DeLuca’s in Downtown Boise is bringing Italian food to Boise with a difference. No platters of spaghetti and meatballs or bottles of straw-wrapped Chianti graced the tables. Instead, business partners Jerry Miller and Alex DeLuca have teamed with Head Chef Amanda Gilmore to create a menu that features some old favorites from Alex DeLuca’s family recipes as well as a host of dishes reimagined by Chef Gilmore. Jerry Miller summed up the Italian concept by saying, “Well, my business partner is Alex DeLuca; and we decided that we would go in that direction and raise the family name, use some of the recipes from way back and give them to Amanda, let her make them mainstream; and she’s done a fantastic job! It just seemed like the logical way to go”.
The location, as Jerry says, “We lucked into that!”. Located on Broad Street between 8th and 9th, it’s convenient walking or biking to the heart of Boise. Just steps to the Grove Plaza and the Basque Block, the newly opened DeLuca’s will be a perfect place to go as Boiseans start to resume their quest for good food and the re-opened clubs nearby. A nice bar inside DeLuca’s plus plenty of dining area with doors to not only let light in but also open for fresh air in-season makes for a warm, rich dining experience with dark woods to soften the light just enough. Jerry added, “We’re rebuilding our front patio area, putting new flooring on it and hope to ‘spiff it up’ with some plants and foliage. Hopefully we’ll get some folks enjoying some good Italian out on the patio deck”.
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Chef Amanda Gilmore was included in the plans from the very beginning. An accomplished sous chef, her promotion to Head Chef at DeLuca’s was recognition of her intense creativity and her competence in planning and executing a myriad of restaurant dishes. She came up the old-fashioned way, working herself up in position, but credits her cooking style and knowledge, “Mostly from cooking from my mom. Honestly, I’ve grown up cooking, so I just try to experiment and try everything”.
Sitting down at DeLuca’s, the plan was to try a few of my go-to dishes. For each type of cuisine, I usually have on item that I use to judge a restaurant by, one item that everyone should be able to do an excellent version of. For a Mexican restaurant it is a Chile relleno, a breakfast place biscuits and gravy or French Toast; and for Italian my test is always Eggplant Parmigiana. Everyone has it, but not everyone can make it taste good. Into this mix, owner Jerry and Chef Amanda suggested items for me to try as well as my wonderful server, Matthew Landay.
The bar at DeLuca’s in Downtown Boise is up-front and serious. Their house cocktails are designed to complement the menu. The Negroni, an Italian cocktail designed as an aperitif to awaken the palate and the digestive system, started out as an excellent choice. A touch sweet, a little bitter with an herb accent, DeLuca’s Negroni was perfect for sipping while perusing the menu. For my second cocktail I ordered a lightened version, the Negroni Sbagliato, which substituted prosecco for the gin in the original Negroni. Matthew also suggested I taste a signature drink of DeLuca’s, the Italian Margarita. Refreshing and with a bright, sweet and sour flavor profile, it would work well with dishes such as the Twisted Nachos or the Spicy Diavolo.
Wanting to get his opinion, I asked Matthew. He suggested the Truffle Mushroom Toast as an appetizer. When it came to the table, the presentation alone was enough to make me a fan. Slices of toasted sourdough were covered with a mandarin cream sauce. Topping that were chopped shiitake mushrooms and black truffles. The levels of flavor, with the ultimate earthiness of the black truffles, were superb. The crunchiness of the sourdough crust against the soft mushrooms and cream sauce were texturally just what you want in a dish. Already, I was impressed with Chef Amanda, putting a dish together like this that works so well.
The rest of the appetizers are equally interesting, with Twisted Nachos consisting of crispy wonton wrappers, Italian sausage, pepperocini, pepperoni, diced tomatoes and an Alfredo sauce. Even though the creativity takes a dish like this out into left field, it still maintains the Italian base to honor the theme of the restaurant. Fried Calamari and Sauteed Clams are more traditional appetizers, while a Foccacia con Cambozola and Fried Polenta Cheese Sticks are both designed with the vegetarian in mind. Throughout the menu in fact, the vegetarian dishes are clearly labeled, so this should make DeLuca’s in Downtown Boise a nice place for a date or party where friends who are vegetarians can enjoy dishes that are more than just salads.
There is a good variety of salads though, including the basic House Salad that I had with their Champagne Vinaigrette, a nice fresh mix of arugula and spring mix with heirloom cherry tomatoes, roasted red bell peppers and parmesan. Matthew was always quick with offering fresh shaved parmesan cheese and fresh ground black pepper, just another way that you can enjoy the higher-end dining experience at DeLuca’s in Downtown Boise. A nice selection of salads designed as more of a full serving include a Grilled Peach and Burrata Salad, a Balsamic Chicken Caprese Salad and an Apple Fennel Arugula Salad.
