Burrata and Birthdays

 Things didn't start out in a way that inspired optimism for our shared birthday dinner. Annie was turning whatever age it is that women decide they are and I was checking into a new decade...the 40's. To celebrate another year of survival, we invited a handful of friends to feast with us. Based on a recommendation of a friend we went with Patrizia's in Williamsburg. Before you get all “Fuck Williamsburg and all those hipsters”, this is the least hipstery thing in all of Williamsburg, maybe in all of Brooklyn. So shut the fuck up. We showed up 645pm for our 7 o'clock reservation and noticed just how packed this place was. It was absolutely bustling. We met the nice woman at the door and she tells us that it'll be just a little bit, but not too long. After being bounced around in the very tiny little area in front of the entrance to the restaurant, a waiter led us into a tent set up against the front of the restaurant that had one of those heater tower thingies in it. He provided us with the proverbial “Bottle of red, bottle of white...” and left us to find someone that could figure out how to turn the heater thingie (I'm pretty sure that's the technical name for it) on. Luckily for our cold selves, I got the thing on and Jason figured out how to control how much heat we got from it. As our party arrived in dribs and drabs we enjoyed conversation and most of the wine provided us, while the tent got more and more crowded with other people waiting to be seated. It wasn't until around 745pm that we were finally shown to a table. Normally, I'd be pretty pissed about waiting an hour for a table that I'd made a reservation for. But this place was simply that damn good! As a testament to how good it was, it's been 6 days since we were there and I actually dreamt of the burrata I had there last night!

Patrizia's is incredibly crowded. It's difficult to move around in your seat, let alone get to and from your table. When I say crowded, I mean that two of our party seated in the corner had to actually crawl under the table to be able to go to the restroom. That's pretty damn crowded. It doesn't matter. The waitstaff are attentive and seem to be pretty happy folks. We're a pretty raucous bunch and a bunch of lushes. No one batted an eye at our needing to see a menu to accommodate our resident vegetarian or at our constant requests for more pitchers of sangria...and there were A LOT of pitchers of sangria. Even the other patrons all seemed to be jovial happy folks. We wound up talking to a bunch of the diners surrounding us, mostly because they're all close enough that they could be sitting with us in some instances. People are laughing and singing everywhere. They do a sing-along thing for people's birthdays where everyone waves their napkins in the air. We were there for probably 3+ hours and I'm positive I waived my napkin at least a dozen times (including for Annie...haha, didn't get me!)...and so did nearly everyone else. At one point we were actually singing and dancing to “Greased Lightning” at the table...yes, I said dancing. Never done that in an Italian restaurant, I bet. As much fun as this place was, and it was a ton of fun, the reason you overlook the wait and being packed in like an N train at rush hour is the food. Oh My God...the food.

We went with a family style menu. In other words, they just brought out plates of food and we attacked the plates with the fervor of ravenous wolverines. It started out with burrata (which is a mozzarella-type cheese stuffed with a creamy cheesy center) with caponata and marinated grape tomatoes. As I said, I dreamt about this last night. This was some of the best cheese I've ever put in my face hole. Someone nearly got themselves stabbed over the last piece on a plate. When the food provokes possible violence, you know you've done something right. After that came absolutely delicious eggplant parmigiana. Then some amazingly tender calamari tossed in a slightly spicy red sauce. Next was the best grilled octopus I've ever had. I LOVE octopus. I order it whenever I have the opportunity. This was the best I've ever had. It was almost buttery it was so tender. It's making me yearn just typing about it, so I'm going to move on before I start walking to Williamsburg right now. This was like wave after wave of Mmmmm. Now they bring these giant plates of mussels, clams and lobster. Which we devoured with glee. There were pieces of shell flying around everywhere. As though a 28-armed Tazmanian Devil attacked the table. Next came the pasta courses. I don't know what these things are really called but we called them “moneybags” because that's kind of what they looked like. Sort of like giant tortellini-type things stuffed with cheese in a cream sauce with mushrooms and prosciutto. So so good and so incredibly rich. Then more pasta which was orecchiette with broccoli rabe in garlic and oil. I'm not really a big broccoli rabe fan, so this didn't do too much for me. Just way too bitter. But the people that did like broccoli rabe, loved this stuff. Lastly they brought us plates of lamb chops and skirt steak. All niceties went out the window and I was eating the lamb chops like big, meat lollipops. By the time the meat was all gone, I was beaten into submission. I simply wasn't able to eat anymore. We had all been fed into oblivion. What an amazing feast.

MoneyBags...or whatever they're called

As I'm talking to a couple of other folks that took part in this fantastic meal I'm reminded that we had pizza and giant grilled shrimp. Both were pretty good. But not on the level of all this other outrageously great food.


At the end, someone ratted out Annie and they came and sang Happy Birthday to her and we all waived our napkins in the air. They brought out some desserts for her to blow out candles on. There was an apple turnover looking thing, tiramisu and some type of what looked like a crepe. I ate 2 bites of the tiramisu, which was quite good, but there was simply no more room inside of me. I'd have burst like an overstuffed sausage. Which is a lousy way to spend your 40^th birthday.


Instead of bursting from overeating, we all went to Windy City Ale House, which has been one of my favorite bars for awhile now, and imbibed until some ungodly hour with even more of my favorite people. I said it that night and I'll say it again now, “If this day is any indication as to what 40 is going to be like, this is going to be a fantastic year.” Thank you to all of you that came out and made it an incredible day. Thank you, Patrizia's for feeding us like it was our last meal. Thank you, Windy City, for making sure everything past around 1am is kind of blurry.


Patrizia's was just great, great food, with an excellent staff, a very fun atmosphere and seriously affordable. With all that food and drink it came to around $75 per person. That's a flat-out steal. If you've got some kind of group food outing in the planning, go here. You might find me at the door begging for burrata and octopus.


PS: I do apologize for the lack of pictures, we were just too caught up in having a great time to take any. Maybe I don't really apologize that much.



Patrizia's of Williamsburg
35 Broadway
Brooklyn, NY, 11249