Bravo Trattoria and Wine Bar

I cook most nights and am a bit of a food snob. I love this place! Happy hour $ 5 glasses of wine, $ 10 Brick oven cheese pizza, great fried calamari, grilled romaine salad just some of our favorites. We love to sit in the bar and have Carlos wait on us. He is a gem as is this place.

I have come here many times to pick up take out pizza (the meatball and carmelized onion pizza is amazing) but tonight we sat at the bar for dinner and drinks. Had a very tasty cavatelli dinner and charcuterie. Food was well prepared and delicious. Carlos, our bartender, was attentive, offered great recommendations, and made a mean Manhattan. I would call it low key yet sophisticated and friendly.

Very disappointing dinner It’s a pretty place but the food quality is poor and the service is slow. I was served a soup that was so salty it was inedible I sent it back. While we we weren’t charged, an apology or gesture would have been appreciated and appropriate. The pizza crust was good, but sauce was too sweet and there was too much of it. Even the balsamic vinegar didn’t taste right. It’s a shame because the location and atmosphere are great. But bad pizza just won’t cut it in Fairfield County!

Incredible. I was hesitant to come back as my last experience was poor, but my daughter begged me for the pizza. Apparently a new Chef as of Wednesday. Our apps, salads, entrees and dessert were all outstanding. Excellent service. Highly recommended.

Wow. Service is poor. Lobster ravioli served cold. Sent it back to be reheated. Came back smothered in extra peas. «Manager» brought it back out and apologized for the «wait.» Understaffed. All in all, poorly executed. Food was mediocre. Never going back. Don’t blame the waitstaff. Management is way substandard.

Barbara and come here often. Great pizza, salads and Italian dishes. Attentive service. inflexible chef.

Came here on a weeknight, and it was fairly quiet. We got seated at the bar immediately and greeted promptly by the bartender. We quickly put in an order of the lobster guacamole. This is a must order! It had large chunks of lobster and you could actually taste the lime juice. It’s not too often that you see this item on a menu so it was a nice change of pace.
For our meal we had the arugula and pear salad, along with a flatbread. The salad was surprisingly spicy even though there were no spicy ingredients.
The flatbread was good, and it was a healthy portion.
Overall, we had a good experience and I’m sure we’ll be back. However, I feel obligated to withhold a five star rating because the experience as a whole just wasn’t anything to brag about.

This place was good! I figured all the reviews were older from when it first opened so it was worth a shot. It’s similar to a low key molto or zaza. I had the filet, it was cooked perfectly and super tender. The gnocchi was a little bland but great with fresh crack pepper. My friend had the chicken Marsala, and she’s super picky about it bc she’s Italian… She loved it. Blood orange margarita was great, we asked for fresh lime juice. Waiter was very polite and accommodating to our obnoxious friend. Location isn’t great but we wish them luck… Will be back!

This is a wonderful restaurant. Service was impeccable. The food was delicious. The menu had a lot of interesting salads that were vegan friendly with no or little modifications, a great selection of tapas and entrees for non-​vegans plus an interesting pizza menu. The atmosphere was comforting. It was quiet enough for conversation. Background music was of the Dean Martin genre. There is a full-​service bar with a TV for sports fans. The tables were decorated with pink roses and candles which helped give the restaurant romantic feel. Highly recommend!

I so wanted to like this place…
The décor was upscale diner — so fun — and the menu was terrific, w/​«gourmet» pizza, pastas and great main offerings. A good variety.
The bartender was dismissive, offhand and almost rude. He acted like I was putting him out when I asked for a glass of wine after being ignored for too long. I overheard someone ask for a wine suggestion — he responded that he didn’t know much about wine.
This is NOT a pizza joint — it is a real restaurant, with prices to match. The bartender should know wine.
The waiter was lovely, but was breathless and acted like the place was swamped.
The house was not full.
The artichoke salad was ice box cold. Frigid. Icy.
The pizza was doughy and the crust undercooked; odd b/​c the top of the crust had some nice burnt blisters. The cheese was not even warm, let alone melted, they were hard little chunks.
The carbonara was not authentic (it is made w/​cream, not eggs and it was full of mushrooms), but very tasty.
Not a good first impression.

