Is This The Best Outdoor Dining Spot In Brooklyn?

Chef Anthony Ricco grew up in Greenpoint, back when this whole stretch of Brooklyn waterfront was pretty much an industrial wasteland, home to a few legendary DIY venues and a playground for graffiti writers and street artists. 

Things, to say the least, have changed around these parts since then.   

“It’s wild. It’s ridiculous,” Ricco told BKMAG as we chatted in the leafy courtyard of the William Vale Hotel on Kent Avenue. “When I first saw this building coming up I was like ‘we don’t need this shit in this neighborhood.’” 

Ah, but as we all know, one of the defining characteristics of New York City is constant change—fighting it is fruitless. And so, after Ricco spent more than a decade cooking in the Jean Georges group—including a ten-year stint as executive chef of Spice Market—he wound up back in the old neighborhood at, yup, the William Vale, running the kitchen at the hotel’s fancy-pants restaurant Leuca and, as of a month ago, launching the terrific and refreshingly playful Little Fino, which has taken over both the inside lobby bar and the outdoor tables in the spacious courtyard.   

And that courtyard is an exceptionally pleasant place for a date or a catch-up-with-friends hang of unpredictable length and appetite. We are not normally drawn to the scene here on the hotel stretch of Kent Avenue, but on a weekday evening, with all that comfortable seating and plenty of shade, and everything set just far enough off the street to feel secluded without being isolating, Little Fino nails it. 

The Little Fino menu skews snacky, but there are plenty of ways to get a very good, very complete meal here. “The Long Sandwich,” for example, is exactly that: 24 glorious inches of prosciutto, provolone, arugula, dosed with balsamic vinegar, and hot-pressed into a homemade pizza-dough hero. It’s fun and hilarious and delicious. “This is how I eat,” said Ricco. “I’m a big guy. I like big sandwiches.”   

Even better in the sandwich department is Ricco’s Roman burger, also served on a homemade roll, an incredibly dense patty of dry aged beef just absolutely smothered in oozing fonduta and topped—”cacio e pepe style,” as he put it—with a pecorino “schmear” and a ton of black pepper. It’s a compact creation that really packs a wallop. 

Those two aren’t even the most dramatic dishes here. The mundane-sounding “house dips” hits the table as a colorful, cascading bouquet of snappy vegetables surrounded by a half dozen peppy dips to drag them through, including an eggplant one, a Calabrian chili one, a bean one, and a pea one. Plus, you get a brown bag stuffed with slabs of toasted semolina, so it’s actually hearty as hell. 

I couldn’t resist ordering the whole artichoke—this was a beloved “special treat” dish of my youth—and neither should you. Especially since they braise that exceedingly tasty thistle in herbs and then blast it in Leuca’s wood-fire oven. I grew up ripping and dipping the leaves into straight melted butter, but Ricco’s saffron aioli is good, too. 

Among the smaller snacks, you’ll find some crisp polenta tots, buttered toast with a “near perfect anchovy,” and devilled eggs topped, rather rakishly, with a round of roasted pepperoni. For dessert, there’s an excellent soft-serve swirl of lemon and panna, drizzled with olive oil and sprinkled with sea salt tableside. 

Drinks galore await you here as well, including a lengthy cocktail list (they average about $17), a “frapperol spritz” slushie, High Life ponies, and several ten-buck teeny-tinis. Apparently, like everywhere in this part of town, Little Fino gets a little hectic during prime brunch hours, but on a warm, pleasant evening, the outdoor seating situation here would be tough to beat anywhere in Brooklyn.         

Little Fino is located within the William Vale Hotel complex at 111 N 12th Street, at the corner of Kent Avenue, and is currently open on Sunday through Thursday from 11:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m.,  and on Friday and Saturday from 11:00 a.m. to 12:00 midnight. You can also get breakfast starting at 7:00 a.m. daily.

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