Cosmo's

Name: Cosmo's
Location: 652 Riverside Dr., Johnson City, NY 13790
Phone: (607) 770-0107
Cuisine: Italian/Pizza/Sandwiches/Subs
Price: Less than $10 per person

Review:
Cosmo's is in a strange little location, at the corner of Riverside Dr. and Grand Ave. in Johnson City, almost literally underneath the Route 201 overpass and not far from the legendary Traffic Circle. It's kind of a strange restaurant in the sense that it is really more like three restaurants in one. There is a small sit-down portion, an even smaller carry-out entrance, and a "tiki bar" in back. We used to go to the Tiki Bar quite often back in the day a few years ago. It was a pretty nice space to just chill out, have a few beers, and throw peanut shells on the floor and maybe order some wings or some "sizzle fries." Then the Flood of 2006 came around. Cosmo's, and that little neighborhood of Westover in general, was hit pretty hard, and they were forced to close for awhile, and in the meantime we found some other places to go and never made it back. So I don't think I had tried anything from their "regular" menu until today, when I stopped into the carry-out to get some lunch.

The menu at Cosmo's is part-Italian, part pub fare. They have Italian dishes like Chicken Parmigiana and Lasagna, in addition to pizza available in 16" round and rectangular sheet varieties, or you can get individual slices. They also have the burgers, sandwiches, fried snacks, and wings like you'd expect to see in a bar environment.

I stopped in and ordered a slice of pepperoni pizza and an Italian sub, with the plan to eat the pizza while the sub was being made. I'd always been a little interested in trying the pizza, and as it turns out, I really liked it. This was one of the better New York-style slices I've had in the area. In terms of crust, sauce, and cheese, I found it to be most similar to Grande's of all the pizza that I have had, which I consider the benchmark for good pizza of that style. The menu advertises a 16" round pizza with 12 slices for a mere $8.50, which is definitely an offer I will be exploiting at some point in the near future, as football season rolls around and I begin to entertain guests again.

The sub was quite a bit less successful, in my mind. The bread was nice and fresh and the toppings (lettuce/tomato/onion/provolone/sub sauce) appeared in good ratios but the meat was mediocre. I think it was just regular salami instead of the usual blend of meats, and it did not taste all fresh. I ate a little more than half the sub before disposing of the rest. Not a good sub, and certainly not one I would order again.

So Cosmo's, in the end, was pretty average for me today. I can recommend the pizza wholeheartedly. $1.25 per slice plus $0.25 per topping is a really good deal, and $8.50 for a huge 16" pizza is among the best pizza deals you'll find in the area. Plus, it's really good pizza. Surprisingly good, really. The sub, on the other hand, was below average, but you win some, you lose some. Service was quick and polite, and even though I haven't been there in a long while, I can say that the Tiki Bar is a nice little hangout that few people seem to know about. I'll give a conservative grade for now, but a few good pizzas from now, this mark could stand to go up a fair bit.

Grade: B-

Greek House Restaurant

Name: Greek House Restaurant
Location: 623 Main St., Johnson City, NY 13790
Phone: (607) 798-7899
Cuisine: Greek/American
Price: Around $10 per person

Review:
The Greek House is yet another place Megan and I have driven by on hundreds of occasions, but until today, we had never bothered to stop in. Strange, considering we live in the area and are fond of Greek cuisine in general. It's located on Main St. in Johnson City in the Westover Plaza across from BAE Systems.

From the outside the restaurant looks very small; inside it is much larger, with a long coffee counter surrounding the kitchen area and probably 20 small tables and booths comprising the seating area. It's a classic Greek diner that serves a mix of Greek and American cuisines, and they are open for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

Upon entering we followed the sign's instruction to seat ourselves and found a small booth about halfway into the restaurant. Shortly thereafter, we were handed menus by the waitress. The lunch menu, I would have to admit, was not all that extensive, particularly in Greek options. They had gyros, souvlaki, and spinach pie (spanakopita), but that was about it as far as the Greek choices went. The rest of the menu was comprised of standard American diner fare like club sandwiches, burgers, and fries. By diner standards, I found the Greek House to have a pretty small menu, at least for lunch.

I ordered the spanakopita and a cup of coffee, while Megan went with the souvlaki. Less than ten minutes later, our meals were in front of us.

I thought the spanakopita was pretty good. For those unfamiliar, spanakopita is a spinach pie made with spinach, feta cheese, onions, and various spices enfolded by phyllo dough. It's not something I order very often, but given the limited menu and the fact that it was marked as a "specialty," I decided to give it a go. It was tasty and filling--maybe a little burnt on one of the edges--but I would definitely consider ordering it again. Megan was happy with her souvlaki and thought it was one of the better souvlaki sandwiches she's had of late.

