Zucca At Night

I'm going to review my dinner at Zucca in Smyrna. Zucca has a different menu for brunch and dinner. It's like a different experience for both. Dinner is about pizzas and pastas. Brunch is about mimosas, bloody mary's and frittatas. So I feel I should separate them. If I ever come back for brunch, I'll review Zucca at brunch. 

Well, when I walked in for dinner, I didn't feel Zucca would impress me. The menu looked boring. I felt skeptical on how good they made their pastas and pizzas. I'm also a huge pizza snob so I got ready to criticize their pizza.

I first tried their house salad. It was your standard tomatoes, greens, and olives. The grated parmesan cheese didn't add too much. I liked the olives though. The oil and balsamic vinegar dressing wasn't anything special.

Just your everyday house salad.

I tried their seafood linguini. My lack of enthusiasm turned to excitement when they brought it out. I love seafood, and their seafood linguini looked good.

It did have a slight fishy taste though. I'm thinking their sea food wasn't super fresh. But that's all right. It still tasted good to me. Since I like seafood a lot (hence my name, Mr. Kitty), I can handle a small amount of fishiness.

The sauce also had a bit of spice–which was a nice touch. I liked this dish. But if you can't handle something that's too fishy or any spice at all, I would avoid it.

Linguini with lots of seafood goodness.

Their pizza won an award in 2008 at some pizza contest in Las Vegas. It wasn't even a national award, it was for the South East region. Sure, back then in 2008, I can believe it.  But since Antico and Varasano's popped up in Atlanta, the bar has risen.

I must admit, if Antico or Varasano's never opened, Zucca's pies would be one of the top pies in Atlanta. It's a tier below those two, but it's not a bad pie.

Zucca's Victory Pie supposed to be their best. So I ordered it. It's pretty much a Margherita with meat and mushrooms. The pie looked like it was cooked in a conventional oven, not a wood burning oven. Of course, that means they can't get a good char in their crust.

I wasn't too impressed with the crust. I'm sure they didn't use high quality toppings, but the toppings tasted good. Even though I didn't like the crust, the combination of crust, toppings, etc. did provide a satisfying pizza. It tasted a lot better than I expected.

Not the best pizza in Atlanta but good enough to satisfy me.

Zucca offers decent brunch and dinner. It looks like a bar from the outside. In fact, the same owner owns the bar next to it. So I thought I would get some crappy bar food. But they did exceed my super low expectations. You can get a decent dinner here. Their pizza wasn't bad and their pasta wasn't bad. I give it 3.5 paws.

Zucca Bar & Pizzeria
2860 Atlanta Rd SE
Smyrna, GA 30080
(770) 803-9990
http://www.zuccasmyrna.com/