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Marchi's dispenses with menus altogether to serve a super-sized, five-course Northern Italian meal in what often feels like an eating marathon. The wine-red carpets, old oils of Venetian scenes, and musty ski-lodge smell can make the 75-year-old restaurant feel like the Overlook Hotel from The Shining when sparsely filled by the typically ancient, longtime customers, some of whom speak only Italian. The meal starts with a bewildering antipasti platter of Genoa salami, bread, a strangely crunchy fish-cabbage "tunaslaw," and an almost comically large platter of whole, unsliced fruits and vegetables—Italian winter celery, radishes, tomatoes, a entire fennel plant, and melon. The second course, a mushy, dull lasagna, is more like a tomato-less meat sauce on linguine with baked cheese. But things head uphill with fried codfish and lemon, simple and light. The meat course ups the ante with fatty veal in a rich gravy and a huge chunk of chicken in the same sauce, crackling skin still on. The accompanying mushrooms sautéed in garlic and their own rich juices are likely the only course you'll want to finish completely. For dessert there's an enormous platter of whole fruit; mild provolone and crostoli, Venetian rounds of thin fried dough sprinkled with sugar; and cream fritta, a warm lemon fritter that's the best part of the meal, with lemon cream oozing from the fried crust. — Timothy Cooper

As if the five dining rooms didn't provide enough space, there is a back garden open during the summer months.

Fried codfish; veal; garlic sautéed mushrooms; lemon fritter