Jill Biden Went Long on Vegetables at Red Sauce Joint Don Angie Last Night

Dr. Jill Biden, America’s first lady, headed to the West Village to dine out at Don Angie Wednesday night, a representative for the restaurant tells Eater. The modern Italian restaurant is widely considered to be one of the harder restaurants to nab a reservation for in Manhattan, since its opening back in 2017. “More or less from the day it opened, having dinner at Don Angie has been only marginally less difficult than eating at a private club,” Pete Wells wrote in his two-star review of the restaurant’s reservation book back in 2018.

The restaurant is known for its innovative takes on red sauce classics. Photos of its pinwheel lasagna for two, priced at $64, swarm Instagram. But Biden went her own way with ordering at dinner on Wednesday.

A representative for the restaurant tells Eater that Biden, and an unconfirmed female guest with whom she was seated, ordered the Sicilian trout crudo and a chrysanthemum salad as appetizers. For mains, Biden and her guest went for the branzino with a tomatillo puttanesca as well as a gnocchi with broccoli rabe, garlic, and provolone. The duo also ordered side dishes of charred broccoli with pecorino, eggplant agrodolce, and Japanese sweet potatoes with sumac. Their order overall was vegetable and seafood-forward, rather than focusing on the carb-heavy side of the menu.

Angela Rito and Scott Tacinelli, the chefs and owners of the West Village hot spot, greeted the first lady at the restaurant and asked for a photo opp, according to the representative. The first lady’s visit comes just days before the launch of Rito and Tacinelli’s first-ever cookbook, Italian American, that will debut on October 26. Her dinner out also comes just a few days after president Joe Biden drew online criticism for walking through a D.C. restaurant without a mask.

Don Angie