good morning & happy friday everyone! i hope you all have a great day ahead of you & then it’s the weekend!
last night brad and i ventured out to downtown madison to take part in another restaurant week meal. this time, we decided on osteria papavero.
they don’t take reservations, and since we were arriving right around 7pm, we knew we’d have a wait. luckily, they said it’d be only 35 minutes, so we grabbed the first open seat at the bar and ordered some diet cokes for the wait.
due to the extreme business of the restaurant last night and some other circumstances*, we didn’t get seated until a little after 8, over an hour-long wait. i wasn’t upset with the restaurant though, they’re a little place and there were a lot of people there!
by the time we were seated, we knew exactly what we wanted! i ordered the ribollita - tuscan kale, country-style bread, borlotti and cannellini bean soup for my first course.
and brad had the bresaola rucola e grana – homemade bresaola, baby arugula, shaved grana cheese, and balsamic vinaigrette.
we were also served a bread basket with a couple different house breads.
we were so hungry, the first course was gone in a snap! i loved both of our choices – the soup was thick and comforting and brad’s salad was nice and spicy from the arugula and it paired perfectly with the salty beef (bresaola) and cheese. poor brad had a hard time tasting much of the meal at all because he’s a little sick, so that’s such a bummer.
i also ordered a drink with the first course – i saw a mulled wine listed on their chalkboard menu at the front of the restaurant, so i asked if it was available last night & it was!
there’s something about heated, spicy wine that i just love. i’m always tempted when i see it on a menu! and since it was cheaper than most of their other drinks, i had to go for it.
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our entrees were ready for us soon after we finished the first course. i ordered the cappe sante – Ssared scallops, citrus & watercress salad, toasted almonds.
i guess i’m on a scallop kick this week – first at bluephies and now here!
and brad ordered the lombatello alla griglia – grilled hanger steak, potato puree, wild mushroom ragout.
again, both dishes were really good. brad thought the steak was just a regular steak, but i could taste the awesome flavor it had and i loved it! also, the potato puree was delicious and flavorful. my scallops were cooked perfectly and i really enjoyed eating them with the citrus and toasted almonds.
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and finally, dessert! i ordered the panna cottta – vanilla panna cotta, wild berry compote, shortbread cookie.
brad ordered the torta barozzi – chocolate-coffee-almond cake, orange compote, toasted pistachios.
my dessert won this one. i’m not sure if it’s because i had a mocha chocolate cake last night and it was just too much richness right after one another, or because the panna cotta was just that good, but i think we both preferred the lighter tasting panna cotta. i will say that i really enjoyed the orange and rich chocolate combination of brad’s dessert.
overall, i think this was my favorite of my 3 restaurant week dinners, despite the very long wait! i really enjoyed all three of my courses and i liked the general feel of the restaurant as well. it’s very small with simple decor and a very friendly staff that remained calm and poised even though it was so busy.
*and now, i just have to say. there were two young women (likely mid-20’s – 30’s) sitting at table, who finished their food and received their bill just as we got to the restaurant at 7pm, so they had likely already been there for around an hour. they each had a glass of wine and were talking away. they didn’t pay their bill, finish their wine, and leave until after we were seated, around 8:10 pm. now, i don’t like it when restaurants rush their patrons out the door to open up tables, but come on ladies. it is restaurant week, there were people standing around waiting for tables all over the place! they should have shown a bit of courtesy and finished up a little faster. there are plenty of bars and restaurants within close walking distance (i’m talking like 10 great restaurants within a block!). they could have easily moved to one of those places after their meal if they wanted to enjoy a glass of wine and a long conversation.
it ended up providing us with a little entertainment and turned into a game of “when do you think they’ll leave?”, but geez.
full disclosure: we paid for this meal entirely on our own and i was not compensated in any way for this blog post. as always, all thoughts and opinions expressed here are strictly my own.
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what do you think? should those ladies have finished up and gone somewhere else given the busy restaurant? or do i just need to chill out?
{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }
Looks like you had another great find of foods!
It’s a dining experience for everyone after alll.
But I have to disagree with you about the ladies. I think it’s perfectly fine, no matter what the occasion, for people to enjoy their time. Some people don’t get to enjoy their meal or drink and I think it’s fine if they want to. Now if it’s pushing the 2-to-3 hour mark I’d be a little irritated. But when REB and I were in Rome, on more than one occasion, before getting paid, we’d get asked if we could give up our table so they could seat someone. We weren’t done with our wine, we hadn’t paid and they wanted us to give up our seat. It’s extremely rude. If you want me to pay, let me take my time
i know, i was going back and forth on it, but i finally just ended up being so frustrated. they must have been there for at least two hours because they were getting their bill when we arrived, and the meal took about an hour for all 3 courses to be served – probably more if they were chatty through the meal too – brad and i wolfed ours down bc we were so hungry and it still took an hour. and i just kept thinking about all of the other nearby establishments with great bars and wine lists that weren’t participating in restaurant week and were certainly not as busy. i will say this, the restaurant staff never asked them to leave, so that’s good on the restaurant’s part.
i supposed i just saw them as a barrier to me getting my food so i got a little hangry…
and i agree – it would definitely have been rude to ask them to give up their table – i don’t think the restaurant staff should have done that. i just know that if i were in that situation of seeing tons of people waiting and our bill sitting on the table for an hour, i would have suggested getting another glass of wine somewhere else nearby instead.