Pulcinella Mozzarella Bar and Restaurant

I have nothing clever, snarky, or wildly derisive to say about this place. It’s just that I have, actually, nothing better to do right now. Unilocaling is better for me than smoking cigarettes, binge eating or chewing one’s cuticles until bloody… and…so is this restaurant.
This being a mozzarella bar, I figured the burrata was an obvious choice, and it was good. Nothing exceptional, but it was what it should be. I would like to see some more flavor pairings or wine suggestions with the cheeses, so when I’m rich, I can get into things besides pairing cheap Spanish wines with manchego, or with my current budget, thoughtfully pairing PBR with American Cheese melts. Surprisingly, my one gripe comes from the antipasti – which is often my favorite part of a North End meal, in that the kitchen can’t screw up things they didn’t produce in house. What in the hell is this cold cut that places are calling «porchetta» these days? We asked the waiter if it was the real porchetta, like in Italy, to which the waiter responded «ohhh yeah, and the owner makes it himself». Of course, I kinda doubt the waiter has ever been to Italy, nor was he italian. None if this is his fault, of course, nor was the chilled herby ham that showed up. So, just so we’re all on the same page here, this is not porchetta, hot, roasted suckling pig with a crisp skin and layers of fat, and flesh. Our fat-​phobic and body obsessed culture has probably ruled out a proliferation of pure porchetta, but I guess that’s why I’ll have to continue to learn to cook the things I can’t find.
Anyways, this place is about cheese, and I’d stick with it. I enjoyed the sheet out of the spaghetti carbonara, with plump cubes of pancetta, eggs, cream, and something they call buffalo parmigiano, which I’d never heard of. This was good, well executed, home styled stuff. Some companions had an understated dish of thick, al dente couscous with a saffron-​tomato-​shellfish sauce; perfectly fine, but I was happier to test out the items that featured cheese.
Okay, negative creep. I also thought the place had far too few wines offered by the glass, and I wasn’t pleased by my boring $ 12 glass of chianti. I can’t believe I actually paid that. Jeesuss that was pretty stupid. Anyways, like I said, this place could really pull ahead of the often underwhelming pack if they decide to pair wines with their cheeses, or do some regional combos beyond the ol’ caprese trio of mozzarella-​tomato-​basil, and maybe get some cheap southern reds and more glasses on the menu.

If I could break it down, food would be 5 stars.
BUT, service is more like 2 stars, though if you chase down a server, they will bring you what you need.
The good news is there wasn’t a wait on a Saturday night, so we ate there as we couldn’t get in elsewhere.
The ravioli was DELICIOUS. So rich and fresh! THe tortellini in bolognese was also just fantastic.
THe biggest problems were that the dish with the meatball (can’t remember the name) was what we really wanted and they had run out of meatballs right before we ordered.
We also ordered a pizza as a starter, but by the time we finished our meal, we still hadn’t gotten the pizza. So we cancelled it and they didn’t give us a hard time about it, at least, and didn’t charge us for it.
So I wouldn’t eat there again simply because of the service, but that’s too bad, because the food is just soo good.

Food was ok at high prices, service was abysmal. Took over 30 min to place our order, another hour to get our apps, and the entrees came about 5 min later. Staff was completely inattentive, and unapologetic about the delays. Definitely not worth it – way better options in the North End.

My wife and I stopped in this restaurant a few Friday evenings ago. We were looking for a casual, relaxed environment to kill some time and enjoy a quick bite to eat. We stumbled on Pulcinella when every other restaurant in the North End had a minimum hour wait. It was quiet, not too upscale and with only two other couples in the restaurant, it meant we could be seated immediately. This should have been our first clue.
We placed our order, only to find that they had run out of their eggplant parm… in the North End… on a Friday night!?! Second clue.
In the end, we kept our order simple — an order of calamari and caprese salad to share and a Peroni for me. The Peroni was skunked and the calamari was undoubtedly frozen and unimpressive in the least. At least the caprese was fresh and tasty — albeit small even for an appetizer — which considering the name is probably a good thing.
With so many other choices within (literally) throwing distance, for the price and quality (and availability) of food, I’ll opt for the hour wait next time. It seems painfully obvious, in retrospect, why the place was so empty…

I had a horrible 10 minute experience here for my attempted birthday dinner. I tried to select a bottle of wine to start off our meal. Long story short, they had «run out» of any bottle of wine costing less than $ 60 dollars. Who runs out of half of the bottles of wine on their menu? I could understand 1 – 2 but this was ridiculous and seemed like a scam. The other red flag was that there was only one other couple sitting in the restaurant on a Sunday evening; all other restaurants were packed. We ran for the door and never looked back.

