Tony & Lucille’s Still Rocks New Haven’s Little Italy (With Bonus Coverage From Return Visit)

Wooster Street, also known as New Haven’s Little Italy,

features a wealth of traditional dining venues, including some of the best pizzas on the planet. One of my favorite Wooster Street destinations is Tony & Lucille’s,

which offers plenty of parking and even used to offer rooftop dining in warm weather.

At the back of the parking lot, visitors can still see the old bus that was once a fully equipped restaurant kitchen that could take to the road at will.

In addition to the main restaurant, there is a separate entrance

with its own seating

where one can buy gelato, Italian ice, pizza by the slice, hot and cold subs, calzones and other baked goods to go.

I can’t imagine a better lunch.

Tony & Lucille’s is often credited with inventing the calzone, essentially a half-moon-shaped stuffed pizza slathered with sauce. For years, Tony & Lucille’s calzones were marketed and broadly distributed,

proving remarkably adaptable to home use. But of course, there’s nothing like a fresh calzone straight from Tony & Lucille’s ovens. Better bring your appetite!

Before I demonstrate the kitchen’s capabilities, why don’t you accompany me on a tour of the restaurant? You won’t see a great many customers during this tour, because I took my photographs in the middle of the afternoon. Anyway, once inside the corner entrance, you will spy a wealth of celebrity photographs,

posted menus and maps,

and even lemon trees (which you are asked not to touch).

Beyond the foyer, you will find a good-sized bar area.

The restaurant’s main dining areas are traditional but attractive,

its patrons cheery.

There are little personal touches to the décor.

My favorite end of the dining room includes these attractive murals.

In the mid-1980s, just months after Tony & Lucille’s moved up the street to their current location, I remember being the new Director of Public Relations for the APT Foundation and enjoying a business lunch at this particular table.

I even recall what I ordered, the zuppa di vongole, a bowl of clams in a broth so bountiful and enticingly scented that it drew oohs and aahs from my jealous colleagues.

Still, that meal couldn’t compare with the embarrassment of riches that I would enjoy during this recent visit. I was accompanied by Ignacio Blanco, owner of Ibiza Restaurant in New Haven and Ibiza Tapas & Wine Bar in Hamden. There’s kind of a mutual admiration society between the Blancos and the Saccos. You might wonder what traditional Italian and contemporary Spanish restaurateurs would have in common, and the answer is—plenty! Both have tremendous respect for the ingredients they use, take no shortcuts in food preparation, and produce stunningly flavorful food that wows their customers.

Glasses of Pinot Grigio quickly put us in the mood—the mood for good food.

We began with this platter that included fine olives, good bruschetta and these incredible baked rolls that harbored just a touch of sweetness.

Tony is the baker in the family, and his rolls are nonpareil! Here’s a close-up of the bruschetta.

As filling as the rolls and bruschetta were, we couldn’t resist reloading.

But there was a wealth of treats yet to come. Smoked salmon and fresh Mozzarella proved to be as refreshing a combination as it was uncommon.

Baby clams and white beans populated an incredibly tasty broth laced with garlic, hot peppers and white wine.

Enjoy this close-up (double click on image for full effect).

Unsweetened rolls, also baked by Tony, were better suited to mopping up every last drop of broth.

Great baking also provided the backbone for this hot sandwich. Round rather than elongated, Tony’s “subs” are shaped more like bathyspheres.

Another treat you don’t come across too often is tripe. It’s one of those dishes that’s either superb or “please take it away!” Tony & Lucille’s tripe alla Romano in a sauce flavored with onion, tomato and red pepper flakes was the best tripe I had encountered since I had it in a café at Plaza María Pita in A Coruña, Spain.

Imported linguine in a great hearty puttanesca sauce provided further evidence that Tony & Lucille’s is not “just another red sauce joint.” If you can’t tell the difference, I guess you’re not worthy.

Most amazing of all, however, might have been these scrumptious medallions of veal with portobello mushrooms in a Gorgonzola cheese sauce.

