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Living the Loop Life
Monday May 07, 2007.
By Zinny Fandel
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 photo: Zinny Fandel
That's what made the idea of Trattoria Caterina so appealing. Located at 616 S. Dearborn Street, the ristorante is tucked into a small row of unassuming restaurants toward the southern end of the 'hood. Adding to our out-of-the-ordinary experience was the fact that we were eating a full three hours earlier than usual, just after 5:30 p.m., so it wasn't a big surprise to walk into a basically empty restaurant.
Once we chose a table by the window in the stocky, L-shape space, a warm waiter greeted us and promptly inspected the bottle of wine we had brought, only to admit he knew nothing about it.
It was a Primitivo I bought on recommendation from Lush Wine & Spirits earlier in the week. When I told the woman at the wine shop that I tend to eat mostly parmesan-flecked pasta and seafood at Italian spots, she pointed me to this $9.75 bottle of red. It piqued my interest mainly because she taught me that Primitivo is just the European name for Zinfandel, a grape I love to drink for its jammy quality. Plus, a medium-full style generally pairs well with both lightly-spiced pasta and shellfish, so I was sold.
Back at the restaurant, the waiter brought over tiny wine glasses, poured them full to the brim and ran through the menu. Steamer was starving but I was just plain ol' hungry, so I let him take the reins...so long as he respected my demands: that we split everything and that "everything" include a salad.
That's how we ended up with a half-dozen stuffed clams, a small Formaggio salad and an order of shrimp-pesto linguini. Oddly enough, it was the salad that took the longest time to decide on; there were a dozen delicious-sounding ones to choose from, and the knowledge that we could get gourmet greens for cheap (we could add a specialty salad to our entree for just $2) made the decision seem all the more important. What we settled on, a sizeable bed of romaine topped with gorgonzola, marinated red peppers and caramelized walnuts, was that kind of sugary, cheesy perfection that makes you realize how even salads can't always be good for you.
After my few bites of salad, I was feeling pretty content. But if there's anything I can do, it's go one-for-one with Steamer, so I poured myself another glass of wine and moved on to my allotted portion of three clams. They were a little small, and Steamer accidentally doused two of them with a giant wash of Tabasco, but if there's anything I can't do, it's critique bread crumb-topped baked clams. They are undoubtedly one of life's better pleasures.  photo: Zinny Fandel Our pasta was pre-divvied into two bowls, ensuring split-down-the-middle fairness. Its simplicity won me over: pesto-coated linguine topped with three garlicky shrimp. Much like the restaurant, the dish doesn't inspire a sermon of praise, but Trattoria Caterina totally hit my neighborhood nail on the head. It's a pleasant spot to share some pasta, talk quietly and linger over dessert...and no sooner had we eaten our way to the bottom of the bowls and finished the last few sips of wine then Steamer flagged down the waiter to order some more: a cannoli and piece of cheesecake.
The cannoli was a little stale, but I powered my way through it. We scraped the plates clean and analyzed the $37 bill, which, to my exploding belly, seemed amazingly cheap. Steamer wasn't bowled over, but that's OK—it's hard to be glass half-full when your bottle of wine is totally empty.
Zinny Fandel's tales of living the (mostly) BYOB life are intended to be attempted at home and in the community, preferably at BYOB restaurants. If you know of a BYOB spot she simply must tipple at, let her know.
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