Corfinio

Pasta made by hand.  Pizza from a wood fired oven.  And a passion for authentic Italian cuisine on every plate.  That's what's served at Corfinio.  Located in Easton, Corfinio has quickly become one of the best Italian restaurants south of Boston, thanks in large part to not one, but two great chefs.

Maximillian Calise is the Chef de Cuisine. 

Maximillian Calise - Chef de Cuisine, Corfinio: "I come from a big Italian family and we cooked a lot and we had a lot of family dinners, and I spent my entire life in restaurants and around food."

Nicola Battistacci is the Executive Chef.

Nicola Battistacci - Executive Chef, Corfinio: "Food for me is everything.  I grew up with this, in Italy you know, we have a big passion of food."

Together, this Italian born chef and his American born counterpart make for a dynamically delicious duo.

Maximillian Calise - Chef de Cuisine, Corfinio: "Our head chef here Nico, he comes right from Italy and he gives me a chance to learn traditional true Italian food and it allows me to learn, and to translate that to the guest as well, so it gives everybody a chance to taste food right from Italy, and I think that's really what everybody wants."

And all that authentic food comes straight from Corfinio's big, beautiful open kitchen.

Maximillian Calise - Chef de Cuisine, Corfinio: "An open kitchen is fantastic.  It allows the customer to see everything that we're doing, kind of get a touch of where their food is coming from, seeing the flames come up from the pans, seeing our wood fired grill along with our wood fired oven.  I think that's a great experience visually, and when it comes from kitchen to plate, it kind of completes the whole thing."

In true Italian tradition, almost everything at Corfinio is made from scratch, from the light and fluffy gnocchi, to the crispy crunchy cannoli shells.  Much of the produce comes from a farm right down the road, and what's not made in house, is imported straight from Italy; like the meats and cheeses on Corfinio's Antipasto, and the Carnaroli rice used in the crispy creamy Arancini.  The seafood is local of course, like this big bowl of fragrant and flavorful mussels.

Maximillian Calise - Chef de Cuisine, Corfinio: "The Mussels to me is a really beautiful dish.  It comes in a white wine saffron broth.  And then we serve it with grilled focaccia with roasted garlic on the top.  So you get to enjoy the mussels, and then at the end you're left with this beautiful broth, which you can take this bread and you can dip it in, and you can soak it all up.  Which I don't know anyone who doesn't like that."

Pastas here are an absolute must, like the homemade Ricotta Cavatelli with mushrooms and truffle butter, or the simple, and simply sensational Capellini Cacio e Pepe.

Maximillian Calise - Chef de Cuisine, Corfinio: "It's very light.  I would compare it to today's Alfredo sauce, right.  It's a better, cleaner Alfredo sauce.  The dish starts out with some butter in the pan and some cracked black pepper and we add pasta water to it which helps build a really creamy nice sauce.  So we throw in our pasta and we emulsify it with some parmesan cheese.  It comes together, it's really creamy, it's got a nice spice to it from the black pepper, I think this is a dish that anybody can come in and enjoy because it's so simple, and I think that's the embodiment of Italian food."

For something a whole lot heartier, and made with a whole lot of heart, nothing beats the Bolognese.

Maximillian Calise - Chef de Cuisine, Corfinio: "To me when you have a Bolognese, it has to taste warming, it has to taste like in my mind, love and family, right, because that's what that dish means.  You know, when my grandmother made me dishes like that I felt love from that dish and to me, I care a lot about the dish while I am making it, so I want that to translate right to the customer, I want them to taste that."

While the Bolognese reminds Chef Max of home, Chef Nico is partial to the homemade potato gnocchi, with wild boar ragu, pine nuts, and sage.

Nicola Battistacci - Executive Chef, Corfinio: "I really love the dish because, wild boar is so popular in my region, the Umbria, we have a lot and the people are hunting the wild boar over there.  So basically I grew up with my father, with my grandfather, they're hunting the wild boar, and then cooking, and every Sunday, people are sitting together at the table and eating gnocchi with wild boar.

Corfinio's dining room is spacious and comfortable.  There's a cool bar mixing up craft cocktails, and a gorgeous chef's table overlooking the open kitchen, where much of the cooking is done with live fire, so meats like the bone-in Pork Chop, and massive Tuscan Steak are wonderfully smoky thanks to a blazing hot Josper oven, while the Neapolitan style pizzas benefit from a well-seasoned wood fired oven.

Maximillian Calise - Chef de Cuisine, Corfinio: "The pizza oven has been here since this building has been here so it's got a lot of years of what I call seasoning.  The bottom of that stone in our pizza oven has seen thousands of pizzas, and every bit of olive oil, every bit of cheese, every bit of everything that's ever touched that stone has seasoned it and given it a really nice flavor, and we run our pizza ovens very hot, so that allows the pizza crust to rise very beautifully.  Get a good crust on the bottom, good crust around the edges, but give you a nice soft pizza too."

Just like the rest of your meal, the desserts at Corfinio are all made in house.  There's fluffy Tiramisu, silky Creme Brulee, and a classic Cannoli.

Maximillian Calise - Chef de Cuisine, Corfinio: "We make our cannoli shells here in house, along with the filling.  I think just taking the time to make a cannoli really makes all of the difference, it tastes fresh, it tastes crispy, it's really really good, and then the filling is a ricotta filling and it's crispy, creamy, and then you've got chocolate and candied pistachios that we also make here as well.  It's texturally a really beautiful dessert."

And it's a beautiful way to end your culinary visit to Italy, at Corfinio.