Basta Pasta

Happy Friday! I hope your week has been good so far. It’s been another busy week for me. Lots going on, people to see and hang out with, work to do, and a beach photoshoot with Lauren (which turned out great by the way!) but it’s been a pretty good week!

Today I’ve got more work to do and some chores to do, but I’m hopefully seeing Spiderman: Far From home tonight so I’ll let you know what I think!

If you remember, I recently wrote about my time at the book launch party for Spin the Dawn in the city. After the event, I went to dinner at Basta Pasta. I was in the city with my family doing some other things before and after the book event, so we went to Basta Pasta for dinner. The restaurant is one I’ve heard of for years and my dad, who used to work nearby, has wanted to go to for a long time but never had the chance to. Basta Pasta originated in Japan in 1985 and then opened in the Chelsea neighborhood of NYC in 1990 so there is a bit of a fusion flair to the Italian restaurant.

For appetizers we shared the Polpo, which is roasted braised octopus with baby fingerling potatoes, radishes, olive flakes, pangrattato, in a paprika tomato sauce, and Zuppa di Cozze e Vongole, which is black mussels and clams steamed in garlic and white wine.

If you order the Spaghetti with Parmigiano Reggiano then they bring over the half wheel of parmesan over to your table and serve up your pasta from the wheel. My cousin’s daughter ordered that and it was fun to watch them serve up the cheesy goodness.

I ordered the Tagliolini Nero con Gamberetto e Granchi, which is black tagliolini with shrimp, crab meat, shredded zucchini in a spicy tomato sauce. I love squid ink pasta and it’s not often that I go to restaurants with it on the menu so when it is available that’s usually what I opt for.

We were too full for dessert and had plans to stop by one of my favorite bakeries after so I can’t tell you about their dessert menu.

Everything at the restaurant was good and the open kitchen design is cool and adds to the feeling and the taste of freshness of all the food. The space isn’t huge so it did get pretty loud in there, but the food was good so it made up for it.

Have you ever been to Basta Pasta?