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Boston - Part 1
Written by: Dominick A. Miserandino
Photography by: Margherita Miserandino
How to eat and walk your way through Boston in three days. In our weekend review, we see some historic sites, eat some and walk some more.
Driving to Boston from New York is like repeatedly driving through Connecticut-a repetition of trees, a few towns and some highway patrol cars. After this continuously recurring scenario, Boston creeps up on you before you even know it. Boom. There it is unexpectedly. Within a blink, the Charles River envelopes you and you are in the heart of the city. I-90 leads right into the center of the city and I mean the center.
We started our adventure by going straight to The Charles Hotel located in Harvard Square, Cambridge. Contrary to the Old World name it is a very modern hotel. Our room was a full suite with a dining section, a living room and a bedroom. The bedroom had a Bose sound system and a king size bed with a down comforter. Oh, and the best, was a television in the bathroom-a man could learn to love this. I was a bit confused by the soap in the bathroom made out of mint and grapefruit, but my wife seems to swear by such things and worst-case scenario when you are locked in the bathroom you can eat the toiletries.
On the day we arrived, there was a Christmas tree lighting at 6:00 and some activities beginning at 4:00. After the long drive, we decided to get lunch in one of the hotel's two restaurants, Henrietta's Café. It looked a bit like a country farmhouse restaurant but the food had a very modern flair. To sum it up, it was the first restaurant I have been to which serves fresh fruit smoothies. I hope that this trend will continue. Whoever thought up the idea of drinking your dessert while eating your vegetables was a rather smart man.
I had the Portabella mushroom appetizer and the Maine Rock crab cakes and Margherita had the corn breaded Monk Fish. I liked the crab cakes the best and just to frustrate Margherita I told her how good they were but how there was not enough to share. The whole time I was envisioning this little old woman Henrietta learning modern fusion cooking from her granddaughter. The results would have made the old farm girl proud. Later I learned that Henrietta was the name of a pig , which really messed up my original theory. As you know you can't teach an old pig new tricks.
We then went up to the suite and rested up for the big Christmas celebration. I was on the couch while typing up to this point in the story while Margherita would scream out loud from the bedroom little factoids she learned about Boston.
"Honey, did you know that the city has lots of squares just like in Europe?" Margherita said.
"Yes, dear."
"But they're not really square."
"Yes, Gracie, go to sleep"
"Who's Gracie?"
"Ask George Burns"
Ok, she didn't really say they weren't square but I did call her Gracie. Afterwards we rested and changed for the Christmas celebration.
Christmas Celebration
| | | Charles Hotel Tree Lighting | |
Around 5:00, we went down to the courtyard where the Christmas celebrations were going on. The Charles Hotel was sponsoring the events with a clown, juggler and a great 5-man gospel group. To be honest I was a bit more partial towards the musicians than to "Peter Panic" the crazy juggling unicyclist. The kids went crazy for the clown but the highlight came when Santa Claus came rappelling down the side of the hotel building. My personal highlight was when Santa Claus got stuck halfway down the building while trying to rappel down to see all the kids waiting for him. It was actually really amazing how well everything went and none of the kids noticed anything wrong, but I was more entertained by watching the M.C. "Peter Panic" truly live up to his name as he had to improvise for a few minutes so the kids wouldn't get scared that Santa was stuck. Soon Santa came down, and the entire crowd walked over to the tree for the lighting.
After the lighting, we walked along Massachusetts Ave to a restaurant called, "Centro/The Good Life". Along the way, we saw many quaint shops amidst the standard "Crate and Barrel" and "Gap". It is an amazing juxtaposition to see colonial homes right next to modern day commercialism.
Anyway, we arrived at The Good Life/Centro, which are two restaurants connected to each other. On the "Good Life" side is a jazz restaurant serving 'bar food'... Buffalo wings and pizza. On the other side is the complete opposite. Centro is a northern Italian restaurant featuring not so traditional Italian dishes.
We started with this Tuscan sampler with various cheeses, mushrooms, etc... I'm not sure of the names of every one of them but the cheese had a nice kick to it and it was a welcome alternative to wings and pizza.
Next, we had our first course, which for me was this pasta Conchiglie, which means pasta in the shape of little shells, with a clam sauce. Now, personally I hate clams so don't even ask me why I ordered this. I think I ordered this because I like the little shell shaped pasta, but considering that I usually hate red clam sauce, or white clam sauce for that mater, Margherita was a bit surprised when I practically licked my bowl clean. It was a bit un-couth, yes, but it was really good. Margherita had pumpkin risotto, but whatever it was, I was too distracted by my pasta to really care. She loved the risotto.
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Walking Home Through Cambridge
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For the main course I had...
I don't remember because the brilliant pasta was distracting. I just remember it being one of the best Italian meals I have ever had.
We walked home and little did we realize that this would be the trend for the weekend. Eat, walk, see something and then repeat the cycle.
Read part 1 | Read part 2 | Read part 3
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