We split a piece of baklava for dessert which was also very good and was a definite highlight of the meal.

Service was a bit of a problem at the Greek House. The waitress was an older lady who might have spoken ten words to us the entire time and was just generally grumpy. I will say that the service was quick, but on the standoffish side. Moreover, she overcharged me on coffee. I drank two cups and the menu stated very clearly that coffee came with one free refill, yet I was charged for two coffees. Not cool, but I'm not about to sit there and haggle over $1.35. So I took it out of her tip, which she frankly did little to deserve anyway. The gentleman who served as cashier was much friendlier and thanked us for coming, so perhaps we just got unlucky with the waitress.

Overall, I was generally pleased with the Greek House and would go again. The ambiance is pleasantly old-fashioned while the food was uniformly solid, albeit unmemorable. Negatives included the cold fish of a waitress we had, and a lunch menu that could use a few additional Greek options. Perhaps the dinner menu is more extensive. I wouldn't call the Greek House among the area's better diners, but it's not bad, and its location is good in the sense that there are few other dining options in the immediate area. I give the Greek House a slight recommendation, with the caveat that Mediterranean Gyro in Vestal is far superior as a Greek dining option for lunch.

Grade: B-

Sabatini's Pizza

Name: Sabatini's Pizza
Location: 1925 Wyoming Ave., Exeter, PA 18643
Phone: (570) 693-2270
Cuisine: Pizza/Italian
Price: Around $10/$12 for a pizza. Bring cash!

Review:
One thing I've alluded to a few times throughout this blog adventure is my affinity for good beer. And by "good beer" I don't mean Heineken or Guinness. I prefer high-quality Belgian sour ales, rich coffee stouts, barleywines, hoppy IPAs, and just about everything in between.

Sabatini's, nominally a pizza parlor, plays host to one of the most prodigious selections of beer I have ever seen. They have 12 taps at any given time for draft beer. Usually about half the taps are the usual swill you'd find at most other bars, but the other half consists of selections you aren't likely to find anywhere else. They sell and fill growlers, giving patrons the option of taking 2 liters of draft beer home with them. The bottle collection is phenomenal, with selections from many of the top American craft breweries and from breweries all around the world. And did I mention the pizza? It's certainly different from most pizza I've ever had, but it's strangely addicting and is among my personal favorites.

Megan and I were heading to a concert in Scranton last night and I took that as an opportunity to introduce her to Sabatini's. I'd been a couple times before. Word of warning: this is not an easy place to get to. It is quite a distance from both I-81 and I-476, and you will have to endure many red lights and little suburban towns where the speed limit is 25 MPH. The small borough of Exeter, PA is home to Sabatini's, on the west bank of the Susquehanna River about halfway between Scranton and Wilkes-Barre. Not easy to get to from Binghamton, but if you like pizza and/or beer, it's worth the trip.

The restaurant itself is laid out such that there are two distinct dining areas. The front room is comprised of older, wooden booths with all sorts of memorabilia on the walls from the coal-mining days of yore in the region. The back room has some larger tables. It's a comfortable atmosphere with a sunroof in the front room to provide some natural light to an otherwise dimly-lit restaurant.

I started with a Bell's Oberon wheat ale (draft) and Megan (not a beer drinker) had a Sprite. Note: if you like Blue Moon...try the Oberon and you'll never go back! We ordered a medium pizza (10 small slices and plenty large enough for the two of us) with half meatball.


Now, that probably does not look like the most appetizing pizza you've ever seen. It is definitely an oddball in the pizza universe. The crust is very thin and the toppings extend the whole way out to the edge of the pie. The cheese is an interesting blend that Megan and I both thought was not entirely mozzarella, and the crust has a nice char to it that gives the entire pizza a very smoky flavor. What separates this pizza from the pack is the sauce. This is some of the sauciest pizza I've ever had and it has such a unique sweet taste. It's the kind of pizza where you take your first bite and think it's just OK, but after you've downed a slice or two, it becomes awesome, as if it takes a few minutes for your taste buds to adjust their expectations. That sounds like some kind of backhanded compliment but it really isn't. This is addicting stuff, vaguely similar to the Neapolitan pizza Megan and I had in Italy, and we polished off the whole pie in short order.

