Phantom Gourmet: Mast' In Boston's Downtown Crossing
BOSTON - There's Italian being spoken in the kitchen, an imported wood burning oven from Naples, and pizzas that will make you smile. Mast' restaurant may be new to Boston's Downtown Crossing, but they offer a taste of the old country.
"We want it to be totally approachable and bring you food that we grew up on," said co-owner John Disimone.
Along with fellow owners Marco Caputo and Anthony DePinto, the trio named the restaurant "'Mast" after the Italian word that translates to 'master'. They're mastering Southern Italian fare in an elegant two-tiered space with three distinct dining possibilities.
"We literally have three rooms with three different atmospheres," Anthony described. "The bar side is much more lively. We have the dining area which is a little more quiet, and of course we have the lounge downstairs. It's very welcoming, very warm. So you have three completely separate atmospheres under one umbrella."
The best seats in the house have to be at the wood burning oven, where you can watch pizzaiolo Salvatore Del Rosa work his magic.
"He's making true original pizza. You go to Naples Italy and you have a pizza, it's going to be zero difference from what you're having here. From the ingredients to the person making it to the recipe: exact," declared John.
Salvatore has even taken the art of pizza making to another level by creating actual edible art.
"He made the Mona Lisa with pizza," recalled Marco.
"He actually makes portraits on top of pizzas," continued Anthony. "He did Mike Napoli, which was fantastic. So he's an artist as well as a pizzaiolo - a true pizza chef."
Even without a fancy design, these pizzas taste like a masterpiece in your mouth.
"It ruined pizza for me for life, because this is real pizza and it's so great," John said. "It's the way they make the dough. It's the initial crispness when the pizza comes out of the oven. The ingredients. The way they put it together. It's the whole combination of things that really make this pizza something special."
There's the Alla Diavola, a fiery creation topped with spicy Calabrese salami, arrabiata sauce and fior di latte cheese. Or try the Calzone Classico, a folded pizza stuffed with ricotta and Genoa Salami. The most popular pie bears the restaurant's name. The O'Mast pizza is a house favorite, loaded up with imported prosciutto, creamy ricotta and fresh San Marzano tomatoes.
"You can taste all the ingredients: the sweetness of the ricotta; the saltiness of the serrano prosciutto. It's a culinary experience. It really is," John said.
Beyond pizzas, Mast offers a menu of southern Italian specialties including Sfizi, Neapolitan Street food that's great for snacking.
"Anyone that's been to Naples or any other type of European city, they know that the best meals come right from the street, right from the cart, right from the vendors," said John.
Customers should leave their diets behind because all of these Sfizi are fried. There's fried polenta, fried zeppole, fried panzarotti and fried arrancini. There's even a massive fried calzone filled with prosciutto cotto and scarmorza cheese.
Great taste seems to be a recurring theme on this menu, from the melt in your mouth meatballs to big bowls of Bucatini Alla Amatriciana. For a soul satisfying dish, order the slow cooked wild boar ragout served over fresh pappardelle pasta. And for something even heartier, there's the fork tender Veal Osso Bucco.
"Slow cooked, the meat falls off the bone," described Anthony. "Flavor is phenomenal, on homemade polenta which my grandmother used to make. It took her two days to make it. Actually my favorite meat dish on the menu."
One look at the dessert menu and you can see that the folks at Mast' are nuts about Nutella.
"We add it to a pizza; we add it to a chocolate cake; we add it to a drinking chocolate; and these are just fun ways to experience Nutella," explained John.
Since they're known for pizzas, the dessert they do best is the Nutella Pizza.
"Basically a homemade honey buttered pizza crust, smothered in warm Nutella; a sweet mascarpone cream cheese which is an Italian cream cheese; walnuts and strawberries," Anthony said. " It's like a drug. Once you start you can't stop."
Pretty much everything on the menu is addictive, and since these recipes were time tested and passed down through generations, it's no wonder.
"This is something that we feel really proud of bringing to our customer, our ingredients, our recipes. This is something that we grew up on and that we loved and looked forward to," said John. "Dinner has always been a time to enjoy and bring people together, so this is what we try to bring to our restaurant."
Mast' is located at 45 Province Street in Boston's Downtown Crossing, and online at mastboston.com.
Watch Phantom Gourmet on Saturdays and Sundays at 10:30 and 11 a.m. on myTV38.
