When you think Italian fine dining, do you think of the Olive Garden?  Well the obvious answer is no, of course not but for me and the misses we decided to take the plunge and visit the Olive Garden together for the first time.  Our restaurant of choice this time around resides at NE 181 st. and Biscayne Boulevard in North Miami FL.

We arrived around 7 pm on a Saturday evening and the place was pretty packed, as we expected.  We grabbed one of those black square things and waited around about 15 minutes before being seated at a booth, as we requested.  Our waiter’s name was Daniel and as I remember it, he came over and offered us drinks immediately.  Good Start.

As is tradition now when Mrs. Smith and I visit a chain restaurant, I ordered the sampler appetizer of fried calamari, chicken fingers and beef toasted ravioli.  As an entree, I decided on the mixed grill (one chicken skewer and one beef skewer with grilled vegetables) and Mrs. Smith picked the Seafood Portofino, which was made up of mussels, shrimp and other seafood I can’t remember at the moment, on a bed of pasta with a cream sauce.  While we waited, we were treated to unlimited salad and bread-sticks.  FINALLY after 25 years of non-stop commercials, I was able to see what the fuss was all about.  Salad great / bread-sticks not so much for me because I’m not a fan of garlic.  Mrs. Smith liked ‘em, so I guess they were good.

While we were waiting for our food to arrive, we noticed just how many elderly people there were at Olive Garden this time of night.  To our left was a very German couple and everywhere else we looked, there seemed to be senior citizens between the ages of 65 and 95.  The poor bastard we had serve us also had some very demanding customers to take care of and I felt nothing but pity for him.  I heard conversations about everything from WWII to if the television “program” called “Letterman” was on Saturday’s.  Serious life changing stuff.

Appetizers arrived and the chicken and calamari was great.  Unfortunately, I found the fried beef ravioli to be all bread and no meat so we plowed through the first two and reluctantly finished up the rest of our ravioli.   Shortly after finishing our appetizers, our food arrived and the portion size was very nice.  My skewers looked quite tasty and Mrs. Smith also found her dish appealing.  Digging in, I found my medium-rare beef and vegetables to be absolutely fantastic.  The chicken was somewhat dry, so I tried to eat that right away before it turned into a rock (which it did anyway).  Mrs. Smith took care of all her seafood and left just a little pasta on her plate and I can’t remember exactly what we talked about but we chatted away for about an hour.

Around 9pm, we asked for our check and with tax and tip, our bill came to a flat $55.  That’s somewhat expensive for a chain restaurant but I consider the Olive Garden on the Outback Steakhouse level.  Just a notch above the rest.  Overall, our experience was fantastic, the service was fantastic and our food was very good.  We’ll definitely be planning a second and third visit to the Olive Garden soon.  I certainly wouldn’t consider the Olive Garden Fine Italian Dining, but I would consider it Quality Italian Dining.

Mrs. Smith and I like to occasionally dine-out on a Saturday Night and being that we have no money, the Applebee’s 2 for $20 sounded just right.  After a quick trip to Google Maps, we were on our way to the Applebee’s located in Doral.

We arrived around 5:45 pm, which seems a few minutes too late, as there was a good size amount of people waiting.  Not a problem, when people wait, they wait because the food is good, so we were handed our black beeper (cool little device that blinks and vibrates when your table is ready) and we patiently waited outside.  About 20 minutes we were seated at what was undoubtedly the coldest table in the Restaurant.  Although there was no vent next to us, we were seated by a very drafty window.  South Florida seems to have a case of recent wet weather, so it was somewhat chilly outside.

Anyway, after being seated we waited for just over 15 minutes before a waitress came to our table asking for our drink or menu order.  Mrs. Smith gave every passer by a glaring look of anger but I managed to keep my cool.  We decided to order the Boneless Buffalo Wings as an appetizer and the Mrs. had the A1 Stake-house Burger, while I chose the Three Cheese Chicken Penne (The most expensive thing on the regular menu for this promotion, I thought I would get a maximum return on my selection).

The Buffalo wings (10) arrived shortly thereafter with 5 pieces of celery and a blue cheese type sauce.  Too small to be worth the $8.65 they are on the menu, we gobbled them down pretty quickly as they tasted pretty good.  Only a couple of minutes later, our entrée’s were ready!  Mrs. Smith was served her Burger first, (so few serve the lady first) then I was given a big bowl of Pasta.  Absent from my pasta was the focaccia stick it should have come with and the serving of grilled chicken that was used was smaller than I had anticipated (About half a breast, sliced)

The first words out of Mrs. Smith’s mouth when describing her burger was “a little pathetic” and I was less than impressed with my meal.  Considering the advertisement we were bombarded with when we logged on to Applebee’s website, we expected the Burger to be much more impressive in look.  Setting our early feelings aside, we dug into our meals and finished around the same time.  While the wife had good things to say about the taste of her Steak-house Burger, and the taste of the Honey-Mustard sauce they gave her, I struggled to down my Pasta filled bowl as the mix of cheeses and lack of chicken made for a very heavy meal.

To finish the meal properly, we asked for the desert menu, which we didn’t realize was considerably short.  Only four choices to choose from, we decided to share the Triple Chocolate Melt-Down (Heated Chocolate Cake with fudge, vanilla ice-cream and whip cream).  Two spoons and 5 minutes later, it was devoured and undoubtedly the most delicious and well presented part of the evening for the both of us.  With tax and tip, the meal set us back $32.00.  Was it worth it?  Probably not but with the right waiter, table and meal, it certainly could be.

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