I washed it down with another draft, this time a Pretty Things Baby Tree Belgian-style ale, a strong beer brewed with plums and a hint of coffee in the finish. A fine beer indeed, and not one I would readily find anywhere else. I filled a couple growlers to go and then we were off to our show.

If you like pizza, Sabatini's is definitely worth trying out. I don't know that it would be worth the trip for just the pizza alone, but it is consistently rated among the best in the Scranton area, a region well-known for its pizza-making prowess. If you like beer, Sabatini's is a gold mine of amazing brews available at completely reasonable prices, far superior to what you would be able to find at Sam the Beer Man in Binghamton. It is a miracle to me that a place like this with such a world-class selection exists in the small town of Exeter, PA, but I will gladly make more trips to sample both the great beer and their addicting pizza in the future.

Grade: A

The Silo Restaurant

Name: The Silo Restaurant
Location: 203 Moran Rd., Greene, NY 13778
Phone: (607) 656-4377
Cuisine: American
Price: $25+ per person

Review:
Last night, Megan and I made the trek out to Greene for The Silo's Friday night seafood buffet extravaganza. It's something we've wanted to do many times over the years, but just couldn't muster the energy to make the roughly 45-minute drive out to literally the middle of nowhere, eight miles east of Greene. We noticed a coupon in Clipper Magazine for $10 off the purchase of two buffets, which provided just enough motivation.

We arrived around 5:00 and were seated quickly. The buffet is divided into roughly four sections. There is a gigantic salad bar with just about anything you'd ever want to put on a salad, in addition to standard fare like cole slaw, applesauce, potato salad, and macaroni salad. They also had some more odd choices like dried cranberries and what quickly became a favorite of mine, pickled watermelon rind. Each of us started with a salad and were pretty happy with what we found. If you go, I highly recommend trying the pickled watermelon rind. It's something you certainly won't find many places, and it has a surprising candy-like sweet and sour taste. I quite liked it. The applesauce was the homemade variety and quite tasty, while the potato salad was the red-skin variety and also good.

The second table on the buffet was a smaller station with chilled shrimp and soup. I elected to have a cup of the New England Clam Chowder and was very pleased with it. Definitely liberal with the clams, while bacon added some smoky flavor.

The third table had snow crab legs and a carving station featuring ham, turkey, and roast beef. These options looked very good, but I was more stoked about sampling the offerings on the fourth table, so I didn't want to fill up on other stuff.

The fourth table is what I would call the "main buffet" and had just about any seafood option you might want, in addition to some meat choices. Some choices on the main buffet that I recall are:

Seafood Newburg

Crab Cakes

Teriyaki Tuna

Mahi Mahi

Fried Shrimp, Clams, and Oysters

Escargot

Clams Casino

Mussels

Meatballs

Chicken Marsala

"Athens" beef

Sides like rice, steamed vegetables, and onion rings

I tried to sample just about everything here. The Seafood Newburg was a definite highlight. Featuring crab, shrimp, and fish in a thick sherry cream sauce, I could've eaten a plateful of just that and been happy. My favorite item on this buffet was the Teriyaki Tuna; it was perfectly grilled and totally delicious. I hadn't had fried oysters in a very long time so I made sure to load up on a healthy portion of those. Quite excellent as well. Other items I enjoyed were the "Athens beef" which was essentially beef tenderloin marinaded in lemon juice and topped with a little feta cheese. This was a personal favorite of Megan's. I was excited to have the chance to try Escargot for the first time. Nothing to get too excited about, as it turns out: it really just tasted like butter and garlic.

Items I didn't care for included the meatballs, which had little taste and reminded me of the frozen meatballs you can buy in the grocery store. The Chicken Marsala didn't really do anything for me, as the chicken was a little dried out and tougher than I would've preferred. Crab cakes are normally a favorite food of mine, but I didn't care for The Silo's version of them. They weren't bad, but were overshadowed by most of the other items on my plate. But that is certainly one of the benefits of a buffet: while you might not like one item; there certainly will be many others you do. And the hit-to-miss ratio at The Silo was quite favorable.

Ambiance at The Silo is nice, but not extraordinary. During our visit they had a singer who delivered acoustic versions of 1970's soft-rock tunes from artists like John Denver and James Taylor. It was pleasant enough, but perhaps a little intrusive and certainly more appealing to the crowd of geriatrics we dined with than to the two of us. In fact, I'd say that most of the patrons were twice my age, and at 30 years old I'm not exactly a spring chicken. So while there is a nice, quaint atmosphere, it's certainly not the hippest, and I would have a hard time recommending The Silo to folks younger than myself. I might need a trip to the ultra-swanky Lemongrass soon to wash the moth balls out of my system...

