I love a good deal, so when I was driving in downtown Palo Alto one night, I saw a sign outside Bucca di Beppo (the Italian restaurant), which caught my eye.
It said Meatball Mondays – 50% off spaghetti and meatballs!! I made a mental note. A couple weeks later, when Vince and I were hungry on a Monday night with no dinner prepped, I said, “HEY! It’s Monday! Let’s go to Bucca di Beppo for Meatball Monday!” He loves Italian food, so he was down.
We drove there, parked in the downtown Palo Alto Ramona Street garage, and saw this tasty meatball truck parked there too. Made us even more excited to head to dinner.
I never understand the photos on the walls..
If you’ve never been to Bucca di Beppo, the restaurant is family-style Italian food. You can order the typical salad, pizza, pasta, appetizers, etc.. from the menu, but all portions come in family sizes – small (feeding 3 people) or large (feeding 5 people). No portions are individual sized.
Ok so we ordered the spaghetti and meatballs! You would think we would’ve ordered the small size, per the recommended portion sizing. However, Vince adamantly wanted the large family size – which is for 5 people!! and we are 2 people!!! Sigh. Why?! But we did so anyways.
Eyeing the empty table next to us where they left meatballs! So tempting.
Finally our LARGE family size of spaghetti and meatballs came! And boy, was it large.
Here’s his hand next to it for comparison.
After I had about 2 servings onto my small plate, I was already full. By the way, I couldn’t even eat a whole meatball. They’re ENORMOUS!!! Maybe it was because I was still chomping on the free bread through dinner. I can’t help myself.
P.S. to Bucca di Beppo if you’re reading this, Vince’s chef commentary is that the dish should come with 5 meatballs if the dish is meant to serve 5 people. Otherwise people would have to split meatballs…
Okay he finally gave up. This is how much was left. He did an admirable job.
Leftovers for many days to come…
Alright, that’s a wrap on our experience at Bucca di Beppo for Meatball Mondays! Next time, we need to bring a larger group. Plus I would probably like to order some other dishes next time. Eating plain spaghetti and meatballs can get a tad boring. Definitely add a generous sprinkling of red pepper flakes to add flavor. I think I actually prefer spaghetti with bolognese sauce instead of spaghetti and meatballs – spreads out the meat to pasta ratio better. 🙂
Okay if you try this out, let me know how it goes! Happy eating!
No more meatballs for us for awhile.
