Food & Drink

Cheap Eats: il Corvo

Serious pastas and meats tucked away on the Pike Place Market Hill Climb.

By Seattle Mag August 8, 2011

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This article originally appeared in the September 2011 issue of Seattle Magazine.

Mike Easton is an inspiration: The former Lecosho chef is cooking what he loves, making his own hours (Il Corvo’s only open weekdays at lunchtime) and running his own show.

At tiny il Corvo, which lives inside the already diminutive Procopio Gelateria on the Pike Place Market Hill Climb, Easton prepares his pastas by hand daily and then serves them with sauces so distilled, so intense—often featuring such esoteric ingredients as dried tuna heart or homemade blood sausage—and so incredibly affordable (each dish is less than $10) that it’s easily the most unique pasta joint in town.

The flavors here require a commitment: There’s no dancing around the anchovy in the cavatelli with Romanesco; it’s front and center. The blood sausage in the fideos y morcilla (blood sausage with broken spaghetti) is likewise central, and revelatory: The large chunks of meat are silken, yet utterly deep, dark and base. This is heart-and-soul cooking, and a gem of a find.

Lunch Mon.–Fri.
Pike Place Market, 1501 Western Ave., Suite 300
ilcorvopasta.wordpress.com
¢
CASH ONLY


 

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