Pompilios Restaurant

This is a historic Italian place - yes it was in Rainman but I think the history of being open during the gangster era is by far more interesting.

My partner ordered a chicken pasta dish that was absolutely out of this world. I ordered a half spaghetti, half ravioli dish that was OK, I was expecting more out of their marinara sauce.  Another member of our party ordered a veal dish and it was not good. The veal was dry and the dish was bland with little to no flavoring. I also expected more out of the bread - tasteless.

The service was very good and they have an excellent wine list. Bar is decent; I was disappointed in their beer selection.

I am baffled. Really. This place has been listed as the best Italian restaurant in some local publications. I was looking to do something cool, and this turned up as one of the locations for the great film, Rain Man. So we chose this place as our Friday dinner spot.

The place was full to brim, and it seemed like it was full of local families, which i thought, is always a good sign. There are some Rain Man memorabilia on the walls.We waited for some 20 minutes before we got a table. I got a beer from the bar so the wait was ok. By this time we made our choices from the menu.

For antipasti, we got a bruschetta. I am  not exaggerating, but we felt the bruschetta came out of some fastfood chain kitchen. It got the looks, but soggy and tasting bad. Each of us had one piece which we somehow finished. So much for the McShetta.

I ordered a Ravioli, with Pompilios Meatball sauce. My wife ordered a Shrimp Ronaldo. None of the dishes impressed us. May be i don't like Meatball sauce. I had liked Meat sauce from Bella Luna and i wanted to experiment a little. The experiment was a failure. My wife went into the desperation mode and ordered a bunch of desserts. A Tiramisu, and 2 cheese cakes. Tiramisu was not as good as the one in Olive Garden. And that says something. Cheesecakes were adequate, did not open any new door for me. Anyways my bar for desserts is pretty high due to living close to Bonbonerie.

I had checked into this place on Facebook,thinking that i would add something like "and xxc was so delicious" but that never happened. For once, i am happy that only 2 people liked my status.

This is such a hard review for me to write because this is such a historical and nostalgia type place, but unfortunately that is probably the only thing keeping this place open.

To start off, I ordered a bloody mary that tasted frankly like a bucket of barbeque sauce which was odd? I passed it around the table and not one person would drink it. Free booze and it's that bad? Yes. We had a big group of around 8. We started with some apps, that were OK at best.

Then we ordered a variety of entrees. I ordered their "famous lasagna." I usually always go with what they say they do best. What came out what the most disgusting display of food I have ever witnessed. The lasagna was so soggy and tasted defrosted, or watered down. The ratio of ingredients was horrible. The entire thing was basically ricotta. And as for the famous red sauce, there was a heaping pile of it slopped on top adding absolutely no flavor, texture, or anything to the dish.  I get that it is old world, but come on people. This was so bad, I feel gross just thinking about it. Bottom line, it was inedible. Again we passed it around and some of the men in my family are like garbage disposal's and they wouldn't even touch it.  

My dad ordered the special which was a pumpkin risotto with tilapia. Everything was beige, No color, no texture. The risotto was so overcooked it was also inedible. The taste all around was bland. It didn't even taste like there was salt, let alone a hint of any other flavor. The only glimpse of hope was a meatball sub in which we took the overcooked meat balls off of, and fought over the garlic bread it was on.

I get that it is old world. And now I understand why when we walked in it looked like a nursing home. This is where people used to go, but hopefully I will never have to not eat, here again if that makes sense. Went home starving. The service was okay and why I'm giving this place two stars instead of one. I hate to do this to a place's reputation, but be warned.