We visited the St. Pete Pier and got dinner and dessert!

For dinner, we ate at BellaBrava, an Italian restaurant. They served us bread and butter first. I’m always a fan of free bread at restaurants. The bread was pillowy, and the butter had herbs in it that made it more flavorful. Since I don’t eat cheese, my options for entrees were somewhat limited, so I ordered the pasta arrabbiata. This was cavatappi pasta with roasted red pepper, broccolini, mushroom, heirloom tomatoes, arugula, and their “spicy” arrabbiata sauce (but it wasn’t spicy at all). The flavors were pretty standard as pasta goes: the tomato sauce was a little sweet, tangy, and acidic. None of the flavor was particularly overpowering or unique to me. The pasta was cooked to al dente texture. It was good, but nothing to write home about. Though, it was a vegan dish!

The ice cream we got afterward, however, is a different story. Also along the St. Pete Pier is The Yard, a milkshake bar. They serve huge towers of ice cream, extravagant milkshakes, and cookie dough. I got the Peanut Butter Brownie Bliss specialty bowl. It comes with their “fudgy brownie sundae” ice cream topped with a brownie, bucketloads of whipped cream, and chocolate and peanut butter drizzles. I love a good chocolate + peanut butter combination. I was hoping for more peanut butter flavor in this one, but it was overpowered by the chocolate. That’s not a big problem, though—I’m a chocoholic.

The ice cream tasted rich, creamy, and silky smooth. It had brownie chunks inside that created a wonderful texture variety and even more chocolate in addition to the actual brownie plopped in the middle of the whipped cream. The brownie itself was also delicious, rich, and chocolatey! It’s texture was chewy and chunky. The whipped cream on top actually ended up being a bit much for me and I removed most of it. Though the dessert looks big, it’s because there’s so many layers of whipped cream. If you eat all of it, you’d be full before you hit the ice cream! Once I took the whipped cream off, it didn’t look like much ice cream by comparison, but I still couldn’t finish the whole dessert. The ice cream and brownie alone are so heavy and sweet. If you love chocolate obsessively like me, this dessert packs a heavy chocolate punch!