Aperitivo
It’s yet another Friday, and my partner had to pick up some items around the southeast part of Central Park. This area is fairly close to the Plaza Hotel and the flagship Apple store. This restaurant was on my eyes for a while, but my partner hadn’t built their tolerance or appreciation for Italian food until recently. Fortunately, I finally had a chance to suggest this restaurant as our Friday getaway. We were able to do a walk-in on a Friday evening around 5:45 PM without reservations.
Ambiance & Service
Since the ceilings were so tall, noise isn’t too much of a problem especially if you sit near another party. The wait staff was able to accommodate a booth for us, which was right next to a large touristy-type party. There is a lot of exposed brick, and they have a pizza furnace and a bunch of pasta making machines in the back.
The service itself was very attentive. Because we were one of probably 4 parties in total in a large room, the staff was probably bored, so they made sure to clean up our plates at the first sign we were ready. We never really asked for water refills, and they were quick to serve.
Food
The Pinot Noir ($16 - left) was from Olema, Amici Cellars, California 2021. The red wine tasted pretty decent. It was subtly acidic, dry, and medium body. It was rather smooth and not complex. It made it a very easy to drink wine, but it was straight forward with very standard red fruit notes. It was a decent pairing with my meal.
The Spicy Passion Margarita ($18 - right) came with house tequila, chili, passion fruit, lime, and agave. This was surprisingly pretty good. All the ingredients blended very well for my partner, who typically isn’t a fan of tequila. It was not too sweet, and had a great balance between the passion fruit and lime. It was not spicy at all for me despite having some chili salt on the side.
They gave us complimentary bread which was fairly no frills. The bread’s interior was very fluffy at room temperature. The olive oil had a bunch of chopped up olives.
The Baked Clams ($20) came with little neck clams, jalapeño oreganata, and white wine sauce. If you’re worried about the jalapeño pepper, there wasn’t much heat. This was pretty much breading on top of clams with a lot of butter wine type aromas. You can’t really go wrong with it. The clams were pretty good.
The Parmigiana ($38) came with chicken, house mozzarella, tomato, and basil. This was not as large as Trattoria Dell’Arte, but it was pretty decent. The parmesan crust was very flavorful, and it wasn’t too salty. The chicken was a little dry, but it had a decent amount of pasta sauce and cheese to help compensate flavoring for it.
The Fettuccine Scampi ($28) came with shrimp, grape cherry tomato, and a scampi butter sauce. The noodles, according to the menu, are freshly made. I was a little surprised by how thin the noodles were, but that was ok. The scampi butter sauce was very flavorful and very typical of most scampi sauces. The pasta flavors were a good complement to the chicken parmigiana.
Final Verdict
Aperitivo is a pretty good Italian restaurant that is close to Bloomingdales and the main Apple store. If you’re looking for somewhere to eat, this is actually a very affordable and reasonable Italian restaurant that satisfies.
Yelp Jabs
The review is just for the americano classic pizza classic whatever it’s called as a born and raised nyer what on gods green earth was that all the cheese slide off the pie greasy slices for 27 bucks
We did contemplate getting pizza, but the real question is why. Some of the pizza did look delicious, but thankfully I prefer pasta over pizza in Italian sit down places.
I liked it here for lunch, it was good , clean and friendly but to me average. Doesn’t mean you shouldn’t go there and try it yourself, but it didn’t check all my Italian boxes.
This Yelper didn’t bother to mention what their “Italian boxes” were. To me, this was a very standard Italian American-like restaurant. This person was from Texas, so maybe one of their Italian boxes was to be as good as Olive Garden.
Revisions
- Sep 9, 2023 - Initial revision.