In the end, our trip to The Silo was a mixed bag in my opinion. I really liked the food overall, and there are certainly some options here you can't get anywhere else in the area, like Seafood Newburg, Fried Oysters, Escargot, and pickled watermelon rind. The food was fresh and well-prepared, and the service was friendly and generally quick. At $21.95 per person, the buffet represents pretty good value given the high quality and rarity of the food. On the other hand, it's a 45-minute drive and the stodgy atmosphere honestly didn't do much for me. I could go to Ithaca and eat at some awesome places there after making a drive of similar length, and eat with people my age. I'm glad I tried The Silo once, but I won't be too disappointed if I never make it back there again.

Grade: B

Arnold's Awesome Pig Stand

Name: Arnold's Awesome Pig Stand
Location: 2909 Old Vestal Road, Vestal, NY 13850
Phone: (607) 201-6424
Cuisine: Barbecue
Price: Less than $10 per person

Review:
Arnold's Awesome Pig Stand is located on Old Vestal Road, near the entrance to the Town Square Mall and adjacent to one of the area's roadside farmer's markets. I drove past one day recently and I knew I'd have to make a stop at some point. I am a sucker for good barbecue and I had high hopes that Arnold could deliver the goods. Yesterday, I decided to give it a go.

I was once asked, around the time I started this blog, how big a place needed to be before I would review it. There are a lot of little hot dog and spiedie stands scattered throughout the Triple Cities, after all. I don't know what the answer is to that. If it's a place that sells food, I am pretty much willing to give it a shot, especially if they offer some kind of specialty food. A simple hot dog stand doesn't appeal to me too much. I can get a hot dog anywhere. A spiedie stand certainly generates a little more interest. Something like Arnold's, where shaved pork sandwiches are the specialty, adds something unique to the Binghamton food scene, and hence is something I am definitely willing to try (and subsequently review), despite its roadside-stand status.

I arrived around 1:45 PM yesterday and ordered one of Arnold's signature "Awesome Gourmet" sandwiches ($7.50). Believe it or not, Arnold's has a website which details their various sandwich options. This particular sandwich consisted of shaved pork, caramelized onions, and gorgonzola cheese on a toasted steak roll. I had a seat on a nearby picnic table while my order was being prepared. There is a tented area with probably a dozen tables for those who choose to eat there; I decided with it being a 90-degree day that I'd be better off eating in the air-conditioned environment of my car. After about a 5-minute wait, my sandwich was ready, and I was ready to dig in.

Sure enough, it was a good sandwich. I don't know if I had ever had a shaved pork sandwich before: it reminded me of thinly-sliced roast beef (with obviously pork replacing the beef) and was pretty tasty and slightly juicy. I thought the onions were simply grilled, not yet to the point of caramelization, but they added a sweet component to the sandwich. The gorgonzola cheese was fresh and certainly had the most dominant flavor of the three. The bread was pretty good but I think I would've preferred it not to be toasted.

I didn't expect Arnold's to blow me away, and it didn't. I did expect something different and out of the ordinary relative to what I would normally have for lunch, and it definitely did the trick. At $7.50, I found it to be a little pricier than what I'd normally expect of a sandwich, but for a specialty item with "gourmet" toppings, I thought it was a fair deal. It may not have been as "awesome" as advertised, but I am more than willing to go back again to try another of Arnold's shaved pork offerings.

Grade: B

Vestal Bakery & Deli

Name: Vestal Bakery & Deli
Location: 176 Vestal Pkwy E, Vestal, NY 13850
Phone: (607) 748-8239
Cuisine: Pizza/Subs
Price: Dirt cheap

Review:
The Vestal Bakery & Deli is an establishment I used to frequent on a fairly regular basis when I used to live nearby, but I hadn't been back for a number of years until today. I had never really liked the place that much, but as a graduate student on a tight budget, it was a good place to get dinner very cheaply if I didn't feel like going the Ramen route, and it happened to be across the street from the laundromat I patronized.

Lately, I've driven past the VB&D a few times and noticed a special on their sign: a foot-long sub for $2.99, which rotates weekly as to which sub is on special (turkey, ham, Italian, etc). For those mathematically challenged, that's $2.01 better than Subway's famous offer. Being the value hound that I am, I decided to stop by today for lunch. Would the low price be the only worthy quality I found?

