Caruso's Grocery, Chef Matt Adler's Red-Sauce Italian on Capitol Hill

[Keithstg]

Headed to Caruso's Grocery for dinner on NYE. While Caruso's is new, we figured the homage to classic red sauce Italian American food was enough to qualify for the "throwback" theme - especially since substantively all the red sauce spots in DC (Famous Luigi's, AV) are gone. Caruso's was running a four course set menu with several choices per course. Looking at the "regular" menu, the NYE set menu provided a solid cross section of the menu overall.

We'd been to the Roost before, though not to Caruso's. While most of the entrances to the Roost are on Pennsylvania, Caruso's entrance is on 14th street. The restaurant's smaller than I imagined, with a bar off to the right of the entryway, delineated with different tile and a darker overall theme than the rest of the restaurant. Continuing a weekend theme, the restaurant was full. Great to see!

We began with an order of garlic bread along with a first round of drinks. The garlic bread was fine - though the very reasonable drink prices and thoughtful liquor choices really stuck out to me. A G&T and house spritz later, we selected our courses. All four of us began with an appetizer of polpette, four smallish meatballs in a bright tomato sauce. Meatballs at second tier red sauce joints can be leaden, these were pretty light, and deftly seasoned. Would certainly order them again. Pasta followed, and we had penne a la vodka (x2), bucatini in a spicy ragu, and shrimp scampi. My son LOVED the shrimp scampi, which looked to be a pretty traditional version though I couldn't get anywhere near it. My wife was kind enough to share the spicy Neapolitan ragu, which was done with housemade bucatini - the ragu was nicely spiced and again had a lightness that showcased the kitchen's skill. The penne a la vodka was very good as well, tough as a vodka sauce fan and ardent tinkerer I prefer my own version. I'd still order it again, though.

Our mains were three orders of Chicken Parm and one order of filet medallions. The chicken parm was excellent - my personal preference for a chicken parm is light/ bright sauce, consistent mozzarella coating, on chicken that's been pan fried - some subtle browning of the cheese/ breading at corners optional, though preferred. I've also added some lemon zest to chicken cutlets as well. Didn't detect any lemon zest, but pleased to report that the parm hit all of the other criteria head on. Certainly the best I have had recently.

Dessert was a sampler including tiramisu, cheesecake, and cannoli filled with nutella mascarpone. I'm not much of a dessert eater, but did enjoy the tiramisu. The nutella cannoli filling was a bit dense for my taste. We had a bottle of chianti riserva which went well with the meal and was very fairly priced, like the liquor. We'd gladly return - likely with my son's hockey team the next time they play at Fort Dupont.

Service was excellent, though understaffed (who isn't these days). Each staff member we interacted with was very pleasant and helpful, and handled the stress of NYE with aplomb. Chef Adler stopped by briefly to say hello and seemed to have a very good handle on both the pacing of dishes and staffing needs. I should note that there was a bit of a "Karen" incident while we were in the restaurant that the staff also handled very professionally. Can totally understand why Caruso's receives such good press!

[Mark Dedrick]

We went once a couple of months ago and had a very nice experience, despite the fact that the building fire alarm led to us all having to evacuate, and then having an absolute monsoon descend near the end of our meal (neither of which are issues where the restaurant is at fault of course). Good food, good service, good cocktails. Only confusing thing as noted is the entrance to the restaurant. 

 

[Pat]

My birthday dinner was carryout from here last night (now the husband has covid...what a summer this has been). I picked up a meal we ate separately, on different floors of the house. He really loved the Neapolitan ragu with bucatini and said the spiciness was perfect for neutralizing Paxlovid mouth. (OK, that's probably not an endorsement the chef was looking for, but you take what you can get, I guess.) He also enjoyed his Caesar salad and the portion of the tomato-braised meatballs I doled out for him. I had the rest.

The meatballs were not my absolute favorite (that goes to another NRG product, the ones from Iron Gate), but I liked them. The sauce was good for dipping the Italian bread in that came with the order. I absolutely loved the calamari. The marinara that came with it was good for dipping. I thought there was supposed to be a lemon aioli as well, but the second sauce was very vinegar-heavy and looked nothing like the menu photo. Someone might have added the wrong little condiment cup to the order. It will be good with the leftover salad, since I didn't really eat much of the house salad I ordered for me because I filled up on calamari.

Two biggest raves from the order: definitely the bucatini with ragu and the crispy calamari.

While this was fairly expensive, it was the least expensive of our recent meals out, and I'm calling it a great value.

[Bart]

Note to future diners here:  You can order half portions of the pasta dishes.  It's not listed on the menu, but I was here recently and asked, and they were happy to accommodate.  

[Pat]

A friend and I had a meal here earlier in the month. The calamari was as good as I remember it. I love the marinara and aioli they offer with it. (What I had before on the takeout order was definitely not the aioli.) We split a Caesar salad, which she loved but I found a bit goopy. That may have been a function of their splitting the order between two plates, though. I might have ended up with too much of the dressing. (I appreciate their willingness to split the order, even if I sound whiny.)

For an entree, I had what I was craving: the spaghetti and meatballs, which took me back to semi-regular Friday night dinners at a local red sauce place when I was a kid. I thought the meatballs were excellent. Presumably they are the same as if one orders just meatballs and sauce, so that means I enjoyed them even more than last time. Friend had linguine with white clam sauce, which she found too heavy on the lemon. It looked gorgeous.

We had a half bottle of wine, which they don't list on the online menu. (I conveniently threw out the receipt shortly before deciding to write this up 😖.) The server (who was excellent, by the way) described it as an Italian equivalent of sauvignon blanc. We liked it, whatever it was. I also had a glass of limoncello after the meal and we split an order of cannoli.

I wish reservations here weren't so hard to come by, but it's worth it.