Last week I visited the coastal areas north of Boston. I had a ticket for a concert by Kathy Mattea, an American country music and bluegrass singer. She’s been one of my favorite artists for close to 30 years. While I had enjoyed her music for many years on recordings, I had not seen her in concert until four years ago, when she played at the beautiful Shalin Liu Performance Center in Rockport, MA. She was so good that night, I was eager to see her again. Best of all, she closed the show this year with a song I love, 455 Rocket.

Her show was amazing. She was accompanied by Fred Carpenter, who played fabulous guitar, mandolin, and fiddle at various times, and also by an excellent bass player, whose name I didn’t catch.

The drive to Rockport from my home is about 75-90 minutes, depending on traffic. The concert started at 8 PM, so I decided to take the afternoon to explore food highlights along the way, thus avoiding the worst traffic periods as well. Two of the best places I know are in Gloucester, MA, which is just 15 minutes away from Rockport, so I stopped there to pick up fresh pasta at Pastaio Via Corta. I planned it so I could have an early dinner at about 5 PM at Tonno — an outstanding Italian restaurant featuring the local seafood — and it is located only a few blocks up the street from the pasta shop.

The meal was superb. I had tuna tartare (the best I ever tasted) and then a lobster flatbread with two cheeses. A glass of Etna bianco provided the wine.

Tuna Tartare

Lobster Flatbread

One final stop…I had some time to kill before the concert, so I stopped in the bar at the restaurant, Feather and Wedge, a few blocks from the Performance Center. Keeping in mind that I had a long drive home late that night, I ordered 1/2 glass of an Italian sweet vermouth. It tasted good and kept me warm before the theater that chilly night.

Vermouth

While we’re on the subject of vermouth, I want to share a discovery that came about recently in an unusual way. This has little to do with the North Shore, but it doesn’t deserve a separate post, so here it is. I recently went back to the restaurant Atlantico and had dinner with my friend, Chris. We both enjoyed the meal, and at the end, I tried a Spanish vermouth exactly to my taste. It reminded me of the vermouth I had in Falset, Spain, in 2019, when I was traveling the wine country there with my son. Then I looked at the Atlantico menu and reviewed the list of the vermouth choices.

The one I liked was rojo (red) Yzaguirre, from Tarragona! That’s where we stayed overnight before going on to Porto in 2019. And Falset was where we stayed the night before we were in Tarragona. All the pieces matched well. NOW the challenge was finding that vermouth in a retail shop. Mirabile dictu! My South Boston wine store, Social Wines, has it in stock. I went there immediately and am now happy to be able to drink it before or after a meal at home. Best of all, the bottle cost $22 vs. $14 by the glass in the restaurant. Once in a awhile, everything just works out well.