Trattoria Il Porcellino

Trattoria Il Porcellino: Round Two. Earlier entry: August 23.

Cheese buffs, head here to sample fun varieties that other restaurants rarely serve. This "burrata" is a mild-tasting mix of mozzarella & fresh cream, boasting a buttery lusciousness to pamper the palate. Ask for it to be dished out at room temperature.

Four types of semi-hard Pecorino ewe's milk cheese, produced in Tuscany. Their delicately savory flavor, bonded with a nutty edge, would bring a nice boost to salads.

Trattoria Il Porcellino's porcine offerings are also noteworthy. Share this cold cut platter of wild boar salami, Parma ham, cured coppa, spicy salami, mortadella & salami felino for terrific tasting portions of pork from wide-ranging Italian regions.

Pork-stuffed tortellini with ham & cream. Rustic comfort food, like something that one might find in a mountain village of Emilia-Romagna.

Strozzapreti with wild boar ragout. The al dente doughiness of the hand-rolled, fat-tubed pasta was well complemented by its tangy, coarsely meaty coating.

Risotto with speck bacon & porcini mushrooms. Enjoyable for its warm earthiness.

Save space for dessert, particularly this tasty troika of mascarpone, nutella & strawberries. Smooth & sensuously sweet.

Yogurt ice cream with more strawberries.

Even the prosecco comes bearing strawberries. Yum!

Wine or beer ... pick your poison.

Trattoria Il Porcellino,

Menara Hap Seng, Jalan P. Ramlee, Kuala Lumpur.

Trattoria Il Porcellino

Now that Il Lido has gone pork-free & Chiaroscuro is plain gone, here's where can we go hog-wild with Italian cuisine in the city center.

Not the typical bruschetta: one topped with pork lard & walnuts, the other with minced pork & emmental cheese. A fabulously flavorful introduction to Trattoria Il Porcellino, a pork-filled, vastly superior offshoot of Jalan P. Ramlee's pork-free Trattoria Cucina Italia.

Tomino cheese wrapped in speck bacon. Soft, oven-baked cheese with smoky, salt-cured bacon: a hookup that's sinful but sensational.

Porchetta ham, described as "the product of a pig that's gutted, deboned, arranged in layers of meat, fat & skin, then rolled, spitted & roasted over wood." Sounds tediously elaborate, but the result tastes more satisfying than supermarket ham.

Crisp-skin suckling pig ribs stuffed with cheese & ham. A bane for girth control; too fatty & greasy for our liking, but still a rather unique recipe.

Atomica Pizza, topped with spreadable pork sausage, tomato & mozzarella. A fine change from other pizzas topped with ordinary sausage slices. This has mushy, spicy sausage meat spread across its surface, providing a pleasurable pungency to every bite.

Ruffino, Aziano Chianti Classico DOCG (Toscana). All in all, there's much to recommend about Trattoria Il Porcellino, a rare Italian outlet that has a predominantly female staff, including the heads of both its kitchen & service team.

Trattoria Il Porcellino,

Menara Hap Seng, Jalan P. Ramlee, Kuala Lumpur.

D'Ceilo

Hoping that Bangsar can sustain another spaghetti-serving sanctum, D'Ceilo has taken over from Tea For Two on Jalan Bangkung.

Smoked salmon bruschetta. This satisfactory starter fairly symbolizes D'Ceilo's philosophy of providing hearty, fuss-free Italian fare.

Spaghetti Gran D'Ceilo, a remarkably flavorful mountain of noodles with (deep breath) mussels, scallops, clams, prawns, broccoli, mushrooms, asparagus, capers & black olives, cooked in aluminum foil & topped with smoked duck breast & mesclun. On paper, this sounds pricey at RM123++, but three or four people can merrily share in its wealth of ingredients.

A kilogram of mirepoix-poached Red Sea prawns _ 24 air-flown crustaceans, all in all. Plump and juicy, but probably too much of a good thing. Suitable for, say, six to eight diners.

Keeping up the seafood streak: pan-seared salmon trout with vanilla pod tahitensis cream, butter basil, balsamic tomato & herbs. Moist and flaky; a relatively healthy reminder that Italian cooking isn't always a guilty affair.

One misstep: scallop, prawn & broccoli risotto. Closer to mushy than al dente.

Canadian cod, oven-baked with paprika & wild honey to enrich the fish's delicate flavors & garnished with tomato salsa to ensure a zesty zip.

Complimentary dessert: a twist on the traditional molten chocolate cake, set like pudding at the base of a bowl & topped with vanilla ice cream. This photo depicts the delicious hot mess that remained after we pierced through the gooey chocolate lava.

