B.A. Nilsson

A Masterpiece in Brick

Trattoria Rustica

26 McKay St., Pittsfield, Mass., (413) 499-1192. Serving dinner Wed-Mon 5-9. AE, D, MC, V..

Cuisine: antique Italian

Entrée price range: $12 (penne all’Arrabbiata) to $30 (rack of lamb)

Ambiance: elegant tavern

By B.A. Nilsson

The secret, says chef Davide Manzo, is in the brick oven from which most of his finished entrées are pulled. But you can tell that there’s more to it than that. Sure, the oven is impressive—as it should be, sitting in the middle of the restaurant, a structure that Manzo himself built, according to an Italian tradition that insists upon having a chef build his own trattoria oven. Manzo, who also has worked in construction, imported the bricks from Italy. The finished product glows throughout the night, and you’ll marvel at the way in which he glides the meats and fish into and out of the oven, the cooking times ticking in a clock in his head.

The kitchen is open for all to see; the dining areas of Trattoria Rustica are at different sides of it. Part of the magic of the place is to see each dish achieve its finish, often requiring a meticulous placement of ingredients. There’s not a lot of fancy garniture here: Manzo believes that the ingredients can speak for themselves.

Take the spigola ($29), a special the evening we visited. It’s a small sea bass, also called branzino, that Manzo orders from Greece. He stuffs it with garlic and Italian parsley, seasons it a little, and into the oven it goes. When it emerges, the skin is crisp (and quite edible), and the flesh is succulent, yielding a tremendous amount of flavor coaxed by the chef’s restrained additions.

“This is antichi sapori,” he explains. “The ancient flavors. I was born in Pompeii, which as you know had a most important civilization thousands of years ago. There are also recipes from the ancient Pompano, and I have studied these.” And pared them down to simple, straightforward presentations that are amazingly flavorful.

Another example was another one of the day’s appetizer specials: speck ($19), a cousin to prosciutto, is a ham cured by brining it with garlic and juniper berries, then cold-smoking it until it achieves dark, rich flavor, reminiscent of pancetta, but, of course, smoky. A generous array of silky thin slices shared a plate with fresh, sweet figs and a handful of large lupini, a bean prized for its ability to neutralize cholesterol.

Trattoria Rustica opened five years ago on a side street in Pittsfield’s downtown. But Manzo is no stranger to the business: Eleven years ago, he and his sister opened Trattoria “Il Vesuvio” down the road in Lenox.

Dinner is offered in a traditional Italian style, with a succession of antipasto, pasta, an entrée and salad if you choose to go the distance. Finish with a sweet and a cup of espresso, then top it off with biscotti and vin santo. And then toss down a shot of grappa.

With my wife staring at my waistline, I put up a mild resistance. Which is to say that I skipped the salad course. She took care of that, anyway, ordering insalata mista ($7) to start. What could have been a fairly ordinary compote of fresh greens (not that even that is so ordinary) was set off by a topping of crisp shaved fennel, and the merest touch of balsamic vinegar and olive oil.

Expect the obvious: Calamari is going to be calamari, but the $11 appetizer features long tubes of the stuff, grilled until tender, served with a lemon and parsley paste that fooled me into thinking it was pesto. Alongside is a green salad.

There’s no more glorious summer flavor combo than fresh tomato paired with a basil leaf; add freshly made mozzarella (Manzo makes it each morning) and you have caprese ($12), a beautiful way to awaken the palate.

The fine print at the bottom of the pasta page promises linguini aglio e olio ($10), which is a simple dish that adds oil and garlic to the noodles. Again, there’s something a little different here: The garlic pieces are crisped and sweetened from roasting.

Opt for the puttanesca ($15) and you’ll find large capers hiding within, along with the requisite array of olives and anchovies. It’s one of the best flavor combinations ever to grace a bowl of pasta, so good that you’d be crazy to insult it with cheese.

Not surprisingly, Manzo stuffs his own ravioli, a classic preparation with ricotta, simply served with a basil-enhanced tomato sauce ($16). If it sounds ordinary, believe me: The flavors are magic, helped tremendously by the look and feel of the room in which you’re dining.

Terracotta light fixtures hang overhead; a tile floor suggests the Mediterranean. Artwork and music are carefully selected. The servers know the menu and are happy to discuss it and to recommend items.

Antonio, who waited on us, has been with the restaurant since it started. He has that tip-enhancing talent of reacting to your order with a surprise that suggests no one more intelligent than you ever has chosen from this menu.

Although we dined late on a Saturday, with the room clearing around us and servers clearly ready to call it a night, Antonio presented my pork loin chop ($22) with a sense that I should take as long as I wished to finish. Likewise the rack of lamb ($30) that completed our ordering. Both emerged from the brick oven with a tender, juicy finish, the lamb seasoned with mint in addition to lemon and parsley, the pork coated with garlic and oregano. Alongside was a serving of sautéed Swiss chard, asparagus, and more lupini.

Desserts are displayed in a case by the bar; others, like the chocolate bombe (chocolate-coated chocolate and coconut ice cream) that my daughter insisted on ordering, emerge from the freezer. I contented myself with the biscotti-vin santo combo, savoring the sherry-like wine as a sense of complete happiness settled upon me. Fine dining at its best is a totally engaging experience, and that’s what Manzo has achieved here.

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