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1303 Wisconsin Ave. NW
(202) 333-7353
Hours of Operation and Prices
Open: M-Sat 11:30 am-midnight, Sun 11 am-midnight
Entrees: $7.50-$18
Other Information
• Credit Cards: All major
• Reservations: No
• Dress: Casual
• Parking: Street
• Entertainment: Jazz Sun noon-3
• Handicapped accessible
• For the two other Paolo's branches, in Virginia and Maryland: 11898 Market St., Reston, Va., (703) 318-8920, and 1 W. Pennsylvania Ave., Towson, Md. (410) 321-7000.
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No matter what else might have gone to pot in recent decades, chain restaurants have improved. In an earlier era, nothing could be more predictable - or boring - than an Italian-American restaurant with branches in the major suburbs. No longer. Paolo's is a restaurant of considerable comfort - except for the noise level - and the visual enticements of an open kitchen and a wood-burning oven. Its servers are well trained, and it offers food that is imaginative and made from fresh ingredients. Most important, it has added personality to formula cooking.
I like Paolo's at off hours, when the place burbles rather than shouts. And I'm impressed by the attractive listings among the pizzas, pastas and grilled dishes. What's more, Paolo's has added a little extra zest to the same old salads that everyone else serves. It's got a Caesar (but with pecorino romano and garlic croutons) and the usual mixed greens (in this case with olives, pine nuts and gorgonzola). Its grilled seafood salads include calamari with hearts of palm, pine nuts and tomato in orange-basil vinaigrette, and grilled salmon and shrimp with olives and dried tomatoes in sherry-herb vinaigrette. While you might think you've seen everything a chicken salad could offer, the grilled-chicken-and-greens toss at Paolo's includes eggplant, olives, capers and feta as well.
The main reason for going to Paolo's, though, is what comes free: warm, soft, seeded bread sticks and the sensational chickpea-eggplant-olive spread that accompanies them.
© Copyright 1998 The Washington Post Company
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