GUYS OMG.  it's been SOOOOO LONG since we've gone on a date!  have you missed this?  do you guys like these posts?  I have to admit this IS one of my favorite series on the blog.  i LOVE sharing new places with you guys, especially the smaller, not popular places.  i also just really love having any excuse to force frankie to take me on a date.  SOOO there's that.

so let's date!  YAY!

beforeeeee we start on THIS date – i should tell you that we went to MELA East with my mom for happy hour when she was here a few weeks ago and loveeeed it! we got happy hour wine and asked for a meat board with just turkey and prosciutto and it was amazing and SO CUTE inside, which just made me want to go there for dinner more.

Date | March 17, 2017

Time | 7:30PM

Place | MELA East

Drinks | a bottle of Montepulciano d'Abruzzo + Espresso Martini + Old Fashioned

Appetizers | Grilled Asparagus + Polpette

Dinner | Grandma Style Beef Rolls + Pappardelle con Coda di Bue

let's start with the wineeeeeeeeeeee. ?????

so when we got to Mela we knew we were going to be sharing a bottle of wine.  i've been super into reds lately && knowing that we were going to have italian i figured there would be a decent amount of red meat/red sauces so it was sort of a no brainer.  i picked a bottle of Montepulciano because it's one of my faves!

our waitress told us the specials and right away i KNEW i needed the asparagus appetizer.  the asparagus was grilled and then topped with arugula, parmesan shavings, & a balsamic drizzle.  SO FREAKING GOOD.

we also ordered the polpette, and the second i said it our waitress gave us a knowing look and a nod, so i wasn't surprised AT ALL when they were fantastic and perfect.  they were tender and delicious with great flavor.  SO GOOD.

for our main dishes we decided to share two of them.  it's my new thing – one dish that's healthier and one that's more indulgent and share.  i got the idea from a live video Ali from Inspiralized did a few months ago and i loved the idea.  it worked out exactly how i wanted it to so YAY!

buuuuut maybe both of our entrees this time around were indulgent… oops.

we ordered the oxtail ragu pasta because… DUH.  and then when we heard the special was a grandma style beef roll with spinach, a crepe, rolls together and then wrapped in BACON, there was literally NO question in my mind.

both were amazing, but i didn't realize the pasta would come with cheese on top so i was definitely more excited about the rolls.  I asked frankie to eat the pasta with cheese on it so i could have the pasta underneath because i was a baby.  it was SUPER freaking good pasta though.

HOOKAY those grandma rolls.  FREAKING AMAZING.  so so good.  i want to recreate them so bad.  they came with an israeli cous cous that had a bunch of different veggies in it.  ughhhh if you go and they have this on special – ORDER IT.

SO after stuffing our faces with food we decided to finish the dinner off with a cocktail.  i got my favoriteeee espresso martini with no baileys and frankie weirdly ordered an old fashioned.  he's been really into those lately… i have no explanations, but whateverrrr he enjoyed it so that's all that matters.

OVERALL. we loved it.  it was so delish and we will definitely go back again.  ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️