Peperoncino Trattoria

Came here for lunch today and tried the lunch special for $ 14.95. The lunch menu wasn’t given to us until we asked for it, but it wasn’t a big deal. It wasn’t busy for lunch, and I believe the owner was serving us.
To be completely honest, the star of this restaurant was the Mozzarella sticks starter. It was AMAZING. The perfect amount of crunch that I didn’t expect to enjoy. I believe it is actually listed as Mozzarella and Anchovies on the menu, but my friend and I just asked for the Mozzarella. Still amazing.
The lunch menu came with a mixed or ceaser salad. I ordered the mixed salad, and it came mixed with the dressing for you. Definitely appreciated and tasted great. We didn’t even finish a quarter of our pasta because we were so stuffed from the mozzarella sticks and salad! We packed it up, but this place is definitely worth a visit. For two people, the lunch menu and mozerella sticks came up to just over $ 45 after taxes.

A classic family owned Italian restaurant, staff were extremely helpful and friendly, excellent value and great tasting food. My only negative comment was that the temperature in the restaurant was very warm. I will definitely go back again.

Located near Hwy 7 and Pine Valley on Whitmore, The Hot Pepper or Peperoncino definitely brings the heat when it comes to home cooked Italian eats — Mamma Mia!
Everything fresh and made to order, how could you ever go wrong, especially with a giant wood burning pizza oven in the back. I was trying to be healthy last week when I paid them a visit, I really was.
I went in there saying to myself «Ok, Kris, you’re gonna get a soup, a salad and a protein and then you are leaving… leaving! Don’t you dare look at the pizza or pasta. You’ll hate yourself later you know you will!!!»
…but then my other side, let’s call him Fat Evil Kris, goaded me and said «Hey, a soup is fine, but CAM’AN, you can have a little pizza, who would know, I won’t tell. And besides look at that little Italian lady making the dough with her bare hands — do you want to hurt her feelings? Go on, have a pizza, you know you wannnnt it»
That damn Fat Evil Kris, always gets the better of me — bastard. I had my straccitella (egg drop) soup, yeah it was massive, and delicious and so hot that I burned my mouth, SO WHAT. It was amazing and I ate every bite — ya wanna fight about it?
And then, Yeah, I had a pizza. Not a slice, or a small. I whole GODDAMN Calabrese pizza, with gorgonzola cheese, roasted red peppers and soprasatta (think long slice of hot salami)! And THEN I doused the whole thing in their home made red hot spicy peppers in OIL! It burned, I ate it all, SO WHAT? You wanna fight about it???
OK so maybe I’ve got a little Hot Pepper in me, since a visit here seemed to bring about an internal battle between good and evil (evil winning) and a little bit of attitude to boot, but it was just so good!
My ONLY gripe (and likely made worse by how hungry I was) was the speed of service. Three tables and myself dining at lunch and my lunch took nearly 90 minutes from order to bill payment. No problem for a Friday/​Saturday night but no bueno for a workday at lunch.
Overall, a good meal, and amazing lunch specials if you’re looking for a good deal on a ton of food!
Eatcrest Out! You wanna fight about it!!!

My wife and came here tonight after reading the reviews. The owner Ida, came and introduced herself to us right away. Felt very comfortable and welcomed. Great number of options. Combos are not only a great deal, but also fabulous flavour. I had the meat sauce and linguine, Caesar salad, and veal parmigiana. Fabulous! My wife had the calamari, shrimp and scallops with linguine in a tomato wine sauce. She loved it. Nailed it in both instances. We will be back again.

Wanted to try out this restaurant last night with some friends before some new years celebrations.
Called to make a reservation, apparently they are CLOSED new years eve because, ”My staff doesn’t want to work tonight, so we’re closed”
That’s a direct quote.
Wow.
A business that doesn’t want to cash in on new years?
What a shame

Hands down the best dish I have had all year was here. My wife brought me here on a whim & oh my god was it a great decision! We can only eat one dish on the menu corn pasta with tomato sauce. Sounds dull but it is the complete opposite. The dish was amazing. It’s real Italian food, non of that fake nonsense. The place doesn’t look that nice from the outside but once you step inside it’s very warm & inviting. More of a place you would dress up a little for. Great feel to the place. Service was friendly, she spoke little english but I think she was still in training. Regardless everything ended up fine. It is more of a pricey place because it is higher end but he food is worth every penny. The $ 7.50 or so for out pellegrino was very over priced so I’ll be skipping that next time. I plan to come back, this place is far as hell from me but holy cannoli is it worth the trip. I love this place!

