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Scoozzi Trattoria & Wine Bar
Rating Details »
- Price Range:
-
$$$$
- Accepts Credit Cards:
- Yes
- Parking:
- Street
- Attire:
- Dressy
- Good for Groups:
- Yes
- Good for Kids:
- Yes
- Takes Reservations:
- Yes
- Delivery:
- No
- Take-out:
- No
- Waiter Service:
- Yes
- Wheelchair Accessible:
- Yes
- Outdoor Seating:
- Yes
- Good for:
- Dinner
- Alcohol:
- Full Bar
11 reviews for Scoozzi Trattoria & Wine Bar
Amazzzing italian food. Each and every dish that you order here is made excellently. You cannot go wrong with anything from the menu.
The desserts are so superb that it just makes me want to go back there right now :)
The service was fabulous. The waiting staff was very attentive and were kind enough to describe some of the more exotic sounding entrees on the menu.
Just so you know we went for lunch. It is definitely on the expensive side, but its worth it.
Wined and dined an interviewee here tonight. First visit for me as well. We had a bottle of their only sauvignon blanc...good, but nothing special--when it comes to sauvignon blanc, I've never had anything better than St. Supery Dollarhide Sauvignon blanc. I wonder why fine restaurants don't offer it (ive seen St Supery Chardonay on the menu, but their S.B. is far superior!) But I digress...
So for food, being women, we don't eat much, but still wanted a taste of as manny things as possible so we shared the first two courses. First, the popular mussels and calamari appetizer...too salty and nothing special. The second course was the salad special which was the absolute star of the evening! It was an arugula salad with fresh figs, gorgonzola cheese, walnuts and proscuitto in light vinagrette. Simple, fresh ingredients that came together to tantalize the palate! Heavenly! Being in an Italian place, we both wanted pasta as our entree. I asked the waitress about whether the pasta was fresh and whether they make any of their pasta in house---sadly yes to fresh, but not in house. My guest really enjoyed her artichoke ravioli topped with shrimp. She said everything in the dish tasted fresh and very flavorful. They did accomodate me in replacing the linguini in my dish with my favorite pasta = papardelle. However, the papardelle was disappointingly not fresh (you can tell because dry papardelle has straight edges and fresh has ruffles!) and over cooked (I like my pasta al dente, which it was not). The sauce was a light but creamy tomato and butter sauce with capers (not a super huge fan) with lots of seafood: clams, mussels, prawn, calamari, fish. Again, tasted good, but not super special.
The most disappointing part of the meal was dessert. The waitress said the portions are pretty small, so though we both wanted tiramisu, we opted to each have our own. It was so horrid, than we each only had two bites of our dessert and called it quit! It was one of these "modern" tiramisu (which the menu did not mention!!! because I would not have ordered it if it did). It was "deconstructed" to have the "flavors" of tiramisu but completely different texture. I hated my last "modern" tiramisu from Tosca in DC which tasted like a cofffee mousse....and if possible, this one was even worse because it tasted like I acciddentally poured my cappucino into my oatmeal in the morning, refrigerate it, and tried to eat it for dessert after dinner! Definitely disgusting! I will never order tiramisu from an "upscale" Italian restaurant again without clarifying whether it's traditional or not. If they use any descriptor like "modern", "deconstructed", or "creative", I will just opt for cappucino to get my coffee taste for dessert!
Service was also lacking. Thought our waitress was very friendly, she wasn't very knowledgeable about the food (unable to answer simple question about pasta without running to check with kitchen). Also, they removed our utensils without replacing us with new ones. We had to ask for new knives for the entree (yes I'd like to cut my huge scallop and prawns into smaller pieces before placing it into my mouth! and my guest would like to cut her ravioli too...in a nice restaurant, you shouldn't be cutting your food with a fork! That's not what it's made for, and they shouldn't expect you to use it for that purpose!) Then she brought us our desserts without any utentsils, came back 10 min later to bring us the check! Weird! Plus, we had a bottle of wine and a bottle of Pelegrino, and we both had to refill our glasses at multiple times during dinner. She refilled our water and our wine exactly once from each bottle! All together pretty dismal service for a place known to be upscale and hauty!
I didn't pick this restaurant...my boss did and sent us their with the company's credit card, so I can't complain too much about a free meal. However, knowing the level of food quality and service here, I would not spend my own hard earned money here!
Came here for a brunch, but I ate off the lunch menu since everything on the brunch menu had eggs in :(
Food was very good; I was surprised to get food this good in NH. Excellent aglio & olio pasta. Insalata caprese was o-kay but not great, 'snickers' gelato was similarly o-kay. Definitely high-end food here - fresh, tasty and delicious, but not /quite/ amazing. Wine recommendation fitted the meal very well.
The only strange thing is the location - it feels like you're sitting in a cave.
