At Catherine Lombardi in New Brunswick, It's Tradition
Did you have an Italian grandma who made her own pasta, so nutty tasting and tender that it was much more than a backdrop to any sauce -- you could enjoy it just as much with a little oil and garlic?
Did she fry her meatballs and let you feast on them (they were called "black meatballs") before she dropped the ones left into her rich tomato sauce (where them became "red meatballs")?
Or did you have a friend who had such a grandmother and were lucky enough to be included in family feasts?
That, in fact, is how the restaurant Catherine Lombardi came into being. Stage Left owner Mark Pascal had such a grandmother: Catherine Lombardi.
He and Francis Schott, another Stage Left owner, were childhood friends and Francis often was included in family meals. They missed Mark's grandma and created this restaurant as a tribute to her and the kind of food that she and all Italian grandmas of the day brought to table. Of course, back then the dining room would have been quite different than the one at Catherine Lombardi.
This second story restaurant fits the bold and beautiful space with no effort or expense spared.
The dining room is done in deep red and cream hues with dark wood tables and chairs. It has an elegant brick bar, which at one end doubles as an antipasti bar. Twenty-one windows overlook New Bruns-wick's theater scene.
If you just want to experience real Southern Italian food the way it used to be when all food was naturally organic and free range, you need to get yourself as soon as you can to Catherine Lombardi in New Brunswick.
--Hilary Harding, Courier-News