We were pretty full as we sauntered back to our room after our traditional food tour of the city.
We took a nice little break before heading back out. We strolled around thinking of what to get for dinner.
I was ready to get a final meal of Trofie al Pesto……and the subliminal hints were there.
But I could tell that the Missus had gotten Her fill. She was having "Asian food withdrawals" and sorely wanted something to fulfill that need. But we were in Genoa!
Then I recalled seeing a tiny shop during our walk the previous evening named Ravioli Orientali right down the street. I know, dumplings in Genoa? But the Missus needed Her fix, so we walked over to find that the place was open.
It had started drizzling as we walked over; nature setting a "trap" perhaps? So we took the bait and scooted on in.
It was interesting as the two guys working were of African descent, but all the dumplings were being made by hand.
So, we placed our order and started with a Tsingtao (of course). Aaah, this was "nice to have around" indeed!
About this time a family of four, mom, dad, and two sons walked into the restaurant. The youngest boy was super interested and excited. He also spoke perfect English as he walked over and asked us, "are you the owners?" After all, we were the only Asians in the place, right? We cracked up and said no, but also offered to help with the ordering. The parents wanted a beer and we recommended and ordered the Tsingtao for them. The parents weren't interested in any food as they had already had dinner, but the boys were.
The gentleman working tried to explain things; but only spoke Italian, so the Missus, charmed by the young man stepped in. And when She explained what Xiao Long Bao was, his face lit up, he had heard of "soup dumplings" and he spoke to his parents….turns out they are from Romania and were spending a month traveling. And so they ordered some jiaozi and XLB.
We got the XLB and one each of the Baozi.
The wrappers on the XLB were too thick and gummy; but there was actually "soup" in them, the filling was very "oinky", great pork flavor, and surprisingly tender! Better than much of what we have here in San Diego!
The texture of the baozi dough was not as fluffy as I enjoy; but it had a hint of sweetness and was not bad. We enjoyed the pork version more….pork here is mighty tasty. There were hints of sesame oil, ginger, soy sauce….not sure how easy it is to get it in Genoa, but this was pretty good overall.
Much better than what we expected.
As for the family….well, they placed two more orders for XLB! We asked the young man what he thought of the dumplings and he said "it's the second best food we've had on this trip!" What was the first? "We could not eat enough kebabs in Istanbul!" You know, I give the boys parents a lot of credit, you could tell they weren't interested in trying any dumplings or baozi, but they encouraged their son to try it! They fed his curiosity and passion. Who knows, a few decades from now he could be Romania's Anthony Bourdain!
Ravioli Orientali
Piazza della Raibetta 4
Genova, Italy
In a way Ravioli Orientali exemplifies what Genova was to us. We arrived not knowing what to expect and were gleefully surprised at what we encountered.
We took a short stroll before heading back to our room, through the atmospheric caruggi, totally enjoying the evening in spite of the drizzle.
Walking thru the porticos, back to the hotel for the final time, we celebrated the fact that Genova had exceeded all our expectations……
As we hope to return someday, as we had only dipped our toes into the vast ocean of what Genoa has to offer!
Thanks for stopping by!
The portion of rice was quite large there was corn and edamame scattered about the hot plate. The beef, supposedly four ounces was topped with a small scoop of butter, which I thought wasn’t necessary.
This was interesting. The katsu had been sliced lengthwise and were as long as my fork. Rather unwieldy to eat.
The katsu sauce was very "local", being ketchup based, tangy and perhaps on the sweeter side of the scale. The mac salad was quite "local" tasting as well, having a touch of vinegar and some shredded carrots. The macaroni was nicely cooked, but unevenly coated. This was probably my favorite item on the plate.
One big minus was no mac salad, which I kinda liked on my previous visit. One big plus; they have Tabasco! Tabasco sauce has been the condiment I've used for loco mocos since small kid time!
First thing I noticed was how foamy the broth was, like it was kept at a rolling boil instead of a simmer. It was also on the thin side and seemed more like a thickened, slightly bitter, shoyu based broth. Like the tonkotsu I had here before, it also had a slight "metallic" tinge to it.
The chashu was a bit on the chewy side and lightly flavored, but not bad. The noodles were actually cooked decently and had a nice "springy pull" to them.
The pseudo tonkotsu bowl arrived seaming hot. There were some…well, interesting things about this bowl. My least favorite was the "impossible chicken karaage". It seemed to be sort of soybean based; but the texture was not to my liking; it was spongy and super chewy…think thick nylon sponge and had no flavor.
Not quite sure what to do with the slice of tomato? How much acidity, sweetness, will one slice of tomato provide for a bowl of ramen? The cabbage added a slight sweet-bitterness and was blanched. The corn also added some nice textural contrast and sweetness to the bowl.
The eggs were again nice and runny; no oof flavors. The polenta cake nice and crisp, good mild corn flavor. The carnitas a bit on the mild side in terms of flavor and also slightly stringy and dry, but not bad. The Mozzarella was fine, though the tomato added some good acidity to the dish. The "salsa" was also on the milder side in terms of spice and acidity. Still, this was not bad.
And we learned something from our meals with JJ. There's a definite difference in "Dog Friendly" versus "Dogs Allowed". This was simply dogs allowed. They are just ignored by the staff. Perfectly fine with us. It's been interesting finding places to dine with JJ!
There were some things I quickly noticed. The liner was very wet, so I started turning over the XLB and guess what? Four of the six had wrappers on the bottom that were cracked and all the "soup" had leaked out. This will also tell you what I thought of the wrappers; too thick, brittle, lacking the slight delicate texture I enjoy. I'm truly not expected anything like I had at 
Looks like lunchwagon tonkatsu, eh? It had been over fried, the breading hard, as was the dried out pork. It could have used some flavor; you know, five spice, soy sauce, a good pre-breading marinade. If it was brined or marinated, I couldn't tell. 