Double trouble: Lychee Mojito & Apple Mojito. Rejoice! A full bar serves cocktails here.

Richland Estate Chardonnay (2010, Australia). To quote a dwarf, everything's better with some wine in the belly.

D'Ceilo (or D'Ciello, perhaps; the manager's card spells it one way, the menu another),

Jalan Bangkung, Bangsar, Kuala Lumpur.

Tel: 03-2095-3729

Chef Andrea @ il Lido

Il Lido's new chef Andrea Zanella's complete a la carte menu is finally ready for scrutiny, revealing a diverse selection that spotlights the recipes of numerous Italian regions, from the cliffs of Amalfi to the shores of Sicily.

Asparagus Milanese, given a contemporary twist with organic egg & porcini mushroom pesto. The ancient version of this recipe was reputedly Julius Caesar's favorite dish. We bow to Caesar's wisdom; this was comfort food back in 62 BC, it's still comfort food now in 2011 AD.

Ancona tomato-based seafood soup, prepared in the style of the Italian port of Marche. Tangy, mildly spicy and overflowing with fish, clams, squid & shrimp that tasted like they leaped out of the Adriatic Sea into chef Andrea's cooking pot.

Risotto & pasta have long been il Lido's forte, a tradition that remains unsullied. This risotto with crayfish uses carnaroli rice instead of arborio, resulting in a creamier, more concentrated bite that explains carnaroli's nickname: "the king of rice."

Ewe's milk ravioli with truffle & honey sauce. Close your eyes, chew on this and let your senses slowly absorb its multidimensional flavors _ a sturdy savoriness, mingling with warm, earthy notes & a sugary sweep of nectar.

Gnocchi with basil & garlic pesto, zucchini & pine nuts. Excellently executed, with herbaceous overtones that seemed to come straight out of someone's homegrown garden.

Pumpkin tortelli with goose liver & aged balsamic sauce. This sounded so spectacular on paper, it couldn't have lived up to expectations. We were hoping for silky pasta topped with a luscious slice of liver, but this was essentially lumpy dumplings with morsels of liver instead.

Zucchini flower & mozzarella fritter with vegetable caponata. A rustic snack, something that Diane Lane might have enjoyed nibbling on in "Under The Tuscan Sun" while contemplating whether to flirt with Raoul Bova.

Crab salad with watermelon & Elisir tomato. A vivid showcase of bright hues that stands out as a summer salad. The crab meat was sweet and succulent, with its handpicked feel complemented by a zesty zip from the melon-tomato synergy.

Grilled Tomino cheese with wild mushrooms. A thinly crusted, gooey cheese, made from the milk of cows from Piedmontese stables. Alluringly aromatic on its own, but slap it together with some mushrooms, and its fragrance is multiplied to lip-smacking proportions.

Angus beef short ribs braised in Barolo red wine, ranked among the world's top vintages. This is meat at its most luscious, brimming with flavor and luxuriously textured.

Sogrape Mateus, a beautifully bottled Portuguese rose.

il Lido,

Jalan Yap Kwan Seng, Kuala Lumpur.

Tel: 03-2161-2291

Huck's Cafe @ Bangsar

Back to Huck's for a magical meal that lasted nearly four hours.

Earlier entry on Huck's @ Bangsar: July 5. Huck's @ PJ: Nov. 24, 2010.

Kicking off with little bundles of joy, like birthday gifts to unwrap gleefully.

Tenggiri in otak-otak sauce. Firm, fresh and fleshy fish, well complemented by the Nyonya-influenced, herb-&-spice-laden gravy, together with what seemed like edible "daun kadok." Huck can tone down the fieriness (but not the flavor!) for those of us who are terrified of too much chili.

Spinach cannelloni. A commendable Italian-inspired effort, alluringly presented. Aromatic and addictive, though the portion might be too much for small eaters, since this is richly cheesy. But this dinner proves that even though Huck's chicken dishes are his strength, it's possible to have a fulfilling evening here that's meat-free.

Durian mud pie for dessert. Available only during certain weeks of the durian season, but it's a total triumph. Creamy but not cloying, sweet without being too stinky, enhanced by a nice nuttiness that illustrates Huck's culinary creativity.

Also worthwhile: chocolate mud pie, which ice cream & cookie lovers will adore.

Huck's signature basil seed soda, with fresh mint & pandan leaves.

Equally refreshing: a zesty beverage of lime & sour plum.

Semillon Sauvignon Blanc, suitable for both seafood and cheese.

OK, there wasn't that much food, but time flies here, since we're always having fun.

Huck's Cafe,

22, Jalan Abdullah, Off Jalan Maarof, Bangsar, Kuala Lumpur.