THE GIST Led by owners Johnny Garrett-Young and Gary Costello, along with partner and general manager Gianni Cionchi, Alimentari Beach opened in Montauk as a high-end Italian specialty-foods market in August 2021, a time when uncertainty in the hospitality world was at a peak due to the pandemic. Despite this, the market not only survived but quickly evolved from downtown grocer to dining go-to, creating fans of both visitors and residents of The End with its top-of-the-line ingredient arsenal and crowd-pleasing dishes.
THE VIBE Through the front doors of the red-and-white Art Deco building is a small bar stocked with myriad amari, wines and spirits. To the left is an open and airy 60-plus-seat dining room. A rounded wall of windows sits above a caramel-colored banquette set with a curved line of dark wooden tables. Anchoring the room’s center are half a dozen more tables and a few shelves stocked with cans of crushed tomatoes, boxes of artisanal pastas and bottles of imported olive oil. Toward the back, a salon wall of vintage posters and framed pictures evoke nostalgic-but-make-it-beachy energy.
Alimentari brings the art of elevated Italian to Montauk. (Photos by Doug Young)
THE FOOD Helmed by chef David Ladner, dishes draw from Neapolitan and Roman influences, simultaneously boasting familiar yet polished classics and clever modern riffs. Sparing nothing when it comes to quality and technique, bread and pizza doughs are crafted in-house with specialty ingredients like premium pastas, burrata and various cured meats. When they can’t be sourced locally, cans of vine-ripened organic tomatoes are imported from some of the most reputable purveyors in New York City, California, France and Italy.
The Clam A thin homemade dough (using Caputo “00” flour as the base) is prepared with handfuls of high-quality mozzarella spread across the top along with chopped, wild-caught New England clams and thumb-sized pieces of guanciale. Baked to crispy perfection, the pie is served with a heavy sprinkling of Italian parsley and a lemon cheek.
Chitarra Pomodoro Simple, quality ingredients shine as square-cut, bronze-dyed extruded spaghetti, hand-packed from Sogno Toscano, is tossed with pomodoro sauce made from Bianco di Napoli tomatoes. Stick with the classic theme and add a tender, homemade stewed meatball, made with beef, pork, flat-leaf parsley, breadcrumbs and aged parmesan.
Clockwise from top left: The Clam, Chittara Pomodoro, roasted pork sandwich, beet salad, whipped sheep’s milk ricotta. (Photos by Doug Young)
Roasted Pork Sandwich Bone-in pork shoulder is rubbed with fennel seeds, black pepper, salt and demerara sugar, then roasted until tender. Piled onto freshly baked seeded bread and topped with roasted broccolini, zingy Italian peppers, creamy garlic aioli and melted provolone, it’s one of those sandwiches with individual components that work together in an effortlessly harmonious way.
Beet Salad Baby golden, red and chioggia beets are marinated in orange juice, honey and olive oil, tossed with plump Thomcord grapes and piled atop a shallow pool of velvety fromage blanc imported from Normandy. Atop lays a generous handful of crunchy, savory granola — made with sesame, sunflower and pumpkin seeds, honey, nutritional yeast, crispy shallots and coconut flakes — and thin ribbons of smoked speck sourced from Northern Italy’s Alto Adige.
Whipped Sheep’s-milk Ricotta Sourced from Lioni in Brooklyn, is whipped into a silky mound and paired with a healthy dollop of Croatian fig jam, drizzled with garlic confit and toasted sunflower seeds, and served with pillowy triangles of freshly baked fluffy bread.
Alimentari Beach
752 Montauk Highway, Montauk
631-668-8256
alimentaribeachmtk.com
@alimentaribeach
Hours
Open noon to 8:30 p.m. Sunday through Thursday and noon to 9 p.m. Friday and Saturday.
