If you are not a “foodie”, you should probably avoid Incanto. If you are afraid of flavor in your food, you should avoid Incanto. If you are looking for a traditional Cal-Ital red sauce restaurant, go elsewhere.

But if you want distinctive food, brilliantly conceived, Incanto is for you.

This is a restaurant that I had been wanting to try for quite sometime, but it’s always easier to try something new here in the East Bay than to travel all the way to San Francisco. My wife and I with two friends finally made it to Incanto last evening. Since we had traveled through Italy together we thought this would be a good restaurant to visit together and it was.

My favorite of the starters was the antipasto platter…excellent salumi. My only complaint about the food of the evening was the sweatbreads…they were a little tough and lacked salt, but still good.

The three pasta courses we had were all at least very good. The cured tuna heart spaghettini was distinctive and excellent, with the tuna heart shaved and served like botarga over the pasta. The highlight of the evening was the rabbit liver foie gras ravioli…superb and well worth a trip back to have that dish again.

For the main course, two of us had the pork shoulder and two the braised lamb neck. The pork was much more flavorful than the typical commercial pork available these days. The lamb was fabulous, rich and complex, perfectly accompanied by the bright flavors of roasted green vegetables.

The dessert of panna cotta with lime mousse and almonds was perfect after the rich meal. One of my favorite desserts of all time!

And being a big fan of Italian wines, the wine list at Incanto is great!