I've got this thing about Italian food.  I just don't "crave" it like I do a great Thai or Indian dish.  In my eyes, Italian food is relatively hard to mess up.  And it's equally hard to knock it out of the park.

With this in mind, it took a few recommendations to get us out the door and over to Al Gelato for dinner.  It was well worth the trip.  Al Gelato is the first Italian restaurant I've eaten outside of Italy that tasted just like the restaurants IN Italy.  The ravioli (I recommend getting half meat, half cheese) comes floating in a bowl of sweet, mild marinara with fresh basil leaves.  Everything is handmade daily, and one of the elderly owners (this is a family business) makes all the desserts at home in the morning and brings them to the restaurant.  Served with the meal is a bowl of fantastic, crusty, fresh out-of-the-oven bread.

If you've still got room, the desserts are great.  You'll see them right when you walk in, just past the gelato window.  Pies standing something like 6 inches high, all kinds of red velvet this and that, and plenty of other tempting offers that I've passed up time and again because of the hefty dinner servings.

The atmosphere is hardly romantic, but it isn't bad either.  But this place is all about the food.  If you've got Italian on your brain, give Al Gelato a spin.  If you've let the endless Thai restaurants entice you away from Italian food altogether, maybe it's time for a reunion.  You won't be disappointed.