DINING OUT: Vern’s, Rochester
Modern Italian cuisine drawing crowds to Park Avenue restaurant
By Jacob Pucci
It’s around 4:30 p.m. on a late Saturday afternoon, yet guests are already lining up for dinner. They’re not after an early bird special, but rather a seat at Vern’s, a quaint spot in Rochester’s lively Park Avenue neighborhood whose no-reservations policy means if you want a taste of wonderfully creative, modern Italian food, you’d better get there early.
Vern’s inspired take on modern Italian cuisine has been drawing crowds since the Swan family, a sibling team of prominent Rochester restaurateurs whose other operations include fellow Park Avenue hot spots Dorado and Roux, opened the restaurant in 2019.
We were able to skip the 30-minute wait for an indoor table by sitting at the marble-topped bar that serves as the centerpiece of the small dining room. The drink list includes five regional beers on tap, a thoughtfully chosen list of low-intervention (or natural) wines and ciders from around the world and a cocktail list of about a dozen offerings, including an option to “wing it” and leave it in the bartenders’ capable hands.
Dinner began with the caprese salad ($14), a daily special of heirloom tomatoes tossed in a hot honey vinaigrette and topped with fresh mozzarella cheese, fresh mint, balsamic vinegar, arugula pesto and flaky salt. The tomatoes, firm-fleshed and flavorful, were a quintessential taste of summer. The mint and pesto offered a twist from the usual basil, but the bright flavors and vibrant green colors were perfectly at home. My only wish is that I had some crusty bread to sop up the vinaigrette — acidic, with a bit of sweetness and a pleasant tingle of spice — left behind in the bowl.
The food menu is short — about a dozen small plates, salads and starters; two pastas; a risotto dish and five wood-fired pizzas, plus a steak that’s grilled over rosemary branches and another wood-grilled meat, vegetable or seafood option that changes regularly. But considering the size of the open kitchen, which one might euphemistically call intimate, it’s impressive that the crew is able to produce the variety they do.
Wanting to sample both the pasta and pizza, we ordered the yellow pizza ($18) and that day’s fettuccine ($28). The pizza gets its name from the charred corn cream that serves as the base, which is topped with smoked mozzarella cheese, Calabrian chilies, salsa verde and crumbled ricotta salata cheese.
The first time I had sweet corn on pizza was during a late-night Domino’s order while studying abroad during college in Europe, where apparently corn and sliced hot dogs are popular pizza toppings. As one might surmise, my memory of said pizza is a bit hazy, but suffice it to say, it didn’t hold a candle to Vern’s pizza, which like the caprese salad that started our meal, provided a familiar taste of summer in a reimagined form.
The charred corn and smoked mozzarella provided a smoky flavor that was more subtle than I expected, and while I could have handled an extra punch of smoke, the balance did allow the heat from the Calabrian chilies and herbaceous salsa verde to shine through.
Of course, all that would be for naught if the crust was subpar. A poor crust will doom even the best toppings. Luckily, that was not the case here. Evenly round, with a light chew that’s characteristic of a properly made dough, every part of this pizza did justice to the others.
The Neapolitan-style pizzas are about 12 inches in diameter and truthfully, two diners could split a salad and a pizza and squeak out just enough room for dessert. But that would mean omitting the pasta, which would be a travesty. The Lost Meatball Ragu, which includes shellbow pasta tossed in meaty tomato sauce and topped with a large dollop of ricotta cheese, grated parmesan and a drizzle of olive oil, is a more classic offering that’s a fixture on the restaurant’s ever-changing menu. But once again feeling the pull of the season, we opted for the fettuccine, tossed in a light but creamy sauce of crab, mascarpone cheese, lemon, chilies and fresh tarragon, garnished with fried zucchini, chives and lemon zest.
All dishes at Vern’s are meant for sharing, further evidenced by the pair of metal tongs served with the bowl of pasta, though any selfishness is justified, because it’s just that good. In this case, the combination of the mascarpone, a creamy cheese with a bit of tang, was a perfect pairing with the lemon, creating a dish that was simultaneously rich, yet light. Rather than being the star of the dish, the crab played a supporting role, bringing a briny flavor and subtle sweetness that nicely complimented the rest of the sauce.
We closed things out with a slice of summer fruit and poppyseed olive oil cake ($12). Baked with in-season plums and nectarines that cooked down into a jammy sweetness, the cake was moist, with bright flavors of olive oil. What looked like ice cream on top was actually vanilla mascarpone cheese, the black speckles mixed throughout an indication of real vanilla bean.
Whether it’s the tightly curated bar selection or the bottles of wine and prepped ingredients poking out from a window looking into the open kitchen, nothing is superfluous or goes to waste at Vern’s.
Every detail is accounted for and intentionally executed. Take the non-alcoholic cocktails, for example. At $7 each — half the cost of the regular selections — these lower-priced options could be an afterthought. But at Vern’s, the espresso for the espresso tonic cocktail is freshly pulled and the orange juice for the “phony” negroni is juiced at the bar to order, creating a frothy juice they like to call “fluffy.”
The menu changes multiple times each season, meaning that any menu and individual visit is a snapshot of time that will soon be obsolete. But that’s OK, because even as the dishes change, the commitment to quality and attention to detail does not. Just as for the cocktails, you can let the team at Vern’s wing it. You’ll be in safe hands.
Vern’s
696 Park Ave., Rochester, NY, 14607
585-340-6689
www.facebook.com/vernsrochester
Sunday to Thursday, from 4 – 9 p.m.; Saturday and Sunday, from 4 – 10 p.m. Bar remains open for at least one hour after dinner service.