It feels a bit like sacrilege that I'm giving this institution anything less than 4 forks but here I am. This is not to say that I didn't enjoy my experience there, it's just that with all the Italian food I've had in the city (ranging from fancy pants to mom and pop) this falls in somewhere in the middle.
In all my years of living in NYC, I have never been to the legendary Arthur Ave. in the Bronx. As Will, Aarti, Kinney, Nat and I continue to "plan" our trip to Italy and hit as many red sauce joints in NYC, it only felt right that we had to visit this area at least once. While the commute up wasn't necessarily the worst, it is most definitely a hike, especially from Brooklyn - it took almost an hour and a half with all the walking and transferring.
As you would expect the area is filled with very old school, mom and pop Italian places. The whole street is lined with options but Dominick's is the most popular and famous. We thought we were doing a smart thing by going at 5:30pm on a Saturday - after all, who eats that early? Apparently everyone does because it was a 30 minute wait. They give you a number and you can go upstairs to the bar/waiting room. When you do get called the main restaurant is kind of a cattle call - it's tight communal seating with you definitely feeling a bit squished in. There is one lone menu on the back of the wall but essentially the waiter just asks if you want this, this and this and you agree to it. We started with the anti pasti salad and stuffed artichokes. Then we got a melange of pastas and broccoli rabe - I can't remember all the details now but it was a lot of family style food happening at the table. Everyone like the salad - I think mostly for the tangy dressing on it. The artichokes were a bit difficult to eat, I never know if I should be eating the entire leaf or just sucking the meat off of it? Then came all the pastas - sadly I don't remember exactly what we got but I do remember a seafood pasta showing up and that being pretty good. Everything was extremely filling and the atmosphere did make me feel like I was in a loud Italian house for dinner but the one thing that kind of disappointed me was that when we were done with our pastas there was a layer of grease/oil on the bottom. Obviously I know they use olive oil to cook but there's something about seeing that big shiny puddle when you end a meal that kind of gets you. Luckily the broccoli rabe helped to make me feeling like I was cleansing my palate and eating something "healthy".
The service was a bit off here compared to the other old school joints. They were nice younger guys instead of the older gentleman you usually see at other red sauce joints. We had to ask for several things repeatedly like more water and wine which was annoying and they weren't as jovial or attentive. The 2nd annoying thing is that it's cash only but luckily the bill was definitely much cheaper than the city so it's not as bad as you think.
Overall, it's still worth a trip up to Arthur Ave. to check out the scene but I think there are other similar red sauce joints in the city and Brooklyn that are much better and easier to get to. While we didn't get dessert here, there is a lovely mom and pop joint right next door that had amazing tiramisu and coffee - definitely check it out. Total bill: ~$35/pp with tax and tip and drinks
Photo Credit: Yelp
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