FOOD!!

Hi Kids:

So, I’ve had a request from one of the editors at iPinion (if you haven’t yet, check them out) to talk more about one of my favorite subjects: Food! I like to eat it, I like to make it, I like to talk about it. I also like to consume and talk about the things that typically accompany it (i.e., wine and beer). So every once in a while, I’ll be posting recipes, restaurant reviews, and other lists/recommendations that I think BN readers might be interested in. Since I travel a bit, I’ll try to make sure to talk about my NYC/DC/Midwest experiences from time-to-time as well.

To get this party started, here’s a review I wrote on Yelp last year (raise your hand if you LOVE Yelp!!), upon the occasion of my first visit to our now semi-regular Italian joint in Newport Beach. I gave them 5 stars that night, though I’d have to say after my initial amazement wore off, our average experience has usually been around the 4-star level. This  is not too shabby and still relatively rare for Orange County, I might add...

Anyway, here goes. Enjoy!

XO,
M

Mama D's Italian Kitchen
3012 Newport Blvd
Newport Beach, CA 92663
(949) 675-6262 


-Summer, 2009 

Four of us made our first trek to Mama D's on Saturday night. Two of us are former New Yorkers, who have had a really hard time finding good, reasonably priced Italian food in southern California. Being generally trusting of Yelp reviews, especially when a place has 4.5 stars and 50+ reviews, we were cautiously optimistic. This place vastly exceeded our expectations and is as good as about 95% of the restaurants in Little Italy in "da Bronx" where the Hubby and I used to be regulars.

Here's a run-down of our evening:

Arrive around 7pm. Bit of a wait, but we are assured that things will move quickly. Before we can even put our names on the list, someone has offered us warm garlic bread. And then little samples of meatball. Then we are shown to a counter (calling it a “bar” would be generous) where we ordered some wine and were given MORE warm bread, plus a little dish of yummy olive oil with roasted garlic. The one beer drinker among us (Hubby) was given a mini ice bucket to keep his single bottle of beer ice cold.

My husband was pretty sure this “warm welcome” was some sort of trick. (As I said, we're New Yorkers and as such are inherently suspicious when people are too nice.) Each time something new and awesome was presented, he would say, "yeah, this is nice, but the food probably sucks."

(But, guess what? It didn't! The food was fantastic.)

Luke, our really nice server from Connecticut, asked for our names. The owner came over to introduce himself and give us a free sample of their homemade ravioli. Delish. We had (between us) one house salad, one Caesar salad, one "special" lasagna (eggplant and chicken), one regular lasagna, one penne in pink sauce with chicken and one Pasta Roma with shrimp. All of this topped off with (free) warm chocolate chip cookies at the end. Everything was absolutely delicious.

There were many more happy things to say about this restaurant, but the upshot is that at the end of the night my face hurt from smiling. I think Disneyland has just been replaced as the happiest place on earth.

**Update to original review:

We’ve been back to Mama D’s several times since the initial visit outlined above. Each time, the service has been excellent and the food very good. Once the novel awesomeness started to wear off, however, I did begin to notice a few things that “bug” me about the place. First, the décor. Tile floors and a less than ideal use of space (i.e. Weird couch thing in the middle of the nicest part of the restaurant. Not really a table, but also not NOT a table. It’s odd). Also, the lighting is OK, but the kids’ drawings taped to the wall give the place a really casual feel. This is fine, but for the price point (usually around $75-$80 per couple, including 2-3 boozy drinks), I’d like a little more ambiance. The other drawback is the potential on the weekend to be seated too close to the keyboard player. While he IS hilarious (and once even played the Star Wars theme on demand, from memory), that sh*t is LOUD if you happen to be seated too close. Makes talking difficult. However, these caveats aside, this is still our fallback Italian joint, and a real guest-pleaser...