Chef Miles Assoun and cook Kristina Baje with some of the Italian Kitchen's delicious offerings.
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Why didn’t someone think of this before? Calgary’s downtown heart has been lacking good Italian restaurants. While Victoria Park’s La Vita e Bella and 17th Ave.’s perennial favourites Il Giardino Ristorante and Buon Giorno Ristorante Italiano are close in, the launch of Italian Kitchen, a conveniently central Italian eatery, is a stroke of obvious genius.
The newly opened Italian Kitchen shares its entryway and hostess station inside Calgary Place with the also recently opened Spur Gastropub. When we arrived at 12:30 p.m. on a weekday, the place was packed, and we had no reservation. No problem. The hostess quickly saw to it that a table was cleared, and we were seated in no time. It was immediately apparent that the restaurant has already hit its lunch-service stride. Its nattily attired wait staff was fast and efficient. Our server immediately took our drink order and made a few menu suggestions as he returned with two bottles of Peroni Nastro Azzuro ($6.70), a popular (in Italy) Italian beer. The liquor menu offers several Italian brews.
Italian Kitchen’s short menu lightly spins old-country standards. The buffalo mozzarella caprese ($12.18) was made with four-year-old balsamic vinegar, organic tomatoes and fresh basil. The rough-cut, authentic mozzarella slices were sandwiched with tomato and leaned against mixed salad greens. It was a simple, pleasant and very Italian salad.
Recommended by our server, I really enjoyed the butternut squash veloute ($9.68) with seared scallop, bacon confetti and maple syrup. “An Italian dish served French style,” the server said as he poured the soup from a small pot into the bowl. The avocado-shaped dish contained a single, large seared scallop, which formed the “seed,” with diced, crisped bacon bits on top. The squash soup was quite sweet, but the scallop knocked this sweetness right back, while the bacon added a savoury salt hit. It was a handsome and well-thought-out dish.
Our second course arrived just before we finished our first. No less than two servers apologized for jumping the gun. We weren’t fussed. My guest dug into a large serving of pollo saffron risotto ($19.60) “with thyme natural jus reduction.” The risotto was not the rich and cheesy type, which threw both of us off at first. Lemon yellow, it was moist with a light crunch to each bite provided by diced onions, though the dish did not taste of them. It quickly won us over, as it complemented the equally moist and tender chicken. The thyme gravy was a light, smooth touch, pooling amongst crunchy green beans.
The house-made ricotta gnocchi ($14.65) with red wine, tomato bolognaise sauce was an equally sizable dish. The mini-marshmallow-sized gnocchi had a light consistency, not sticky or grainy. Again, a little unexpected. The sauce was meaty, but not excessively so and folded nicely into the gnocchi. A dusting of shredded Parmesan garnished this hearty dish. It was simple, homey and golden-delicious.
For desert, we shared a citron tarte ($9.50). Two pastry-crust-like rectangular wafers sandwiching a thick lemon pudding. A deconstructed desert, the top wafer sat at a jaunty angle. Berry drizzle dressed up the plate. While the drizzle didn’t add much, the desert was light and tangy, and a great finish to the rather large meal.
Italian Kitchen’s downtown location makes it a good stop for a business lunch or a lunch date. While service moves at a speedy clip, our lingering wasn’t out of place. Our fast and professional server kept a close eye on us, and the manager checked on us as well. My only suggestion, given the modern Italian menu and the stylish-enough interior design, is to put something less singular and more savvy on the stereo. The compilation of Italian-American pop classics (songs by Louis Prima and so on) was fine, but not on repeat and certainly not if I hear the same disc on a return visit.
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