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I've been here a couple of times taken by my coworkers, but been really disappointed each time.
Positives: The ambiance is great, you can spot Famous People (TM) if you peek around. Right in the middle of Chapel, New Haven's fancy neighborhood. Great for grabbing a bite before or after some theatre.
Negatives: The food is quite drab. Pasta overboiled, meats flavorless, etc. I could cook better Italian at home. Chef Boyardee could make a better sauce.
Warning: Parking is impossible on Chapel on Friday-Saturday night unless you find a pay lot.
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It's between a 2.5 and a 3 rating -- it's a 2.5 on the gourmet scale and a 3 on a regular scale. Scoozzi is trying to be gourmet & fancy (upscale ingredients, etc) but it falls flat. However, it could be a very good higher-end regular restaurant. It also didn't really have any vegetarian-friendly items.
The ingredients were fresh but the flavor wasn't there. The service was very good (esp. considering half of our party was late) and the atmosphere was festive (but quiet enough for us to have a conversation).
In the end, we probably won't be going back though.
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The food here is good, but it wasn't what I expected. People told me that this was one of the best Italian places in New Haven, but nothing was make-you-jump-out-of-your-seat awesome. The atmosphere is good, and very upscale, and I caught an air of pretense. Overall, I had a better-than-average experience. 3.5-4 stars.
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Scoozzi presents itself as an exciting alternative to the boring and gloppy southern Italian fare one has to suffer through on Wooster Street and in American Little Italys the country over. "Everything Italian, but nothing you've come to expect," their menu declares--and the slogan is indeed enticing. The flavors are, admittedly, more dynamic, more interesting, than, say, what you find at flavorless foundering dinosaurs like Wooster Street's Tre Scallini or Consiglio's--but at the end of the day, Scoozzi is still too heavy, too blunt, too Americo-Italian to really succeed. Delightful salads and occasionally stellar appetizers, not to mention the largest gin martini in town, are saving graces, but this place isn't quite the nuevo-Italian hot spot it wants to be.
First let me say that I'm happy to see that the other reviewers ALL gave Scoozzi 5 stars. I really want this place to rock. Unfortunately for me, it doesn't.
Starting with the service I can tell you each time I've been there the service has been pretty awful. In fact one night after sitting the bar for about 20 minutes and not getting so much as a "I'll be right with you" we got up and left. The host and manager stood there and watched us leave. No apology and no good bye. It wasn't even busy. Even during lunch the service is slow and unattentive.
I've eaten here for lunches mostly. Lunches are somewhere in the vicinity of $12-15 so my expectations are consistently good food, and this isn't. And while the items on the menu always sounds wonderful they miss the boat a good perecntage of the time. How can tiliapia BE that dry? I've had the rissotto a couple times and sometimes it's great - sometimes not so much. On the contrary the bolognese is consistently quite good and if I ordered that everytime I'd be a happy customer. And, I'm the first tto admit that my knowledge of wine is weak. But I try and I do know a nice glass of wine when I have one. I've tried many of the wines by the glass and have yet to try one that I like. At $10-12 a glass they should be able to serve something less pee-pee like (like the Pinot Noir!).
The patio is Scoozzi's strongest asset. Last time I was there (April 2008) Yale seems to have done to the patio what it does with so many great New Haven hot spots. Destroy it. According to our server Yale decided this cute little patio needed to be more like the style of the building next to it. So instead of a garden dining with wysteria and lighted trees we now have a stark WWI like shell with no trees or light. Oh, and stop letting cusomters smoke out there!
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Oh Scoozzi, how I love thee...
My Father took me here for a birthday brunch when he broke tradition and didn't take me to Bill's. And I almost didn't forgive him for that, except that the food was delicious, the service was spectacular, the band played me Happy Birthday and they gave me a wine tasting.
Since then, I've been back a few times and every time has been wonderful (well except for that one date...). The paella risotto was superb, the desserts are always delicious and beautifully plated, and the wines are always paired properly.
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Of all the restaurants in New Haven, Scoozzi's is definitely my favorite. A small yet elegant place with just enough touch of class. The service is excellent and the food is like an explosion in your mouth! Their risotto and fish entrees are superb. Make reservations if you expect to dine on a friday or saturday night, because its almost impossible to walk in on either of those two nights.
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This is one of my all time favorite Italian Trattoria serving great great risotto and other dishes. It is a great date spot and right across from Yale. I told my best friend, mike about this place. Ever since when he drives down to PA, he has to stop by at Scoozzi. Food price is average ranking around 17 - 28 dollars for entrees.I love their front patio. Cool design and impeccable service. They offer cool brunch and cool jazz music too.... you won't be disappointed, trust me. Let say Babbo in NYC is my best ate Italian, here is my second best. When I lived in Providence, 2 hours drive to dine here was just worth it