Huge disappointment. This was our second meal here, the first experience was wonderful. Unfortunately service this time around was super disorganized — 2 of 5 entrée orders were incorrect, and the meals were served at very different times (some diners got entrees 10 minutes after others). The food was fine, but with so many other great options in the north end, we’ll choose another restaurant next time.

We waited over an hour for our food, which was definitely not worth the wait — at least for the price. Apparently one of the dishes took a long time to cook, but we were not informed of the wait ahead of time. Every time we needed something we had to flag someone down as our waitress was often no where to be seen. I don’t think this was necessarily her fault. It was probably just a general issue with the restaurant being understaffed. I will not be returning.

We came to this place on a whim… we had waited too long for a highly recommended place that was nearby. The service was pretty good– the menu was not extensive– food was ok and wine was reasonably priced… the biggest draw was the «no waiting «and zero attitude. Will try it again. I think it doesn’t have any reviews because it is new…

This is my first time writing a review but I really felt the need to write this one. While in Boston a couple of weeks ago I read Unilocal reviews for an Italian restaurant. The restaurants with the best reviews all spoke to long waits and tight spaces. We decided on Pulcinella Mozzarella. As we were walking through the north end there were people waiting outside restaurants. When we got to Pulcinella Mozzarella the place was empty. We hesitated for awhile before going in but boy were we glad we did!
The restaurant is quaint and clean with seating along open windows. For appetizers you get to pick from 3 types of mozzarella and add whatever meats or veggies you want with it. We had ours with roasted zucchini, tomatoes, and beets. It was delicious. My husband had the Paccheri, which is a large tube pasta with meatballs. He has not stopped talking about those meatballs, best he has ever had. I had the ravioli which were delicious as well. The pasta is cooked just right and the sauce was awesome. For dessert we shared a cherry gelato that was really good. I’m not much of an ice cream person or dessert in general but I did enjoy that Gelato.
If you find yourself in beautiful Boston I highly recommend this place. I know we will go back every time we are there.

Have been here twice, both time for appetizers and wine —
Service has always been very good and the food as well. The first time we went in and had some meats, cheese and roasted veg — expensive, but all delicious. This time we had the smoked mozzarella in bread crumbs — kind of a high-​end fried cheese — but it was very good. Wine was also good — Looking forward to having a full meal there —
It is also a great place to go when you are waiting for your table at Neptune’s —

I came here with my husband on a Saturday night. To begin, we ordered an antipasta plate with burrata cheese, the salumi medley, and the vegetable medley. It was all delicious. The sundried tomatoes were the best we’ve ever had.
Then we split the linguine con vongole and ate every last bite.
The servers were very friendly and the wine was tasty.
This place was different than most of the other North End restaurants we’ve been to and we would definitely come back.

I was really excited to try this new north end restaurant — the idea of a mozzarella bar makes me really excited since my husband and I just returned from Italy. We went on a Sat night — every other place we tried had no room — our fault with no reservations. I was very happy to be able to walk in and get a seat right away at pulcinella — most likely because it is a newer restaurant in the north end.
We started with a nice glass of wine and decided to have the burrata with some prosciutto. Sad to say it was just average. The cheese did not wow me as I had hoped. I love burrata and this did not meet my expectations.
Our server was great — he even spoke in a little Italian with me, which was wonderful — as I have been missing Italy since we returned from our trip.
I will probably give this place another try once they have been open a bit longer

The food here was great. We thought the traditional mozzarella was amazing. We paired the mozzarella with the roasted tomatoes, prosciutto, and eggplant. It was all delicious. I got the Risotto with pancetta and tomatoes which I loved. My husband got the pasta and meatballs. The meatballs were supposed to be filled with mozzarella but there weren’t so that was disappointing.
The staff couldn’t have been any nicer!!! They were all so wonderful.
We went on a Saturday night and it wasn’t crowed.
Overall we would definitely go back!

Not a fan of the décor, but one bite of the delicious food and several fantastic glasses of wine later, I wasn’t really thinking about the lack of ambiance here. My partner and I were thrilled that we ducked into this place one night, escaping the crowds, and ended up having a very memorable meal.
Wish restaurants in San Francisco were this good.

The food here is melt in your mouth INCREDIBLE and the staff is beyond nice. Found reviews of this on Unilocal and since my sister was in town visiting we decided to give it a shot. The décor inside is pretty funky mixed with traditional, it gives a nice fresh feel to a North End restaurant. The staff was very friendly and greeted us right away and seated us. We decided to try a few different dishes to share to really get a taste for the food: The Zucchini flowers (which were amazing but definitely a lighter dish and not great for sharing b/​c you will want to have the whole thing to yourself! :-)); the Pacherri (melt in your mouth extreme amazing-​ness, perfectly flavored meatballs with a delicious pasta that is the perfect consistency and a richly flavored sauce); and the Ravioli (the best ravioli I have ever had hands down — I did not want to share this!)
The Ravioli was so good and I was bummed bc in trying to share w’ my sister I dropped one on the floor. So sad to have a man down since it was so yummy! Side note – the staff rushed over to help clean off my bag since it dropped on it.
This is my new North End fave. We will most certainly be back!

