Main Street Got a Tapas Habit

Downtown's newest dinner plan is not a reservation for one giant entrée. It is a pile of small plates that somehow keeps growing.

Baldoria opened recently at 1528 Main St. in the former Block 15 Cork & Craft space, from Riccardo Margarella and Paola Pignata — the same duo behind My Mamma Italian Kitchen on North Tamiami Trail. The name is Italian for celebration and good company, which is either a mission statement or a warning label depending on how you order.

Share plates, Italian-Spanish remix

Per the Herald-Tribune write-up, Baldoria leans Mediterranean: tapas with Italian and Spanish twists, focaccia sandwiches, craft pasta and pizzas. Pignata told the paper the idea is approachable and informal — lively, social, still centered on food and conversation. I am translating that as: you will order "just two things," then renegotiate with yourself twice.

I am calling this the Main Street Multiplying Plate. One tapa becomes three. Three becomes a table that looks like a travel montage. Nobody is mad about it.

The wall that pours itself

There is also a self-pour beer and wine wall with 24 taps, plus craft cocktails. You can stop for a drink and one plate, stay for a bottle and several, or treat the whole evening like a tasting flight with bread on the side. Baldoria sits somewhere between restaurant, cocktail bar and hangout, which is exactly the category downtown needed for "we said we'd just pop in."

Hours before you Uber

Monday through Thursday 4 to 10:30 p.m., Friday and Saturday until midnight, Sunday 4 to 10 p.m., according to that same coverage. Lunch is on the wishlist for mid-October. Check BaldoriaSarasota.com or @Baldoria_SRQ before you go, because opening weeks love a soft-launch plot twist.

I will be the one staring at an empty plate like it owes me another round of olives. See you on Main. Bring friends. Or don't. The plates will multiply either way.