Wendy Logan photo

Café Roma’s rich and creamy ravioli burro e salvio

Café Roma
269 Fairfield Ave., Bridgeport, (203) 333-0055

While I've been a fan of Café Roma since it opened nearly four years ago, the restaurant long suffered somewhat from inconsistency. But several recent visits indicate they've hit their stride. The place has nearly everything a true Italian food lover could ask for: charm, a great menu, a 15-seat bar, a cheery but low-key staff and remarkable value. Prices at Café Roma range from $9 to $16 for pasta and $16 to $26.50 for entrees.

Unless you need a vast wine list (wines here are basic and sold only by the glass), the next time you're craving Italian food, go straight to Fairfield Avenue for a plate of chef/owner Giuseppe (Pino) Pace's superb pasta.

You'd have to go to Italy to find a better beef Carpaccio than the melt-in-your-mouth Carpaccio Di Manzo served at Café Roma. All too often, this dish comes out tasting over-refrigerated — but not here. The classic preparation of paper-thin raw beef topped with peppery arugula and shavings of the finest Parmigiano Reggiano has just the right drizzle of bright green extra virgin olive oil, a healthy squirt of lemon, a crunch of sea salt and a crush of fresh pepper. Skip the extra sprinkle — offered by the server; the dish is seasoned to perfection.

A shrimp and crab cake, flecked with bits of red bell pepper, is an unusual Italian menu offering, but its symphony of flavors, textures and colors won us over. With just a bit of a crunchy crust, the creamy seafood cake is piled on fresh greens and garnished with a diced fresh mango salsa which, along with a swirl of balsamic reduction and some fresh corn kernels, offers a sweet contrast to the sea saltiness inherent to the dish.

Funghi terra e mare is a combination of shrimp and portobello mushrooms, sautéed with white wine and served in a tasty, spicy marinara sauce. Here, the sauce is the thing, so if you haven't eaten up the warm bread that's brought to the table (with a bottle of garlic-infused olive oil), use it for cleaning your plate.

Moving on to pasta, it's hard to go wrong at Café Roma. Bucatini, a chewy, fat and hollow kind of spaghetti, is served classically, "Al Amatriciana." The preparation doesn't stray far from tradition. It's a kicky red sauce made sweet by slow-sautéed onions and smoky by small chunks of salty pancetta. While a teensy bit over-sauced, it's hard to complain about this dish, which comes with a generous sprinkling of parmesan cheese. Throw carb caution to the wind, grab some more bread and mop it up.

For a rich and creamy selection, go for the ravioli burro e salvio, a spinach and ricotta cheese–filled pillow bathed in — but thankfully not swimming in — butter and topped with crispy fried fresh sage leaves. A smattering of juicy, halved cherry tomatoes cuts through the sauce beautifully, adding flavor balance.

There are just six entrées offered on the regular menu, but specials are always on tap and we tried one: veal medallions grilled and served with a balsamic reduction, corn and fresh tomato salsa tinged with fresh basil, broccoli rabe and polenta. The dish was beautifully presented and hearty, but not entirely successful. Just a bit overcooked, and sliced perhaps a touch too thick, one of the medallions was chewy. (The other was tender.) The very buttery and slightly dry polenta triangles, crusted with Fontina cheese and sprinkled with a dice of portobellos were somewhat overbearing, rescued only slightly by some fresh rosemary and the natural meat juices that cut through their heaviness. The greens, on the other hand, were cooked to crunchy perfection.

I was sad to see that Pino's chicken scarpariello, with its beautiful, brown, balsamic-tinged sauce and slices of hot, tangy cherry peppers, had been relegated to the lunch menu only, as it is an absolute star. But as hospitable as the kitchen is at Café Roma, I bet they'd make it for you if you asked very sweetly.

Speaking of sweets, we finished our meal with a slice of ricotta cheesecake. The very crumbly cinnamon crust was more reminiscent of a fruit crisp topping than a cheesecake crust, but the creamy texture, unusual for the ricotta version of this cake, and the garnish of mandarin orange sections, fresh orange zest, and strawberries, made for a lovely dessert.