Nostos is the place where, if you’ve been going long enough, you can sit and order and never open the menu because favorites will be there and will always be executed exactly the same. Lightly battered zucchini, fluffy and happy to take a dip in a thick yogurt sauce, is a standby starter, as is avgolemono, the homey rice and chicken soup spruced up with lemon, and the showstopper: saganaki, a Greek cheese lit on fire tableside so that it turns crusty and melty. The whole fish is an obvious entree, not only because the bronzino or sea bream or whatever is shipped from the Mediterranean is cooked and seasoned so well it doesn’t need the accompanying lemon and butter, but also because this classy restaurant debones the whole thing tableside.
The specials also sing. A summer display pairs cubes of watermelon and cubes of sesame-crusted feta in a checkered pattern that is as delicious as it is stunning and simple. Dessert can be a traditional baklava or a revisited version that’s just as sweet but more texturally interesting: Apples, apricots, raisins and walnuts form a loosely bound layer between sheets of firm phyllo dough with all of it topped by two scoops of vanilla ice cream.
Nostos
Greek | $$$
8100 Boone Blvd., Vienna
