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Armand's Reviews |
Armand's Restaurant Chicago
Sun-Times Review |
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Armand's Treats Young and Old to Circuslike Fun By Pat Bruno, Restaurant Critic CHICAGO SUN-TIMES No fewer than three "Happy Birthdays" are belted out with gusto every hour. Groups of six here, eight and more there are gathered around large tables that fill the center of the front dining room and trail off into yet another large dining room at the rear. And the centers of the tables are filled with platters of food- some being worked on, some empty. Children in high chairs, banging spoons or whatever, add an eccentric, cacophonous teat to the dicordant din. The floor beneath them is awash with a circle of debris, the pile increasing as the night wears on. Grandmothers gently pat and soothe tiny tots (she who holds so others can eat), who stare in wide-eyed wonder at the circus (culinary) maximus that is unfolding around them. It's a typical Saturday night at Armand's Ristorante, a thirtysomething-year-old restaurant in Elmwood Park. A followup Sunday night visit was a lot quieter (only one "Happy Birthday" was heard). This restaurant doesn't miss a trick when it comes to handling food and customers. The menu is awesome in scope (just about everything from zuppa to noci) so much that you wonder if the kitchen can get anything right. It does more often than not. But when the place is extremely busy, the kitchen does turn loose some dishes that are rough around the edges. Peak hours can also cause the usually super-efficient service to bog down, so on occasion the wait between, say, the soup or salad and the entree can be a gap to remember. Combining the sum of all parts though Armand's can be a delightful dining experience, especially if you like to explore some of the more arcane areas of Italian food. One such dish is the capozzelli di angnelli, or lamb's head, which, according to our waitress, "is ordered frequently by some groups." In case you're interested, two hours' advance notice is required. All things considered, I think that's not much time at all. Less esoteric, but still wanting on the menus of many Italian restaurants, are tasty dishes such as a Melrose pepper salad, a grand salad of heroic proportions that includes tomatoes, celery, onions, lettuce, provolone cheese and, of course, tasty Melrose peppers, a slim, sweet pepper that Italians dote over. Also there is scungilli (conch), which comes as a salad or is paired with calimari. Steaks come straight up, as in filet mignon and sirloin, or stuffed and rolled (braciole), alla pizzaiola (simmered in tomato and garlic), and sautéed in garlic and oil. Fish can be as basic as baked fillet of sole and orange roughly or as interesting as baccala (salt cod) and zuppa di pesce (a.k.a. cioppino). Zuppa di pesce is the Italian answer to the French bouillabaisse, a fisherman's stew, which at Armand's is made with a rousing combination of clams, squid, shrimp, mussels- whatever good shellfish is around- in a herb and garlic tomato broth. It's quite a delicious meal in a bowl and comes with a salad and garlic bread for only $14.95 (I once paid twice that in New York City, and it wasn't half as good). Armand's Pizza Nova is a thin-crust pizza that's offered in five versions (including Greek). The one we had was an excellent pizza (Armand's has a pizzeria and trattoria annex that does a bustling business) with mozzarella chopped fish tomato and fresh basil- pizza. Margherita- that served two of us nicely. Armand's pasta e fagioli, a classic pasta and bean soup from the Veneto region of Italy, had all the right stuff- white beans, tubetti pasta, a rich and light tomato broth- the right ingredients- but the soup lacked flavor; it was weak, limpid. The $9.95 price for fried calamari is exorbitant despite the size of the portion. Easily enough for two to share, the calamari was excellent, though. It was flavorful, and there wasn't a chewy one in the bunch. Pasta choices are a pot of plenty. One night I ordered the cavatelli, and my wife the linguini with white clam sauce. Both dishes were a pleasure to eat (well, I didn't eat both of them: I only sampled my wife's dish). The cavatelli, which was swathed in a light and fresh-tasting red sauce, was perfectly cooked and properly chewy. The linguini was a wonder to behold and enjoy. Several cherrystone clams in the shell were gathered around a grand abundance of chopped clams that were strewn across an amazing amount of linguini. That by itself is not unusual, but the flavor was rife and ripe with garlic and herbs, and there was plenty of the sauce (some restaurants make this dish too dry). I thought the ravioli with ricotta cheese was a bit wish-washy. It might be that the ravioli was holding too much surface water from the cooking when it was sauced, with caused somewhat of a run-off that diluted the flavor. And I like the pasta in ravioli to be thinner and more delicate. And another pasta dish that washed out- sort of- was the linguini with rapini. The rapini was fine, and there was plenty of it; the pasta was cooked right, too. But what I think happened was that the oil and garlic sauce got watered down, much like the ravioli, with the cooking water. It may be that when the kitchen is extremely busy the pasta isn't drained the way it should be. I do like Armand's marinara sauce, though, so when I had it with spaghetti and a couple of meatballs, I ate the whole thing- much to my wife's amazement. The braciole was wonderful. There are many versions of this dish, and Armand's stuffs the thinned-out