The fellas and I were looking for a nice top level italian meal while traveling through in our road trip, something similar to maybe Rosebud on Rush in Chicago. While I did enjoy my meal, this was not the meal I was looking for.
For starters the place is rather small, cozy, but when you walk through the entrance you are immediately standing in the crowded dining room. No hostess table, no entry space, nothing but a group of four looking to eat and get out of the cold now crammed in a 3'x3' space with diners all looking up taking their evaluation of who/what just walked in. 30 seconds in and already not comfortable.
This place had Mario Batali written all over it, what I mean is a super small menu, most of the Italian I can't read, all of the dishes were deep Italy style and totally homemade style recipes. This is a very good thing in it's own right, but not what me or the group was looking for. I wanted the whole slate of Italian favorites with white table cloths, premier service and food quality. We had it all here except for the Italian favorites and the table cloths.
I knew we all felt the same way when we all ordered the same entree and had the same opinion. After the appetizer which was good we all had the spicy pasta with meat ragu. It literally came in a bowl similar to the size I would eat my cereal in. After I was done I was jokingly like "ok now I'll take three more of these" and at $34 each, I was not happy, it wasn't that spectacular. They might have gotten away with the perception factor if it was at least in a large bowl. We all had dessert too and I still had room. One of my freinds even used a classic line from a trip 3 years prior, which was after eating he said "anybody up for PapaJohns?"
The only saving grace was that the waitress failed to charge us for the $40 bottle of wine. I would not go back.