First Taste: LaGuardia's

Say hello to la dolce vita with the authentic pizzas, subs and pasta dishes served at LaGuardia's Salumeria and Pizzeria in Manahawkin.

This cozy café and market, located in the Driftwood Plaza, is like a little island of classic Italian cuisine in a surrounding ocean of seafood restaurants. But petite as it may appear, its culinary offerings are multifaceted: full-service catering, pizza delivery to all of Manahawkin and LBI, a full line of Boar's Head deli meats, a variety of prepared foods to go and a market stocked with imported Italian specialties.

"We don¹t try to change things that are bona fide good," said Amy LaGuardia, owner and namesake of the café. "If we have something that's good, we stick to it and strive for consistency."

LaGuardia's offers a full menu of hot and cold subs, with classics such as meatball parmigiana ($8.50) and a Philly cheesesteak ($8.99), as well as original creations such as The Don ($9.50), which features spicy chopped meatball and sausage, tomato sauce, and mozzarella.

With so many tempting options, I struggled to pick just one thing to order. So I picked two. The Diana's Muffaletta ($9.50) hot sub is packed with all my favorite cold cuts ­-- ham, salami, proscuitto, pepperoni, provolone and mozzarella ­-- and I couldn't resist it. It would also seem wrong to leave without trying its pizza, so I ordered a slice of a specialty grilled chicken pie ($3.50). Both were delivered to the table in record time, with a friendly joke about my ambitious appetite.

An at-home feeling

The atmosphere at LaGuardia's is so casual and hospitable that it feels more like being served at the table in an Italian grandma¹s kitchen than a restaurant. To the LaGuardias, the restaurant is like home; husband, wife, son and daughter all work there
together.

"We try to keep things simple, friendly and homey," explained LaGuardia. "It's authentic homestyle Italian cooking with family recipes, just like grandma would make."

And the food easily upholds the Italian grandma standard. The muffaletta had layer after layer of cold cuts piled on a crispy-on-the-outside, soft-on-the-inside roll. To add an extra kick, there was a chopped olive and garlic spread on the inner buns. While the bread is delivered fresh every morning and the cold cuts come straight from LaGuardia's own deli, it was the spread that really made the sandwich for me. It had the tang of raw garlic along with the saltiness of high quality gourmet olives without overwhelming the more delicate flavors of the cold cuts. I would easily risk the garlic breath and use that spread on anything and everything.

My slice of pizza also made perfect use of classic Italian ingredients in a creative way. It had generous chunks of grilled chicken, smoked fresh mozzarella, and globs of homemade pesto sauce randomly spotting the thin crust. It was as if they had taken ingredients normally found in a pasta dish and piled it all on a pizza, with equally successful results. LaGuardia's also offers other hearty pies such as a cheesesteak pizza ($16.50) and a chicken parmigiana pizza ($16.50), plus a variety of gourmet ingredients such as prosciutto, broccoli rabe and ricotta so diners can create their own signature pies.

Don't forget dinner

While LaGuardia's may have the lunch crowd salivating over its pizza and sub menus, the dinner crowd is not forgotten. The restaurant offers a wide variety of pasta, meat and fish dishes, all of which come with a generous basket of garlic knots and a house salad. Every Italian-American classic you could crave is offered: chicken marsala ($13.95), eggplant parmagiana ($12.95),
baked ziti ($10.95), cavatelli and broccoli ($11.95), mussels marinara
($13.95).

Just as with the subs and pizza, so many favorites make it heart-wrenching to pick only one, but we finally settled on the penne vodka ($11.99). It came out to us looking as prettily presented as if it were ready for a photo shoot -- the pink creaminess of the sauce contrasted with the stark whiteness of the plate, while strips of ripped fresh basil freckled the penne. And luckily, everything tasted just as amazing as it looked. The sauce was thick, with a perfect proportion of cream to fresh tomatoes, while the penne was al dente, or firm to the bite.

Much of what LaGuardia's offers is available in large quantities for catering, and I think it's safe to say a steaming tray of lasagna ($75) could amp up the tastebuds at any party. Not only that, but the folks at LaGuardia's pride themselves on their flexibility and hospitality, and they are willing to use whatever ingredients they carry to accommodate a special request.

And that's what makes LaGuardia's Salumeria and Pizzeria the perfect one-stop location for all things from bella Italia.

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