A Fork in the Road: Yes Pasta!
It’s always sunny with a chance of meatballs at Yes Pasta! in North Miami Beach. The fettuccine, linguine and gnocchi are made fresh, and the dried pastas are high-quality imports from Italy. Customers pick a pasta type and then customize their orders with a choice of 15 sauces and a host of add-ons. The sleekly designed space with white and black walls would be at home in Milan. Shelves are arranged with bottles of wine, olive oil and artisan products such as wildflower honey, white fig jam and chocolate-hazelnut spread. Flaminia Morin, the manager and chief shareholder, is a native of Rome who shares her first name with an ancient Roman road that led over the Apennine Mountains to the Adriatic coast. She had been a buyer for an international clothing company and had run a a gelato shop in Valencia, Spain. When her husband’s job brought them to Miami, she decided to pursue her passion for food.
The Persians or Chinese may have created noodles, but Italians have been perfecting them since the eighth century — along with thousands of sauces. The ones here range from simple aglio e olio (garlic and olive oil with crushed chiles) to funghi and tartufi (dried porcini and fresh cremini mushrooms in buttery truffle sauce). The Flaminia is a creamy blend of yellow bell peppers and black pepper, good with capellini. A hearty Bolognese ragu pairs well with rigatoni, and penne cries out for spicy arrabbiata sauce. Add broccoli, fresh mozzarella or meatballs. Salads include the Tuscan Viareggio, a blend of nutty, chewy farro (a wheat grain), olive oil, tomatoes and green onions that’s delicious topped with shrimp. The Positano combines grilled chicken and zucchini with Parmesan cheese and walnuts in lemon dressing, while the Sicilian Taormina tosses macaroni with albacore tuna, sun-dried tomatoes, olives and capers. All menus lead to dessert, and here the vanilla gelato is decadent in a crisp cookie basket with chocolate fudge. Oh, yes!
This story was originally published July 28, 2010 at 10:07 PM.