Porta Via Italian Foods

This Italian café and market peddles the Tuscan lifestyle, offering fresh salads and panini as well as prepared Italian favorites. Fresh vegetables and herbs, artisanal meats and cheeses, and healthy doses of olive oil shape the menu. The “insalata bar” isn’t really a salad bar in the traditional sense. There’s no self-service area with sneeze guard; instead, the cooks behind the counter make the salad for you with your choice of greens, protein, toppings, and dressing. The prosciutto-mozzarella hot panini and Italian BLT (with crispy pancetta) are also popular choices at lunch. Dine on the charming brick patio replete with oak barrels, or swing by on the way home from work to pick up a meal for one or ten. Hearty dishes like beef meatballs and chicken parmigiana (which put Buca di Beppo to shame), ordered by the pound, cleave to an old world sensibility. Pair your main course with specialty sides like caramelized cauliflower, orecchiette with broccoletti, or shaved fennel with oranges. You can also snag sundries like gourmet dried pastas and Moreno Cedroni jams. Keep Porto Via in mind early, too, for your morning latte and perhaps a square of ricotta and swiss chard frittata—a cut above that breakfast burrito from Los Tacos next door.