Restaurant Review - Cosimo

Tonight I met with an old friend to catch up and have something to eat. Cosimo's seems to be her favorite restaurant in Westfield, so when we drove by and saw an empty table outside and a parking spot right there, we thought we were in luck and went right for it.
I had been to Cosimo's quite a while ago but at the time wasn't that impressed. In the meantime they have extended/renovated the place and made a real restaurant out of the former "take out pizza with a few tables" place.
The service is effective, friendly, mostly attentive and trying hard to please the customer, but sometimes they seem to be a bit disorganized and trip over each other.
The menu has all the typical Italian pizza-pasta-meat-and-sandwich-standards with a few unusual additions. The specials however are really interesting and innovative. It seems, there, they give the chef a chance to be creative and show what he can do outside of the daily routine.
One example was the stuffed grilled pear appetizer that we had. The pear with the blue cheese, grilled just right, to give the blue cheese this special taste and texture, to create a perfect combination with the flavor of the pear. This combination is served on a crisp bed of greens with a special dressing.
My friend had the penne with meat sauce. The meat sauce was good, even slightly above average but nothing special. Yes, not everything has to be special.
We also had the bruschetta pizza because we both like the real bruschetta. The pizza is not a true replacement for the original but overall not bad. The menu touts a thin crust but it turned out not be that thin. We ordered the version with cheese. So what you get is essentially a cheese pizza with the typical bruschetta toppings. Actually not a bad idea and well executed, except for the crust that could be thinner. For regular pizzas that type of crust is absolutely OK. Also, the bread they serve is pretty nice and goes well with the salad.
Overall, Cosimo's is a good place for a casual dinner in Westfield with good outside seating. Wine is BYOB. When you are in the mood for a good pizza or other Italian standards at reasonable prices it is a good recommendation.

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