Officine Brera - great dinner this weekend

Went to Officine Brera for dinner last night. Had planned to go several times previously but due to last minute changes, we never did made it. Restaurant is in an old converted factory and is beautifully done with out door patio. Nice bar area which does not need reservations. Our reservation was at 7 for 4 people and it was about 1/2 full when we sat down. Became very crowded when we got done at around 9pm. Owned and run by the same people as Factory Kitchen.

Ordered 5 starters/appetizers, 2 pasta and a steak to share family style.

Frisceu, vegetable sage fritters. Did not expect much but was very good. 5/5

Calamari salad. Good size with lots of whole baby squid. 5/5

Lingua Salmistrata, picked beef tongue with salsa verde. One of the best beed tongue I ever had. 5/5

Polpo, grilled octopus salad. Okay. 3/5

Fagiolini, blue lake green beans salad. Good. 4/5

Pappardelle al Nero, handcut black ink pasta with octopus ragu. Good. 4/5

Foiade Bergamasche, handcut whole wheat pasta with goose ragu. Fantastic pasta with great flavors. Definitely the best dish of the evening. 5/5

Carne Bovina, 14 day dry aged prime ribeye with salsa verde, grilled vidalia onions and roasted potatoes. A little under seasoned. 4/5

Castagnole, donuts with salty bourbon caramel sauce. 4/5

Torrone, honey + nut nougatine semifreddo. 4/5

Serving size were good for sharing among 4 of us. All in all, fantastic dinner and highly recommended.

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I love those light sage fritters quite a bit as ell.
Nice report. thanks

Took a friend here for lunch recently. I wanted to try the risottos. I’d been making them more frequently at home with no real idea what I should be aiming for. I was in Italy once, when I was 20, and was much more interested in beer and gelato than fine dining or even Italian food, really.

We got there around 1 and the dining was more empty than full. They had a nice selection of wines by the glass.

We started with a salad, which I thought was good, but don’t remember much else.

We also got these vegetables fritters. I thought they were going to be like fried squash flowers, vegetables in a batter, but they were very doughy, with little vegetable. Very good, just not what I was expecting.

My friend ordered the lamb pasta with gravy, which she loved. I thought it was very good, but not outstanding.

I got the two risottos, since they each had different rice. I wanted to see if you could taste the differences in rices. You can! They were both amazing, standouts, each one.

One had cotechino, which was not housemade, and sausage.

The other risotto was topped with turbot. I asked if they only used shellfish or fish broth in it, but they waiter said all the risottos had chicken broth.

It was more food than I could eat, so I took home and had as leftovers. Not great leftovers, after the amazing taste of the fresh risotto.

It was my friend’s birthday, so we got the ricotta tart for dessert as a mini-celebration. She really enjoyed it. It was nice with coffee.

It was a nice lunch, with good service and easy valet parking. I would definitely go back again, though I don’t know when, as I have so many places on my must try list at the moment!

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