minnesota
(as was the case for The Lunch this week) or in Gdansk, Poland where I
succumbed to the temptation of Italian pizza. What’s on offer is cheap
and never very good.
From the above you might have gathered that The Lunch went to an Italian joint this week, Latuff's Pizzeria to be precise. The choice was a forced one after our primary destination—a Malaysian restaurant in Golden Valley—wasn’t open. Apparently A in his younger days worked nearby and Latuff's used to be one of his favored lunch establishments, therefore don’t be surprised if A waxes lyrical about this restaurant. I thought the restaurant was located in a little strip mall on Highway 55 that is devoid of any charm. The restaurant itself is extremely faded with tatty carpeting and walls that haven’t seen a new color scheme in several decades. Don’t let this fool you as being charmingly dated; this is old and worn out and the kitchen appears to have a layer of grease caked on its walls. The service is very experienced; it wouldn’t surprise me to learn that some of the waitresses were hired when the restaurant first opened. There aren’t many wines on the menu and I started off with a glass of Lambrusco that was sweet and bubbly. The menu consists of pastas, salads and pizzas—nothing too challenging or interesting for that matter. I ordered the Spaghetti sampler that consisted of rigatoni, spaghetti, ravioli and a couple of meatballs. The dish was unappetizing to look at and not much better to the taste. The sauce was served on the side and the pasta looked obscenely white as if uncooked. The meatballs were the only things worth eating in this dish. A ordered lasagna—probably the worst dish you can order in a place like this—that was one of the more ugly dishes I have ever seen. It was (looked) burnt and the bubbling cheese looked like cooking fat. A is not one to complain about the appearance of his food and by all appearance he found the lasagna acceptable. The bill came to a thrifty $20.00 and I can't remember if A had his customary coffee or not. Pizza might be the thing to order at Latuff's or any meatball based dish, but I suspect that you might do even better by avoiding the place altogether. B
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