Ava's Pizzeria & Wine Bar

[Rovers2000]

First time starting a thread so please, feel free to move this as it makes sense.

Due to a very generous gift, my wife and I found ourselves at the Inn at Perry Cabin for the weekend. I'll detail my experience there in another post, but I wanted to call out what I thought to be an excellent find right on Talbot St. in St. Michaels.

We had eaten lunch (and planned to eat Breakfast) at the Inn so we wanted to wander around a sleepy off-season St. Michaels in search of something on the less expensive side for dinner. The front desk at the hotel had recommended either Theo's or Ava's (they're both run by the same ownership group) and they were about a quarter / third of a mile walk from the Inn. Since it was nearing 60 degrees in January, we took advantage of the weather for a stroll up the road.

We walked into Ava's and grabbed a 4 top in the bar area (the Raven's / Bronco's game was on and I couldn't resist). I really liked the low key, homey feel of the place. Not pretentious and by the crowd (the restaurant was pretty full at about 5pm on a Saturday) it is definitely a place the locals visit. As we are trying to be a bit less gluttonous we split a salad, appetizer, pizza, and dessert as well as a moderately priced bottle of wine and found it to be the perfect amount of food to explore the menu yet not be completely stuffed.

We started off with the nights special salad which were a nice portion of mixed greens with slivers of roasted cauliflower, goat cheese and crispy proscuito with a balsamic dressing. The cauliflower was a nice addition and I'd order this again. Additionally we had an order of 3 meatballs which were served on a base of tomato sauce with some melted cheese. These were good, but pretty standard versions. For the pizza, we had a margahrita with mushrooms and carmelized onions. The crust is quite thin, with some slight chew. The dough could potentially use some salt, but this was a solid version of wood fired pizza. The surprise of the meal was dessert. I'm a sucker for bread pudding so we split an order. It came out nicely sliced with a cream cheese frosting on the side (which I liked the portion control aspect of)...this was a tremendous way to end the meal. Nicely custard-y yet able to stand up to the presentation of "slices" the chocolate and peanut butter really stood out and mixed well with the cream cheese frosting.

All the food, with a nicely priced bottle of Dolcetto d'Alba and coffee came out to 85 dollars pre-tip.

I would imagine this place really hums during peak season, but if you find yourself looking for a low key spot with excellent service, I would highly recommend Ava's