TURNING THE TABLES
Food Network may dine in Hub
Boston Herald - Boston, Mass.
Author: DONNA GOODISON
Date: Jan 21, 2009
Jimmy Burke - one of the original chefs at Cambridge's Harvest restaurant along with Lydia Shire, Jasper White, Chris Schlesinger and Frank McClelland - is back in the kitchen at Orta, which opened last week in Pembroke.
Named for a lake in the Piedmont region of Italy, the casual restaurant sells piattini, antipasti, Neapolitan brick-oven pizza, pasta and other meat, chicken and fish entrees, with only a grilled New York sirloin steak eclipsing $17.95.
Prior to opening Orta, Burke spent a month in Naples in the south of Italy studying pizza making under a professional pizzaiolo, or pizza chef. His wife, Joannie, is running Orta's dining room.
Burke previously owned Allegro and Iguana Cantina in Waltham as well as several other restaurants.
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The Food Network may be headed to Boston for television coverage of the fourth annual Winter Restaurant Week.
Winter Restaurant Week is designed to drive business to Greater Boston restaurants at a particularly slow time of the year. On March 15-20 and 22-27, diners will get to eat three-course lunches for $20.09 and three-course dinners for $33.09 at 185-plus restaurants. More than 70,000 people took part last year.
Food Network researchers have been collecting information about the annual promotion from the Greater Boston Convention & Visitors Bureau, one of the sponsors.
"Nothing's definite, but all signs point to a surprise visit from the Food Network," said Pat Moscaritolo, who heads the bureau.
New Restaurant Week features this year include a cheaper lunch option - an entree, and an appetizer or dessert - for $15.09. The visitors bureau surveys participating restaurants every year, and feedback indicated that many diners thought a three-course meal at lunchtime was too heavy and time-consuming, Moscaritolo said.
Restaurant Week specials haven't been offered on Saturdays in the past, but this year many restaurants are including Saturday, March 21, a sign of the economic downturn's toll on the industry.
Other media outlets also are planning stories on Boston and Cambridge's restaurant scene, including a Restaurant Week feature in Ireland's "Food & Wine Magazine" in March and a feature on the two cities as culinary destinations in London's "Food and Travel Magazine" in May.
"People are starting to give some real respect to Boston and Cambridge as a culinary destination," Moscaritolo said. "It's only taken two centuries for this to hit in the marketplace - that Boston is more than clam chowder, Boston cream pie and a boiled lobster."
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Bostonians who vacation on Nantucket will have a new restaurant to check out in April.
Michael Getter purchased Cioppino's Restaurant & Bar on Broad Street, which has closed after 16 years.
The former chef and part owner of Nantucket's American Seasons is renovating the restaurant, originally a private home built in 1850, and will reopen it as Dune.
"I wanted it to have some Nantucket connotation, and dunes definitely surround Nantucket," Getter said "The design concept is going to be kind of soothing earth/sand-tone colors, and the cuisine is going to be modern American."
Getter previously served as executive chef at 21 Federal on the island and as chef at Boston catering company Max Ultimate Food.
The 75-seat Dune will be open year-round for dinner, with lunch added in the summer months.
Turning the Tables runs every other Friday. Send restaurant tips to dgoodison@boston herald.com.
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