Highly not recommended. After 1.5 hours of waiting for the food they said that they didn’t start to prepare it. The owner forgot the Italian hospitality and honour and didn’t even apologize. We came after making reservations. Shame. Do not get there!

We went to Peperoncino for a 50^th Wedding Anniversary party. This restaurant was wonderful. They went above and beyond. The food was delicious. The pasta was hand made and the sauce was absolutely perfect. Service was great and friendly. I would recommend this place to anyone. Thank you Ida for the fantastic meal and a great time. My family loved everything!

I was looking for a new Italian restaurant and found this one from my trusted Unilocal resources. I think I must have ended up at the WRONG restaurant!
This would have to be one of the most AWFUL restaurants I have ever had the pleasure of trying…
To start off, the Bruschetta was burnt, came out black not to mention the veal parmigiana was black, tough and could not be swallowed. I had better luck with the most overcooked steaks then this piece of «meat» which looked from outer space! I had the veal with a side of lasagna which was tasteless, no cheese and only noodles… I decided to try the chicken parmigiana instead…
BIG MISTAKE!
It was lousy as well but the best part of this whole evening is that they re-​served the lasagna! It was half eaten, had the Parmesan cheese sparkled on top that I added myself and now nice and hard from being reheated .
The pizza was nothing but salty, that’s all you could taste. salty piece of cardboard.
The menu is also very confusing and not clear as it stated a $ 3 up charge for the larger meal. But was charged $ 6, $ 3 for the up size in meat and $ 3 for the lasagna that was served twice and not touched.
Do yourself a favor and look for another Italian restaurant in the Vaughan area, please go somewhere else. This place is HORRID!!!

%*&$ this place, seriously. We arrived at 8, fairly busy but not packed and were seated. And then sat some more. Ten minutes later no one even gave us a water, a menu, nothing. Meanwhile the guy who sat us is having a conversation with one table the whole time were waiting, while another staff member is clearing plates off another table. The third server then begins a lengthy conversation with another table, while we sit there, ignored.
I get it if you’re busy, but atleast acknowledge us, no one even looked in our direction, it was pathetic. I regret not telling off the staff but then I would have looked like the asshole. I’m particularly appalled because we were really excited to try the place after reading the reviews and being in the area. Did they think we were poor or something? Don’t they know the Neans splurge in restaurants?
Don’t waste your time here, these people are disrespectful cretins. and if the inside of the place is any indication of how they are doing financially then hopefully this dump gets closed down before the years out.

Read all the reviews here and was really looking forward to having a wonderful dinner — but it didn’t happen. The best part of the meal was the great server. She really took good care of us.
Could have had the same kind of food for much less at any food court…
Overall the price was okay (4 adults including bottle of wine was $ 150 + tip). We all had a dinner special with appetizer, pasta, and main.
Stracciatella was bland and too salty.
Chicken parmigiana was only okay.
Lasagna was many layers of pasta without much meat.
Gnocchi was doughy and heavy.
Best dish was the very traditional tiramisu.
Did not live up to the hype. What happened Unilocalers?

