Celebrated Christmas dinner last night with family in town from Maui. The cold greeting by the hostess ladies was not warm or friendly. Waited 10 minutes to be seated with the rest of our party that was already seated but the hostess ladies mostly ignored us so we just walked in and found our table ourselves. Our waiter who I wish I could remember his name was fantastic and friendly.
We were a party of 6 so we were told our party had to be seated in a room in the back with four other large round tables. This didn't give us the ambiance we desired but the boys were happy with the laker game. No table cloths were on the tables which wobbled our glasses around and the wood kept snagging the sequins off my now ruined dress. I was stuck in between the seam of two wood pieces.
I started with the Giada signature cocktail. It had a floral taste that I did not enjoy. We then munched on a platter of Salumi and cheeses which were awesome and the kids ordered a pizette with spinach.
Next my group ordered and I tasted the Pappardelle, Rack of lamb, Braised short rib, Bucatini, Salmon and the clear winner was the simple but delicious house made spaghetti with gigantic lemon basil shrimp. The salmon was the biggest disappointment. I'm going to compare fish cooked at Mamas Fish House on Maui to this salmon. Mamas is always moist and delicious. The salmon was dry, thin and not flavorful. If we're paying $40-50 for each portion of food I want to at least walk away saying "Wow that's a great bite". The waiter was fabulous by recommending the spaghetti that he said was the best seller and it was fantastic.
I do recommend to try the pasta dishes here and avoid the mains. The rest of the meat dishes were just okay but the pasta dishes were the best.
For dessert it was a toasted banana gelato that stole the show over her favorite cookies, tiramisu which our waiter scrounged in the kitchen for us even though it wasn't on the menu (what a great guy!!!!), and the strawberry sorbet.
I so wanted to fall in love but I walk out with a "it was just ok".