Asking for a friend whose anniversary is coming up - she’s looking for a replacement for her first choice (Sarma, which she says is no longer offering takeout). They have very sophisticated palates and he’s an excellent home cook but not on their special day - they would like someone else to feed them well. Preferably somewhere in the Arlington-Camberville axis to minimize travel time. Thanks in advance for anyone who can help.
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Is there a food preference, or are they open to anything?
If they like sushi, Cafe Sushi offers these lovely weekend bento boxes with an assortment of their fun and super tasty sushi offerings. It’s packaged in a pretty little box with a nice description of the items inside. They even have a box for two.
I’m a big fan of Pagu, if they like the Spanish and Japanese focus, and it looks like they are still doing takeout Tues thru Sunday evenings. When I dined in, their food had just the right balance of casual and fun, but also with modern sophistication.
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Oleana appears to still be doing takeout - bit fancier but perhaps anniversary-appropriate?
I liked Pagu when I ate there, but I’m not sure how well their style of food would travel.
How about Celeste?
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Most likely too far away, but Nightshade Noodle in Lynn is still doing take out. We’ve driven from Somerville to Lynn twice and it was fabulous.
We are also disappointed that Sarma is no longer doing take out. We had a great experience with take out once from Oleana. Very good instructions on how to reheat/serve everything and full list of ingredients. That was in summer 2020, though.
Loved Pagu in person several times pre pandemic. No direct experience with take out, but I strongly suspect the chef only offers take out on items that can handle it.
Maybe check out Juliet in Somerville and Peregrine on Beacon Hill…same owners?
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Giulia, Posto, La Bodega, Cha Yen, Branchline (the last three are in Watertown but driving time should be Ok), Alden & Harlow, Commonwealth, Catalyst
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Definitely great take out for special occasions- very well-packaged food. We’ve done several special events dinners with them. You just need to spend a bit of time to figure out which menu they’re serving which night. For example, Sundays they often do a price fixe neighborhood pasta dinner. I can’t speak to Peregrine other than to confirm they are the same owners. Would not be as convenient for your friends location-wise.
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It seems to me that if Sarma was their first choice, then Oleana ought to be second without further digging, @digga.
(Personally, I’d put Oleana at #1 and Sarma at #2, but that’s just me.)
Your friends must also consider how the food they get will travel. Over the course of the pandemic we did a lot of takeout, and the food from both Sarma and Oleana was always carefully and thoughtfully packed with clear instructions. Bondir was the only other place that did as good a job with packaging and instructions (but they’re on pause right now). Forage (the old Craigie St. location of Craigie St.) has an interesting wine-paired Tuesday night dinner that you can take away, but a lot depends on whether you want those wines and that food on that Tuesday .
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One more we liked a lot during Covid take-out times is Puritan
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Reporting back - I suggested a few places (among them was Chalawan, which @Parsnipity thankfully reported about and I told my friends to “proceed with caution,” Oleana; Branchline; Puritan). I also suggested a high-low meal of delicious Detroit-style pizza from Avenue Kitchen accompanied by some of their apps and a couple of kick-butt bottles of red wine. And they did something similar - ramen from Pikaichi and some fancy adult beverages. I don’t have the details, but it sounds like the perfect anniversary meal. Thanks to everyone who made suggestions here. Maybe I’ll actually do a fancy-ish meal from one of these places one of these days.
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I like the way you think.
What a lovely favor you did for your friends by helping them with these recs. Useful list!
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I echo @tomatotomato. I wish I had a friend like you. The list your request inspired is, as Denise says, useful, and the ultimate choice your friends made brought to the foreground a place that had dropped off my radar. @passing_thru had mentioned it as he passed through but after that, it had slipped my mind.
The Pikaichi website has instructions on how to cook their takeout noodles. Did your friends have to do a little cooking, after all, or was everything fully cooked?
I’m a big fan of hi-lo as well. Potato chips and caviar come to mind.
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hmmm, thanks for the reminder. I haven’t gotten takeout from this place for awhile now, and have always enjoyed it. Need to pick one of those up soon!
We got the special Sunday Dia de los Muertos dinner from Juliet last year as take out. It was stunningly good. The posole I still dream about. It was packaged beautifully and easy-to-follow instructions to complete the meal…and included a skull and some beautiful paper flowers to construct an ofrenda.
We got lunch delivered from Peregrine to Somerville once around this time last year, I think it was. The Sardinian sandwich with Spanish serrano ham was delicious.
I love Juliet, but have to say I found their menu structure overly complicated and confusing even pre pandemic. It’s even worse now to figure out what’s offered when. I was told by several different people who also spent too much time trying to figure it out that they just gave up and chose another restaurant. It’s really too bad because everything I’ve had from them over many visits has been superb.
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