My post today is going to be a rant, rave & review of Coppa. This is a very nice, upscale Italian restaurant on Washington & TC Jester in the Houston Heights area. Thanks to freaking Roula for talking about it on 104.1 KRBE about her eating a pizza with eggs on it and how incredible it was here, I just had the need to go. I normally don't go out to eat Italian too much because I am picky, and my boyfriend has said I have ruined Italian restaurants for him; he says that, in his opinion, my Italian cooking is far better (awwww ♥)
So I sent a tweet to Roula letting her know my bf was taking me (back on the 9th), and she immediately suggested the Lemon Semifreddo for dessert! So we get there, and this place is PACKED! Immediately we were not drawn to inside seating; the patio had such a warm, inviting ambiance and luckily, this is where we were seated with nice fire heaters. We had a really sweet waitress (totally forgot to get her name), and she was running everywhere but never forgot us for one bit.
To start off our meal, we ordered the Prosciutto Truffle Breadsticks off the Bites menu and also the Roasted Pulpo (roasted octopus, an off-menu item) off the Small Plates Menu.
The octopus was so perfectly cooked, that our fork just melted through it with ease and the taste was phenomenal.
I decided to try their Spaghetti Carbonara (I was secretly praying it was equally phenomenal because I make a totally killer Carbonara myself and have yet to find a fantastic one in any restaurant.
Spaghetti Carbonara
Let me die a happy death now: the dish has salami toscano instead of the usual pancetta and was such a pleasant surprise. As you can see towards the bottom left, yes that is a whole egg yolk (this is the secret to carbonara). They bring the parmesan cream sauce in a very tiny pitcher and "help" with it once at the table: they toss it all together nice and gently.
Once word: SPECTACULAR! My fave NEW Italian restaurant after this dish!
Swordfish with Risotto Cake & Mussels in a Tomato Fennel Sauce
So Christopher orders a special off-menu dish for his dinner which was this incredible cut of Swordfish with a beautiful risotto cake, beautifully cooked mussels and this very luscious tomato fennel sauce. He was totally in love with this dish and agreed that this was now our fave Italian spot.
We just HAD to take Roula's suggestion and order the dessert:
Lemon Semifreddo
Holy crap! This dessert was absolutely fabulous: semi-frozen lemon custard atop a lemon curd and topped with pistachio crunch (kinda like brittle)..forget it, it was totally out of this world!!
sooo happy!
Valentine's Day
So we were lucky to get on the patio again and we ordered the same drinks (too good to pass up).
Fritto Misto
So this time we opted for the Fritto Misto on the Small Plates menu: jumbo shrimp, delicate calamari, green onions, basil, fennel and whole lemons drenched in rice flour batter (SO much lighter than regular tempura) and fried served with a marvelous lemon aioli for dipping. I cannot believe how incredible the basil tasted battered and fried! This is a MUST try!
Spaghetti Lola
I must admit I had my heart set on a dish I eyeballed the last time; however, they had a special Valentine's Day menu set up so I opted for the Spaghetti Lola which had a beautiful story behind it: inspired by the chef's 2 grandmothers, one with the love of veggies and the other for cooking. The hand made spaghetti is make of basil, parsley and other greens in what I can imagine is kneaded into the pasta dough which gave the pasta such an amazing flavor profile. The pasta is topped with a beautiful tomato basil sauce and then fresh burrata (this stuff is so creamy and heavenly) which just bursts all the luscious cream into your pasta. This is such an original dish, and I am so glad I ordered this!
Bone-in Ribeye Florentine Style
Chris opted tonight for the ribeye which is a 18oz of meat and is cowboy cut with the bone in (his fave); this smells absolutely amazing! It is topped with lots of beautifully roasted garlic gloves, rosemary sprigs and fresh parsley and comes with a side of crushed potatoes.
Now I must say he orders his steak medium rare, but it came out medium well. Our waiter is the best waiter EVER! His name is Grant, and he got on it quick, fast & in a hurry. The manager, Reilly, came out immediately and apologized and within a few min a new, thicker steak came out and was perfect! Chris was absolutely thrilled with his meal!
You will never believe what we had for dessert:
Cotton Candy
The best freaking cotton candy we have ever had plus it came out with a sparkler on top!!! Our past waitress had said it was like a birthday thing, but our waiter got it for us anyway.....crazy amazing!
Cappuccino
Plus I had a couple of Cappuccino's and even got Chris to like them as well; they were perfect and surprisingly complimented our cotton candy, lol!
Hopefully you will be able to visit Coppa Ristorante; if you do, try to get seated with Grant. He is super awesome, has a real knowledge of the restaurant, it's history and the food AND he has a real passion for food and has fantastic customer service.
Part 2 of my Valentine's Day coming soon!
Until then, Happy Eating!!!! ♥
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