Pay close attention to the garlic vegetable mash in the upper left hand corner, which was absolutely heavenly.

How do you wind down an incredible Italian meal such as this? Less may be more. A simple fragile housemade cannoli provided the perfect finish,

and good espresso was its ideal companion.

And if you’re offered a little housemade limoncello, you can count yourself fortunate indeed!

Now, some introductions are in order. Here you see Blanco (left) with Tony Sacco himself (right) and daughter Anne Grecco (center), who runs the front of the house.

Here you see Lucille cheerfully at work.

Here you see Anne with her husband, Anthony (who works to provide healthful meals to Bridgeport public school students), and with Blanco.

And here you see daughter, Maria, who is an absolute whiz in the kitchen,

as is sister Donna (photographed later).

Tony & Lucille’s is good honest wholesome old world cooking of the highest order. It’s a beautiful thing to see this family, each member of which has different strengths, come together to form one of the finest traditional Italian restaurants in New Haven or anywhere.

BONUS COVERAGE—

I returned to Tony & Lucille’s on May 30th with my wife and daughter in tow. Or actually, my eager wife and daughter towing me, so envious were they of my earlier visit to the fabled restaurant. On our way inside, we paid respects to Lucille, who was enjoying some fresh air from a lightweight chair placed in front of the restaurant. Soon after we were seated, my wife was clasping her hands with anticipation,

my daughter was sipping a Shirley Temple,

and I was taking sips of cold water taken from a carafe refreshed with “some nice fresh mint.”

And shortly after that, glasses of the house Chianti followed.

The first food to arrive was another fabulous assortment of house-baked breads, including bruschetta, pizza bread, broccoli rabe bread, garlic croutons, twisted sweet rolls and a cute miniature loaf

shown close-up here.

We also got to try some hotdog rolls that Tony had just made for a Memorial Day cookout.

There was also a delightful cabbage relish with some zip to it.

Tony & Lucille’s is a busy restaurant, and generous portions of colorful food passing our table kept our curious heads turning. Here’s Marie wheeling a cart full of food by us.

I also snapped shots of an antipasto platter brimming with delights,

these two plates of food,

and this impressive seafood dish.

But we had more food of our own than we could possibly consume in one sitting. We began with these stuffed red bell peppers

and this pane cotto.

Bread factored prominently in both dishes, and while breaded meatloafs, meatballs, crab cakes, stuffed mushrooms, and so on are normally anathema to me, one forgets what a tremendous asset Tony & Lucille’s great breads are in its cooking.

The restaurant doesn’t serve pizza on the weekend, but some pepperoni pizza was found for my fortunate daughter. “One slice is like three,” she observed.

I ordered the baby clams and white beans again, because I knew my wife would love it. This time, an increase in the number of cherry peppers made it peppier.

For our two entrées, we tried Tony & Lucille’s famously soft potato gnocchi topped with fresh Mozzarella

and an incredible special of pork ossobuco in Marsala sauce with portobello mushroom, potato wedges and a zucchini, cherry tomato and onion vegetable medley.

Both were amazing!

For our desserts, we had watermelon

and mango sorbets,

a mixed berry tart,

another cannoli,

and of course strong espresso.

Glasses of housemade limoncello and raspberry-cello were the perfect way to finish my second great visit to Tony & Lucille’s.

As our dinner was winding down, Tony and his daughter, Anne, sat down with us, and we became lost in conversation. Tony said he never claims to have invented the calzone, although he is sometimes credited with doing so. The calzone, he says, originated in Italy, but he was certainly the first in Connecticut to serve calzones in a restaurant and the to market them seriously. At one point, his calzones were being distributed to 100 Stop & Shops, but he got out when the next step would have been to produce them for another 400 Shop Rites.

I end with a photograph of Tony and Lucille’s hardworking and incredibly nice daughters Anne, Donna and Marie.

Tony & Lucille’s Little Italy Restaurant, 150 Wooster Street, New Haven, 203-787-1621