LIWINEDAD

  Villa D’Aqua in Bellmore is an old friend, and this note on how fine a restaurant is long overdue.  Today, we stopped for a late lunch early dinner with our son for his birthday.  The restaurant was doing a brisk business, but ample parking was still available alongside the docks.  So we opted to sit inside as there was still a chill in the air.  We were warmly greeted and guided to a table of our choosing by the friendly staff.  Cocktails were ordered to open the palate and arrived promptly with generous pours (Figure 1).  The menu has all the usual offerings and a page more of fantastic specials for the day. Opening the meal with starts, we each selected small plates and a salad.   The Stuffed Pepper (Figure 2) is a fine roasted red bell pepper filled with a flavorful, moist meat and rice mixture covered in a red marinara sauce.   The Spinach Salad (Figure 3) is a goodly portion of spinach with Mushroom and Prosciutto and finished with a warm balsamic reduction dressing that perf

  We were looking for a local place for dinner and landed on a relatively new place named Anthony’s Kitchen & Cocktails in Belmore.   It is on the Northside of Merrick Rd . next to Oz General Contracting, replacing the Morpheus Greek restaurant (Figure 1).   The inside is modest and still has the Greek Restaurant vibe, a fun family place (Figure 2).   We opened with a round of drinks which included a fine Cosmopolitan and a Woodford Reserve ™ on the rocks; both were generous pours (Figure 3).   The cocktail and wine menu is a deep list of the classic drinks and a good selection of wine both by the glass and bottle.   The prices were remarkably moderate.   The beverage menu should be added to their website, allowing folks to map out what they will be enjoying that night.   The food menu is straightforward, with a broad selection of traditional Italian favorites (Figure 4).    For starters, we had the Shrimp Cocktail and Grandma’s Meatball.   The Shrimp Cocktail consisted of five