The restaurant does not have much for atmosphere. It's dimly lit but appears to be pretty clean, and there are some booths available off to the left should you choose to eat there. Menu-wise, they have the usual cold-cut subs available in both small and large sizes, spiedie subs, and pizza, available whole or by the slice. I recall having the pizza here before and being largely unimpressed. I recall it being the sheet variety and a pale imitation of Nirchi's, although I thought I spotted some regular NY-style slices on today's visit in addition to the rectangular ones.

Upon arriving I went with this week's special: the foot-long Italian sub for $2.99. Asked if I wanted "everything" on it, I replied in the affirmative. A few minutes later, I was out the door and on my way home, ready to give this sub a shot.

As it turns out, I thought this sub was just OK. For starters, it's an Italian sub, and they put American cheese on it. Granted, I could've asked specifically for provolone I suppose, but when I said I wanted "everything," I assumed I would get the right kind of cheese. American on an Italian sub, yikes, I mean, who DOES that? So that kind of threw me off a bit. As for the rest of the sub, I didn't get the sense it was all that fresh. The meat was definitely not high quality stuff (perhaps my visit to Vincenzo's yesterday has spoiled me) and the lettuce appeared to be the bagged, shredded iceberg variety. If it wasn't, it tasted like it. For a place called the Vestal Bakery, I also expected better bread. It wasn't bad bread and it was definitely the freshest part of the sub, it was just nothing to get excited about. Overall, if you look up "average sub" in the dictionary, the picture associated is the one you see above.

But think about it. $2.99 for a foot-long sub. That is seriously cheap. It may not be the greatest sub in the world, but it's certainly a notch better than edible, and if you're a starving, overworked, underpaid grad student like I once was, a deal like this could just be your saving grace. For quality the Vestal Bakery & Deli may not be anywhere close to the area's best, but for value, you aren't going to do better.

Grade: C

Vincenzo's Restaurant

Name: Vincenzo's Restaurant
Location: 1407 Watson Blvd., Endicott, NY 13760
Phone: (607) 484-0073
Cuisine: Italian/Subs/Sandwiches
Price: Around $5 or $6 per sandwich

Review:
As regular readers know, I've been looking far and wide for a great sandwich shop in the Triple Cities. The search has uncovered some real gems like the Original Italian Pizzeria in Endicott and Nezuntoz on the South Side, but I knew there had to be someplace even better out there, or at least more along the lines of what I wanted. Today, the search has ended. Vincenzo's on Watson Blvd. in Endicott is exactly the place I have been seeking.

I have driven by Vincenzo's on a number of occasions, on the way to Consol's or Oaks Inn (it is about three or four blocks east of those restaurants). I never gave it much thought because quite honestly I thought it was closed. I never saw any cars in the (tiny) parking lot nor did I notice any action going on inside. Today, I was looking for a place for lunch on Urbanspoon (great website, by the way) and stumbled across a few positive comments on Vincenzo's. Intrigued, I found their menu online which looked good to me, showed it to Megan who also found it agreeable, and five minutes later we were in the car, en route to Endicott.

Vincenzo's has an all-white exterior and a small parking lot directly behind the restaurant (drive past the restaurant on Watson and make your immediate right if coming from points east). On the inside, I was stunned by how clean and how charming it was. There are about 8 evenly spaced tables, each with their own floral arrangement, and some artwork gracing the walls. They also had some Italian music playing in the background when we were there which helped to set an appropriate atmosphere. For a small sandwich shop I found Vincenzo's to have near-perfect ambiance. It's pleasant and low-key and has the vibe of a place that's been there awhile, even though Vincenzo's has only been around since 2003.

The menu consists of various paninis, wraps, salads, and subs, with an emphasis on Italian items. I decided to order the Milano Press ($5.25), a panini consisting of mortadella, capicola, salami, and ham with a roasted red pepper mayonnaise, lettuce, tomatoes, and onions, all covered with a balsamic vinaigrette. Megan ordered the decidedly-less-Italian Turkey Wrap ($4.95) which was pretty much exactly what you'd expect, turkey, lettuce, tomato, onion, and mayo on a wrap. Each sandwich was served with a side of complimentary cole slaw.

My sandwich was phenomenal. For starters, I thought it looked great, and the taste certainly did not disappoint either. The red pepper mayo was a perfect compliment to the Italian meats, and they certainly don't skimp on the portions. This thing was stuffed to the gills with meat and toppings and everything tasted extremely fresh. But the very best part of the whole thing was the bread. This was the freshest, softest, best-tasting sandwich bread I've probably ever had. I'm not sure if they bake their own bread there on the premises or not, but I'm thinking they do. Since it was a panini, the sandwich was lightly pressed but not overdone like the panini I had a few weeks back at Escape State Street. There is absolutely nothing I would change even in the slightest about this sandwich: it is hands down the best I have had in the Triple Cities.

