Wednesday, August 7, 2019

Heroic Deli & Wine Bar is The Santa Monica Neighborhood Italian Spot To Go To

If you live or work in Santa Monica, then you need to know about Heroic Deli and Wine Bar. The place is divided into distinct spaces with the wine bar on one side and a cute communal dining on the other side.
Untitled
On the deli side, I tried the OMG sandwich. The OMG is their challenge to Bay Cities' Godmother sandwich, and it's a great sandwich. It's served on freshly toasted ciabatta that had a nice crunch. Sure, at $16 it's more expensive than the Godmother, but it's filled with better quality ingredients (I shared the sandwich so only showing you a little piece here)
Heroic Wine Bar
The sandwich is made with Italian prosciutto, salame, capocollo, mortadella, porchetta, smoked mozzarella, artichokes, housemade giardinnaire, house roasted tomatoes, olives, mustard, mayo, and Italian black summer truffles.

I also tried quite a few dishes from the wine bar side over my two visits there, including:
Insalata di Granchio (Pacific crab, lemon zest and vinaigrette)
Heroic Wine Bar


Mini polpettone (ground pork and veal, taleggio, Porto, quail egg, squash - $16)
Heroic Wine Bar
I tried this dish during each of my visit and I liked it the first time but the second version was even better. They've put the polpettone inside a squash and served it with a squash puree.

The Santa Barbara (fresh sea urchin, live spot prawn, spaghetti, caviar - $28)
Heroic Wine Bar
This is certainly one of the most beautiful dishes on the menu. The spaghetti is served with Santa Barbara sea urchin and live Santa Barbara spot prawn. Don't miss the crispy prawn head!

Nonna's gnudi (ricotta and spinach), sage infused house made brown butter, fluffy Parmigiano Reggiano ($16)
Heroic Wine Bar
This dish was quite unique. The gnudi seems lighter and healthier than the typical, since it is mostly made with spinach - yet it's delicious with the all ricotta and butter.

Spaghetti al pomodoro (slow roasted cherry tomato, ricotta, crispy basil - a tasting portion is shown here)
Heroic Wine Bar
Sometimes a simple dish is best. The pomodoro sauce here is quite creamy.

Polpo croccante (crispy octopus with potato salad)
Heroic Wine Bar
This was a nicely cooked octopus that came from Dutch Harbor in Alaska, and went quite well with the potato salad.

Branzino all'Acqua Paza (Italian branzino with fennel, onion, garlic, saffron broth - $28)
Heroic Wine Bar
Merluzzo Puttanesca (Santa Barbara black cod, tomato, capers, garlic, anchovies - $28)
Heroic Wine Bar
A unique twist on puttanesca using the delicate black cod. I'm typically not a huge fan of olives, but I did enjoy this dish.

Tournedos Rossini (Central Valley rib cap, chicken liver parfait, mushroom medley, Italian black summer truffles)
Heroic Wine Bar
So tournedos rossini is traditionally made with a thick toast with filet mignon, foie gras and black truffles. Heroic reimagined it and used mushrooms instead of toast and rib cap instead of the filet mignon cut. Unfortunately foie gras is banned now in California so they're using housemade chicken liver pate. Of course, it's still topped with freshly shaved truffles! This is quite a rich and heavy dish, but worth it.

For dessert, the house favorite is the Tipsy tiramisu with brandy shot ($10)
Heroic Wine Bar
This tiramisu is also richer than the usual tiramisu. The owner is quite proud of the eggs they use here, which are the free range organic eggs from Kaliko Farm in Malibu. I'm quite curious to try the egg dishes at brunch!

Heroic also does happy hour on Tuesday-Saturday from 3-7pm with $9 wines and discounted food items. There's also a $22 half bottle of wine with a meat and cheese board for two.

Heroic Deli and Wine Bar
516 Santa Monica Blvd
Santa Monica, CA 90401
(310) 490-0202
https://www.heroicdeliandwinebar.com/
Heroic Deli and Wine Bar Menu, Reviews, Photos, Location and Info - Zomato

1 comments:

discovering LA

Wow, this is my kind of place. Nice pics and nice write-up!

Gourmet Pigs   © 2008. Template Recipes by Emporium Digital

TOP