Consistently excellent Trattoria Fratelli is a must-visit for Italian fare

• By Phantom Diner

If you’ve got some time during the holiday season to head out for a relaxed meal or two – and if you don’t, I highly suggest you make such time – you should seriously consider wending your way to Lebanon to dine at one of my all-time favorite Central Pennsylvania restaurants.

Trattoria Fratelli, is a casual, comfortable sort of place, tucked in an over-the-tracks, out-of-the-way old city neighborhood.

And it’s unique for reasons that extend beyond its wonderful food.

It not only managed to stay around for two decades-plus at a time when so many restaurants in our region tend to come and go. It also managed to maintain a level of culinary excellence rarely seen outside major metropolitan areas.

If you love Italian and haven’t been, you need to visit. If you’ve been but not in a while, you need to know it’s as good as ever.

It is really the whole package: food, service, atmosphere (including the intoxicating fragrance of a wood stove oven), with a hard emphasis on food.

The place is smallish but cozy. The dining room, with a beautiful bar, has hardwood floors, exposed brick walls and wood-beam ceilings. Wall art, like the menu, rotates with the seasons. And service always is informed and attentive.

Cocktails are well-made. There’s a delightful wine list with selections from various regions of mainland Italy, as well as from Sardinia and Sicily, and there are reasonably-priced wines by the glass, including nightly features.

My recent meal there began with an appetizer of pan-fried oysters with some pomodoro sauce ($11). It is a small plate of three large oysters. It approaches the size of a meal in itself and is therefore easy to share. And it is simply delicious.

My dining partner opted for sautéed eggplant ($9) with olive oil and thinly-sliced Portabella mushroom “bacon” with truffle honey, which also drew high praise.

Pizza runs in the $12 o $14 range and is extremely popular, either as a shared appetizer or as an entrée. And the house-made bread is not be avoided.

Pizza offerings can include a four-cheese (mozzarella, ricotta, asiago, pecorino) pie, as well as a pie with wood-roasted chicken, hot sausage and peppers. You can even build your own pie with anchovies, eggplant, pepperoni, etc.

Pasta dishes are priced from the high teens to the low 20’s. Most come with a house salad which, unlike far too many house salads, is perfectly dressed, fresh, crisp and refreshing.

I went with penne al pollo, penne pasta with wood-roasted chicken, spinach and pine nuts in a light basil cream sauce ($18). It was hard not to lick the bowl.

The other pasta at my table was tagliatelle alla Bolognese ($17), a classic dish of pork, beef and tomato sauce that is always suspect at lesser eateries but always perfect at Trattoria Fratelli.

Pasta dishes change but can include butternut squash ravioli with pancetta and roasted Brussels sprouts, cavatelli with seafood or spaghetti with venison. Point is, when it comes to pasta, there is always variety.

There is also more. The menu usually includes a veal chop, a filet mignon, a couple of seafood dishes. For example, maple bourbon-glazed salmon with sweet potato gratin and escarole. And, recently, there was a turkey breast piccata dish with broccoli and peppers.

It is difficult to save room for dessert. But if you can, it’s worth it. Among favorites are vanilla crème brulee, chocolate opera fudge tort and, especially, when they have it, malted-milk-ball gelato (you will thank me later).

There are specialty coffees and, if you’re not driving, post-meal treats such as apple pie moonshine, grappa, Amarone and house-made limoncello.

This is the real-deal Italian cuisine, consistently excellent and well worth whatever time and trouble it takes to get there.

The sole caution I’d offer is that the place is almost always crowded and they don’t take reservations, except for parties of eight or more. Weekends are rough, though bar is comfy while you wait. But a weeknight is your best bet.

Oh, and don’t worry. The name Fratelli, Italian for brothers, has nothing to do with the frightening “Mama Fratelli,” played by the wonderful, late actress Angelina Ramsey in the 1985 Steven Spielberg-produced The Goonies.

There’s nothing remotely frightening, or goony, about Trattoria Fratelli.

 

TRATTORIA FRATELLI

502 E. Lehman St., Lebanon

Open for dinner Tuesday through Saturday

Takes major cards; street parking; full bar; 717-273-1443.