Veni Vidi Vici is a place I had been dying to go to for years since moving to Atlanta. But I always had a bit of hard time qualifying the expected price point to my girlfriends for a girl’s dinner. So when my mom and aunt came in town a few weeks ago for the best of the best of Atlanta’s cuisine, Veni Vidi Vici became our Italian destination. I’ve gotta say, after all those year’s of anticipation, this place did not disappoint.
Appetizers: Fritto Misto, Polipo, & Polpette
The appetizers. Ooh, the appetizers. We decided this was going to be a no holds barred kind of meal so we didn’t hold back. We got three of the appetizers our waitress recommended. The calamari (fritto misto) is a personal fav no matter where I go, but we wanted to step out of our comfort zones so we tried the octopus (polipo) and the rabbit meatballs (polpette). We kept rotating between bites of each because we genuinely couldn’t decided which one was the best.
Main Event: Spaghetti Pomodoro, Linguini, & Spaghetti Carbonara
We intended to vary our main dishes the way we did our appetizers, yet somehow we still all ended up with long-noodle pasta dishes. Best laid plans, right? Spaghetti is my absolute favorite food (specifically my mother’s) but the description of their pomodoro sauce just struck me and I had to have it. Plus there was the added benefit of adding on more of those rabbit meatballs 😉 . The Linguini really benefited from the addition of the clams, which gave the delicious broth a subtle brininess. Where the pomodoro was a heavier sauce and the linguini was light and oceanic, the carbonara was a mix of the two with it’s pork and pecorino. We twirled our forks right through each dish and loved every bite.
Dessert: Vanilla Gelato, Almond Biscotti, & Bread Pudding
Needless to say we were a bit stuffed by the time the dessert menu came. But we rallied and continued our indulgence. My Aunt BB savored her “traditional” Italian dessert of almond biscotti and a glass of vin santo, a Tuscan dessert wine. I needed something that would sort of cleanse my palate so I enjoyed the vanilla gelato which also came with a couple of biscotti (they were so perfect I asked for the recipe to make them myself, but unfortunately the pastry chef declined. C’est la vie). My mom tried the bread pudding, and she made it look so good that the rest of us couldn’t resist a spoonful or two for ourselves. Yowzas. A perfect ending to a perfect meal.