Came here with a girlfriend on a Monday and the restaurant was very quiet. The restaurant itself is very cute — a small space but with the chic modern look, it made it feel bigger. The service was great the moment we stepped in. Waitstaff greeted us and were very attentive, always making sure to refill our water glasses and checked in every so often. So onto the really important stuff… the food!
I loved the idea of the Mozzarella plates. You choose a type of mozzarella (all homemade) — buffalo, smoked, or burrata — and pair it with a choice of antipasta. My friend and I never had smoked mozzarella so we chose that with a side of marinated wild mushrooms. The mozzarella was very good although wasn’t mind blowing but that’s probably because of our preference. But the marinated wild mushrooms… delicious! The mushrooms were extremely fresh… like «i think they are growing the stuff in the backyard and just picked it from the garden» fresh. And the marinating was just right — not too oily, not too salty, and not to vinegary. For entrees, we both had the special — squid ink pasta tossed with lobster in a light tomato marsala broth. Can we say PARTY IN MY MOUTH?!! Definitely one of the tastiest pasta dishes I’ve had in the North End.
Definitely worth another trip back!

We stumbled upon Pulcinella Mozzarella on a bustling Saturday night in Boston. All the restaurant on Hanover had lines out the door and the quiet alley restaurant with an open table seemed the right fit.
We were greeted as family by the owners and the service was casual in a truly Boston way. Our entrees arrived. «Oh Yeah», the first words Nicole exhaled when she relished her first bite of Spinach Ricotta and Buffalo Mozzarella Ravioli in Tomato Mascarpone Sauce. At that moment we knew the right North End restaurant was at hand. I opened the meal with The Pulcinella Salad. The salad was beyond your standard green opener. Cucumber, green and black olives, shaved Parmesan in a bed of romaine smothered in vinaigrette and the right amount of fresh cracked pepper. Delicious. The Cabernet began to open which made a perfect complement to the Truffle Risotto special. The savory Umami lit my mouth with giggles right down to the last grain. The evening ended perfectly with espresso and a Cannoli.
I will be coming back

Mozzarella plates are the way to go. We enjoyed the selection of mozzarella and meats and veggies– all done very well and ample serving size. This course is extremely cool! There is nothing else like it in the North End.
Kitchen still working on the service — took a very long time between courses. Main plates flavored well — but hey it’s opening week — there is a lot of potential here.
Very friendly servers and hosts. Fun atmosphere and good wine selection at bar.

Okay, here’s the thing: all the restaurants in the North End are the same. They look about the same, they cost about the same, they have about the same menu. That’s why when people start telling me about their favorite place in the North End I roll my eyes and sigh dramatically: because that’s a chump game. Just fuckin’ pick one, you’ll be fine. (Note: the exception is The Daily Catch, which is far and away the best place in the neighborhood, but that’s sortof pointless to say since you’re not going to get a seat there.)
And enter Pulcinella, which is DIFFERENT. It looks different — brighter and more colorful! And it has this gimmick, that it’s a mozzarella bar, which is super fun. I mean, don’t get me wrong, it’s totally a gimmick! Whatever, there are like five different kinds of mozzarella and you pick one and some meat and that’s your starter… it’s not like revolutionary. It’s just a restaurant where cheese is definitely your first course. But so what? It’s a fun gimmick. You have fun doing it.
We had the smoked mozzarella, which was totally great. And some salami, also great. And then a seafood salad, which was not earth-​shattering but certainly perfectly good, and at least they didn’t call it ceviche.
I am totally down for this place, and I’ll tell you what: if you have a date in the North End and you bring her here, you’re going to get points for doing something different and cool. You should do that.

Pulcinella Mozzarella’s specialty is… drum roll, please… mozzarella!
MENU: Their menu consists of classic Italian dinners and desserts,
along with appetizers, such as mozzarella stuffed zucchini,
and entrees, like «paccheri,» mozzarella-​stuffed meatballs.
ATMOSPHERE: Open and bright, with colorful accept lamps,
I find it happily inviting for families, as well as romantic couples.
DEAL: Cheese-​lovers unite…(and hit me up to join you) for this lactose tolerant feast:
«La Degustazione di Mozzarella di Bufala.» This dish is a a mozzarella sampler,
in which you pick one of three cheeses, or all of them, if you want to do a «tasting.»
They offer traditional (on the lighter side) mozzarella, smoked and burrata (heavier on the cream).
Like every Anti-​Pasta, they also feature a variety of meat and vegetable starters too.