I feel like I just finished a food marathon but not in a good way but in the way where you want to curl up in bed and forget about the whole experience. A few friends and I spent 2 1/2 hours mostly waiting for a 3-course Pittsburgh Restaurant Week meal. People, this is one portion of the 3 part meal every 50 minutes. It was excruciating to say the least and while in the beginning (oh the first 1 1/2 hours) we attributed the extended wait times to the crowd coming for Restaurant week there seemed to be bigger issues at play, like for example the actual taste of the food or the general demeanor of our waitress (I think she hated us).
It should not take so long to cook sub-par food and in a customer driven environment you probably should be somewhat apologetic about the extended wait time...or maybe even preface the meal by saying, "we're really busy tonight due to Restaurant week, we appreciate your patience as we prepare and bring out the food" or even a "hey, your food's going to take a long ass time, hope you didn't come in hungry"...I don't know just say SOMETHING, ignoring the issue doesn't make it go away.
I ordered the blackened tuna, caesar salad and porcini pasta off the Restaurant Week menu. The only way to describe the blackened tuna was stiff...it didn't seemed overcooked but it was just like these crostini type pieces with little flavor...the gorgonzola cheese and sun-dried tomatoes helped but couldn't save this dish from itself. I was ok with the caesar salad although my friends informed me that caesar salad shouldn't have tomatoes or olives both of which this salad had, including the token anchovy atop romaine lettuce. The porcini pasta was decent...I wasn't blown away but felt that it could have used a little something something. It had a creamy marsala sauce that was a bit sweet and tangy and the the pasta was cooked well as in al dente...it just wasn't doing anything for me. But at this point in the meal (2 hours later) I'm not sure if there was any food dish that could've redeemed the whole experience.
Why the generous 2 star rating you ask...I guess I'm hoping that the lackluster meal and service had more to do with Restaurant Week and that their regular menu on regular service days are much more pleasing.