round steak with finely chopped meat such as salami and capocollo, Parmesan cheese and oregano. The success of this dish, though, centers on not only the taste balance but also the tenderness of the meat; it must be fork-tender. It was, and I enjoyed it immensely. The same was true of the veal parmigiana. The veal (three large pieces), according to the menu, was dipped in egg and flour, fried, topped with mozzarella cheese and baked. It did, of course, come with sauce, a generous amount of the delicious marinara sauce, and it's a very good dish. Although Italian cookies and fruit are included with most main courses, there is a dessert menu- complete with pictures- of some interest. About eight desserts are listed, which gives me hope that Italian restaurants are not total dessert wasteland. We sampled the torta della nonna, a pasty cream with pine nuts atop a short pastry crust. Though sorely lacking in pine nuts, the torta was very nice and very much enjoyed. Very good, too, was the tartufo. A ball of chocolate rolled in cocoa powder encased chocolate and vanilla cream. It may not sound like much, but there was a sweet richness to the tartufo that was compelling. On a lighter note, the limone ripieno and tangerine sorbetto were excellent. In both instances, either lemon or tangerine sorbetto (sherbet of a sort) filled a natural shell of lemon or tangerine. It was most refreshing and very enjoyable. And just to make sure I got all the facts, one night I took home a pan pizza. The next evening I reheated it in the oven. I have to say that it was a first-rate pizza, one that I would definitely order again, too bad they don't deliver into my neighborhood in Chicago). 'Grandma' will rule the kitchen forever by Heidi Seagren She has her finger in every pot, her eye on every meal and the upper hand in the kitchen. She works 12 hours a day, six days a week. Never mind that Angela Caringella is 78-years-old, or that she has been working since 14. Try to keep up with her and you'll run yourself ragged. She manifests the wisdom of her years and vitality of her youth. She is the head cook at Armand's Restaurant, 7402 Grand Ave., and she plans to work there forever. All the employees call her "Grandma" because she oversees everything. "I don't let any food leave the kitchen that doesn't look good," she said. "I say, 'it's my food and don't you spoil it.' "I LOVE WORKING here. I don't feel old when I work. When I'm home I feel old, because I just sit and watch television, but I love being at work with my friends and my children. I'm going to work here until they carry me out on a stretcher." The restaurant belongs to her son Mike, but the kitchen belongs to Grandma. She does all the preparation work, cutting and boning the meat, making pasta, soup and her specialty, spaghetti sauce. "My spaghetti sauce is my specialty. People come and buy cartons of it, but I'm not going to tell you everything that's in," she said. She hinted that one of the secrets to her special sauce is the herbs she grows herself. "I don't use oregano at all, and I don't measure anything. I just know what to put in," she said. "People always ask me how to make it, and when I tell them, they try, but they always ask me 'how come it doesn't taste like yours." She learned to cook from her grandmother, who came with Angela and her family to America in 1920. She was born in Bari, Italy, in 1905. In early 1920, at the age of 14, she married Achilles Caringella, who owned Caringella and Sons, a meat market and grocery store in Chicago. "MY HUSBAND TOLD me when I married him, if you want to cook with meat, cut your own," she said. So she worked as a butcher with her husband during the 45 years the store was in business. At 16 she had her first child. Seven others followed. "I used to make four pounds of pasta for may family and set it on the table so they would all help themselves," Angela said. When the store closed to make way for the University of Illinois-Chicago Circle, Angela stayed home to nurse her ill husband. Mike Caringella opened his restaurant in 1956, and in 1972 Angela started working for him. After her husband died, she continued to work as head cook at Armand's. She works with three assistant cooks, but the recipes and the food are hers, she said. In addition to her cooking, she loves being with her family. Her two daughters, Mike, his wife, and his son all work at Armand's. ALTHOUGH SHE SAYS she works for Mike, she takes pride in her food and her stubbornness. "We argue about little things sometimes, but I'm always right so I get my way. ""If I don't like some produce, I argue and I won't use it and I win. I keep everybody in line." Tell her to relax or slow down and she laughs. "I don't sit down at all while I'm working," she said. "If I sit down, I probably couldn't get up. Even when there is nothing to do I'm standing. I just stand up and crochet." People and cooking are her life. "I don't like to be alone," she said. "I love meeting people and I like to walk out into the restaurant, make sure their food is okay and talk with them. I love to talk." No one and nothing can stop her from working. Several years ago she had hip surgery; even after she broke her knee falling in the kitchen, she refused to quit. "I came back," she said. "I had to. I missed everything." Her youthful attitude and disposition may be due in part to her avoidance of alcohol and cigarettes. But Angela credits her vivaciousness to her work. "Work keeps me going, it keeps my mind clear and my mind working," she said. "If I stopped working I'd be dead. You can't stop me." |
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