First Impression: The New Genoa, Accanto

FIRST IMPRESSION – THE NEW GENOA

by Amelia Hard

For any readers who don’t already know this, my husband and I owned Genoa from 1981-1992, then sold it to a group of our senior employees. Though we had no financial interest in the restaurant after selling it, we of course continued to dine there and to care deeply about its welfare. So after mourning its demise last year, we were eager to experience Genoa in its new incarnation. These are my impressions from the pre-opening dinner we had there on Monday, November 30^th and the lunch we had at Accanto, the neighboring bar, two days later.

I know I’m going to get rhapsodic here, but I don’t want to raise the expectations of PFD’s readers to an impossible level. So please take my review with a few grains of artisanal sea salt. And please forgive me for going on at length – I want to describe everything in detail!

When you approach the restaurant, the first thing you notice is the warm light pouring from the windows onto the street (a change from the old days when the windows were covered). You can see right into the new corner bar, Accanto, which has the no-frills, streamlined look of the Italian bars on which it was no doubt modeled. We went in there first, to have a look around before going into the dining room. Behind the counter, which is made from two matching pieces of polished hardwood with the natural shape of the trunk intact, there’s a small but complete cooking line: 6-burner range, ovens, panini press, etc. There’s also a large espresso machine and a well-stocked bar. The tables look comfortable, but I think the fun place to sit would be at the counter. In the back of the room are some overstuffed chairs and sofas, next to shelves of cookbooks; at the back on the right is an open entrance to the prep kitchen shared by the bar and the dining room. There’s some nice art hanging on the walls. Altogether an appealing spot.

To get to the dining room, you have to go outside and through the old front door – that’s a good thing, because the experience of entering the room from the street is striking. There are some filmy, silver-gray curtains that partially screen the dining room from the street and another set of the same curtains that create an entry foyer where you’re greeted. As you enter the dining room, you walk past the old burl table, which, along with a large floral display, is one of the few recognizable features from the old Genoa dining room (the other is the nicer of the two old sideboards, newly refinished,  standing in its former place on the west wall). Everything else has been totally transformed.

It wouldn’t have surprised me if my reaction to the new dining room had been nostalgia for at least some aspects of the old ambience, but in fact both my husband and I were simply knocked out by how beautiful the new room is. I don’t think there’s a lovelier dining room in Portland. The walls are a deep cream color, with banquettes upholstered in autumnal colors along the east wall and deep blue silk gathered into decorative panels above the banquettes. The floors are warm-toned hardwood, and the ceiling is hung with chandeliers made of small suspended orange/red/brown stained glass rectangles. And there’s now a small fireplace on the east wall, which gives the room extra warmth (in every sense of the word). The room manages to combine comfort and elegance: you feel wonderfully cozy at your table, but when you look around the room, you’re struck by how beautiful it is. Having owned Genoa in the days when it was operated on a shoestring, I know how much of its original ambience was the result of sleight-of-hand like dark walls and focused lighting; it’s heartwarming to now see the old girl step out looking as stunning as any of her New York counterparts.

The night we were there, they had the back room (beyond the south wall) open, but it can be closed off for private parties with a huge pair of honey-colored hardwood doors salvaged from an old church.

So, what about the food and the service? Not a single mis-step. Seriously.

We were treated to a delicate amuse-bouche of paper-thin strips of Chioggia beet wrapped around a citrus-mascarpone filling, tied with chives. I started with the old Genoa cocktail, which had been updated to a drier, more complex version; for the preview dinner, they were also offering a couple of nice wines by the glass. We liked our server immediately: she was not only thoroughly professional and well-informed but also warm.

The first course was bagna cauda, which for a long time was Genoa’s default antipasto and was greatly missed by many of our customers when we first began replacing it seasonally with other antipasti. I almost wept, because I had thought I’d never have it again. (Yes, I could make it, but somehow it’s not the same at home.) The vegetables for dipping had been updated (endive leaves make great scoops!) and the grissini were long, thin, and crisp. The bagna cauda was so good, we finished it off with spoons.

There’s a choice for the pasta course: on the current menu, either agnolotti filled with a mixture of meats and escarole in meat broth with shaved parm, or “rotolo di pasta,” a sheet of fresh pasta rolled around a filling of house-made ricotta, spinach, and parm, poached, sliced into pinwheels, and served on a pool of tomato sauce. Both were wonderful: the agnolotti were appropriately small and richly flavored, and I really liked the presentation in meat broth, which made them less cloying than they are when served in butter; the rotolo was tender and subtle, and the tomato sauce was light but very flavorful.

The next course was a salad of Yukon Gold potatoes, topped with mâche and shallots, dressed with a black truffle vinaigrette with nice big slices of truffle in evidence. The vinaigrette was light on acidity, so the dish went perfectly with the red wine I was drinking.

For our entrees, Fred had a beef tenderloin steak with a red wine/demiglace sauce enriched with marrow; it came with a delicious mixture of roasted root vegetables. I had partially-boned quail stuffed with buttery breadcrumbs and wild mushrooms, wrapped in pancetta, pan-seared, and served with creamy white polenta (probably the best polenta I’ve ever eaten!) and sauteed brussels sprout leaves (not whole sprouts, just the leaves pulled off the sprout – a wonderful idea). By this time, we were really in heaven.

Then dessert! I had to have Torta di Cimabue, probably my all-time favorite Genoa dessert, and it was absolutely perfect: the meringue crisp and chocolatey with lots of hazelnuts, the whipped cream not too stiff. Fred had a deconstructed Pear Tatin, which consisted of a caramelized pear resting on a piece of crisp puff pastry, accompanied by a small lemon panna cotta and a drizzle of caramel sauce – as delicious as it sounds.

We saw a lot of people we know also dining there, and everyone felt the same way we did – the whole experience was a total knock-out, all the more amazing for being a pre-opening, iron-out-the-kinks dinner. One thing I noticed with amazement was how gracefully the waitstaff moved around the room – usually dining room choreography takes a while for everyone to figure out. But these waiters have obviously been chosen for their intelligence, confidence, and experience, and they already give the impression that they’ve been there for years. In fact, the whole place, although it’s radiantly new, already feels comfortably “lived in.”

Two days after our dinner, we stopped into Accanto for lunch, which was also delicious. We both started with a bowl of farro and vegetable soup, hearty but not too filling. Fred had a panino stuffed with bresaola, robiola, and arugula, which was a wonderful combination of flavors; it came with chips and an especially tasty version of mild giardiniera (assorted vegetables in vinegar, without any hot peppers). I had the focaccia of the day, topped with gorgonzola, walnuts, and caramelized onions – a classic, nicely executed. We also had a chance to taste the coppa di testa (headcheese) which is made in-house and just melts on your tongue; the mustard flavored with porcini complements it perfectly. The cappucino we had after lunch was second only to Andrea Spella’s.

What pleases me most of all about Genoa’s rebirth is that Chef David Anderson has focused the kitchen back on traditional Italian dishes. It was passion for traditional Italian cuisine, as authentic as we could make it, that originally motivated Genoa’s cooks and won the loyalty of Genoa’s customers. Now with a more knowledgeable generation of cooks and diners, David will have the challenge and pleasure of exploring more widely the many ways in which Northwest ingredients can be prepared with Italian soul. I can’t wait to see and taste the results!