Taliano's Italian Restaurant, Fort Smith - Elegant Dining.

Fort Smith’s oldest Italian joint still stands downtown.  Taliano’s Italian Restaurant resides in a two story brick home, the 1887 J.M. Sparks Mansion. Two men -- Jim Cadelli and Tom Caldarara
-- took the recipes their mothers taught them and put them to good use within the walls of the home, changing little over the years but the prices.

The mansion has been kept up over the years. Chandeliers have been converted from gas to electric. Fleur de lis carpeting, velvet drapes and candelight make it one of the most romantic places in town. Oh, why have I not experienced the magic?

Oh, but I have. I even remember the date of my first visit. It was August 5, 1993, and my boyfriend and I were marking six months. I had the Veal Scallopini. He had the Seafood Diavolo. He had red wine. I had a cappuccino (a novelty to me at the time). I had an accident and spilled said beverage down the front of my shirt. He had a conniption fit. I insisted we stay for tiramisu.

For two young folks to drive up from Russellville for dinner is something else. The incident didn’t mar my love for the place. After all, the sauce was flavorful and fresh, the pasta pliant and marvelous, the cappuccino wet, the tiramisu a moist and caffeinated dream that fueled the drive home since the cappuccino couldn’t.

That was 21 years ago. After all these years, does it still stand up as an outstanding example of fine Italian family cookery? Is it still romantic? Could it be romantic while photographing and taking notes about the food?

We decided to try on a cool September night. We met a rather friendly fluffy gray cat outside, who insisted on attention before we made our entrance. The Talianos folks say the fellow belongs to nearby neighbors but he’s a regular mooch at the door.

Inside, we were first seated in an interior room where the bar was located, but we found that taking photographs of anything there was going to be problematic – candlelight may be great for romance, but it sucks for taking photos. We explained the issue to our waitress, and she happily

sat us out in the sunroom, where she turned up the lights for our benefit.

We noticed right away that the menu prices have changed since the last time they were updated on the website, but not so much as to scare us off. We decided to start off with the Baked Artichoke

appetizer, which turned out to be a large flat ramekin full of artichoke hearts submersed in marinara and coated in cheese, baked and served with fresh bread. Oh, the bread? It’s cooked and sliced just like the loaves

you get at the store, but a lot softer inside. The artichokes were still piquant and the overall flavor was a wee bit sharp but still marvelous.

We took our time about ordering, and finally came to our conclusions and ordered. While we waited, we chatted and our waitress came out and lit our candle. The music periodically soared, an all-Italian soundtrack without much English, with melodies straight out of the 1950s, maybe even out of Roman Holiday. We enjoyed our salads adorned with hefty globules of blue cheese dressing, enjoyed them a lot.

Our orders were eventually delivered, and we did our dance, amusing the waitress as we exchanged places (plates were hot and full of pasta, so that seemed the better idea), shooting at level and overhead the two dishes set before us.

Grav’s Herbed Linguine With Grilled Chicken made me heady with the scent of so many fresh herbs. The pasta, recently cut and a hair off al dente, seemed to soak in the butter and oil herb sauce that also encompassed the chicken. For me, it ticked all the boxes – light enough so you could still

taste the flavor of the pasta and chicken, yet with a strong aroma that made my mouth water. It was crowned with sautéed mushrooms and Swiss cheese and even more herbs. Now, honestly, Grav was a little disappointed, but I think that might have to do with how much salt we prefer. He likes a LOT of salt.

I had gone for a duo of flavors, after I had found that the vegetarian pastas

were options to be added to the already more-than-adequate list of dishes to double up. The lasagna slid across the plate a bit, its homemade pasta sheets unglued from the four cheeses adhering it thanks to the plethora of meat sauce between its ample spans. The beef almost overwhelmed the tomato in the sauce, but it lead to a very hearty dish.

The other side of my plate was far more exciting,

though – three hand-crimped spinach ravioli filled with both spinach and cheese, topped with fresh, chunky marinara atop a bed of Alfredo-type sauce. The play between Alfredo and marinara would have made it interesting enough; the comfortingly substantial ravioli somehow managed

to develop the wonderful fresh flavor of the spinach without the overwhelming flat tones many spinach-sort pastas tend to get. I will get this next time by itself, it’s that good.

Dessert was out of the question. There was no way we were going to be able to consume anything else. And that’s okay. Our hostess mentioned that there are a lot of people who like to come in just for dessert and coffee. We’re going to have to do the same.

