Baci — Restaurant in Rockledge

We moved to Florida last year and are still trying to find our favorite haunts. When my wife saw an ad for Baci, she pointed to it and said, "6 dollar martinis and 20% off pizzas every Tuesday. You in?" Like she had to ask!

We arrived at 5PM on that Tuesday and the place was already humming. Almost every table was filled and the bar area was completely occupied with people clearly enjoying their visit. Our server was bubbly and fun-spirited and walked us through the menu and made several recommendations. First, she talked us into trying the garlic knot meatball sliders. OMG!!! They just about ruined my appetite as I couldn't keep my hands off of them.

We each ordered a martini. My wife tried the lemoncello martini, and I went for the grapefruit martini. I don't usually go for sweet drinks, but they assured me it was mildly sweet. And they were right! I was delighted by my choice, and my wife absolutely loved her lemoncello. It actually tasted like the lemoncellos we used to get in Italy. Spot on! Later we decided to order one last drink and chose the blood orange martini. It was wonderful, as well. But, it was a tad sweet for me. So, I just declared it to be my dessert!

The garlic knot meatball sliders were perfection. We rarely order appetizers, but I'm so glad we gave them a chance. AND--it was happy hour, so they were 50% off!

We ordered the spicy Italian pizza, which had pepperoni, and a couple of different salamis, and topped off with banana peppers. That pizza was soooo dialed in! We gobbled it down and just about made ourselves sick. So, I say this tongue in cheek, but there was too much meat on our pizza! (Like that's a thing, right?) Seriously, it was loaded with robust, spicy meats, and we loved it.

So, we were so excited by our garlic knot sliders that I completely forgot to take a pic of the pizza.

WE ARE GOING BACK! Where else can you get three drinks, an appetizer, and a pizza for less than 40 bucks?

Oh, on a side note, the restaurant was super clean, including the restrooms.

#todaysdiscovery...

2 days later and still having a hard time posting this. First off the inside is cute/nice, a cross between an Italian eatery and sports bar with a tiny slice of a cosmopolitan martini bar. The service was awesome, very friendly and attentive. Now the food.... We ordered the "Baci balls" meatballs and 2 orders of Chicken Masala. Simple and easy, right? Well the ball were like tiny basil balls wrapped in copious amounts of dough, deep fried and served with marinara. They were ok, but bland, the meatballs tasted only like basil and they dropped 1/2 tsp of red pepper flakes on the top of the non seasoned marinara which we had to scoop out. While eating the appetizer our meal was served. Pasta was cooked well, servings were large and looked wonderful. But looks can be deceiving. Chicken was also cooked well. But had absolutely no flavor. We took bites and looked at each other in awe. We are still talking about the meal today. It tasted like oil, water and starch... The masala was never forward as a flavor. By the look of the meal we both thought for a second we got piccata, but no lemon flavor. Just a starchy, oily, water flavor. Very weird. Garlic knots were burned and I had 1 and it was hard as a rock. Over baked for sure. I dunno. So disappointed. With this place, try it...

It’s been years since my mom and I have gone to Baci. We decided that it was time for a visit because we were craving pizza.

I ordered a 12” margherita pizza, my mom ordered a 12” roasted feta pizza, and we split a side caesar salad.

The salad was pretty large for a side salad. It had enough contents in it for two people to split. It was loaded with parmesan cheese and croutons. The caesar dressing was creamy and tangy.

My pizza is described as having “fresh tomatoes, garlic, olive oil, fresh mozarella, and basil.” There were thin slices of tomato which tasted fresh. It had the right amount of garlic where it wasn’t too pungent. There was a light amount of tomato sauce which I liked. The cheese was stringy and soft.

My mom’s pizza is described as having “roasted red peppers, ricotta, feta, mozzarella, fresh garlic, and basil.” The cheeses were creamy, the peppers had a slight smokey and sweet flavor, and it had the right amount of olive oil.

The crusts on both of our pizzas were yummy enough to dip in the caesar dressing we had left over.

We took home the other halves of our pizzas to enjoy again. We’ll...