We've eaten at a lot of restaurants on The Hill in St. Louis. My wife spent a few days in St. Louis this summer and we decided to go to a place that we'd never been to before for dinner one evening. One of the few places we've never tried - but have driven by dozens of times - was Lorenzo's Trattoria. My wife said, "Hey, let's try this place!"
Larry Fuse, Jr. was raised on The Hill and was around a number of the restaurants while growing up. After he graduated with a culinary degree from the Forest Park campus of St. Louis Community College, Larry Fuse, Jr. held positions in the kitchen at Cafe Mira, Brazie's and the toney St. Louis Country Club in Ladue. At the age of 23, he approached his father who co-owned a building on The Hill that was used as the offices for his father's partner's construction company. The younger Larry Fuse convinced his father to allow him to put an Italian restaurant in the spot, only this restaurant was going to be different from the others on The Hill. All of the restaurants in the neighborhood featured southern Italian cooking - red sauces, primarily. He wanted to do a northern Italian restaurant that features more seafood and cream sauces. Lorenzo's Trattoria opened in late December of 1999.
The restaurant at the corner of Daggett Ave. and Edwards St. on The Hill. (see map) We were able to find a parking spot just down the street and went inside. We were greeted by a hostess who told us it would be a short wait for a table. We hang out at the small bar near the front door for a table to open up.
After about a 10 minute wait, we were shown to a table in a large room toward the back of the restaurant. The dining area at Lorenzo's Trattoria consists of four different areas - three are in the main part of the restaurant and a fourth appeared to be a private dining area down a hallway lined with wine bottles in a case. The dining room we were in was spacious and open, and the lighting wasn't too dim, nor was it too bright. It was very comfortable to dine in.
We were greeted by our server for the evening, a young lady by the name of Athena. The place was very busy and Athena appeared to be very busy. In fact, there seemed to be some tension among the waitstaff at Lorenzo's that we picked up on very early in our visit. Athena was pleasant, but we could tell she was somewhat frazzled as the evening continued on. I got a beer to start out and my wife got a glass of the Bolla Soave.
One of the servers brought out a signature item from Lorenzo's Trattoria - their famous breadsticks served with a side of a gorgonzola cream cheese. The breadsticks are made each day at Lorenzo's and Fuse said he got the inspiration for having the long, skinny breadsticks served at the venerable Al's Restaurant, a restaurant in downtown St. Louis that opened in 1925. As a little boy, Fuse loved the breadsticks at Al's and when he opened his own restaurant he incorporated serving his house-made breadsticks as an opening appetizer for patrons. The breadsticks were crisp and had a toasty taste to them. The toasty taste overpowered the taste of the gorgonzola when they were dipped into the creamy cheese.
Since Lorenzo's Trattoria is the only northern Italian-style restaurant on The Hill, they have a number of items on the menu that feature cream sauces, seafood, risotto dishes, and rustic dishes made with beef, pork and chicken. One of the more popular entrees at Lorenzo's is the sautéed calves liver dish served with caramelized onions. They also had ossobucco on the menu, as well as grilled salmon with portobello mushrooms.
I wanted to start out with the tomato/mozzarella salad. It featured large slices of tomatoes topped with fresh mozzarella, sliced red onions, kalamata olives, chopped fresh basil, and capers, then finished with a red wine vinaigrette. The tomatoes were crisp - they tasted more like a winter tomato than one that should be meaty and juicy from a summertime crop. For that, the tomato/mozzarella salad was a little disappointing, but the mozzarella was very fresh, as was the chopped basil.
For our entrees, it turned out that we were both thinking of the same thing - the veal piccata. They had an angel hair pasta dish with a bolognese sauce and grilled Italian sausages that caught my eye, and I almost went with the tortellini stuffed with portobello mushrooms in a white cream sauce, but the veal piccata kept calling my name. My wife was thinking about getting the fettuccine alfredo with grilled chicken as she and I usually order something different to either share off each other's plates, or to at least have a sample of what the other ordered. But we both couldn't get past the veal piccata.
The veal piccata entree featured an ample amount of flour-dredged, pan-fried veal loins that was paired with sun-dried tomatoes, portobello mushrooms and capers, and was served on a bed of pappardelle pasta covered with steaming fresh spinach. The veal was very tender, but the outer layer was a bit too "flour-y". And it was also somewhat overloaded with what I thought was white pepper - not that I complained about that because I like a lot of pepper on my food.
The pasta is made in-house and I thought from the first couple of bites that it was a bit undercooked. But as it sat underneath the steaming spinach, the pasta seemed to cook more and was definitely less stiff and more enjoyable. While we both had minor quibbles with our veal dish, we decided that it was much better than we initially thought it would be.
While there was a lot of veal and pasta on our plates, we decided to get some dessert. The only problem was that I couldn't figure out what to get from the list of delectable items on their dessert menu. My wife was sort of thinking about getting something light like gelato, but they only had spumoni offered on the menu. Athena told us that even though it was too late that evening (it was just after 9 p.m.), a lot of people are encouraged to "walk off" their meal and take a two block walk to Gelato di Riso, a popular dessert cafe on The Hill that is owned by Fuse, that features a lot of different styles of milk-based and fruit flavored gelato.
But my problem was what to order for dessert. My wife said that she'd share anything that I wanted to order, but there were four or five things that really sounded good to get. They had cannoli, a cheesecake, tiramisu, bread pudding, and creme brûleé on the dessert menu and when Athena came around to see what we wanted I asked, "Do you guys have a sampler of desserts? I want to try one of everything." But in the end, I ended up ordering the bread pudding. It was made with cinnamon and Amaretto, then drizzled with a chocolate and caramel sauce. It was sinfully delicious and very rich. We had a hard time finishing all of the dessert, but we made a significant dent in it.
All in all, we thought our visit to Lorenzo's Trattoria was enjoyable and the food well-above average. The minor quibbles we had with the flour-y texture of the veal piccata, and the crispness of the tomatoes in the caprese salad were minor compared to the overall meal. Our server - who was frazzled and stressed early on during our visit - settled down and became more friendly as the evening went on and things settled down. With a lot of good restaurants on The Hill, Lorenzo's Trattoria stands out with its northern Italian cuisine served in an elegant, yet comfortable and relaxed setting.
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