And that’s the thing… those ladies, most of the diners there, even Grav himself, have been coming back for decades and generations. See, when the restaurant opened in 1970, there weren’t any other Italian restaurants in town. Today there are a handful. Taliano’s survives because it doesn’t change. The two families still run it – grandchildren now filling their grandparents’ roles. The menu is perfect as is. The house is beautiful. It’s still a popular place for wedding receptions and prom night dinners… and as long as the families stick with it, it’ll remain that way.

If you haven’t been, check it out. If you have, it might be time to head back again. Watch out for the cat.

Taliano's Italian Restaurant
201 N 14th St, Fort Smith, AR 72901
(479) 785-2292
talianos.net

Tavola Trattoria, Bentonville - Fresh, New, Bright.

Bentonville's exploding with fresh new restaurants.  A new and diverse palette of flavors can be found in its downtown -- from Matt McClure's The Hive at 21c Museum Hotel with its ever-fresh emphasis on

regional produce and flavors to the rustic "let's see how many animals we can eat in a sitting" adventure of Tusk and Trotter.  The Italian representative in this new wave happens to be next door to the latter, the airy and distinctive Tavola Trattoria.

Opened in 2011 by the folks that brought the esteemed Table Mesa modern Latin restaurant to the Bentonville square in 2008, Tavola's sleek lines and even sleeker dishes are respectable upscale dining.  Honestly, here's your date night right here. Carl Garrett's second venture offers a new take on traditional Italian classics, and he's dubbed the efforts "modern Italian cuisine."

We dropped by on a suddenly cold September lunchtime for a quick bite -- and to pick up a little more research for the Pasta Week project.  Our seating in the front window of the restaurant was delightful -- a small area of four tables slotted in-between windows facing north and east, separated from the main dining room by sail-light sheeted curtains.  No tablecloths -- this was a lunchtime, as I mentioned -- but still refined.

We chose two specialties for the meal -- that took some doing, since the menu is very, very long.  Meals are offered in individual or family sized portions.  We chose to go with signature dishes, choosing the Tavola from the pizza menu and the Ravioli Tavola, partly because of the descriptions but partly because we were at the "everything looks good" stage and decision making wasn't going to be strong with any of us.

Actually, that's not entirely fair.  Hunter's the one who decided on the Tavola pizza.  She loves gorganzola cheese and she adores pears and once she read that on the menu she had to have it.

I do need to mention the tea -- which was nice and robust and clean.  A beef I have with many restaurants is how tea is made and kept.  I can pretty much tell when the tea is old, or when the tea leaves or bags have been left to sit in the water.  Neither was the case here.  The tea was refreshing and not stale.  Okay, that's it for my tea-nerdiness.

Our dishes arrived together, and they were delightful.  Hunter's choice of the Tavola pizza was spot-on.  The pesto base and the buttery crust were fragrant with parsley and rosemary, nicely nutty.  The pears and the onions had been caramelized together and had merged into a lovely tangy-sweet and savory union.  The arugula gave a tangible crunch to the compilation, and the pecorino and gorgonzola

cheese came together well with that little bit of mozzarella to create the perfect bright and fresh pizza.

Still, even with that, I liked my ravioli better.

The delicate pockets of thin-rolled pasta had been filled with blue crab meat and parmigiano-reggiano cheese with a hint of white wine and cream -- that I later found to be parsnip cream.  I like parsnips.  They were topped with a parmesan cream sauce, shaved parmigiano-reggiano and dried herbs and served not only with asparagus (the menu calls for seasonal vegetables) but a magnificent red pepper cream sauce

expertly traced along the inside edge of the plate... along with a single tomato.  The presentation was absolutely perfect.

And it was utterly delicious.  I've had many a frou-frou plate set before me that delighted me with flavors but disappointed me in satisfaction, and this was not the case.  The plump pouches weren't oversized but they were filled within a squidge of bursting and the flavors they contained were fantastic.

Tavola doesn't seem to have a separate lunch or dnner menu -- but that's all right.  For a romantic dinner, it'd be absolutely marvelous.  Sharing the experience with my daughter was pretty dang magical, and I can report she highly approves of this restaurant.

I really want to come back and try the Polpettone, the Wagyu beef in parmesan cream sauce and Buffalo mozzarella -- along with the Veal Osso Bucco (which I would have ordered, had it not been only offered at dinner) and the Tavola Ratatouille with butternut squash and goat cheese.  And I absolutely have to come back for the poached Chianti pear.

Tavola Trattoria
108 SE A St, Bentonville, AR 72712
(479) 715-4738
tavolatrattoria.com

Uncle John's, Marconi Family Traditions in Crawfordsville.

A tiny Delta town is home to some of the best homemade pasta for a hundred miles around, an unadvertised Italian place with deep family ties. That place is Uncle John’s – an improbably comfortable eatery that manages to survive on word-of-mouth.