Megan enjoyed her Turkey Wrap, finding the turkey and veggies fresh and the wrap itself to be well-constructed. She was happy with it but not quite as enthusiastic as I was, preferring the deli sandwiches at the Full Belly Deli in Vestal. Maybe I need to give that place another shot, because I found it to be fairly basic and very average. At any rate, I sampled a few bites of the wrap and it was good, but certainly paled in comparison to my sandwich. Then again, what wouldn't?

I regret not giving Vincenzo's some business sooner. The ambiance as about as good as it could be given the location, service was quick and pleasant, and my panini is exactly what I had hoped for. Upon arriving, I wasn't expecting greatness, but Vincenzo's is truly excellent. It is one of the Triple Cities' hidden gems and immediately has become my favorite sandwich spot in the area. I'll be back again very soon.

Grade: A

La Vita E Bella

Name: La Vita E Bella
Location: 1708 Vestal Parkway E, Vestal, NY 13850
Phone: (607) 748-2900
Cuisine: Italian
Price: $30+ for two

Review:
La Vita E Bella is a somewhat newer entry to an already-saturated Italian food scene, but is certainly a restaurant worth seeking out. Located on the Vestal Parkway not far from the Full Belly Deli and Lemongrass, La Vita E Bella (henceforth to be referenced by the shorter, less pretentious name "Bella") doubles as a pizzeria and a casual fine dining restaurant. I have not yet had the pizza, so this review will focus on the rest of the experience that Bella offers. My understanding is that the owner of Bella is related to the former owner of Pino's, which was located on the South Side of Binghamton and what seemed to be a local favorite of many folks before it closed for good a couple of years ago.

The restaurant actually has two entrances. The pizzeria entrance is the one to the right while the dining room entrance is to the left. I advise entering through the left entrance if you are going for dinner. Bella has probably the strangest layout I've seen in a restaurant. There are three distinct dining rooms: to the right there are booths, to the left there are some larger tables, and there is a back room with what appeared to be smaller, more intimate tables. Both times when Megan and I have been there, we've gotten seated in the exact same booth in the right-most room. This layout is most strange in the sense that the waiting area where the host/hostess stand is located is directly adjacent to the kitchen, so all food must pass through this centralized area before it reaches its destination. I don't think the layout is too conducive to efficiency, but hey, whatever works. All three dining areas are well-decorated and give off the vibe of a fancy Italian bistro.

The wait staff is professional and seemingly experienced, delivering the daily specials from memory and dressed appropriately. A suited gentleman who I believe is the owner can often be seen walking around making sure the patrons are well taken care of. On both visits to Bella, I have been very impressed with the service.

The menu consists of the usual Italian favorites like Chicken Parmigiana, Lasagna, etc. but also includes some other, less common items like Spaghetti alla Carbonara, and they usually have some interesting specials as well. Last time, I ordered the lobster ravioli with arrabiata sauce special, which was quite good, and one of the specials on our more recent visit was Spaghetti al Nero di Seppia, spaghetti with a sauce made from squid ink. Definitely an item you won't find everywhere. Bella also appears to have a decent wine list, as all Italian restaurants worth their salt should.

I ordered the Spaghetti alla Carbonara this time and Megan went with the Penne alla Vodka. Dinners at Bella include salad and bread.

The salad was, in my estimation, disappointing. Basically it was just a big mound of iceberg lettuce with a couple tomato slices, maybe some onion, and dressing on the side. I would've liked to see some Italian greens and/or olives in there, but it's hard to be too critical over salad. The bread, on the other hand, was absolutely wonderful. Extremely fresh with oil for dipping on the side, this was some of the best bread I've had around here. Very impressive.

The carbonara I ordered was very good. Not mindblowing and not something I would necessarily crave again at some point, but a really good mix of al dente pasta, egg, pecorino cheese, and pancetta. The pancetta in particular was a highlight of the dish and it could've probably used a few more bites of pancetta in there to give some more smoky flavor. Overall, I was happy with the dish and found it to be an above-average dish.

Megan's penne alla vodka was also quite good. Her immediate thought was that it was "much better than the penne vodka at Consol's" and that it was "maybe on par with the Lost Dog's." I'm not really sure about that last part, but I tried it, and it was definitely better than Consol's. Oddly enough, the Penne Vodka it reminded me of most was Megan's own. She has made the dish herself a few times and is getting to be quite good at it! Anyway, this was pretty good stuff.

