rev:text
| - Checked out Carmines with my fellow Yelper Amar B. this Halloween. I've heard alot about this place so I was pretty excited to see what they had to offer. Carmine's occupies the former Planet Hollywood restaurant spot inside the Forum Shops. My first thoughts walking in were "wow this place is huge and empty." The restaurant is massive, vaulted ceillings, tons of pictures and sizeable bar.
The food here defintely gives 'family style" dining a whole new meaning as the portions here on the are massive. I have never seen a restaurant regularly serve up so much food. The appetizer and two entrees we order were more than enough to feed the seven of us. Unfortunately, Carmine's failed to follow the common mantra of quality over quantity.
We started with ordering the Garlic Bread Parmigianino as a appetizer. The huge texas toast style slices of bread totally caked with a thick layer of Parmesan cheese and garlic seasoning. After about half through the slice, the oil from cheese and spread became overwhelming and I had to put it down. The Chicken Contadina was OK at best, huge pieces of bone-in chicken got cold too quickly and the sausage that accompanied it was surprisingly lacking in flavor. The last dish we had, Rigatoni Bolognese, was the best out of the three, the meat sauce and the pasta complimented each other nicely and dish was full of flavor.
Service was a bit below average for this type of restaurant. Our server came around infrequently to refill our miniature glasses of water and didn't even offer us a wine list or dessert menu. Not sure if he was just having a bad day but he came across as very uninterested, hurried, and unhospitable.
Carmine's is certainly not cheap, most entrees run anywhere from $30-$50 but keep in mind that they are meant to feed a large group of people. The place has a lot of potential and I would love to come back and check out some of their other offerings.
|