You know a place has issues when your facebook check-​in draws out unsolicited horror stories from aquaintances.
Have a look at my other reviews, which are generally pretty charitable. I don’t go for nitpicking or sniping reviews, but, sadly, Bravo is an accolade in name only, and IMHO your money is much better saved than spent here.
First, our experience. Things started promisingly, with a coal fired pizza oven providing ambiance to the well-​lit and smartly styled space.
The menu confusion:
My family arrived in two phases, which prompted our well-​meaning but terminally-​confused server to remove the food menus, leaving only the drinks menu. Logically flawed, but excusable, at least up until the point when our faithful server somewhat impatiently asked if we were ready to order, prompting me to point out we hadn’t actually seen a menu yet. When he came back with a fresh set, we found out there are no kids selections (a buttered penne is off the menu at $ 9). There was no pizza on the menu, which seemed odd with the oven right there in the room, but we soldiered on, assuming the oven was used for baked dishes during dinner service, or something. Only later, when other tables started getting pizzas did we realize that pizzas were on a different menu, which never made it to our table. Given the struggle we were having finding something for our kids, you’d think the server would have noticed.
The dirty glassware:
My wife ordered a glass of wine, and immediately noticed that her glass was filthy — not just water marks but pulp (dead bellini, perhaps?) caked to the inside. Our server’s response was to try to explain it away (oh, it’s just soap residue) linger just a beat too long at the table implying that she should be ok with it now that he had explained, then ran off to the kitchen to rewash it by hand. This took about 5 long minutes which we spent contemplating the glassware on adjacent tables, which could have been pulled into service. They obviously don’t polish glassware here, despite pretensions to fine dining.
The food arrives. Well, most of it anyway:
Three out of four ain’t bad, except when the fourth is for one of the kids, and is *A SALAD*. Ok, ok, it had grilled chicken on it. But the kitchen managed to get a risotto and two pasta entrees out at the same time. Our terminally-​confused server scurried off to the kitchen, stayed there awhile, popped out to enter what I am certain was a grilled chicken caesar into the POS, then went back into the ktichen. In about the six minutes it takes to grill a breast of chicken, he finally appeared with my kid’s salad, with some excuse about how the chicken needs to be done «at a particular temperature» (say what?). So either he let it die at the pass, or it never got entered. This dude was in the weeds with three tables!
And the disappointment sets in:
The calamari was heavily breaded, some of it rubbery and some underdone, which is a neat trick if not exactly what I am looking for in an appetizer. The lobster risotto had a positively stingy portion of the marquee ingredient, was watery, and wasn’t very flavorful. Our two salads were swimming in dressing (even my kid complained). Salmon on another salad was overdone. Penne ala Vodka was similarly watery and lacked depth of flavor.
(Pet Peeve alert — appetizers are billed as «Italian Tapas» to denote… what exactly? Tapas are a) Spanish, b) traditionally free with a drink, c) at the very least, small portions at small prices. These were none of the above. You might as well call them Italian Dim Sum).
The aftermath:
A few friends let us react, then related their stories. One family heading in for pizza at 5:30pm on a Saturday was confronted at the door by the owner, who stated that he didn’t like kids in the restaurant after 6pm. She left. Another had an experience similar to ours — frenzied service with negative impact, disappointing food, never going back.
With a new Italian place opening in Fairfield County every minute, you need to stand out. Bravo stands out, but for all the wrong reasons. I don’t think it’s going to make it.

Try the sausage cavatelli! Very nice wine selection too! The atmosphere is lively albiet a small space. Service was attentive and knowledgeable. Definitely going back.

A very welcome addition to the eastern side of Westport. The starter salads are tasty, generous in size, perfect for sharing. The pizzas are thin-​crusted, with very good topping options to layer over an excellent base (just the right amount of cheese). The atmosphere is pleasant, with a small bar area with two sports-​bar screens. The wine list is good, and the draft beer selection is small but well-​chosen.
Service was slow and disorganized during our first two visits but, to be fair, this was during the opening weeks. Better during our last visit, but still can be tightened up.
Overall, they’re off to a very good start, not V pizza but a reasonable facsimile.

Pleasant interior but the prices are ridiculous. For no drinks, 3 side salads, one small pizza, and two dinner entrees our bill was $ 95!!! Our jaws dropped. Service was s-​l-​o-​w with only 2 waiters covering the crowded room. Food was oversalted. Hope they’ll re-​think their menu (both meals and prices) and retool.