I'm going to start out with the "bargain" portion of this meal then work my way into what ALL we ate. Our purpose was bargain but it was our 5 month anniversary so we splurged a bit and it was all well worth it.
The Bargain Portion
Monday thru Friday from 5-7 (and 9 'til close), in the bar only they have a nice variety of $2.95 appetizers. We were expecting reduced portions of their normal ones, but oh no! They were full sized! What normally would be $9.99 was only $2.95! There are 8 to choose from and the portions were huge! We went with Bruschetta with mushrooms & boursin which turned out to be my favorite. Just a delicious combination of flavors and a bit different from the typical Italian Bruschetta. It was toasted ciabatta topped with melted Provolone, sauteed portobello, caramelized onions, crushed red pepper, tomatoes and garnished with Boursin cheese. Yummy! Our next choice was the Crispy Shrimp Napoli. Shrimp fried to a golden crisp with green onions and a savory lemon butter, charred tomato Napoli sauce. This was the first one we asked for and my immediate question was how many do you get and our waitress told us 10. That's when we realized these were full appetizer portions. This one by the way, is normally $11.99 for $2.95! Our waitress then recommended the Chicken, Spinach And Bacon Flatbread. It was grilled chicken, creamy spinach, applewood smoked bacon with green onions, mozzarella and provolone. Also very good. This one is normally $5.99 but at $2.95 was still half price!
As much as the $2.95 was a great deal, I joined their "Club Bravo" online where they promptly sent me a coupon for a free appetizer. So we chose the Calamari Fritti - lightly battered calamari (scungilli for you Italians, squid for the rest of ya) cooked to a crisp brown, served with creamy horseradish sauce and marinara. This saved us another $10.99.
So we got 4 appetizers for under $10! You too can dine on delicious food at a budget!
Now where we "ran up the bill" a bit is with alcohol and dessert. I was content on having my wine at home but since we were celebrating I did opt for a glass of Riesling which was $6.95 and I thought a bit pricey. My husband went for a glass of Peroni beer which was $5. Hey! They have to make their money somewhere! So basically we paid more for alcohol (only 2 glasses) than we did food. But then there was dessert, ahhh, dessert . . .
We went with the Tre Dolce, described as a little something sweet. Smaller portions of three of their most popular desserts. Their award winning Tiramisu, Torta di Cioccolata, and Warm Berry Cake for $8.99. Well worth it! The Hubster ate the warm berry cake, I ate the Torta di Cioccolate which was their version of a rich chocolate cake with warm center topped with vanilla bean gelato (aka as ice cream for you Americanos!) I don't normally like Tiramisu (yeah, what kind of Italian am I?) but theirs was truly the best I had tried. We brought that portion home to my son. Plus Jero had a cup of coffee with this.
Still, our bill was only $35 and we gave her a $10 tip. Plus we didn't get there until 8 minutes before 7. (I know this because Jerome made sure he made note of that as I was dragging him into the bar!) I also had my BOGO from Citipass with me and when I pulled out all my coupons she had that look on her face, like, "Oh Great" a lot of work for a little bit of money! We showed her! Truly, if you drank water or even tea or soda, you could have feasted for way under $10. I'm looking forward to going back and trying the apps we didn't try (artichoke & spinach formaggio, cheese ravioli forno, balsamic onion, portobello & gorgonzola flatbread, flatbread Roma)
You can check out their entire menu at: www.bravoitalian.com
Who wants to come with? :)
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