67th Annual St. Philip Neri Spaghetti Dinner (11/14/10)

After interviewing about 20 guests, it became clear that the meatballs are the stars at this dinner.  The meat sauce came in a close second.   I’m pretty sure that the recipes came directly from the Italian immigrants who made up the original congregation.  The (slightly) more diverse group that now runs the food side of the dinner has the good sense to not mess with the best - according to Amy Costanza, the meatballs taste just like the ones her Italian relatives make.  Other sentiments included:

"The meatballs are tender, they have a complex flavor."

"I don't think you can get meatballs like this at any restaurant in Portland."

"Phenomenal meat sauce - it's so hearty."

This year we had the pleasure of being a part of a group of over 30 sprawled across four tables to celebrate Amy’s birthday over spaghetti and meatballs, so the community feel in our section was great.  The servers were very accommodating and they really will bring you all the spaghetti and meatballs you can eat.

The $12 dinner starts with a Wonderbread version of Italian bread and a salad with a dressing that is zippy enough to entice me despite the limp iceberg lettuce.  MSG?  I hope not, though I doubt it is homemade.  Then comes the piece de resistance (for most), the spaghetti and meatballs.  Despite all this talk of meatballs I am vegetarian and in my 9 years of attending this event I’ve only ever had the vegetarian sauce, which is homemade with lots of fresh ingredients, but I have a feeling it’s a far cry from the real deal in this case.  After as many plates of spaghetti as you can handle, the final course is a square of vanilla or chocolate cake, likely from CostCo, which makes tasty cakes as sheet cakes go.  The kids especially seemed quite pleased with the dessert.  Wine by the glass or carafe is a very reasonably priced extra (it's from a box after all).

Post dinner, in the behind the scenes role I played as server for the second half of the dinner, I was saddened by the fact that we had no composting, served the salad and cake in disposable bowls, and served the cake with a plastic fork when we had just collected the guests’ metal spaghetti forks from them.  St. Philip Neri’s other big fundraiser is the Muddy Boot Festival, an event that hosts more people than the spaghetti dinner, but managed to only generate two bags of trash this past year.  I also heard complaints about the lack of bike parking – bummer.  Needless to say, it’s time for the Spaghetti Dinner organizers to talk with the Muddy Boot organizers.  I’m pretty sure that we put the wheels in motion for eco-upgrades to the dinner next year. 

Based on the feedback I heard, I give this dinner 11 out of 10 on the meatballs and sauce, but overall it gets 7 out of 10 spaghetti noodles because of the lackluster non-main-course items and decidedly unenvironmental choices from a parish that should know better, but on the other hand an outstanding main course, very friendly service, and welcoming community.  I’m confident that next year they can get to 9 out of 10 with some eco upgrades – I’d highly recommend checking it out!