The Dishes You’ll Want to Order at Scampi

Caesar Toast

Grothe likes to call Scampi’s Caesar Toast her idea of a salad: one without “all the green stuff.” The dish was born by accident during her Couch Cafe days. She’d planned to serve it with lettuce but realized mid-service that she’d forgotten to buy any. It didn’t matter. Guests loved it, and a lettuce-free Caesar was born.

The “really intense flavors” come from a housemade dressing of colatura, anchovies, egg yolks, and Parmigiano Reggiano. (Grothe is quick to point out that it’s the real stuff, not just any old parm.) The dressing is spread over pillowy housemade focaccia toasted in olive oil, then topped with boquerones and a few grinds of black pepper.

Available only on the à la carte menu, each order comes with two slices. If you’re ordering the tasting menu, just ask, however; the kitchen is happy to work it in. “Caesar nerds love it,” Grothe says. “People who are anchovy averse will be scared of this dish, but I really think the balance is there.”

Oklahoma Onion Burger

Grothe has strong opinions about the Oklahoma Onion Burger, her favorite dish on Scampi’s à la carte menu. The Depression-era specialty was born when cooks stretched expensive beef by piling thinly sliced onions onto the griddle with the patties. Many restaurants, she says, get the technique wrong by simply piling caramelized onions on top.

“I’ve seen a lot of disrespect happening to the Oklahoma burger and I don’t like it,” she jokes.

At Scampi, Grothe starts with two mounds of razor-thin raw onion slices on the flattop before smashing 80/20 beef patties directly into them. As the burgers cook, the onions soften, crisp, and blacken in the rendered beef fat, creating a lacy crust. They also keep the thin patties juicy. She finishes the burger with American cheese — a departure from the classic cheese-less version — on a potato bun that’s steamed on the griddle for a minute, plus seasonal housemade pickles.

“Smash patties are a thing that people really like to f—- up,” Grothe says. “They [usually] need a lot of sauce to make it not so dry, but onion solves the problem.” As a purist, she skips ketchup and other condiments unless guests ask. “People have been bastardizing the Oklahoma burger forever,” she says. “You can get one from other places, but if you want to get it from a certified Oklahoman, you need to go to Scampi.”

Tiramisù

What’s the worst part of a typical tiramisù? Grothe doesn’t hesitate to call it out: the ladyfingers. “I have a problem with super-dry pastries,” she says. “The texture is bad and they don’t bring anything. They crumble in espresso. They would be nothing without mascarpone and espresso.”

Instead, she turned to one of her mom’s favorite treats: mocha chiffon, a light, airy Filipino coffee-and-chocolate sponge cake sold at bakeries like Goldilocks. “I’d eat it as a child,” she recalls. “It’s a good sponge for coffee and is structured enough for the dish.” Scampi’s coffee-and-olive-oil version is baked in-house, soaked with coffee (from Ox Coffee across the street), layered with fluffy whipped mascarpone, and topped with Frosted Flakes. “The crispiness breaks up the softness of the dessert,” she says.

The tiramisù has become one of Scampi’s signatures and is one of two desserts served during the tasting menu. “It wouldn’t be Scampi without it.”

Lizagna

Of her popular lasagna, Grothe jokes that “we spell it Lizagna because we’re extremely unserious people.” In winter, when there’s room in the restaurant’s cold storage, Scampi will bring back its beloved lasagna to both the tasting and à la carte menus, while also selling frozen trays to take home. “It’s a dish, and it’s an event.”

The flagship version is a classic lasagna Bolognese layered with sfoglia verde (green spinach pasta), béchamel, and plenty of Parmigiano Reggiano. The star is an Emilia-Romagna-style Bolognese that braises all day with pancetta, prosciutto, mortadella, ground beef, and pork. “It’s extremely delicious,” Grothe says. “People go nuts over it.”

Lizagna season also gives the kitchen a chance to riff on the classic with rotating versions like Roman-style oxtail, spinach and artichoke, Neapolitan, Genovese, squash, and mushroom. Each eight-by-six-inch tray costs $35 and feeds two — or, as Grothe wisecracks, “one Liz.”

Scampi

Most Americans think of scampi as pasta tossed with shrimp in a buttery, lemony sauce. But Grothe points out that scampi is simply the Italian word for langoustine. “In Italy, they would eat langoustines, lightly cooked or raw, with lemon, olive oil, chile, and parsley,” she says. Her version bridges both traditions, swapping in head-on Australian prawns but skipping the pasta. “They are big boys, served in all their glory, swimming in sauce,” Grothe says. “People don’t really care about the pasta at that point.”

The prawns themselves are a point of pride. Grothe prizes the Australian variety for their sweetness, tenderness, and meaty tail-to-head ratio. She sears them before adding roasted garlic brown butter, deglazing the pan with Italian lager, and building the sauce with Filipino fish sauce (patis), lime juice, Calabrian chile, and cilantro. The tasting menu includes two prawns per person, while the à la carte version comes with about five, depending on market price.

Grothe’s affection for prawns started long before Scampi. Growing up, her family regularly bought 10 pounds of Gulf shrimp from “some guy with a cooler” in Galveston, Texas, then drove 10 hours home to clean and freeze them for future meals. “I’ve always had an affinity for prawns because of that,” she says.

For Grothe, the dish also represents her own story. “As Italians became Americans, the dish transformed from a word for langoustine to the scampi that we serve here in the States,” she says. “That was a really beautiful discovery for me. When people fully embrace and accept new cultures, the sum is greater than its parts. I’m not really that Filipino, and am definitely not Italian. Being American is this idea that I’m able to be anyone I want. I’m not bound by cultural standards.”

Scampi is open starting at 5 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday.