Chapel Hill Newcomer Bombolo Is not an Italian Restaurant | Eater Carolinas

"A new, intimate (under 50 seats) Chapel Hill venture from siblings Garret Fleming and Eleanor Lacy that bills itself with a tongue-in-cheek sign—“Ceci n’est pas un restaurant Italien” (“This is not an Italian restaurant”)—yet leans Italian-adjacent and wildly eclectic. The menu applies the duo’s boundary-pushing ethos from their former barbecue project to a global take on pasta, noodles and dumplings: highlights include a ragu made with turkey neck served with ribbon-like mafalde, pillowy pork-and-veal polpette, Turkish-style lamb manti, New Orleans–inspired barbecued shrimp, beef cheek rendang, and halibut khao soi. A lobster pot of massive chunks in lemony butter with plenty of bread reads like late-summer Maine, while dessert (created by Lacy) features a signature chocolate bombolo inspired by the French chocolat royal—a crunchy praline base topped with thick chocolate mousse. Lacy’s Level 2 WSET training informs a carefully chosen wine list that leans Old World with a few adventurous selections (think sparkling rosé from New Mexico), and the team frames the whole experience as a culinary journey rather than a conventional, expectation-driven menu; dinner service begins at 5 p.m., Thursday through Sunday." - Matt Lardie