I generally avoid Italian restaurants. Who wants to pay $15 for a plate of noodles that could just as easily be made at home for 1/8 the price? There is no mystery about fettucini alfredo, et al. I have no doubt that Italian restaurants worth their salt can make a better noodle dish than me. And friends speak in hushed awe about the delights they tasted on trips to Italy, with its rich culinary tradition. I just don't think Italian restaurants make for an exciting and worthwhile dining experience, as a general thing.
In our effort to try as many restaurants as possible, the other day Kweepo and I visited Portobello on Broadway near Granville. Our first choice was Cru next door, but the mains there were an absurd $35. The mains at Portobello are between $24-$28, and after my experience there I can confirm even these are laughably overpriced. The noodles range between $14 and $18, which again I find overpriced, although I predictably had better luck with these.
In summary, the pastas are decent but slightly overpriced, the mains are hit or miss, and the service is lousy. I do not feel that this restaurant is a good value. My experience is based solely on two dishes we ordered, so I can't comment on the rest of the menu. Perhaps we just chose the wrong dish, but I am not inclined to go back to check.
The first sign that things were not headed in a good direction was the emptiness of the room when we walked in. It was Friday night, and every bistro in Vancouver worth anything is completely packed on a Friday night. Clearly, people are not flocking to this restaurant.
The next sign was the casual, unprofessional attitude of the service. Instead of a person standing behind a counter greeting us and asking us for our reservation, a waiter casually sauntered up and looked askance at us until we were forced to say we had a reservation and could we please have a seat.
For our starter, we ordered the Fungo Portobello Gratinato ($10, portobello mushroom stuffed with bread crumbs, fresh herbs, served with roasted red pepper sauce). It arrived within about 10 minutes. It was quite passable, but not extraordinary in any way, and did not justify the $10 price tag.
For our mains, we ordered the Ossobuco Classico ($26, veal shank braised with red wine rosemary, carrots, celery, served with risotto) and Pappardelle Alla Romana ($14, broad egg noodles in a cream sauce ham, peas, mushrooms, fresh basil). The dishes took a long time to come out. We had been in the restaurant almost an hour before our mains came out.
We ordered a glass of Chianti Castiglioni frescobaldi to go with the Ossobuco. It had strong tannins with a little fruit, and though I usually like bold wines, it was without body and unimpressive. Very disappointing for a $9 glass of wine.
A basket of warm bread was brought out before the dishes were served. I like warm bread as much as the next person, but these were literally burning to the touch. I almost got a third degree burn just trying to break open one of the loaves. I know the importance of brining out hot food, but that was ridiculous.
I have personally eaten Ossobuco made in the traditional way, and it was a marvelous thing and a revelation about the possibilities of cooking meat. It was for this reason that I ordered Ossobuco for Kweepo, to share the experience of this one-of-a-kind traditional dish that is not so easy to find in restaurants. I hoped - no, I assumed - it would taste like the last Ossobuco I had. Hello, disappointment! The Ossobuco we had at Portobello was, in a word, tasteless. There seemed to be a hint of the trademark flavor of this classic dish hidden there somewhere, but only a merest hint. What a deception foisted on innocents who would eat this travesty and be forever turned off to the notion of Ossobuco as a tasteless, flavorless waste of $25. As if this weren't enough, the meat was on the leathery side. Every flexion of the jaw left my masseter screaming for mercy. Somewhere along the line in the course of the birthing of this dish, something went terribly awry.
The Pappardelle Alla Romana, on the other hand, was a satisfying dish, and exactly what I would expect from a pasta joint. The broad noodles were fresh and soft, and the cream sauce was unctuous without being pasty or overrich. There many pieces of ham and peas filled out the texture nicely. And finally, it came out piping hot. Italian pasta cools quickly, and I can't count how many times I've been served lukewarm pasta in an Italian restaurant, which ruins the dish. So at the very least, the pasta was spot on. Worth $14? Not really. Still overpriced for what it is, but at least not the massive disappointment that was the Ossobuco.
The thing that left me with a bad taste in my mouth was the decided lack of professionalism in the atmosphere at this restaurant among the servers. The service, while not rude or inattentive as in the case of many restaurants, was dissatisfying for a different reason - it was offhand, casual, sloppy. It was not what one would expect for the price tag. As we were getting up to leave and putting on our coats, the busboy flipped his tray impatiently behind Kweepo. The open design of the restaurant felt uncomfortable. A group of three or four people seemed to constantly be milling behind the counter/kitchen exchanging idle chatter or looking over the room. A lady I assume to be the manager was chatting away with the table behind me for the greater portion of our meal.
In short, my visit did nothing to change my general opinion of Italian restaurants. Quite the opposite, it mostly reinforced the majority of my negative perceptions.
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