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Culture: Bistro's urbane flair justifies Metro name
By
Allen Pierleoni
Sacramento
Bee
Published:
Jan. 21, 2000
Are
you over your diet resolution for the new year? Good,
because it seems like every time we drop by the Metro Oven
& Grill, something else is going on -- a few more menu
items or some first-time chalkboard specials.
There's
even a new name. The place used to be Metro Pizza &
Grill, but the four owners decided they wanted to upgrade
the image from pizza parlor to bistro. Which worked just
fine, since in reality the Metro is a bistro with a
menu of fresh specialties (one of the best of which is
pizza, ironically) served in comfortable surroundings.
My lunch
mate and I -- he's a labor union executive who marched
(peacefully, he says) in Seattle last month in protest of
the World Trade Organization's international shenanigans
-- began with from-scratch tomato-Florentine soup, a
colorful concoction studded with fresh tomato and spinach,
and cheese tortellini. Better still was the French onion
soup, a rich, dark broth filled with tender onions and
topped with a crisp crouton and gooey mozzarella cheese.
The accompanying focaccia bread is actually the house-made
pizza dough spiked with Italian seasonings, topped with
garlic and Parmesan cheese and then baked; it's light and
addictive, one of the best we've had anywhere.
We moved
on to three outstanding dishes: We hope you're lucky
enough to find the seafood lasagna ($10) on the lunch
specials menu (why not move it to the permanent menu, to
join the lusty meat lasagna there?). It's a plate of
tender lasagna noodles laced with spinach, fresh tarragon,
prawns, snow crab and halibut, plus four cheeses --
Parmesan, provolone, ricotta and mozzarella. The stack is
placed on a bed of roasted marinara sauce, covered in
bechamel sauce, then sprinkled with diced red bell pepper
and parsley.
It's
unusual to find bechamel sauce on a luncheon item, which
says a lot for the industry and imagination of chef Kerry
Treleven. Bechamel is a white sauce created by adding
scalded milk to a white roux; the roux is made by mixing
and heating flour and butter in a pan.
Another
special was chicken Marsala ($8) -- tender fettuccini
topped with luscious chunks of seasoned chicken, sweet
shallots and fresh mushrooms, covered in a Marsala wine
cream sauce (which could have used more Marsala).
We also
sampled linguini with wonderfully sweet prawns, scallions
and tomato that had been sauteed in white wine and butter,
then poured over the pasta ($10).
On
another visit, we tried some dishes that were simpler but
still impressive: grilled halibut sandwich, Metro burger
($7) and chicken Caesar sandwich ($7).
We were
craving some pie the other day and stopped by, knowing
from past visits that the pizza here is one of the best in
town. The Metro has nine specialty pizzas ($7-$23.50) in
four sizes -- 10, 12, 14 and 16 inches -- as well as the
fresh ingredients to build your own customized version.
Let's
emphasize that Metro uses real Italian sausage, not those
salty pellets that a surprising number of pizza chains
prefer. If my labor-union pal has an urge to arbitrate,
there's an issue that really needs resolution. |
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