Omnivores at Heart

Ninth Stop:  Fatty Patty’s

Date:  March 8^th, 2012

Location: 644 Main Street Covington, KY 41011

Ranking: 32

Robyn was stoked to finally try out Fatty Patty’s.  Not far from her home and having received lots of positive buzz since its opening, the restaurant had been on her personal to-do list for a while now.

Fatty Patty’s is located in MainStrasse village, right on a corner near Straus Haus, Zola, and across from Designs by Dana.  We walk by this place all of the time, often together, but still had not yet managed to cross its threshold.  We grew nervous as we approached and saw a “For Sale” sign facing us from the Fatty Patty window.  Not to be too concerned, though – apparently they’ve been renting, and the building owners are looking to sell.  This isn’t a death sentence (yet, we know; but, we’re also hopeful). 

The dining room, which is located towards the back and past a bar-like area, is small and surprisingly orderly, despite the masses of neatly displayed cartoon and pop culture memorabilia all over the walls.  It’s actually fairly organized by genre:  Snoopy & the Peanuts gang in one corner, the Simpsons in another, and several shelves of that old BC cartoon, among numerous other collector’s items.  The tables are adorned with a variety of comic strips (ours was the Garfield table!) and some have copies of comic strip coffee table books atop them, which you can look at while you wait for your order if you aren’t already mesmerized by all of the things hanging from the walls. 

After reading some other internet reviews of Fatty Patty’s, it is clear that they offer quite a range of menu items.  People seem to be over the moon about their hoagies, sandwiches, and ice cream, but the real reason for our visit was of course, the pizza! Based on Cincinnati Magazine’s recommendation, we tried the namesake Fatty Patty pizza, which is a meat lover’s dream, topped with Italian sausage, ham, bacon, beef, pepperoni, “red sauce,” and Provolone cheese.  Since we haven’t ventured into the arena of all-meat pizzas, we thought we’d give it a go.  Honestly, though, neither of us were truly excited about it.  We generally like some veggies to mix it up, even if only carmelized onions. 

The crust was thick and fluffy around the rim, and thin throughout the diameter of the toppings.  Unfortunately, the thin crust in the middle could not support the weight of all that meat, and had to be carefully dished out and eaten with a fork.  There is no way you are getting the Fatty Patty in your mouth by hand, no matter how determined.  It seriously falls apart when you remove it from the pan (see picture below).  Courtney really wanted to double up the thin underlying crust and toppings with the hearty outer crust, and tried to fold hers in half.  This did not work out so well.  It should be pointed out that the crust around the rim was especially aerated, chewy, and tasty.  What Robyn really loved about the crust was their own specially concocted blend of grated Parmesan cheese mixed with other herbs/spices that flavors the crust while it cooks.  It came out with a charred but flavorful tinge to it.  You can also find this special blend of cheese on the tables to dispense on your pizza at your own will, along with the standard red pepper flakes. 

Speaking of red pepper flakes, Robyn was amused by the fact that she felt the need to “liven up” the flavor of the pizza with some of that red pepper zing.  Maybe it was all of those meats blending together to form one homogenous flavor that she can only describe as “carnivorous.”  Or maybe she felt the need to include some vague semblance of a vegetable on board this animalistic voyage.  Either way, red pepper flakes are not a common thing to see on her plate, so as far as her taste buds are concerned, there had to be a little bit of something missing from this pie.

There are areas where this pie excelled, however, including the subtle flavoring on the crust and the seemingly fresh, quality meats that served as our toppings. But, we both discovered that, when it comes to pizza, we definitely want an abundance of cheese and sauce.  Both of those ingredients were almost completely masked by the meat toppings, which was a little disappointing, because it would have been interesting to see how the Provolone cheese affects the pizza as compared to the traditional flavoring of mozzarella that we see most often on pizzas.            

One of the other advantages of Fatty Patty’s is the friendly service we received.  Our server was really nice, attentive to our needs, and eager to answer any questions we had. We would love to make some return visits and sample other pizzas and menu items (the stromboli, in particular!), and grab some ice cream for dessert.

Epilogue:  The next day, Courtney toted her two leftover slices to work to eat on her lunch break.  For lack of a toaster over, she reheated them in the microwave.  It sucked.  Pizza is never really that good after making some rounds (literally) through the microwave, but this was especially gross:  sloppy, gooey, soft, and blahhhhhh.