A couple of weeks ago, Cy and I attended  a traditional Napolitan Christmas Eve 7 Fishes dinner at Dolce Vita/Dolce Veloce in the private cantina (which was packed with regulars) next door. Giuseppe “Joe” Ricciardi, chef/owner of the aforementioned Fairfax Italian restaurants is a native of Naples, and an extraordinary chef/restauranteur. His restaurants have some nice touches including artwork, tile wine racks that store wine at the correct temperature, Dolce Vita’s wood burning pizza oven shown above, and a superb selection of wines that displayed and sold (at retail prices) at Dolce Veloce.

I’ve  posted pictures of the different courses above. The paired wines were as follows:

• Assorted Crostini was paired with the sparking wine, Prosecco Anima.
• Baccala 3 Ways was served with Gavi Di Gavi , a dry white wine from Piemonte.
• Linguini with Eel Sauce was complemented by Barbera D’Alba, a light red from Alba Piemonte.
• 7 Fish Stew was paired with a Pinot Noir Reserva from Alto Adice.
• Amaretto Mouse was served with Moscato from Piemonte.

Below is a video Cy (our videographer and beer note writer) took of the dinner.  Included is some footage of the wonderful Bunny Polmer (Dolce Vita’s publicist) and I eating dinner.

The food and wine pairings were excellent. It’s a shame I could not try the crostini due to an allergy to molds/truffles/mushrooms but Cy enjoyed it. You can tell that Joe knows how to work with salt cod, because it was very flavorful without being too salty. We enjoyed the texture and flavor of the scungili (imported from Italy) included in the 7 Fish Stew.

I’m looking forward to eating at Dolci Vita again soon; I hear that I have to try their pizza cones. Joe told me that pizza cones were popular for a short while in Italy, but now that he has perfected them, they are a regular part of his menu .

Previous DCFüd coverage of Dolce Veloce is available here and here.

-JAY