We didn't get dessert on our most recent trip (too filled up!) but they do have a good looking dessert menu with different cakes, cannoli, and tiramisu. I read somewhere that the tiramisu is the stuff of legend, so I will try to save room for it on my next trip. The key words there, of course, are "on my next trip," suggesting that La Vita E Bella is certainly a restaurant deserving of return customers. It's a nice atmosphere, the service is quick and attentive, and the food is praiseworthy. I give La Vita E Bella a solid recommendation.

Grade: B+

Mad Moose Saloon

Name: Mad Moose Saloon
Location: 53 Chenango St, Binghamton, NY 13901
Phone: (607) 723-3470
Cuisine: Southern BBQ/Wood-Fired Pizza
Price: Entrees $10-$15, pizzas about the same

Review:
Mad Moose Saloon, or "The Moose" as everyone including myself seems to call it, is a unique restaurant to Binghamton's dining landscape, and a place I've been to countless times over the years. The Moose first opened about five years ago as an upscale bar/lounge/nightclub with large, comfortable couches, a small dance floor, and huge projection screen TVs. Since then, it has progressively morphed into a casual dining restaurant which happens to have a humongous bar adjacent. It has been interesting to watch this progression over the years as a loyal patron who has had high hopes for The Moose from day one. This is easily one of the best-looking places in town and a really comfortable place to hang out with large groups of friends in a spacious atmosphere. Its location near the intersection of State St. and Henry St. puts it far enough away from downtown that the clientele tends to be a little older than what you'd expect a couple blocks down.

Since the Mad Moose opened for food a year or two ago, I have always been interested in trying it out, but had never actually done so until last night. I was especially interested after I found out that the Moose had procured the services of Chef Dunster, formerly of D.C. Dunster's and Zazou across the street. Those are places I'd never been to, but had heard from many people that they were quite good and quite unique as Binghamton eateries go. Anyhow, I was meeting some friends at the Moose for a going-away party at 8:00 PM and decided to arrive an hour earlier than that to try the food. With Megan out of town for the evening, my friend Tom (also a longtime patron) came along and we gave it a shot.

The atmosphere at Mad Moose is unparalleled in downtown Binghamton. This is the best-looking place in town, a dimly-lit, underground location with spacious booths, high-top tables, and the biggest bar I've ever seen. The space is well-decorated. There's a clear dead-animal motif with all sorts of animal busts protruding from the walls. The atmosphere is rustic yet somehow feels a little upscale. On ambiance alone, this has long been one of my favorite places to go in Binghamton.

We arrived shortly after 7:00 PM and got a table pretty quickly. It was unclear whether we were to seat ourselves, or be seated by a host/hostess. A hostess kind of weakly pointed toward an open table so we sat ourselves there. Five minutes later, we had menus.

The menu at The Moose is totally up my alley. They have all sorts of specialty wood-fired pizzas, ribs, pulled pork, chili, and several other items that appeal to rampant carnivores such as myself. The side dishes (from which you can choose two with the purchase of any entree) sounded equally tasty. Some options for sides include sweet potato fries with a tabasco-honey glaze, root beer baked beans, Chef Dunster's "famous" cole slaw, and mashed sweet potatoes with marshmallow sauce. With Theo's in Johnson City gone by the wayside, I didn't think I'd find sides like these again in the Triple Cities.

I decided to try the Pulled Pork Platter and opted to go with the baked beans and the mashed sweet potatoes for my sides. I also ordered a cup of chili as a starter. Tom decided to try the Pulled Pork Empanadas and got a bowl of the soup of the day, a spicy turkey soup. With the empanadas, Tom elected to try the aforementioned sweet potato fries.

A few minutes later, our soups arrived. I thought the chili was very good. In addition to the usual ground beef, I also detected some pulled pork in there. With beans, chopped onions, stewed tomatoes, sour cream, and jack cheese, this was some very good chili. I would've preferred it a little spicier, but that's what I say about most everything I eat. Tom found the turkey soup "pretty good" but was a little bothered by the discovery of a bone in the soup. Not a huge deal, but lack of attention to details such as those would become a theme of the meal. So the bone was a harbinger of mistakes to come.

After we were done with our soups, the waiting game began. Both of us were pretty irked by the shoddy service, especially since it was now after 8:00 and the rest of our posse had arrived. We had hoped to be done eating by this point. We watched as those around us who had come in after us got their meals, and after about 40-45 minutes from the time we finished our soups, we finally got ours.

