Saturday, October 18, 2008

Henry's Cafe & marvelous mismatched pasta

A friend recently commented to me that it drives her bonkers when, being on a fixed income and wanted to eat some spaghetti, she has to combine different shaped half-empty pasta boxes together to achieve a perfect pot. Not a stickler for such, a visit to Henry’s CafĂ© off of Pottstown's High Street and a satisfying bowl of mismatched pasta caused this lady to want to endlessly rant and rave.

With attractive bar seating revealing the open kitchen and owner/chef Jamie preparing your meals to order, my plus one and I had overwhelmingly pleasing lunch experience. As he selected the cook’s highly-praised seafood pasta, shown above, served with a fantastic assortment of calamari, mussels and shrimp, I selected a full-sized pasta portion of mix-master’s grilled chicken plate, shown below.

Ideally seasoned and cooked to an impressive al dente, the tomato-y blends created before our own eyes absolutely peaked to the tippy-top of my most favorite foods.

And, without a doubt, I must briefly mention that the chef's wife/co-owner solely creates all the eatery's desserts in-house. They're delectable, old-fashioned and light, and a visit is incomplete without a few tastes. Below, are the two we sampled -- an apple bread pudding and a fresh blueberry cobbler.
Words of advice for future diners: Share everything with your dining companions. Also, when the chef suggests throwing some jalapenos into your dish because "that's how he'd eat it," follow his lead.