Experience two levels of dining at one of Stratford, Ontario's great restaurants. Our pizzeria serves the best thin crust pizza, pasta and fresh salads and is a fabulous bar to meet up with friends after shopping. Or dine in our stunning main level Taverna for a romantic evening where we feature hand made pastas, locally sourced meats and seafood while you select the perfect wine from our extensive wine cellarmore...See more text
This place is located on Ontario Street beside the memorial gardens.
When I was a kid growing up here in Stratford I remember going to this building with my mother to buy me clothes. It was for as long as I could remember Brown's clothing store. Little did I know that as an adult I would be eatting and drinking in the same building. Stranger things happen I suppose.
The establishment is divided into a higher end upper restaurant and the lower casual "basement". As noted in the heading the focus of this post is the downstairs casual restaurant and bar. To call it a basement does it a diservice as it is decorated in a sleek modern fashion that blends well with the location. Entry can be had from Ontario street through the main doors and down the stairs or from a back door just off the corner of memorial gardens and the alley by the apartment building. To the right of the stairs is restaurant style seating and the open kitchen. The floor is architectural concrete throughout the place with oriental rugs and the exposed brick and stone foundations give a cosy old world feel. To the left and straight ahead is the bar, booth seating and a half dozen tables toward the back entry. Tucked behind the stairs is a wonderfully done wine cellar with a glass wall for viewing. Nice touch. We tend to always sit in the bar area either at the bar or in one of the booths. The decor here is dark mahogany woods, sleek lighting and surprisingly for a basement some nice sized windows. They also have local art on the walls and it is available for sale.
The menu is straight forward and uncluttered. They have an extensive list of hand made pizza with top notch ingrediants which you can order as you like or in pre-done combinations. I must say that the pizza is excellent. Yes... a bit more expensive that the usual delivery fare, but the quality and taste is well worth the price. They had a special on friday nights last year and I hope they do it again, buy two pints of stratford pilsiner and get a margaritia pizza for half price. We did this several times during the winter months. Yes this place stays open in the winter....high marks from me as many of the good places in town close.
Three other notables on the menu are the Mushroom Brushetta...unbeleiveably good.....the mussels...the best and probably only place to get them in town....and virtually any pasta on the menu is top notch italian. The quality and presentation is excellent in all the pasta dishes. The only place in town that can come close is the daily pasta special at Fosters.
Service has always been good. Friendly and prompt.
Downstairs at Pazzo is worth a visit for a drink, food or both.
I went to find out what all the talk was about. The man I went with said he had tried to book a reservation, but they were full. When in Stratford, we walked right in.
Of course, we were a little stuck, so went upstairs although I liked the look of the downstairs menu much more.
I won't really say the food was bad or good- it was passing fair, but the layout of this little restaurant is terrible. The seating is too close. You can't walk around the tables or find a natural pathway. You sit right beside the people at the next table and everyone looked terribly unhappy.
I'm not much on desert so ordered the cheese dessert tray. It was over the top strong cheeses. There was nothing exotic or wonderful about the blend that they chose, they were just pungent and made me want something else...
Oh, and heads up- The washroom is a shared accommodation that you can't get to unless you're willing to take off a couple heads on the way.
We dine out alot (Toronto, London and while travelling)and enjoy doing so. We like all kinds of stuff.... from $ to $$$$ and all styles & cultures.
We had a reservation and were seated upstairs - the room was quite nice - trendy and sleek - quite appealing, especially when dark. But for some reason we were put right at the back, near the kitchen entrance - not sure why since the restaurant was not full & we had reserved over a week prior.
The menu was not large; they did suggest wines to go with each dish - good idea. I think the menu set up is confusing for the North American consumer - apps, pasta mains. North Americans find it hard to think of small amounts of pasta being served like an app - they want a big mound, so I think some people may be put off by the size and content of the pasta dishes. They really aren't meant to be a main course and fill you like one. And since it's mostly North Americans you get, it probably makes sense to make it work for your marketplace. Hmmmmmm?
