Let the Romance Begin
“Lucca casts a butter-yellow glow against the street corner. The
enticing menu includes chef Ken Vedrinski’s cauliflour sformato, a
kind of custard that spills soft egg yolk when we cut it open. Golden
beet carpaccio arrives flecked with pickled garlic, walnuts and chilies.
Grilled trumpet mushrooms came from a local monastery. The most incredible dish is a bowl of hand-cut pasta with cubes of raw yellowfin tuna that color and soften when I give the dish a toss.My wife is loving her plate of ceviche-like triggerfish crudo, dressed with bits of tangerine. This restaurant is so much more her speed than the formal joints I’ve dragged her to on trips past. Truth be told, it’s mine, too. Charleston has busted out of the gate as the kind of food destination that’s just right for everyone.” – John Kessler
Every Day with Rachael Ray, May 2011
Charleston’s Southern Hospitality
“On Percy Street, we dropped into Enoteca, a dark jewel box of a bar, for a brief nightcap, and wound up treating our group to an Italian beer tasting of such esoteric depth that Mario Batali would have been humbled.” – Matt and Ted Lee
Travel + Leisure, May 2011
Lucca’s Crudo
“The crudo at Trattoria Lucca is some of the best that I have ever eaten… This is one of those dishes that won’t always be on the menu, and you hope that you’ll be lucky enough to get when you go to Lucca for dinner.” – Angel Powell
Charleston Scene, April 2011
101 of America’s Most Delicious Noodle Dishes
“Even though Ken Vedrinski’s Lucca is named after a town in Tuscany, this dish of fresh snails, creamy fresh Cresenza cheese, and a wild-onion broth wears its American pedigree proudly.”
New York Magazine – Grub Street, April 2011
A Touch of Tuscany in Northern Italian Food
“Vedrinski applies techniques from Lucca to the seafood that is available in South Carolina. For example, he poaches artichokes in olive oil from Lucca, makes a sauce from Tuscan white wine and serves that with flounder.” – Bret Thorn
Nation’s Restaurant News, March 2011
Best Raw Fish Dish In Town
“Ken Vedrinski, chef and owner of Trattoria Lucca, does a lot of things well. Among them is his crudo.” – Brys Stephens
Charleston City Paper, March 2011
John Mariani and Ken Vedrinski Team Up for a Lesson in Old World Food
“If you asked them both, chef Ken Vedrinski and author John Mariani would agree that Italian food is the best cuisine in the entire world.” – Alison Sher
Charleston City Paper, March 2011
Trattoria Lucca
“He can take the flavors of the sea and make them sing with the fruitiest olive oil you’ve ever tasted.” – Stephanie Barna
Charleston City Paper – Dish, Winter 2011
50 Foodie Faves
Next Top Chef: Ken Vedrinski, Trattoria Lucca
Pasta: Trattoria Lucca,
Pasta, which requires not only skill but passion, is pure elegance in his hands… Whether it be gnudi, tuffoli, or trofie, you can expect perfect execution, exciting sauces, and frequent changes, giving you even more excuses to return.”
Editors’ Picks: Trattoria Lucca
“Chef Ken Vedrinski’s Family Supper, now Monday nights, is the ticket. Sit down at a communal table and share the four set courses ($36) of antipasti, pasta, entree, and dolce and cross your fingers that he’ll be serving the to-die-for crudo of grouper.” – Darcy Shankland
Charleston magazine, December 2010
Feast of Seven Fishes
“Trattoria Lucca celebrates an Italian-style Christmas Eve with its Feast of the Seven Fishes.” – Teresa Taylor
Post and Courier, December 2010
Trattoria Lucca, Luna Rossa
“…Vedrinski also sees Lucca as place in which he can celebrate the olive oil of Lucca, Italy (a city in Western Tuscany) — the olive oil he
consider the best in the world.” – Meaghan Strickland
Charleston City Paper, June 2008
Lowcountry Rising
“Last fall, he opened Trattoria Lucca, Charleston’s answer to a casual Mario Batali place, on an unlikely residential corner away from the tourist traps, and the natives came running.” – Christian L. Wright
Gourmet Magazine, May 2009
Best New Restaurant: Trattoria Lucca
“Was there any doubt that Ken Vedrinski’s amazing little trattoria in the ‘hood would win? We didn’t think so. The food is astounding, affordable, and…”
Charleston City Paper, March 2009
Best Cheese Plate: Trattoria Lucca
“Ken Vedrinski doesn’t just fix a cheese plate — you know the kind where some chef plops down three or four meager slices on a cold plate and charges you eight bucks for the favor — this man composes cheese plates. He loads them up with…” – Jeff Allen
Charleston City Paper, March 2009
Chef Ken Vedrinski Interprets His Italian Roots at Charleston’s Trattoria Lucca
Cauliflower Custard? “The Warm Cauliflower Sformatino with a soft organic egg was our first appetizer. It was so sensual that it was almost downright embarrassing to eat in public.” – Terri Evans
LikeTheDew.com
A crazy busy day in the life of Chef Ken Vedrinski
“It’s a life of early mornings and late nights, non-stop business deals and the occasional cheap thrill, but it’s a life devoted to passion — to the evolution of culinary genius…” – Alison Sher
Charleston City Paper, August 2009
Good as Grandma’s: Finding comfort within the wolf’s den at Trattoria Lucca
“Like most things honestly Italian, the simplicity and purity of the flavors sing through. It’s the freshness of the fish and caring hand of a chef who takes delivery himself in the little alley beside the kitchen.” – Jeff Allen
Charleston City Paper, October 2008
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