Casual Roadside Eatery where Sonoma meets Italy
Finding a family-fun Italian-American restaurant that brings the goods each and every time is like finding a perfect pair of jeans, or getting into a great college – at least that’s how excited I am when I discover a new one.
In Sonoma this weekend I was told this was a must for family gatherings like the Sunday brunch I enjoyed. The menu is written on boards above the counter, but there’s far more available than deli food as the casual self-serve ordering style would suggest.
All the crucial items are made from scratch: ciabatta and foccacia breads, chocolate-dipped biscotti, lasagna and raviolli, roasted turkey and stimulating coffee drinks. Order a sandwich with such traditional sensations as mortadella or sliced leek frittata, and choose their homemade mozzarella as your cheese like I did. There’s local Russian River beers, wines from the surrounding acres and imported Italian bottles, plus plenty of tammer bevvies.
They let me have some mortadella and some of their house roasted turkey on my mozzarella sandwich – they added a pie of undressed coleslaw and served it on their freshly-baked foccacia bread
We also tried the Tuscan salami combination with a seedy mustard and very wet potato salad, the Damnation white beer from Russian River Brewing Company was an ideal pairing
A half-order of the lasagna is enough with an order of one of the tempting salads, like anchovy-heavy ceasar and tomato and mozzarella duo with aged balsamic
Plenty of homey, painted decor
Order here! Then you’ll be served everything else at the table…
Dutsi, my research assistant poodle and I checked out the scene, then he waited patiently outside until we were finished
Now is a perfect time to head to Sonoma County, California, as the wild yellow mustards make all the fields glow… this is Arnold Road, just a few minutes down the road from the restaurant
Looking up at the menu board, the desserts looked tempting even after we were full!
Isn’t Sonoma just beautiful!? Even with the vines bare…
Look how different the old vine zines look (some in the area are reaching 60 years in age) compared to the cabernet grapes above
If you go:
Cafe Citti is in Kenwood, on Arnold Road.