As in any true Italian restaurant, pasta is an integral category of dishes on the menu. I ordered the Eggplant Parmigiana and awaited my true test of DeLuca’s kitchen. When it arrived, the presentation was superb. Sitting astride some locally made fresh Ferrantes linguine pasta, the eggplant looked familiar and yet different. At first I wondered why, especially after Matthew offered me a sharp knife, something I’ve never needed for soft, buttery eggplant. The ‘why’ again showed Chef Amanda’s creativity. Rather than the usual mozzarella (makes you wonder why they call it parmigiana!) on top with a little shaved parmesan, she made a Parmesan Crisp for each slice of soft, fried to perfection eggplant.
As I got used to cutting the eggplant parmigiana, I wondered why I’d never seen this before, since it really was brilliant. It brought true parmesan flavor to the dish and provided a chewy-crunchy texture that is sadly lacking in other versions. I asked Chef Amanda about her inspiration and she replied, “That is something that I learned from a head chef that I used to work with. It’s a little trick that he did and I really liked it. I’ve made Parmesan Crisps for my soups before so I stuck with that one”. The marinara on the linguine and on the eggplant was also very good, not overly done with oregano and fennel like many are. I can’t recall an Eggplant Parmigiana I have enjoyed more in a long time.
Jerry suggested I try another pasta, the Diavolo, since I enjoy spicy foods. Again based on the fresh, locally made pasta, it came in a nice bowl, beautiful in its simplicity. The spicy marinara and sausage were tempered only slightly by the mellowing out of the cream added to the marinara. The mushrooms soaked up the sauce as did the fresh pasta, working much better to hold the flavors of the sauce than dried pasta does. The ‘kick’ on the sauce was just perfect for my taste buds.
One of the reasons Jerry feels so strongly about the quality of the cuisine at DeLuca’s in Downtown Boise is the sourcing of the ingredients. He said, “We’ve actually continued the tradition of growing some of our own herbs, spices and some vegetables during the summer. We use those in our dishes. All of our beers are local. We try to stay local as much as we can; this year we are actually going to try to use the farmer’s market a little more. We try to ensure that anything we make is as locally grown as possible. That’s kind of where we want to go, we enjoy local”.
Deluca’s has three signature entrees, including a salmon filet and a portobello steak, which again would be a delight for any vegetarian coming for dinner. Since I am a meat lover at heart, Jerry suggested I try DeLuca’s Manhattan. It is a Manhattan New York Strip, actually a thick steak cut that embodies the flavor of the New York Strip with close to the tenderness of a filet. Having been to major steak palaces over the years including The Palm, Mastro’s, The Hitching Post and Ruth’s Chris and many others, I have to say that the hardest part, ensuring perfect doneness, was taken care of perfectly by the kitchen at DeLuca’s. The Manhattan New York Strip, served with a creamy polenta and three delicious asparagus spears, is certainly in the class with Chandler’s and other top-line steakhouses in Idaho. My medium rare was not only perfectly cooked, but the kitchen had taken the time to rest it so it was still juicy inside, with the delicious beefy juices in each bite, not on the plate.
DeLuca’s in Downtown Boise has made sure that guests know they are not strictly a formal Italian dining place, but a place you can also go for a nice casual experience, a nice local beer or glass of wine and maybe even a different take on an American classic. With that in mind, they have two burgers on the menu also, both with a touch of Italy to remind you where you’re eating them. The Classico can be ordered with smoked provolone cheese as well as the more traditional, non-Italian cheddar. Chef Amanda has also created a Lasagna Burger, filled with ricotta and provolone cheeses and topped with marinara. Both burgers come with French fries.
Chef Amanda came out after I finished my steak to talk with me and tell me about her dessert creations. Besides the traditional Tiramisu, she has used gnocchi, usually a main course pasta, in some unique ways by frying it. She said, “I really love sweets and desserts and we were trying to come up with something we thought would be a little different. We just kind of stumbled upon that, my sous chef and I. We were just ‘messing around’ in the kitchen one day and decided that that would be really good—-deep fried gnocchi. That one was just a happy accident!”.
I tried both types of gnocchi, the sweeter bourbon caramel sauce topping one sample and a tangy-sweet Limoncello sauce the other. The Limoncello sauce, based upon a popular Italian liqueur, was another amazing flavor combination. The soft interior of the gnocchi with the crunchy exterior made this dessert, served with fresh whipped cream and vanilla ice cream, a perfect topper for dinner. A Bourbon Peach Cheesecake made it a tough choice though; tender slices of peach went well with the creamy cheesecake and the sweet bourbon sauce.
I found myself marveling at the flavor combinations Chef Amanda uses at DeLuca’s in Boise. These are not 100 ingredient creations, but simple dishes that highlight fresh, flavorful combinations. Jerry Miller and Alex DeLuca showed a lot of confidence in Chef Amanda to place DeLuca’s in Downtown Boise under her control as Head Chef. Overall, they have assembled an excellent staff and DeLuca’s is certainly the kind of experience diners have been missing for a long time. Jerry Miller summed it up by saying, “DeLuca’s is a labor of love. We just want to make really good Italian food and have a place people can go and not break the bank, enjoy our fine dining experience and leave here going ‘Wow, that was really spectacular!’. If we can do that, we’ll be happy”.
DeLuca’s Downtown
855 W. Broad Street, Suite 250
Boise, ID 83702
(208) 344-5795
All photos by Ed Simon for The Boise Beat
