We decided a few weeks ago to go into queens for a family visit. After spending some time in Trader Joe's with my wife, brother-in-law and his wife, my stomach was making its usual sounds. Walking around a food store for any length of time makes you start to build up an appetite, I am sure everyone can agree.
We wanted to try this place that my brother-in-law and his family have been going to for so many years. Dee's has been in Forest Hills for about 20 years and the one thing that they are known for is their brick oven pizza. We got there before the dinner crowd started venturing in but within a half an hour or so the restaurant was packed. We liked the restaurant setting and the staff was very nice too.
We started off with appetizers consisting of that's right you guessed it; calamari which we all shared and enjoyed. My brother-in-law and I split the beet salad and my wife and her sister-in-law split a Cesar salad. We also ordered a bottle of red wine and the wifey poo spotted one of her favorites on the drink menu called "Caipirinha". This is a Brazilian cocktail that she would enjoy having with my father during the holidays. It brought back fond memories of wonderful dinners we had as a family. They did a fine job with both salads and the calamari was cooked perfectly. You would be surprised of how some places overcook this simple dish. The marinara sauce for the dipping was done really well also.
Onto the main dishes, I opted for the Linguine by the Sea, and everyone else wanted to share the Rigatoni Bolognese along with one of their famous brick oven pizzas. It was so cute; each one of them picked their own topping and had the pizza made with all three toppings. You have to see the variations of pizza's there are so many to choose from and one sounded better than the next. I was pleased with the flavor but was not happy with the portion (maybe its just me but I like to see a large portion especially at an Italian restaurant), it consisted of sauteed shrimp, PEI mussels and calamari over linguine in a spicy plum tomato sauce. The others were extremely happy with their Bolognese, my wife thought they did an outstanding job with the flavor. They were also complimenting the pizza, the crust is done to perfection in a beautiful wood fired brick oven located by the front door for all to see.
We then went onto to the desserts, my brother-in-law said if there is anything that you have to get there it is the Tiramisu; he happens to think it is one of the best and orders it every single time he goes there. So they had the Tiramisu, I had the Key Lime pie and we all opted for coffees. Both were outstanding; though we don't know if they are home made. It was definitely a delightful day and incredible dinner we will certainly go back.
We apologize for no photos on this one due to the Blackberry not cooperating (it did not save the photos) but trust me it all looked as good as it tasted!
They get 5 out of 5 forks.
