Aiyaaah the dreaded 3 star review. I hate writing the 3 star review because you already know exactly what I'm going to say. 3 stars says it all. A-OK. Good, but not great, nothing special. And that basically summarizes my feelings about Oregano's.
So I came here with a friend. He claims it's one of his favorite Italian restaurants and Italian is pretty hard to mess up so why not? Tagging along... We step into the restaurant. Colors green and red everywhere! Digging the atmosphere! Digging the old school vintage vibes! Jukeboxes and checkered floors and walls adorned with paintings and dim lights! It's wonderful! So an A+ for decor! But then again, I am not an interior decorator. So what do I know?
Moving on to the food! I ordered a pasta called Alfredo the Dark. It came with spiral pasta drenched in cream sauce, diced tomatoes and poblano chillies. Underneath the pasta were 4 slices of bread, made infinitely more appetizing by the fact that it was sitting beneath the pasta and soaking up ALL the cream sauce. Divine!
The chicken in the pasta was well seasoned and roasted. The pasta itself, while a solid pasta, wasn't mind-blowing. Delicious and safe. Too safe. The poblano chillies did not have much of an impact on the dish which was very disappointing. In fact, the dish wasn't spicy in the least. But other than that, you know. Chicken pasta with cream sauce. It was good! You can't screw it up. I just wish the poblano chillies had challenged me.
Good thing about this place is that the service was fantastic. Also, the portion sizes are pretty decent too. My ~$12 pasta became 2 whole meals for me so that's always nice!
Will I return here? Yes absolutely. I had a lovely meal with my friend and I'm sure we shall return in due time. And I will come back with absolutely no qualms because this is a good restaurant. It's not a great restaurant and it falls far short of my finest Italian dining experiences but it's a good restaurant and sometimes good is good enough (and cheap enough).