And don't get us started on the parking. But I recall, albeit dimly, Little Italy's glory days. My grandfather's family was large and spread out between Baltimore and Washington. Family-reunion clubs were big in those days, and ours liked nothing better than to meet and eat in a place called Maria's. These days you don't find spaghetti Caruso on the menus in Little Italy, but a neighborhood feeling persists.
People live here.
When the weather warms up, they sit on the stoop or claim a patch of sidewalk. The hostess directs us upstairs to a long, narrow dining room with archways and pale yellow walls. Brandon, our young server, mixes bits of lore about the host family into his smoothly efficient attentions, which begin with the delivery of warm, crusty bread, seasoned olive oil, and a plate of green beans and new potatoes in vinaigrette, unusual and hearty. So hearty, in fact, that we decide to share only two appetizers among the four of us. We select both from the night's specials, and we select well.