Bootlegger's in Lunenburg: veal parm worth the drive!
I stumbled across Bootlegger's, an old school (kind of but not really) upscale casual restaurant on Route 2A in Lunenburg last night and had a wonderful veal parm, perhaps the best I can remember since I was eight years old and eating veal parm at Giorgio's in Newton Centre!
This is not a high end restaurant. This is the type of place that serves families looking for a nice after-church lunch, or seniors looking for a "fancy" dinner at 5pm, or 50-something suburban parents out on "date night." The type of place with a keno machine in the lounge area. The type of place you'd expect to find in Lunenburg, not the South End or Cambridge or Brookline. The type of place where I'd be willing to take a chance on the veal parm. And it was delicious!
First, as you might have predicted, the portion size was tremendous. Half is sitting in my fridge right now, to be reheated for today's lunch. It was two large cutlets piled on top of each other. Those who prefer a super thin cutlet might wince at the presentation, but the pile can be deconstructed, and the taste causes one quickly to overcome any objections. The cutlets are heavily breaded and super crispy. Again, one hoping for a more delicate dish might object to the breading, but that's what created the crisp exterior and hardly overwhelms the dish. (It would be hard to overwhelm a dish smothered in mozzarella and tomato sauce!) The cutlets were served on top of a bed of linguini and swimming in a bath of rich tomato sauce, with a choice of soup or salad (iceberg, of course) on the side.
As you probably can tell, this is not the fine, delicate dish that you might expect if a place like Prezza had veal parm on its menu. This is an old school Italian American presentation. And it was awesome! Well worth the 10-minute detour off of Route 2.