A strong 4 ½ stars… would be a solid 5 had it not been for a few small hic-​cups.
We visited Saturday, Feb 9, 2013, strictly based on the reviews I’ve read on Unilocal and we wanted to try something new… we were not disappointed.
The restaurant itself is located in one of the many non descript plazas along Highway 7… but to help those who are not familiar with the area, and who should really try this restaurant… it is located on the southwest corner of Highway 7 and Whitmore (Whitmore is the intersection where Fortinos/​Shoppers Drug Mart/​Princess Bomboniere is). I would suggest you learn this intersection as you’ll want to keep coming back once you taste the food that comes from their kitchen !
We made reservations as we heard that this Trattoria can get quite busy. Our table was waiting for us when we arrived and we were promptly seated. I was surprised at how small and quaint the restaurant is… it could probably hold no more than 30 people at a time.
On to the most important thing… the food. It is A-M-A-Z-I-N-G…perhaps some of the best Italian food I’ve ever had while dining out. For $ 16.95, you can order a full meal… a salad to start (Mista or Caesar), pasta, and a meat dish (veal, chicken or basa). For a nominal $ 3 you can upgrade your pasta to gnocchi and a better meat selection. On the night we visited, our waitress raved about the 4 «specials» available that evening. Unfortunately, all contained veal, which I do not eat, but 3 of our group ordered the specials while I ordered from the menu.
2 people ordered the veal stew over gnocchi. It was chunks of veal with vegetables poured over gnocchi. They ate every drop of it and used bread to sop up the sauce. Seriously, their plates were spotless when the waitress came to pick up their plates.
1 person ordered a veal layered dish with linguine. It was a layer of veal, eggplant, panchetta, and boccochino cheese with a side of linguine in a tomato sauce. He raved about this dish and without a doubt, we will be going back soon just so he can have this dish again.
I ordered gnocchi with a vodka sauce with chicken Parmesan as a side. The portion size was huge… but I somehow managed to eat every last piece of it… it was de-​lish !
The few complaints we have are as follows:
1) The bread at the table should be changed to reflect the wonderful cooked food. It was non-​descript, flavourless, dinner rolls and should be a sliced loaf of Italian bread or a fresh ciabatta.
2) the lights flickered every few minutes and it really was annoying
3) our empty salad plates sat in front of us for 20 minutes… from the minute they were placed down in front of us until our main course came out. The restaurant was not that busy that this should happen.
Other than these 3 small things… it is the food and friendly service that will bring us back. Our waitress was warm and entertaining and her recommendations on food selections were bang on. She obviosuly took great pride in the quality of the food that comes from the kitchen… rightly so.
Dinner for 4 (salads, main course) with a carafe of Pinot Grigio, taxes, came to $ 114. Great value for the quality of food.
I have no hesitation in recommending this restaurant and will definitely be back… sooner than later. One of my new fave restaurants.

Like other reviewers we, my wife and I, discovered this lovely trattoria accidentally while we looking for an Italian restaurant for lunch.
We shared an organic salad and vegetarian pizza, thin crust, fresh toppings and baked in a real wood burn owen, one of the best we tasted in the recent years. Besides the delishes food friendly service adds a great value to the whole experience.
Obviously we will come back to try the other dishes. Such an unexpected marvel!

Like the previous reviewer, our discovery of this place was fortuitious! We had planned to eat out in an Italian restaurant for a birthday and picked a place in Woodbridge/​Vaughan based on Unilocal reviews. We could not find the damn thing and Google maps put it in the wrong spot. After driving around frustrated for 25 minutes we came to the strip shopping center where Pepperoncino is located and decided to try it instead. It was a good thing we did!
This is real, old fashioned home cooking. Almost all is homemade, with a Calabrian accent. The owner, the cook (his wife, I think) and the server couldn’t have been better or more solicitous.
The atmosphere is pleasant too, with lighting that is neither too dark nor too bright and not a lot of overdecoration yet enough Italian ambience.
As for the food, it was almost completely perfect. Standouts were some of the best fried calamari rings we’ve ever had, excellent thin crust pizza, and a dinner special of veal spezzatino over homemade gnocchi. The latter featured butter tender veal which was so well-​flavoured it might have been marinated, and gnocchi that the best consistency I”ve ever had for them. The mixed salad, with lots of raddichio, was very good too, as was the tasty ans well-​presented bruchetta.
The menu offers lots of mix and match options for both pasta and main dishes and is extensive enough to satisfy all tastes. Portions are what one might expect from Italian home cooking: extremely generous. Prices are very reasonable too.
We will be back to try some other things.
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.

I was somewhat surprised to not find Peperoncino already listed when I came to look, because on top of just being a great restaurant it has appeared on the odd top 10 list, and has been very favorably reviewed elsewhere. So I thought I’d do my part and add it since we enjoyed it so much.
We discovered it by accident when we were out in the Woodbridge/​Vaughan area for dinner and our previous go-​to Italian restaurant wasn’t open. We thought we would check out the area and see if there was anything else interesting before caving in and getting fast food, and we happened to spot Peperoncino somehow in its little plaza off Highway 7. It is an unassuming location, and we took a look inside, saw that it wasn’t very busy, and figured we would take a gamble and try it out. I’m glad we did, and now we have a new go-​to in the area.
We have eaten there twice, and have had great, friendly service both times from different people. We have tried the penne alla vodka, the gnocchi, and I think the veal parmesan, and all were delicious. Good large portions meant that I left stuffed, and my wife had lunch for the next day. The bruschetta was great too, nice and fresh.
I think both times we went we ended up ordering the dinner meal package which was reasonably priced. The wait for food was never outrageous, although we haven’t been on a busy night. All in all, this is a 4.5 /​5 star if not a full 5 for me. If this place was closer to our house we’d eat there a lot more.