Just opened: An old-school Italian restaurant where you get out your phone to order online

Yeah, you get hit with the smell of garlic and sounds of loud table talk when you walk into the new Italian restaurant in Germantown, where actual Italian staffers carry pasta dishes past a back wall covered with old black-and-white pictures from Brooklyn.

Don't let the old-school, authentic vibes fool ya, though. There's something newfangled about Pelato, as new as self-driving cars or ChatGBT.

Diners are encouraged to scan a QR code at the table and order from their phones here, though paper menus and servers are options. (While not uncommon nationwide, this method is fairly new to Nashville, with only a handful of other restaurants, like Black Dynasty Secret Ramen House, doing so.) Oh, and if you do order from your phone, humans bring your food and drinks. So no robot service here, not yet, anyway.

In fact, when we visited on opening Labor Day weekend, our table had a great time interacting with staff, whether it was 21-year-old server Hunter ("I'm a paper menu girl myself!" she told us cheerily) or older Brooklyn-raised siblings Theresa and Robert, the owner's brother-in-law and wife, who good-naturedly busted each other's chops during dinner.

Pelato is Luogo chef/owner Anthony Scotto's slightly less fancy Nashville restaurant, housed in the old Saint Stephen space in Germantown.

Need a break? Play the USA TODAY Daily Crossword Puzzle.

The online ordering system does take some getting used to, but several dishes appear pretty quickly. The other advantage is that the diner controls the order and the pace that food is delivered.

The food includes several Italian standards − shrimp scampi, chicken parm and fried calamari among them − as well as some unique takes, like eggplant parm-stuffed bread (exactly what it sounds like) and crispy zucchini strings.

A server told us the super-creamy, delicious gelato might be coming off the dessert menu soon, which would be super triste.

Pelato at a glance

What: A boisterous, Brooklyn-style trattoria from the owner/chef of the more upscale Luogo restaurant in the Gulch

Where: 1300 Third Ave. N., in Nashville's upscale, restaurant-rich Germantown neighborhood

Hours: 5 to 9 p.m. Tuesday through Thursday; 5 to 10 p.m. Friday and Saturday; 5 to 8 p.m. Sunday

Reservations: Through Resy.com

Prices: breads and salads, $6 to $17; small plates, $9 to $17; pastas and entrees, $15 to $29

Website: PelatoRestaurant.com