3.5/5 stars
1-877 Waverley Street
Pre-visit:
I have been to this restaurant before, but not for a very long time. I was apprehensive about going here because I know someone who got food poisoning from chicken at this restaurant on a previous occasion. This place is pretty popular so I highly recommend having a reservation - especially if you have a group larger than 4. It is a business casual atmosphere, so don't show up in sweats but you don't need to dress up to go. Also keep in mind that the lighting is dim plus the walls are a darker brown so it can be difficult to see the menu - perhaps don't take your grandparents here.
The Meal:
The menu is quite extensive with a large variety of appetizers, salads, pasta dishes and other entrees.
Appetizers
I highly recommend the Pane Fritto if you are wanting an appetizer. It is a dish consisting of a number of small pillows of cooked dough seasoned with butter and garlic, served with a bowl of warm marinara sauce to dip the dough in. If you like garlic bread or pizza this is most definitely the appetizer for you, and it's great for sharing because it's a very large portion. Just keep in mind that you also get bread before your meal so save room! We also had calamari to start. It was tasty but it wasn't any more spectacular than any other restaurant in my opinion.
We all had Caesar salad in addition to these appetizers. The dressing had a large amount of garlic in it, but the salad was well put together with not too much dressing. Something different about their Caesar salads is that they are served with grape tomatoes and olives as garnishes which changed the flavour of the salad but still worked.
Entrees
My partner had the vitello parmigiana (veal parmigiana) - a standard Italian entree. The veal was massive! It took up the majority of the plate. Even though it was so large, the meat was well cooked. The marinara sauce used was rich in flavour, and was also used on the pasta side dish served with the meat. If you do order this, just be prepared to bring some of it home.
My brother ordered the spaghetti with meatballs. The pasta was cooked well - as it should be in an Italian restaurant - and the marinara sauce made another appearance on our table. The stand-out part of this dish is was the meatballs which had a 6-8 cm diameter! It was quite funny when the dish came out because you could barely see the pasta because the three meatballs were covering the majority of the dish. You may question the quality of such large meatballs but they were very tasty with just the right combination of seasoning. Again, a portion of this dish came home with us.
My mother had the Pesce Asiago, which is a seafood pasta dish. Although this dish had a lot of flavour, it was not something that stood out as being different/original.
My step-father had the Pollo Marsala - chicken breast stuffed with spinach, caramelized onions, and bacon, which is wrapped in prosciutto. This sounds really good to me, and I will probably order it next time I go there if it is still on the menu. My step-dad does not share my enthusiasm - he won't order it again, he's going back to the veal parmigiana. I think that it might have been the sauce that took away from this dish - a marsala wine sauce. An alternative idea could be that the designated side dishes would have better complimented the chicken done like this. It is supposed to be served with potatoes and vegetables. In place of this my step-dad got the penne with marinara sauce (which I have now decided is probably their specialty based on the number of times appeared on our table).
Finally, I ordered the Pollo Ripieno - chicken breast stuffed with asparagus, sun-dried tomatoes, onion and chevre cheese. The chicken is also crusted with pecans (yum) and then topped with a caramelized honey sauce. Thus far the description is probably sounding pretty good and it was tasty. My issue with this dish were that I couldn't really taste the stuffing or the pecans due to the copious amounts of honey sauce. Also, the sauce started to harden on the plate which made it harder to function. The side that came with the chicken was a pasta, vegetable stir-fry. I wasn't a huge fan but my partner said it was good - perhaps it's just because I had a whole lot of sweet stuff in my mouth.
Dessert
Again, we didn't really have a lot of room in my stomach for dessert, and neither did everyone else.
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