My pulled pork was awful. AWFUL. I'd say at least a third of what was on the plate was fat. The rest of it was mediocre and covered with a bland, weird barbecue sauce that reminded me of Heinz' 57. As someone who typically loooooooves pulled pork, I found this massively disappointing and a far cry from the pulled pork I had the other day at the Big Dipper BBQ in Apalachin. That was some delicious stuff....this was not. On the plus side, the sides were both excellent. I enjoyed the root beer baked beans and the mashed sweet potatoes were very good and somewhat reminiscent of the candied yams I used to order at Theo's.

For what it's worth, Tom thought his meal was "pretty good." I tried a bite of his empanadas and thought they were decent and an interesting combination of flavors...southern BBQ-meets-southwestern. The sweet potato fries did not impress me much. They looked and tasted a little bit burned and the "tabasco" portion of the tabasco-honey glaze was seemingly missing. Tom also noted that he was not impressed with the presentation of the food, in baskets instead of on plates. I tended to agree, but there were obviously other things that bothered me more.

After eating we paid the bill (by now it was almost 9:00) and headed over to the bar to join the rest of our group. Speaking of the bar, something that bothers me is that the Mad Moose serves all of their beer in Mason jars. I can understand why they could get away with serving crappy swill like Bud Light in a Mason jar, but a few weeks back they had Brooklyn Brewery's Dark Matter on tap, and it would've been nice to experience this rare bourbon-aged beer in a snifter or wine glass. But the bartenders at the Mad Moose range between unknowledgeable and just plain stupid. After all, this is the place where Megan once ordered an Amaretto Sour and was asked by the bartender, "what's in that?" A: you're the bartender, you tell me, and B: what the hell do you think's in an amaretto sour?

Within an half-hour after finishing eating, I started to get some massive stomach pains and had to leave the party early. I'll stop short of saying that my illness was caused outright by the food I had eaten, but I will say that I was fine before I got there...

I don't know that I would eat the food at Mad Moose again. I am still interested in trying the pizza, but I can't fathom that it would be a place I'd go for pizza often given the number of other quality pizza options in the area. I do know that the service was beyond slow, the pulled pork was positively disgusting, and that I have felt ill since consuming the food. At the same time, the sides were awesome, and the atmosphere that the restaurant provides is the best in the area. It truly is a fine place to hang out with friends and have some drinks in a cool atmosphere. I feel awful to give such a harsh grade to a place I've had a lot of enjoyable experiences in over the years, but as a restaurant, I did not find The Moose up to par from a food or service standpoint, and this is "Tasting Binghamton," not "Cool Places to Hang Out in Binghamton." Frankly, this grade is generous; had this been my first visit to the Mad Moose, it would have been my only visit.

Grade: C

Nando's Pizza

Name: Nando's
Location: 217 Harry L Dr., Johnson City, NY 13790
Phone: (607) 798-0439
Cuisine: Pizza/Subs
Price: Around $10 for a large pizza

Review:
Nando's represents yet another entry into the Johnson City pizza mix. It's located at the corner of Harry L Drive and Academy St. I believe there are three Nando's locations that are all related: this one in JC, one on North St. in Endwell/Endicott, and a third location on Conklin Ave. on the South Side. I am pretty sure at least the Endwell and Binghamton locations are related. This is the one I'm not sure about, but how common is the name "Nando" really?

This is yet another place I've driven by thousands of times over the years but I never bothered to stop in until yesterday. I placed an order for a large pizza (12 small slices) with half-sausage, half-cheese and opted to do take-out. The restaurant itself has probably seen better days. I would not recommend eating there, but there are some tables set up on their front porch if you choose to. All in all, I found the restaurant itself to be a little sketchy.

At any rate, I picked up the pizza (around $10) and headed home to give it a shot. What I found was some pretty decent pizza. This didn't blow me away or anything, but I definitely did like it. The sauce is the most unique aspect of this pizza. Instead of normal pizza sauce it reminded me much more of spaghetti sauce. It had nice flavor and tended to dominate each bite. So if you like saucy pizza, this is definitely a place you might want to check out. The cheese and sausage were nothing to write home about, and the New York style crust was ultra-thin but still sturdy enough to support the toppings, unlike some other slices I've had recently...

All in all, Nando's is not likely to become your favorite pizza place or anything, but I found what I had to be a solid pie and, due to location, one that I would consider getting again. For what it's worth, it tastes pretty good out of the fridge in the morning, too. I give this one a mild recommendation.

Grade: B-