Whenever I’m checking out a new Mexican restaurant, I’m always reassured to see Mexican families eating at a nearby table. If the experts are there, I figure, it must be good.
The Midtown Cafe is not a Mexican restaurant, but the other night, when I was having dinner there and the well-known owner of a popular Nashville restaurant stopped in to dine, I stuck to my theory. If he’s eating here, I figured, this place must be all right.
Midtown doesn’t seek—or need—celebrity endorsements. Both the location and the proprietor can boast pretty impressive pedigrees when it comes to experience in the restaurant business. Midtown, tucked away on a tiny lot on 19th Avenue, just behind the BP station on West End, occupies the building that formerly housed Marchetti’s, one of Nashville’s best-loved Italian restaurants. Unfortunately, Marchetti’s was burned out by a 1983 fire. After extensive renovation, the building went on to house two Greek restaurants, neither of which lasted long.
In July 1988 when John Petrucelli and his then-partner Curt Cole opened Midtown Cafe, they were hoping to fill a niche somewhere between casual restaurants like Houston’s, TGIFriday’s, O’Charley’s, and Ruby Tuesday and upscale joints like Arthur’s and F.Scott’s.
Petrucelli cut his teeth at Nashville’s original Ruby Tuesday’s back in 1975. Then he moved on to help open the Atlanta branch of Houston’s, before returning to Nashville to run the local Houston’s for several years.
Petrucelli says that he and Cole wanted to open a place that was intimate and romantic yet still appropriate for business lunches and dinners. They wanted a menu that stuck to the straight and narrow, good food that was consistent and dependable. Midtown has succeeded admirably on every count. What’s even more impressive is that it continues to do so after almost a decade.
Midtown isn’t one of Nashville’s flashier restaurants. In fact, with its discreet location, its subtle signage, and its scant advertising, it almost goes out of its way not to call attention to itself.
Yet, at lunchtime on a weekday, customers can almost certainly expect a wait. (Midtown doesn’t take lunch reservations.) When we arrived at 7:30 on a frigid Tuesday night, there wasn’t an empty table in the house.
Admittedly, the house is fairly small; it seats just 78. In the evening, with its peachy walls, its carpeted floors, and its subdued lighting, it is transformed into a pretty little jewel box. (I’ll certainly remember that subtle lighting the next time the occasion calls for me to look younger and prettier than I actually am.) After 7 at Midtown, everybody looks like one of the Beautiful People.
The people at Midtown do look beautiful, but they also look like someone you know. Definitely, they’re faces that are familiar to Petrucelli. Midtown claims a good number of regular customers, one of whom refers to the place as “Sperry’s Light,” a nod to Midtown’s non-stuffy supper-club atmosphere and to its more contemporary menu.
Midtown is the type of place you’d want to meet friends, entertain out-of-town clients, or rendezvous for a comfortable date. It’s not exactly a Big Occasion place like Morton’s or Wild Boar, but its loyal fans insist that it’s always pleasant, always welcoming, and always accommodating. As small as the place is, you can become a familiar face after only a couple of visits.
Of course, if the food weren’t up to snuff, all the pleasantries in the world wouldn’t make a whit of difference. Happily, Midtown’s kitchen is more than holding its own these days, even though it won’t win any culinary awards. What Midtown does, it does well—so well that a couple of its standard dishes have attained the sort of signature status enjoyed by Jimmy Kelly’s corncakes, Rotier’s burgers, and Sylvan Park’s chocolate pie.
The lemon artichoke soup, Ann Petrucelli’s recipe, is quite simply one of the best soups in town, a perfect blend of citrus tang, buttery cream, piquant spices, and tender artichoke hearts. Midtown’s crab cakes also deserve their renown, plump and fried to a golden brown, with a nice balance of crabmeat and filler. I wasn’t keen on the cayenne Hollandaise that accompanied them, but the crab cakes stood perfectly well on their own.
For starters, we also sampled the stuffed mushrooms, the Midtown mozzarella, and the gourmet pizza of the day. The mushrooms, small and overbaked, were a disappointment. The appetizer pizza was terrific, crispy and flavorful. With a salad it would make a fine light meal. The mozzarella, wrapped in paper-thin slices of prosciutto and served on a bed of crispy Romaine, was impressive—it appeared to be fresh, creamy mozzarella, not the rubber handball that comes out of most kitchens in town.
Midtown displays an admirably light hand when dressing its popular Caesar salad. The kitchen makes its own dressings, except for the ranch, and we all liked the house dressing, a soy-citrus vinaigrette with sesame seeds. It worked especially well at lunch with the excellent grilled-steak salad—sliced marinated flank steak cooked to order on a bed of mixed greens, mushrooms, cucumbers, and pretty decent winter tomatoes. At lunch, we also tried the chicken croquettes, which are of the patty and not of the torpedo-head configuration. They were light and moist and full of finely shredded white meat; with a dollop of sweet pea cream sauce, they could be a classic comfort food for cold winter days.
Midtown regulars go for the pork loin with raspberry or the lamb chops, which are encased in a peppery crust. Our chops were delivered, cooked to order, with a pink interior. The popular Midtown Pasta is basically a dish of linguini tossed with a good pesto and stout marinara sauce, and livened up by the addition of Danish bleu cheese. For a few dollars more, you can add grilled chicken or shrimp.
John Walther, Midtown’s original kitchen manager, is still around to keep things on track. Chef Ralph Roithner, who signed on last summer to work the night shift, has revamped the menu, tweaking a few dishes and adding a few more, including pork Florentine, breast of duck Calvados, and his version of saltimbocca. His tender pounded medallions of veal are topped with prosciutto, provolone, Parmesan, and fresh sage; then they’re rolled and sautéed, glazed with red wine, and served with one of my new favorite things, fried spinach.
Our complaints were few and minor—the bread was merely OK; and Midtown subscribes to the one-veggie-fits-all theory, julienned sautéed squash, zucchini, and peppers with a listless side of rice pilaf.
Service was superb during both of our visits. At dinner our waiter was extremely helpful and knowledgeable, particularly when we asked for help with our wine selection. Dinner for four ran to approximately $120, not including our wine and our Cosmopolitans; lunch for two, with appetizers, was $28.
It’s nice that Nashville’s restaurant landscape includes a place like Midtown, consistently and dependably doing what it does well. Even if they don’t know your name, it doesn’t matter. They’ll treat you like they do.
Midtown Cafe is located at 102 19th Ave. S. (320-7176). Open 11 a.m.-10 p.m. Mon.-Thurs., 11 a.m.-11 p.m. Fri., 5:30 p.m.-11 p.m. Sat. Closed Sunday.
