General Manager/Bartender Brian Ouellette with The Italian Stallion.
Pat’s Italian Restaurant
1200 Hartford Avenue #109
Johnston, RI
With locations in Coventry and Johnston, each Pat’s Italian Restaurant is a destination venue known for its authentic Italian cuisine and homemade pasta. Owned by Greg and Chris Stevens since 2007, the venue was named Best Italian Restaurant by the Observer and is also celebrated throughout the state for its tomato basil sauce, which was voted Best Sauce in Rhode Island in The Providence Journal. To drink, guests will find a variety of fine wine and beer selections on tap, along with an ever-evolving array of craft cocktails. A recent signature concoction created by General Manager and Bartender Brian Ouellette is The Italian Stallion, a variation on a Paper Plane, which came to fruition after he combined ideas from two similar cocktails. On the menu for several months, it’s started to pick up in popularity with guests, even those hesitant to give it a try. “There’s no mixer in there, so some people are kind of intimidated by it,” Ouellette said. “But it’s served on the rocks, [and] what I tell people is just let it get cold and kind of settle down and it’s very refreshing … and they really enjoy it.”
General Manager/Bartender: Brian Ouellette
Cocktail: The Italian Stallion
Ingredients:
» 1½ oz. Bulleit Bourbon
» ½ oz. Bully Boy Amaro
» ½ oz. Aperol
» ½ oz. Simple syrup
» Garnish: 2 lemon slices
Method: Fill a rocks glass with ice. Add all ingredients to the glass and stir. Garnish with lemon slices.
“We put a little splash of simple syrup in there, just to balance out the acidity of the Aperol and the amaro, and we use Bulleit [bourbon]. I think it has a little more smokiness to it, so it pairs nicely with the Aperol. We ended up going with Bully Boy Amaro, which is a Boston-based spirit line. That’s kind of where it all started. I started doing Old Fashioneds with Bulleit and amaro, [using those] in place of the bitters, and a little simple syrup and orange,” said Ouellette. “Our clientele is so broad, it’s crazy; we get [people from] their 20s to their 70s and 80s, so we just go off of what people like. We’ve found that in an Italian restaurant [people like] Aperol; pretty much anything you make, someone’s always willing to try.”
