Joe Badali's Ristorante

Exactly a year ago... Lutz.n49.ca and I went to Joe Badali's after the SES show, so of course we had to do it again this year, bringing with us our newest co-worker...Tina. Same Time, Same Place, New Friend.. :) This time it was raining so we couldn't sit on the patio but were quite happy to sit at a cute little booth. We ordered a few glasses of wine and some delicious apitizers that we shared... although I didn't share my soup...it was fantastic!! I could have eaten another bowl.

My boyfriend took me here for our first date ever, and now two years later we went back for our anniversary. The first time we went, I ordered the calamari without knowing that he hated it, but like the good first dater he was, he didn't say anything. Thank god he bit his tongue, because that order of calamari changed his opinion of calamari forever. Since then, we have constantly be on the hunt for the best calamari we could find (Jack Astor's is decent, Montforts in Oakville is horrible and ridiculously overpriced, Alice Fazooli's serves their's with a crappy marinara sauce, etc etc). But I must say, after ordering Joe Badali's calamari again last night, we realized that our search was up the first time we had it. It is SO good: perfectly deep fried, no gross tentacle pieces, two awesome sauces (I especially enjoyed the lemon aioli), and more than enough for two people. I'm getting hungry again just thinking about it.

Anyways, after we got over the food-gasm of the calamari, I ordered the Citrus Barbecue Chicken pizza, excited for something "different". However, as soon as I placed my order our waiter got a look of disgust on his face and highly recommended I rethink my order as, and I quote "whoever thought mandarin goes well on a pizza was out of their mind". So instead I got the Tuscan Chicken pizza and was pleased, but a little full after a couple of slices due to the calamari overload. Matt got the awesome Peasant Carbonara pasta with tiger shrimp after mulling over the menu for a while (he hates tomatoes, which can be a little difficult at an Italian restaurant).

Overall, the experience was almost better the second time around. We had a great time; the food was great, the beers were great, and our waiter was hilarious. I highly recommened all those single guys out there take a girl to Joe Badali's...clearly, it works.