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photos by s.n. jacobson

Fratello?s
1906 Broadway
Vallejo
557-2137
Dinner only
Monday ? Thursday 5:00 ? 9:00
Friday ? Saturday 5:00 ? 10:00
Closed Sunday

The bad news is that the Foothill Caf?, a down home restaurant in Napa closed soon after I visited. The good news is that there is a restaurant in an industrial area of Vallejo that fills the need for quality food in a comfortable setting. Fratellos is the kind of place that people who like good food will discover and return with friends.

Fratellos is located behind Raleys, just off the corner of Broadway and Tuolomne. There is no street parking here, but the restaurant has a large parking lot behind the dining area.

The interior with walls painted orange and yellow, candles on the tables and real chairs, is cheerful and welcoming. When I visited, the best part was seeing the smiles on the faces of other diners. There is something very special and satisfying about the food at Fratellos.

Our meal started with a couple of glasses of Italian wine, a chianti and a barbera. Although the list is small, the wines have been carefully selected. With our wine, we ate slices of warm fresh Italian bread with a dip that tasted of olives.

The Beet and Orange Salad was a heaping mound of carefully dressed beets. The orange segments added an intense sweet flavor. Angelas Salad has an almost irresistible combination of almonds and gorgonzola cheese. The soup of the day was Kabocha Squash, a large thick bowl of the earthy vegetable soup.

The Roast Chicken took something ordinary and made it sublime. The dish consisted of half a chicken cut into large pieces. The skin was crisp, brown, and covered with a spicy herb mix. The meat remained moist. Best of all was the salsa served on the side. Flavors exploded in our mouths while eating this dish. The vegetables were cooked al dente in butter.

The Ravioli was a long shot from the packaged cheese pasta that this word often refers to. The Ravioli at Fratellos consisted of large squares of delicate yet firm pasta filled with duck and vegetables and coated with a brown butter sauce. The sauce had a flavor of onion that complemented the filling. Both the wildness of the duck and the earthiness of the vegetables came through.

For dessert we had the Tiramisu. The version at Fratellos is the traditional moist square of layered mascarpone cheese and cake soaked in liquor with a shaving of chocolate. The texture and flavor achieve the goal that many tiramisus fail to achieve. The espresso at Fratellos is strong, almost syrupy, they way I remember espresso tasting in Italy.

The menu at Fratellos includes the expected pasta with marinara sauce, but no pizza. This is the kind of traditional Italian food that graces the pages of my cookbooks, the Italian version of haute cuisine.

The couple who own Fratellos are originally from Guatemala. They worked for many years at an Italian restaurant in San Francisco before they decided to create their own. The restaurant has been opened almost a year and is slowly being discovered through word of mouth.

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