“From the Boot?” asked Matt Sherlock in the comments, less than three hours after this week’s reader poll of the top Italian restaurants in Plymouth Whitemarsh had been posted.

Cindy chimed in an hour later. Bridget$ an hour after that. Then Heidi Meiners, and Joane, and Kelie Schannel. The same question, increasingly incredulous, kept coming:

“Why isn’t From the Boot on the ballot?”

So staring down a wave of populist resentment unlike anything we’d seen in this space, before or since, we acquiesced. The restaurant was added to the ballot that evening, the offending editor came out of hiding, and, not surprisingly, the Lafayette Hill eatery rolled to victory.

Boasting top shelf Veal Marsala, friendly, but unfussy, service, and as loyal a customer base as any business in the area, From the Boot took 51 percent of the vote, in a field of seven, to claim the title of Best Italian Restaurant in the Plymouth-Whitemarsh area.

Come back on Sunday to see the rest of the results from the Philadelphia region.