Cafe Oggi

Ryan made reservations to take me to one of his accounts for Valentine's Day, a small authentic Italian place called Cafe Oggi ('O-Gee'). He told me about it a little more than a week ago, so of course I was excited for Italian, my absolute favorite! The weather was bad yesterday, and the restaurant was about a 20-30 minute drive from our place, so I wasn't so sure early in the day, if we would be able to go since our reservations weren't until 8:00pm. But when Ryan got home, he told me to be ready around 7:00, so I was thrilled! Ryan said the owner had told him he had about 20 cancellations because of the weather so we expected this small place to be empty...but it was packed, mostly with older people.

We opted not to get an appetizer to save room for dessert, but we snacked on some fresh Italian bread and dipping oil. The owner greeted us and suggested a bottle of wine after we told him what we were having for our meal and the wine was fantastic...and it was on the house if you can believe that! Only about the third perk we've ever experienced from Ryan's job when dining out, so it is still unexpected and exciting when it happens.

I ordered ricotta-stuffed shells with a cream sauce. It was to die for...the best pasta I've ever had! It was so creamy and cheesy and the shells were homemade, more like ravioli than what I would consider "shells." Ryan had butternut squash-filled pasta (they looked like pierogies) with a wine sauce and he loved them as well. We finished our bottle of wine before dessert. We shared tiramisu and I had a cappuccino and Ryan had espresso. The tiramisu was also homemade and was delicious! I don't usually choose tiramisu because it is typically soggy, but this was a generous portion and perfectly fresh.

All in all it was a great experience. The service was a bit slow, but I'm pretty sure it is supposed to be a dining experience and is supposed to take a while...not exactly like the Olive Garden where they are trying to turn over tables to get the waiting people out of their lobby. I'm so glad Ryan chose Cafe Oggi...I think it is a new favorite! Thanks, baby...for a fantastic Valentine's Day!

I was looking for an image to include, but couldn't find one, so I attached a link to a nice article about the place from the Washington Post. Just click on the name of this post to get to the article.