Date Night is a multipart road map for everyone who wants a nice evening out, but has no time to plan it. It’s for people who want to do more than just go to one restaurant and call it a night. It’s for overwhelmed parents who don’t get out often; for friends who visit the same three restaurants because they’re too afraid to try someplace new; and for busy folks who keep forgetting all the places they’ve driven past, heard about, seen on social and said, “Let’s remember that place next time we go out.”
For years my husband Dom has said he doesn’t believe in Valentine’s Day. It’s a Hallmark holiday, blah blah blah. Fine. I’ve never been a fan of forced romance. Last year he started dropping hints that he bought me a Valentine’s Day gift. Couldn’t resist. Got served an ad and thought of me immediately. He just hoped it arrived from overseas in time. All I had for him was a box of his beloved Little Debbie Valentine snack cakes, and I worried they’d seem paltry in comparison.
It was toothpaste. Designer toothpaste from the Swedish brand Selahatin. Instead of “Crest” or “Colgate,” on the front it said “Of Course I Still Luv You.”
“You bought me toothpaste?” I said, dumbfounded.
“Decorative toothpaste!” he said. “It can sit on our bathroom counter!”
I tried so hard to understand what would possess him to buy me such a thing. I even went online to look for clues in the product description, which was a paragraph-long eyeroll calling it a “tribute to hope and fidelity” and a “holy union between woody pine and aromatic juniper.”
This year we’ve given each other the gift of carbs, which never disappoints and is a 24/7 craving since we started watching The Sopranos, which we both somehow missed in the early 2000s. In every other scene someone is eating pasta — and I want that someone to be me.
The Fox Bar and Cocktail Club
Stop 1: The Fox Bar and Cocktail Club
Naturally I ordered the Sunday Gravy ($16), which is not a pot of meat-filled marinara that’s been slowly bubbling on a stove all day but rather a smooth, quiet cocktail made of sun-dried-tomato amontillado sherry and lo-fi gentian that’s been steeped with Parmesan rind. It’s served with a tiny bay leaf in a Nick and Nora glass — not a coupe, Georgian, flip, sling or any of the 11 other kinds of glassware The Fox stocks, which I only know because there’s a sketch of each (and all five shapes of ice) on a menu that could double as wall art.
Why you would sit anywhere other than the bar at The Fox is beyond me. I loved watching the bartender make Dom’s Fox Old Fashioned No. 10 ($22), especially when she stamped The Fox’s logo into the top of the glass-filling ice cube. There’s nothing dramatic or flashy about the bartenders; they work with great focus and precision while answering questions from people like me who have no clue what lo-fi gentian is. It’s fun to have a front-row seat for all the spoons, sprays, garnishes and random splashes from the shaken cocktails.
Sunday Gravy at The Fox Bar and Cocktail Club
Learn from our mistake: The Fox takes reservations at 5 p.m. only, so when we arrived at 5:45 on a Friday night, there was a 45-minute wait because everyone who’d thought ahead was enjoying their Concord grape margaritas, Old Bay popcorn and hot chicken hummus (which contains no chicken). It’s a small space with no indoor waiting area, so if you have to wait, the tiny photo booth just outside the door is a fun way to kill time. Dom and I were too wide to sit side by side and too short to be in the frame, but we had a good chuckle taking the world’s worst pictures.
Parking is not what I’d call plentiful — more of a ditch-your-car-in-an-alley-and-hope-for-the-best situation. Instead of signage, there’s a fox mural along the side of East Hill Row, home to Gallatin Pike-facing Nicoletto’s Italian Kitchen. Follow the foxes to the back, and the entrance is underneath the stairs that lead to The Bowery Vault. Don’t mistake the covert location as coy or pretentious. In a high-low town that’s silly with over-the-top douchebag bars and dives, The Fox is Goldilocks.
Meatballs (top) and cavatelli at Frankies 925 Spuntino
Stop 2: Frankies Pizzeria and Frankies 925 Spuntino
As soon as we got back in the car, I advised Dom that we’d be having a slice of pizza at Frankies Pizzeria before having dinner next door at Frankies Spuntino. I waited until the last second because I knew he’d say the pizza would ruin my appetite, and he did not disappoint. He didn’t have long to try to change my mind, because Frankies is thankfully a three-minute drive from The Fox.
“I’ll drop you off,” he said. “You order; I’ll park and come in and have one bite.”
One bite turned into half my classic Sicilian, a tall square slice covered in a mix of tomatoes and mozzarella and pecorino Romano so it all hits your mouth at the same time as the bread.
This is the play, folks. Frankies Pizzeria is a casual dine-in and to-go spot for slices or whole pies with paper plates, Parmesan and red chili flake shakers on the tables and beer in a stand-up cooler. Frankies 925 Spuntino is more of a sit-down, reservations kind of restaurant, and they don’t offer pizza on the menu. If you want a slice, and I believe you do, this is the way to make it work.
We weren’t the only ones having a slice before heading to the Spuntino: One of the guys who seemed like a casual diner at the pizzeria ran food to a nearby table during our dinner. Internet sleuthing tells me it was John Burns Paterson, wine director of the O.G. Frankies Spuntino in Brooklyn and the reason its sole outpost came to Nashville with him.
Meatballs at Frankies 925 Spuntino
“Spuntino” is Italian for light meal or snack, and most of the menu is meant to be shared. There are seven selections in the salad section, one of which is a beautiful burrata covered in olive oil and large flakes of salt. If Frankies considers burrata a salad, they’re going to get along just fine here in the South. Dom inhaled the paper-thin prosciutto while I ate more than my half of the broccoli rabe and roasted cauliflower. I’d have the shaved Brussels sprouts and ricotta salata again, but not before I try the escarole with sliced red onion and walnuts.
Frankies isn’t much on décor — with the exception of a merch display at the door, there’s just a dried flower arrangement here and there — and I get the sense they haven’t quite settled into the space, which is large and has a few nooks that feel forgotten. A long table lined with bread, plates and utensils sits in the middle of the main dining area, giving the impression that bread is complimentary. This is not the case. We got an order with our appetizers, ate it immediately and wished we had more later to sop up the sauce of our entrées.
I suppose you could share entrées too, but I wasn’t inclined to give Dom more than a forkful of my tomato-braised short ribs and polenta, nor was he happy to part with more cavatelli with hot sausage and browned sage butter than absolutely necessary. Eggplant Parm is my go-to order, and I loved Frankies’ version of eggplant marinara, but wanted it to come with a small side of pasta so I didn’t feel like I was missing out.
Tiramisu at Frankies 925 Spuntino
Earlier in the night, upon learning we were headed to Frankies for dinner, our bartender highly recommended the red wine prunes and mascarpone for dessert. We’d had the tiramisu on our first visit and loved every rum-soaked, cocoa powder-covered spoonful, but thought we’d give the prunes a shot. When the food runner set down the prunes on our table, he said, unsolicited, that it was his favorite dessert on the menu. Dom and I took a couple bites, shook our heads and ordered the tiramisu again.
At least twice in the weeks since our visit to Frankies, Dom has lamented the fact that he didn’t order the meatballs with pine nuts and raisins, and that the couple at the two-top next to us who had them “out-ordered us.” So maybe on Valentine’s Day, Dom will come home for dinner and find Frankies meatballs on his plate. And maybe he’ll surprise me with more Scandinavian dental decorations for our bathroom counter. Every time I see that ridiculous tube of toothpaste it reminds me that, beyond all the clichés and candy hearts of Valentine’s Day, love is mostly about getting it horribly wrong with the best of intentions.
