We joined a friend who lives in Des Moines for dinner last night at a simple Italian place downtown called ALBA that is one of the few options for dinner on a Sunday in this very quiet city. We started with a yummy D'Arenburg "The Hermit Crab" 2021 Viognier-Marsanne blend from McLaren Vale in Australia that is always a winner and ordered some of the yummy Deviled Eggs with Beet Tartare, Brioche Crumble and Leek Ash Tuile. They were nice and only needed a tad of spice, maybe a sprinkle of paprika!
The three of us chose to start with the Steak Tartare which came on two huge pieces of toasted brioche with Anchovy Aioli and Grana Padano cheese with an herb and caper relish. We told our wonderful server Cole that we would wait to order our mains to see how full we were....and BOY were we. Will chose to have the Rhubarb Salad with goat cheese, strawberry vin, pistachios and pickled rhubarb which was huge and quite good and I chose a half potion of the NY Strip Stroganoff which had to be the largest half portion anywhere and the heaviest with local mushrooms, crispy shallots on top and ricotta...I had several bites and shared some, but over half was left.
We were quite surprised to see a 2013 wine from Puglia on the menu and the Copertino Riserva Negroamaro was earthy and full bodies and we adored it!
We stayed around to close the place as it was quite empty, but enjoyed the food and were happy we chose not to order our mains and end up being way over-stuffed, because with what we had we were more than full indeed.
