Botte Brooklyn — Restaurant in New York

This place is ok. There are some strengths (cocktails and the "space") and some weaknesses (food, price, service) that make it overall fine, but not a place I would recommend to a friend. (See disclaimer at the bottom.)

This building used to be another restaurant called Forno Rosso. Forno Rosso closed during the pandemic. The new owners didn't change much. The furniture and layout is exactly the same, even the posters on the walls are the same. They did paint the walls a deep red when they used to be white, but that's the only difference I can tell. I liked Forno Rosso a lot, Botte, not so much.

As others have said, the cocktails are solid. And the space is beautiful with very high ceilings (25 feet maybe? I'm not a good judge.) If you just wanted a place to grab a cocktail or two Botte would be a fine choice.

Not so much for dinner. The food was just ok. I had lasagna. I used to love Forno Rosso's lasagna. Probably my favorite lasagna in Brooklyn. Botte's was mediocre at best. My wife had a seafood pasta and was similarly underwhelmed. The salad (beets and arugula) was solid as was a fig burrata appetizer we had.

Our waiter was not so great. He was attentive and the timing was good. But he was kind of pushy and there was a definite "upsell" vibe which made it feel impersonal.

Finally a pet peeve that I'll mention just b/c it irks me, but I didn't take it into my overall rating b/c maybe it doesn't bother others:

All the ordering was done with one of those hand held devices. As we told our waiter what we were having he would scan and swipe the screen until he found what we were ordering. It felt like ordering at a fast food place. Then of course when it came time to pay, he just handed it to us and stood over my shoulder as I picked the "tip" amount. Which is fine I guess but makes it feel (to me) even more transactional and impersonal.

Disclaimer: I expect other waiters are better and folks have said the pizzas are good. We didn't try the pizzas so if they are as good as people say I imagine we could have had a much better overall experience if we had had a better waiter. (And maybe it was just an off night...

While staying at a hotel around the corner, and after traveling all day, we wanted somewhere close for dinner. Botte was the ticket. A quick look at the menu and we were sold.

We were greeted and quickly sat. Our server, Manuele B, was over in a minute with water and let us know he would be right over. We scanned the drink menu…like I said, we traveled all day. My wife loves a good Cosmo and wants to try one everywhere. I decided on a bourbon drink, Just Take The Ferry. Both drinks were great!

Shortly after, our server came over with yummy bread and let us know about the daily specials. We had a good idea of what we wanted and placed our order. I ordered the chicken parm and my wife had the fettuccine pesto. They say all of the pasta is homemade and with the irregular shape and size, I believe it was. The food was just as good as our drinks.

Manuele came back and offered dessert or an after-dinner drink. We were stuffed but I did notice they had Limoncello. We are both huge fans and asked if they made it in-house. Our server said they do not, although, they buy from a local guy who does. He explained how the guy makes it and where he sources his lemons. It was very good and smooth. We had a conversation with our server about what he likes for an after-dinner drink and how Limoncello is in Italy…where he is from.

It was a great first night in a city we knew nothing about. We had such a nice time, we went back the day we left for a farewell drink. There we met Miguel. He was just as wonderful as Manuele. We sat at the bar and let him know we were headed home and wanted a goodbye drink. He was great!! We had an amazing conversation about the city and his life now and back in his home country. He was so interesting to talk with we ended up sitting way longer than we anticipated.

Botte is a wonderful place for a good meal and great conversation. I should mention, both times we were there it was off time and they were not super busy. Next time we are in Brooklyn, we...

I have a few mixed feelings about this restaurant. For the most part the lasagna and bruschetta I ordered was good and very tasty … but let me just say I left hungry and unsatisfied. The Bruschetta was basically 3 slices of hard to bite into Italian bread with only marinated seasoned diced tomatoes on it. Not too imaginative of a food presentation. As far as the Lasagna it had a very nice taste to it, but I had a difficult time cutting the noodles and for the price, I got only a very small portion for the buck. To add, the entree does not come with a house salad … well, to be honest, they don’t offer a small salad with the entree. They only offer large salads, second thought after recalling the portion size of the lasagna, the entree salads may have been small salads!

Lastly, I prefer not having people watching my table while I eat. As soon as I finished a dish or a drink, there was a waiter or staff member immediately there to grab it or fill it up. It makes me wonder if they have enough dishes in the kitchen to serve other patrons.

I spent $57 for a very small plate of lasagna which probably had 2 pieces of lasagna noodles with meat sauce and cheese, 3 pieces of Italian toast with diced tomatoes, & unsweetened tea. It should have only been $28 at the most!

If if have the $$$, sharp teeth, & don’t mind staff members eyeing you...