It’s likely Island Walk residents are in the know, but those not living within the gated community may be unaware of a new restaurant there that’s open to the public. (Nonresidents need to make reservations on OpenTable or via the restaurant’s website.)
Casa Cotzelli is a 150-seat Italian restaurant serving lunch and dinner. The name is a combination of the owners’ names: Gabriele Cotza, originally from Milan, and Filippo Butelli, from Tuscany. Both have worked at reputable Naples restaurants, including Sails Restaurant, Bice Ristorante, Molto Trattoria, and Truluck’s.
The longtime friends and coworkers opened their own restaurant, Butelli says, “because we’re very passionate about food. We want to bring modern Italian food to Naples.”
While there are many Italian restaurants in town, Butelli says the pair seeks to create a more authentic experience. That means the menu has no meatballs, veal parmigiana, or other dishes Americans think of as Italian but Italians consider Americanized versions of their cuisine. That includes heaping plates of pasta. “Our portions are not too small, not too big, but tasty,” Butelli says.
Lunch selections include prosciutto and melon, fried calamari, seafood salad, panini, pizzas, salads, pasta, sea bass, steak, and more. For dinner, choose from grilled octopus, beet and arugula salad, tuna tartare, tortelloni della nonna, spaghetti carbonara, cod livornese, and other classic dishes. The pasta and desserts are homemade, and there’s a full bar, which remains open after the kitchen closes.
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