Indeed, I wouldn’t have found it had it not been for the recommendation of fellow writer Rex Nelson, who keyed me in on the place. And now I’m going to share that secret with you.

The restaurant sits in the last remnants of Crawfordsville’s downtown area, a lone storefront with a field on one side and the hull of a long-dead business on the other. The door is metal and heavy, but inside you’ll find the vestiges of many older restaurants – concrete floor, mismatched chairs and a host of local articles framed on the walls. This is community center.

Uncle John’s was originally opened in 1984 by John and Lucille Marconi. John started out farming but when business went sour in the 1990s, he turned to

cooking for friends and family. The Marconis bought the restaurant from Lucille’s sister, who was about to close it down. They started serving the family’s Italian recipes along with hamburgers and cold sandwiches (and on Fridays, catfish).

Now, John didn’t believe in advertising. He thought that if the food was good, people would come and share the word. He was right. The word has been passed slowly over the years, and folks seek this place out regularly.

The Marconis had seven children. The youngest, Michael, stayed, and when John passed away in 1994, Michael took over the running of the restaurant.

Now, I’ve had good-looking food at Uncle John’s, and I’ve had terrible-looking food there too. This photo taken with my phone shows a dish that heated up social media… folks could not figure out what this was.

That, my friends, is Uncle John’s Combination Dinner. It’s a chance to sample around the menu. That menu’s pretty vast – it includes steaks, ribs, barbecue, toasted ravioli and spaghetti and a lot of pasta. JUST with the pastas, there are hand-stuffed shells (with your choice of meat or spinach filling or both), meat stuffed manicotti, meat and cheese stuffed ravioli, spaghetti and meatballs and cheese-filled lasagna.

On that particular night, I had my combo with the manicotti, ravioli and stuffed shells, all with the meat sauce except the spinach shell, which I had with the cheese sauce. Let’s just say the presentation lacked. But everything on that plate was rich, fully spiced and well-enjoyed, especially with the big slices of house made bread offered.

Why did I show that first? Because I’m funny that way. Here’s some more attractive items. One time when I walked through the door I was told before I sat down that I’d want the fried mushrooms. They were served almost too hot to handle with a creamy homemade ranch-ish (but not quite ranch) sauce, and they were marvelous.

The salad dressings are homemade. I’d take home a quart of this blue cheese dressing if they’d let me… of course, the Marconis and their staff are nice enough, they probably’d make me an offer if I asked.

The toasted ravioli, made by hand with a beef and cheese filling, is always a winner. In fact, I’d say if I had to choose just one item to order, it’d be that one item about 50 percent of the time. Crispy and dusted with parmesan cheese, packed with those spices, they’re hearty.

The other item I’d consider as my one-and-only would be the lasagna: layers of cheese, sauce and pasta, very simple but very tasty and nicely filling. That’s my order for anyone going out there who’s going to bring me back a box.

The signature dish for which the place is know, though, is ribs and spaghetti. The ribs are nicely smoked, fall-off-the-bone wonders and the spaghetti is… spaghetti, but that’s all right, not only because it’s good but because ribs.

But what you really need to get, no matter what else you get, is the bread pudding. It’s far different from anything else you’re going to find. See, Lucille Marconi didn’t care for traditional bread pudding, especially how it was served in New Orleans, because it invariably contained raisins. The texture was different, too.

The Marconis tried a lot of things, but one night when they were out of other sorts of breads, they resorted to hamburger buns. The softer buns absorbed the egg, milk, sugar and bourbon custard to create an amalgamated pudding both delicate and assuredly firm enough to slice. It’s topped with a marvelous bourbon sauce (though, if you ask nicely, you can have yours topped with lemon sauce instead). It’s always heated, and that warm fulfillment at the end of a meal is about enough to put you to sleep; though, with no hotels nearby and considering the great distance you’d have to go to get anywhere with a bed, you’d best get yourself a driver.

When you go, make sure you take time to survey the second room. There’s a mural that takes up an entire wall, painted by local artist Joann Bloodworth, that depict just about every town resident in a setting reminiscent of a Tuscan village.

You’ll find Uncle John’s on Highway 50 in Crawfordsville. Either take Highway 50 off US Highway 64 from the north or, if heading east on I-40, take exit 265, cross the interstate and proceed northeast on 218, then turn left when you get to Highway 50. It’s open for lunch during the week and for dinner most nights – but there’s no lunch on Saturday. It’s about 14 miles from West Memphis, so consider that

My friend Kim Williams got this Italian Beef sandwich on
one of our trips.  Note the "Italian slaw."

next time you decide to cross the river into Tennessee for your return trip.

Uncle John’s
5453 Main St
Crawfordsville, AR 72327