Littler, Durham

With covid-19 wrecking havoc on the restaurant industry, whenever possible I'm going to squeeze in tribute food posts to restaurants we love, local or otherwise. Initially, I thought of doing all food posts, including those we didn't like so much. However, I feel posting negative reviews of restaurants right now is akin to kicking someone who's already down. We don't need anymore negativity, do we? So for now, positive posts only when it comes to food ^.^

Without much further ado, here's Littler in Durham, North Carolina. Late November of last year, hubby attended a work conference in Durham and I tagged along as usual. We have friends in the area from whom we solicited restaurant recommendations (though it didn't dawn on me until much later in our trip that Caty, my friend and reader, is also in the area =.=" sorry, Caty!), and Littler came up quite a few times. So I booked a dinner reservation for our first night there, and that one single dinner remained the highlight of our entire trip. I still think of the food even now--it was that good!

Let's start with the space. It was cozy and intimate, a small space that served about two dozen diners, I think. The wait staff was courteous and attentive, and the only thing hubby complained about was the music. However, let me preface that with this: my hubby is a music snob ^.^" Yes, music can add--or take away from--ambience, but unless a restaurant is playing loud, obnoxious, and intrusive music, I generally just block it out. After all, I go to restaurants to eat. Personally, I'm there for the food and the food alone. Everything else comes second. Of course, there were times when the ambience, the service, etc. was so atrocious it ruined the food, but this was not the case with Littler. Hubby raved and raved about his dinner there and we would go back in a heartbeat, but being his snooty musical self he just had to comment on the music they played, to which I just rolled my eyes and ignore :P

We ordered the grilled octopus for appetizer, not knowing what to do expect. They knocked our socks off. The octopus was so tender and flavorful hubby took one bite and exclaimed, "This is amazing!" For our dinner side, we got the stuffed carnival squash to share. Hubby loved this more than I did because I just don't love squash in general, but even so I thought it was good.

My main entree was the scallops and hubby got the steak. Savored every bite and almost ordered a second entree which was crazy, because we both were so full. We ended up going for the milk pudding dessert instead. Yum.

Unfortunately, with the current event Littler has closed its door until further notice. I really, truly hope they'll open and get back on their feet once everything calms down. It'll be a sorry loss for the world of dining to be without food this good.