The food was o.k. but there is was nothing I'd be dying to have again soon. The salad was tasty but not fresh tossed.
The pastas were o.k. but not memorable. The meat dishes were o.k. too - its funny - while we were eating we didn't discuss the food - and we usually do.
The downfall was the absolutely abysmal service. None of us could recall having anything that bad in the past dozen years. It sure had us scratching our heads.
We were still deciding when the waitress came to take the order and rather than working through it with us & answering questions she said she had something else to do and disappeared for another 15 minutes. The order was finally taken more than 30 minutes after we had arrived.
After waiting for a further 55 minutes one of our party asked the waitress when we might expect our food and he was promptly fluffed of with a very obnoxious reply - we were gob-smacked. Condescending and rude! Inexcuseable in a business where customer service is at the core. 5 mins later 3 of the dinners arrived but the 4th had to wait another 5 minutes. The whole time we waited there was no attempt to defuse the situation or make an attempt at customer service.
Since it took so long to order and be served we ended up staying longer than we normally would have, leaving at around 10pm & being the last out. And boy, it was very clear that the wait staff was anxious to have us out of there so they could close. We were really made to feel that we had overstayed the 'welcome'.
What is management thinking here? Nothing, obviously.
There are lots of places to eat in this town and you can get good customer service at most of them.
We won't go back.
I'm not much for posting my complaints on the internet and as such don't really like forums like these. Having said that I'm not going to post a complaint but rather a well deserved compliment about my experience here. I've been reading these postings and I must confess am an ex restaurant owner from a large American city so I am familiar with the kind of reviewers/diners who come into a restaurant of this caliber with champagne tastes on soda pop budgets. It seems like you would have something negative to say about everything so Pazzo take heart, here are some things you've done very well!
The room is lovely NOT pretentious. It is one of the nicest your town has to offer. There has been obvious care and consideration taken to make this space alive and beautiful. Secondly, you have a well thought out wine list with careful consideration given to your selections. We particularly enjoyed the feature Argentinian Malbec, (among numerous others) which was both professionally described and presented by our lovely and well dressed server. Some items we shared included the rabbit liver toscani - slightly spicy, with a marinated fennel and grilled radicchio salad. The mussels were amazing - with saffron and a hint of grapefruit. Summer vegetable salad features local and organic greens and the antipasti plate was original and exciting featuring house cured meats, local cheese from Monforte dairy as well as marinated vegetables, peppers and olives. For main courses we tried the Lamb chops (cooked perfectly with a balsamic and fig reduction). The beef striploin is local, extra aged in their cooler and served with a gorgonzola butter that sets the dish apart from many other steaks I've had in the past.
Organic chicken was delicious with a hazelnut picada and the pancetta wrapped rabbit stuffed with quinoa and served with an oregano brown butter may have been the highlight. Pastas included a vegetarian rigatoni with fresh tomato and local mushroom sauce which was cooked and seasoned perfectly. And the ravioli stuffed with goats cheese, contrary to a previous review, was wonderful - served with an arugula pesto, pine nuts and shaved parmesan might explain his misunderstanding of the dish. Perhaps he was wanting to pay for Chef Boyardee instead of a staff trained at the Stratford Chef School.
Dessert was panna cotta with fresh cherries marinated in grappa, house made chocolate gelato with sesame tuille and a chocolate tart with house made vanilla ice cream and blood orange sauce which was to die for.
Just a tip from one formerly in the business folks. If you want a bowl of pasta and a glass of water - don't go to a restaurant of this caliber. You'll be unhappy with the experience because you don't know how to dine.
Thank You all at Pazzo!
We will be back.
The food was fab! The wait staff equally so. We truly enjoyed our meal. The only downside was that it was very noisy and we were in the part with no windows, so it was a bit oppressive. Nonetheless we truly enjoyed it and hopefully someday be back.
